Word: auction
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Dates: during 1980-1989
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...rolling fields of western Wisconsin last week, Jim Lemanski, 44, and his wife Martha, 43, watched their 330-acre farm near Fennimore being sold at auction. They had left Madison, where he had been an appliance salesman, less than four years ago, going $380,000 into debt to take a fling at farming with hogs, cattle and corn. But prices fell, his 10% loans came up for renewal at 20%, and Lemanski lost $10,000 on corn alone last year. Overall, his try at farming cost him $100,000. "Numbers like that take...
...Altman, 65, and his son Danny, 34, had scratched out an increasingly difficult living in a way they loved: farming 1,440 acres of irrigated land. The buyers were ambivalent. They were seeking bargains, but they hated to see the Altmansget hurt. And each feared that his own auction might be held all too soon...
...watched a rotary hoe go for $950 (it would cost $3,500 new) and two irrigation motors for $155 (they would cost $1,000 if new); a small cultivator, bought ten years ago for $500, went for $2. Danny's wife Frieda, 33, stayed away from the auction. "She cried," Danny admitted. "She cried...
Danny was concerned that the auction would not go well. "There are too many farm sales and money is tight," he said. "I hate this, but I think I'll be happier not worrying about it." Looking back, he regrets putting so much of his life into the farm, forgoing any vacations. "I've never taken Frieda any place for over a day," he says. "Now we can't buy a car and our 1974 Ford is worn...
...feared, the auction had gone poorly. The Altmans collected $70,000. Danny's share of that will go toward the debt of $180,000 that he owes the FHA. Each year from now on, someone from that office will look Danny up to see if he can make more payments. He is not sure how he will earn a living now. For the time being, he plans to weld fences for a nearby rancher...