Growing up on a farm included mending the fences. Fences to keep the horses, cows and pigs in their place. Ours were the wire type with log posts. A strand of barbed wire when across the top. Dad always wanted to keep the fences in good repair. Posts would rot and need replacing, wire would come loose or sag.

Brother Dave and I were born for the job. We had a small group of trees which we could cut down to make the fence posts. Using a posthole digger, (you all know the one with the split handle) was quite a chore for small boys. Getting the hole deep enough and pulling up a load of dirt caused a few aches and pains the next day.

Dad had a wire stretcher for pulling the wire tight. I haven’t seen one of these since but as I recall it fastened to the fence post and had a lever which you pulled. I would pull as hard as I could, and Dave would drive the nails to hold the wire to the post. No need to go to the gym to get exercise.

Now I know you wanted some history. Seems that people built fences around 3000 BC. The Greeks were the first and the Romans followed. Many were stone walls such as the Great Wall of China. Technically it is a fence.

Here in the good old USA, we came up with barbed wire which the ranchers despised. There are wooden fences, those you can whitewash, (Tom and Huck wanted me to include that) and wire fences, electric fences, underground fences, security fences, etc. Do you know what a fence stile is? It is steps built over a fence in case you need to climb over without ripping your pants.

Now all of this leads up to my fence story while in elementary school. I don’t remember which grade I was in but anyway the assignment was to write a report and we were given a list of topics to choose from. So, as I scanned the list I saw “Fencing.” Well, oh boy that was something I knew about. I was well versed on the subject and wrote a descriptive report on how to build a fence. I explained about keeping it low to the ground so the pigs wouldn’t root under it and high enough to keep the horses from jumping over them. I told about barbed wire and how it cut your hands. I went on and on and read it to the class. They all liked it and applauded.

Now, of course. it could have ended there but my mean old teacher said it was a good report, but the topic was supposed to be about sword fighting. Well, dog gone I didn’t know nothing about sword fighting. Maybe when I saw Zorro and his zip, zip, zip. I still don’t know much about the sport of fencing. I doubt that any of my classmates did either.

The old saying about writing stories is to write about what you know about. Well, I did just that and I didn’t need to know I didn’t write about the topic. Sometimes it’s best to let things go and be happy with what you get instead of fussin’ over details. That’s my opinion.

Don Hill is a resident of Seymour and a longtime volunteer for Southern Indiana Center for the Arts. Send comments to [email protected].