Clyde Willis Rainford was born in Illinois on July 2, 1905. The records don't say, but chances are that he was born with the long, lean body and thick dark hair that he had all his life. His mother was a plucky Irish gal named Lola Besse. She married Willis Robert Rainford in 1901 in Renseler, Indiana. About 1912, they split and she gathered up two of her three boys and moved to the South Dakota prairie to join her mother and father in Britton. Willis took the oldest boy Alvin with him to homestead in Montana. Willis and Lola never divorced but were separated for the rest of their lives. Eventually she took the boys to Doland, SD, where Clyde attended the Red Starr school in the NE quarter of section 30 in Belle Plaine Township. Although he only finished 4th grade, Clyde was self-taught, well-read and mathematically adept, as shown by his success in farming. The 1920 census found 14-year-old Clyde living in Faulk County with his mother and his brother, Calvin Robert Rainford, likely at Seneca, SD. Clyde was only a year younger than Cal. Lola worked keeping house for the Shult brothers from the late 1920s till 1940, when she moved to Billings, Montana with her son, Cal, and lived for the rest of her days in the house Cal built for her. The boys were working hauling gravel when Clyde met and married Florence Delia (Dolly) LaBrie on Dec.14, 1925 in Redfield.

That first year of their marriage they lived on Dolly's parents' farm with Ben and Francis LaBrie near Turton while Clyde continued to haul gravel. Their first child, Duane, was born in 1926. But in spring1927, Clyde started as a hired man on the Aksel Realson farm and moved Dolly and Duane there. By that fall they went out on their own to "begin their life of farming" as Dolly put it, on a rented acreage in Belle Plaine Township in Spink County, 4 miles west and 4 miles south & 1/4 east of Doland.
They farmed with horses until 1928 when Clyde purchased their first tractor, a 1928 International Harvester (regular) Farmall with steel wheels. He also bought at a new contraption that cut harvesting time by 75 percent: a 1928 International Harvester 8-foot combine. He planned to do custom combining since few farmers bought combines until the 1940's. Remember that in 1928 Clyde was 23 years old. Three more children were born south of Doland. Darrel was born in 1928, Marvel was born in December of 1929 but lived only a month. After Dona Jeanne was born in 1931 they moved to a farm not far from Ben LaBrie. But that fall they had an opportunity to move to the farm they stayed at for 11 years, informally called the West Farm. The farm buildings were four miles west, four north &1/2 west of Doland. Dwight was born there in 1932. The land was owned by Connecticut General Insurance Company, as much of the land ownership defaulted after the crash. The Rainfords were sharecroppers. The insurance company furnished the seed and land and farm families furnished machinery and labor. In return, the insurance company's share was 1/3 of the crop delivered to the elevator in Doland. Clyde farmed the north 320 acres in Section 17 of Prairie Center Township and also the Southwest 160 acres of Section 8 across the road.

Clyde traded the 8-foot combine for a 12-foot International Harvester in 1932. But the price of grain had fallen so much because of the 1929 depression that grain was hardly worth harvesting. After the stock market crash, most banks were failing by 1933. There was no rain in 1933, 1934 or 1935. Dust storms blew tons of prairie topsoil on the winds to Chicago and beyond. South Dakotans had red dirt from Oklahoma dumped on them. It was South Dakota's worst drought and hottest summer, with temperatures to 100 degrees F. After Franklin Roosevelt created the work recovery, many farmers who were idled by the drought found work with the Works Progress Administration (WPA) or the Civilian Conservation Corps. Clyde worked for WPA hauling gravel with a team of horses and wagon to surface the roads. He drove to a road building site and unloaded the gravel, shovel by shovel, in weather 100 degrees F or 20 degrees below.

To get milk from the cows, they had to be fed but there was no pasture grass. Clyde mowed Russian thistle to use for hay but the barbs kept the cows from eating much more than they needed to stay alive. Iowa farmers went out on the ice to mow slough grass to sell to South Dakota farms. It was a coarse grass without much food value, but farmers including Clyde took loans to buy it. The cows were so thin it was pointless to butcher them, so they were kept for milk. During those three years there was no need to plant seed since there was no moisture. Clyde told International Harvester that they may as well come get their combine in 1933 because he could not pay for it. But they said to just leave it sit and when the crops return, he could pay for it. That is what happened. In the late 1930s Clyde did custom combining and paid for it. And by 1938 they were able to purchase a new f-20 Farmall tractor with rubber tires and a road gear that would go about 10 m.p.h.
Four more childen arrived at the West Farm. Delmar was born in 1935, Darlene "Dardy" in 1937, Delroy in 1939 and Delia Diane-always called Dee Dee-in 1941.

Dad's brother Calvin had two boys; Robert and Roland, who were about the age of Darrel and Dona Jeanne. In the 1930s they lived in Minot, N.D. and visited in the summer for a month on the farm. The farm kids welcomed the company but by the second week they would be bickering like brothers. Clyde was very fair minded and when he made a rule he would stick to it. Sometimes it would favor the Minot kids and next time the farm kids. Later in the war years of 1942-45, Bob & Rol lived in Watertown, S.D. and would come out to the farm. These days they found out the meaning of farm work and pitched in and did their share.

Farming was booming. In the thirties, a milk cow was a cow that gave milk, without much attention to breed or bloodline. About 1943 Clyde decided it was time to improve his cattle herd. He drove to a farm near Minneapolis and purchased a registered bull (Milking Shorthorn) for the monstrous sun of $400. It was a deep-bodied animal like a Hereford Beef Cow but produced nearly twice as much milk as Herefords. By the second generation Clyde's steer calves were selling for more than the Herefords at the sale barn. In 1943 Clyde's 90 acres of oats made 90 bushels to the acre, but all the railroad cars were being used to transport military equipment. Oats were piled on the ground in the field nearly like straw stacks until the elevator could get railcars available. Clyde couldn't hire help since everyone was in military. Darrel was only 14 years old, but he was paid $1 an hour on a threshing crew to haul bundles. Donnie enlisted in Navy the day after high school graduation in 1942. Duane helped until he enlisted in Navy in 1944.

Then Clyde went to the Mayo Clinic during 1943 to find out he had cancer on the back of his left hand. There was no cure or treatment at that time. The lesion and some lymph nodes were surgically removed, but it continued to be painful and his health declined.

It was pure luck or pure need that Clyde was able to purchase a new Allis Chalmers (B) Tractor in 1944, since all metal was reserved for the war effort.
Clyde had ideas that many farmers didn't think of, and the skill to build them. For example, Clyde found a broken-down old hard- rubber tired truck and tore it down to the frame and wheels. Most hay racks are 8 x 16 feet. Clyde built a 10 x 20 hay rack on that frame that could move a 10-ton stack of hay in three trips. Nobody could plow a straighter furrow or plant a straighter corn row than Clyde. Darrel would be watching the seagulls to see if they got the worm, but when Clyde came back from dinner and climbed on the tractor, that furrow would be straight as arrow in two rounds. Darrel remembers the 'dirty thirties' from Clyde's stories and recollections since Darrel was only 5-8 years old during the depression.
Clyde and Darrel farmed together for the next several years. Darrel learned a lot and Clyde was fairly tolerant of Darrel's mistakes. One Friday night Darrel was quickly changing the oil in the tractor to get finished for a night in town. As he poured oil in the crankcase, Clyde stopped to watch and said "What are you going to do, fill it from the ground up?" Darrel screwed the cover back on the drain and never made that particular mistake again.

Clyde's last child, Delaine, was born in May 1948, the only baby born in a hospital. Clyde died on June 24,1948 from cancer and carbon monoxide poisoning. He was 43 years old. Clyde's 9 healthy kids kept the farm humming till 1957 when an auction was held. The boys took turns farming in between service in the army, navy or air force. The girls pitched in on farmwork, doing the milking, driving trucks and carrying their share. Clyde was a good mechanic as well as a good farmer, because the combine he purchased in 1932 lasted until 1947. The F-20 Farmall Tractor purchased in 1938 was still in use in 1957. As the Rainford children married, they moved all over the United States: Duane to Pennsylvania and then Indiana; Darrel to Minnesota, Jean to South Dakota and then California, Delmar to Germany and Indiana, Darlene to South Dakota and Diane to California, Delroy to South Dakota, Florida and California. Only Dwight and Donovan continued as farmers, but every Rainford had strong mechanical skills and a can-do attitude that carried them through their lives.
Clyde is buried with Dolly in the northwest corner of the Doland Cemetery.