Clarence Arthur Darby

Grandpa took great delight in playing with his grandchildren. He had a big, deep, booming, bass voice. He would walk out to the pasture with the grandchildren & call the cows with that deep bass voice "Come Boss, Come Boss". He walked along singing hymns everywhere he went in that deep bass voice.

One of the best games was called "COME TO MY SHEEP PEN"! This game involved Grandpa leaning back in his recliner, reading the newspaper, while you laughed, & screamed with excitement, & ran away to hide! When you were all done hiding, he would shout "COME TO MY SHEEP PEN! ..... Are you behind the bed? And you had to answer! He would guess where you were, & then of course you would have to move, running out of the hiding place as you yelled "No, I'm not there!" & as you ran in front of his chair for a new hiding place, he'd reach to grab you! It was just so exciting! This could go on for hours, although sometimes Grandpa would lean back in his recliner & doze off while you were hiding, if it went on to long. It probably was not nearly as exciting for him as it was for his grandchildren! It was so much fun!!!

And what kid could forget: "Itsey, Bitsey, Tiggity, Fig, Alla Balla Dominig! Itsiee, Bitsiee Dominitsee, Alla, Balla, Boo, with the "Boo" being a little jab in the tummy! Or "The little Bumblebee comes out of the barn, & he buzzes, & buzzes around"...then a little jab in the tummy when you were least expecting that bee to get you! Grandpa followed the "Dennis the Menace" comic strip in the paper & always had the newest funny thing Dennis had done that day to tell about!d

Grandson Ken remembers going in Grandpa's garage and just looking around in amazement at the four walls of old license plates lining the walls inside of his garage! And he tells this cute story about Grandpa remembering what a great sense of humor Grandpa had!

"Grandpa and Grandma would come visit us and Grandpa would help out. We had a few horses for a while. One fall when they were visiting Grandpa was feeding them for us. He had just thrown some feed over the fence into their area, turned around, bent over, and Prince (A young Colt), decided that Grandpas' overalls looked like a nice dessert! He proceeded to take a bit out of Grandpas' back pocket. A neighbor was also over and happened to see what happened, had quite a laugh, and many more good times with this incident, all on poor Grandpa's misfortune. Well this particular neighbor was known for liking to kid people and of course he never let Grandpa forget this. (The grandchildren also helped Grandpa not to forget his friendly horse either!!) Grandpas' good nature and attitude was more then happy to go along with our kidding."

Grandma & Grandpa's lives spanned the time of the greatest technological improvements the world has ever seen. They were both born in the last part of a century when their parents and grandparents pioneered in Butler County, Iowa from New York, and Germany, and used only horsepower to do their farm work. They lived with the early automobile, enjoyed the "new, improved models", went through lots of innovations in farm equipment, and kitchen gadgets, and towards the end of their life, flew to visit their family by jet airplane, and watched a man walk on the moon on TV. They took it all in stride, enjoying every minute of it! The telephone that first hung on the wall in their parlor was a huge oak box with the earphone on a cord and the mouthpiece in the wall unit. They were on a party-line, of course, and answered only "2 shorts and a long" ring. If they answered other rings you could hear the conversations of other. Sometimes the older grandchildren remember answering other rings, when Grandma was out of the house hanging clothes or getting eggs. She had left strict instructions of "No Rubbernecking on the phone".....but it was such fun to eavesdrop on neighbors conversations !)