Rachel Hjorth
Rachel Hjorth
Eden Prairie Oral Historian & Lifelong Resident
Work hard, so you can get ahead. Listen to what your folks have to say and your teachers. Be good kids. Don’t smoke. Finish school. Get all the schooling you can before you get out in the work field. Keep in touch and care about one another.
Rachel Hjorth
Eden Prairie Oral Historian & Lifelong Resident
My name Rachel Hjorth. I was born on July 24, 1916. I was born in Milaca, Minnesota. When I came to Eden Prairie, we were in the new school on 8100 School Road when it was built. All the grades were together.
I grew up on a dairy farm on Sunny Brook Road. I had to get up in the morning at 5 o’clock and help my dad milk cows. We milked about 20 cows all by hand every morning and every night. We had a chicken coop full of chickens. We had two goats and a pig house where we raised two pigs. We had a barn full of kittens to keep the mice away and one dog, named Nap.
I didn’t graduate. I went to the eighth grade and then went out to work to help my Dad, until I was married.
Three Strong Women From Eden Prairie
Honoring Rachel Hjorth
Three Strong Women From Eden Prairie
(Honoring Rachel Hjorth, Irene Swartz and Dorothy Dotty)
[CHORUS]
Three strong women from Eden Prairie
Milk them cows
Pick berries
Grow that corn
Pull them weeds
Three strong women from Eden Prairie
We worked all summer in the field
With a rag cleaned those wind shields
At the Flying Red Horse Mobil
Here in Eden Prairie
(Chorus)
We never got paid much
We had to walk home for lunch
No such thing as a school bus
Here in Eden Prairie
(Chorus)
When the leaves began to fall
We would throw an old rag ball
Up against the old barn wall
Here in Eden Prairie
(Chorus)
We went out on Anderson Lake
All together we would skate
Then roasted wieners we all ate
Here in Eden Prairie
(Chorus)
Dad set a trap in early morn
To catch a skunk eating the corn
Which scared my mom who’s city born
Here in Eden Prairie
(Chorus)
While their husbands were at war
The women handled all the chores
Laundry, dishes, farming more
Here in Eden Prairie
(Chorus)
Memories of rolling hills
Sunflowers, daisies, daffodils
Which we saw by an old windmill
Here in Eden Prairie
(Chorus)
Care for the past bring in the new
Plant more trees, apples, too
We still have me and you
Here in Eden Prairie
(Chorus)
Words of advice our elders said
Work hard so you will get ahead
Do not smoke, live well instead
Here in Eden Prairie
(Chorus)
Music by LARRY LONG
Words by LARRY LONG with Ron Case’s 6th grade of Oak Point Intermediate School
(Eden Prairie, Minnesota)
© Larry Long 2004 / BMI