Tuesday, April 22, 2008
Brother Walt's Memories
Hoeing cotton:
Think I was 5 at the time, and for some reason I always wanted to go to the field with Daddy. May have been the kick in head by the horse. I remember there wasn't much to hoe as there were no goat heads or Johnson grass. There were only some gypsum looking weeds and not many of those. Daddy decided if I was going to be there anyway I could hoe one row while he took two. Seems like he got 10 cents an hour and I got 5, but don't think that could have been right as that would have been a dollar a day and don't think he made that much until ‘38 or ‘39.Don't think I did that much so no danger of child labor laws. Ha.
Killing hogs:
The people who had hogs would kill them for meat when the first cold snap moved in. When we had hogs, that was usually the only meat we had and when it was gone sometimes we would have a treat on Sunday and have fried chicken. Anyway back to the hogs. After killing them they would put them in scalding water and then scrape the hair from the skin. That was usually my job and it wasn't easy; Daddy would say you’re not scraping hard enough. One fall there at Crowell's we not only had a hog but also a calf. Daddy killed the calf, I think, by hitting it in the head with an ax. Sounds gruesome but guess you gotta do what you gotta do. Anyway we were eating high on the hog, so to speak, that fall. Daddy would rub the meat with sugar-cure, work it into the meat to preserve it, as there was no refrigerator, as there was no electricity. Some people had a smokehouse to put their meat in but Daddy hung ours on the north wall of the house, no smoke house.
Killing chickens:
Maybe one Sunday a month we would have fried chicken. Momma would get on the cell phone and called Kentucky F.., oops, got carried away there. The chicken deal was simple, you would go to the hen house Saturday night and get a chicken from the roost, put the chicken under a tub. Sunday morning Momma would get the chicken from under the tub, grab the chicken by the head and wring it until its head came off. Then I believe she would scald the chicken, pluck the feathers and gut it. Seems kinda simple. . .P.S. Don't know how the chickens would do it, but they would jump around some after their head was gone. (really!)Stay tuned..
–Walter Gunn, Son of a Gunn, e-mail memoirs
More at www.cgtrent.com
Cora Gail (Gunn) Trent
cgtrent@att.net
Think I was 5 at the time, and for some reason I always wanted to go to the field with Daddy. May have been the kick in head by the horse. I remember there wasn't much to hoe as there were no goat heads or Johnson grass. There were only some gypsum looking weeds and not many of those. Daddy decided if I was going to be there anyway I could hoe one row while he took two. Seems like he got 10 cents an hour and I got 5, but don't think that could have been right as that would have been a dollar a day and don't think he made that much until ‘38 or ‘39.Don't think I did that much so no danger of child labor laws. Ha.
Killing hogs:
The people who had hogs would kill them for meat when the first cold snap moved in. When we had hogs, that was usually the only meat we had and when it was gone sometimes we would have a treat on Sunday and have fried chicken. Anyway back to the hogs. After killing them they would put them in scalding water and then scrape the hair from the skin. That was usually my job and it wasn't easy; Daddy would say you’re not scraping hard enough. One fall there at Crowell's we not only had a hog but also a calf. Daddy killed the calf, I think, by hitting it in the head with an ax. Sounds gruesome but guess you gotta do what you gotta do. Anyway we were eating high on the hog, so to speak, that fall. Daddy would rub the meat with sugar-cure, work it into the meat to preserve it, as there was no refrigerator, as there was no electricity. Some people had a smokehouse to put their meat in but Daddy hung ours on the north wall of the house, no smoke house.
Killing chickens:
Maybe one Sunday a month we would have fried chicken. Momma would get on the cell phone and called Kentucky F.., oops, got carried away there. The chicken deal was simple, you would go to the hen house Saturday night and get a chicken from the roost, put the chicken under a tub. Sunday morning Momma would get the chicken from under the tub, grab the chicken by the head and wring it until its head came off. Then I believe she would scald the chicken, pluck the feathers and gut it. Seems kinda simple. . .P.S. Don't know how the chickens would do it, but they would jump around some after their head was gone. (really!)Stay tuned..
–Walter Gunn, Son of a Gunn, e-mail memoirs
More at www.cgtrent.com
Cora Gail (Gunn) Trent
cgtrent@att.net
