But in the end we persisted and won the battle. Father showed us the knack of filling the holding needles with the twine, so it was unable to roll over the edge of the needle, and tangle up on the floor.

There was also a wood gage that had to be held a certain way, for a proper mesh size. Father never had to use the gage for knitting heads or repairing the fishing nets. He gauged each mesh by the thickness of his large fingers. When we managed all those minor twists and turns, we would laugh over all the uproar we had made.

The trap heads were knit off a nail on the kitchen wall. We were all given our own little spot. The reason was to avoid tangling with so many of us sitting around and knitting so closely together. Father would have us attach a bundle of twenty—five heads on long pieces of twine, ready to be used in lacing them into the traps in an outdoor building. That would mean a big

payday of fifty cents that we earned, after hours of knitting. At first we were paid one cent a head, but at school we heard

that some fathers were paying two cents, so when we brought the news home, Father increased our pay. When our friends, Rhoda, Peggy and cousin Daisy would come, we showed them how to knit the heads that was extra pennies for spending. This would mean an enormous bag of candy and the weekly funny papers from Peter Bernard’s store in the village. The weekend would be lively with lots of excitement and laughter, around the kitchen table.

Father would be reading in his favorite armchair in the sitting room and mother would be baking up cookies for us in the

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