My Great-Grandfather Raised Hogs

[Turbine]

Fred Willie Farm
Colmbus Nebraska
circa 1917

The picture at the end was taken in the early 1900's It's my Great-Grandfather Fred Willie standing behind his HUGE Poland-China Hog.

It's him displaying one of his Poland-China Hogs it just looks like my Great-Grandfather is hiding in the picture.

Yes the picture is real. You can't tell it from the picture but "BumPa" (as he was called by grandchildren) was 5'11" the height of the barn door gives you a clue as to how big this hog really was.

The hog seems to be 4 or 5 inches shorter than "BumPa" so it must be about 5' 6" give or take an inch.

For the record: Fred Willie Farm was located 5 miles north of Colmbus Nebraska, and my grandma (one of 6 girls and 1 boy) was the designated with giving the hogs their showers when BumPa was away.

BumPa and BumMa (Great-Grandmother) got their nicknames from their first grand daughter who couldn't pronounce their names.

The hat is a spinoff of the beret hat. This version was called "The Big Apple" sometimes called the KANGOL Tropic Spitfire Cap.

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Trivia: The largest pig on record was a Poland-China hog named "Big Bill." He weighed a hefty 2,552 lbs and had a shoulder height of 5 feet and a length of 9 feet.

[DaddyCajun]

Turbine are you sure BumPa was not Juicing (administering steroids) to his big piggy. By the measurements you are stating BumPa's pig may have topped 3000#'s!!!


That is a huge pig and a great story!

DaddyCajun!

[Turbine]

No connection other than timing but at the exact time my GGF was raising hogs in Nebraska ... UL's Research Hog Farm was going full steam on campus

In their effort to hide the swamp or make it useful an adjacent barn was built and the design made dumping the hog mess into Cypress Swamp an easy feat.

It was fenced off to keep alligators out, othwise, end of hog farm.