This is an I-Heart podcast.

And we return to our American stories.

Up next, a story from our regular contributor, Dennis Peterson. Today, Dennis shares with us

the story of something his father did called Make and Do. Here's Dennis.

It surely had something to do with his having grown up on a farm and during the Great Depression,

but Daddy expressed few desires for things, and he seldom made impulse purchases.

He bought only what he needed.

If he needed it but couldn't buy it, he made it, or did without.

He was always looking for the better deal on what few things he did buy. Daddy hated debt. He had built his own house on his own land.

The only debt he incurred was for the drilling of a well on his property,

something that he was unable to do himself. He paid his brother-in-law, my uncle Dylan,

$10 a month until the total was paid off, and he never owed anyone a dime after that. Rather, Daddy saved money. Actually, it was probably

mother who saved it, but Daddy certainly was behind her efforts, never fighting against her on it.

I recall that every time the Knoxville News Sentinel raised its subscription rate,

Daddy threatened to stop the paper.

But mother always found some way to trim the household budget,

usually through getting better buys on her grocery purchases,

and saved enough to pay the higher rate and keep getting the paper.

For years, home delivery of the seven-day

subscription was only 50 cents a week. But if Daddy needed something, he saved for it, not making

the purchase until he had the cash in hand to pay for it. That's what he did when buying a car

or a truck. He saved and saved over a long time. Then, when he

...