MEMORIES OF THE ADAMS RANCH

Odebolt, Iowa: My Parents' Story:
Submitted by Connie (Stripling) Kiger, daughter of Laurence & Verna Stripling

My parents were Laurence (Pete) Stripling and Verna (Blow) Stripling. My father and mother moved to Odebolt, Iowa in the early 1940's because my father got a job at "Adams Ranch" just outside of Odebolt. They had a young son named Marvin. While my father worked out at the ranch, he was only known as "The Cowboy", and my mother as "Mrs. Cowboy." My brother Marvin started school down there when he was 4 years old, and went to Odebolt schools.

As best as I can remember, my father told us kids that he used to ride a horse everyday to go out and check on the cattle for the Adams. My parents talked about a certain person who was the cook for the ranch hands. His name was Heavy Hillman. That is all they knew him by.

Dad said that during WWII, they had German prisoners and Italian prisoners of war to help with the field work. Dad said that there was one time when the Italian prisoners kept being mean to the ranch hands and trying to destroy the farm equipment that they were allowed to use.

Mom told us that Adams had water pumped from the ranch all the way to the cemetery to keep it watered during the summertime.

My parents lived down there until after my brother Carl was born in 1946. I am not quite sure when they left Odebolt. My father told us that every Friday night he would go out to the ranch and play poker with the other ranch hands in the bunk house that Adams had provided for the single guys that worked for him. Dad had also told us that even though one of Adams' sons was in a wheel chair, he would go out each day that was nice and ride his horse around the ranch and chat with the ranch hands on how everything was going and ask if he could be of any help to them. He also had a dog that would follow him everywhere he went around the ranch.

Years later, after my father had passed away, my husband and I took my mother down to Odebolt to see if she would remember anything, and she remembered where they had lived down there, and where Heavy and Ethel Hillman lived in Odebolt, and where the ranch was located.

Going up the lane, off to the right was a huge mule barn that was now gone. A huge barn just across from the mule barn was gone also. As we drew closer to where the office was on the right hand side, then straight ahead off to the left were all the bunkhouses for the single ranch hands. We got out and walked around, and mom noticed by a light pole that grandmother Adams' house was gone per her instructions after her death.

Lawrence (Pete Stripling)

Verna (Blow) Stripling

Read more about the Adams Ranch, also known as Fairview Farm.