Readers of John Mulkin’s Herrin Daily Spokesman in the 1960s looked forward to Sue Glasco’s weekly column about life on their Williamson County farm.

Replete with stories of their adventures and misadventures as the family tried to become “real live dirt farmers,” Glasco’s columns were republished in the book Down on the Farm: One American Family’s Dream by PublishAmerica in 2005. The book is now available at Herrin Drug at 116 North Park Avenue.

With stories of their young children and their cousins, their pets, raising hogs and hauling them to market, growing crops and gardens in bad weather and good, the columns told of their struggles and pleasures with rural life. Glasco began the column in central Illinois under the title “Just a Housewife,“ and after moving to this area continued writing the column for the Herrin Spokesman through the encouragement of editor Anne Tygett and Herrin readers, who responded favorably.

Down on the Farm, a compilation of those columns from 1962-66, will bring not only lumps in the throat but also laughter and insight into the social history of the 1960s. The new column title “A Widening Circle” when Glasco began part-time employment as a speech teacher at Marion High School exemplifies those changing times.

The book’s short and complete segments make for easy reading in the car or the bathroom. The humor and the universal appeal of a young family’s trying to achieve a dream makes Down on the Farm a good gift book for not only those who lived through the 1960s but also for younger families rearing children now.

-30-