Farming
The ground would usually be 'broke up' in the winter. We would use a 'turning plow'. One man would walk behind the plow and hold a handle in each hand. The lines, to control the horses or mules, would be tied behind
our back, you held a little tension on the lines. Your body had to stay tense, to be ready to jerk---side to side, to guide the team. The soil could not be to-wet or to-dry, or the plow would 'stick' or else come out of the ground. You guided and pushed down or lifted on the handles, to keep the plow point at a certain depth and in a straight row. On the front end of the plow, where it hooked onto the 'double-tree', there was an adjustment, also.
A double-tree hooked up two horses, or mules. A single tree, was for one horse. If it was real dry or rocky, the plow would jerk. You wanted to smoothly 'turn' a row of dirt to one side. That 'turned under' the dead stalks and stubble from the last years crop. Then another row and another.
Eleven rows a quarter of a mile long, three feet apart, was generally an acre. With a good fast team, you could get about 10 acres in a day, working from sun up until sun down. Some farmers couldn't get over six and a half acres.
One man with a team, two mules or two horses, could work about 40 acres of row crop. That was every day but Sunday, all the daylight hours.
A good team could be guided by 'chucking' or talking to them. That is where 'Gee and Haw' got started. A team learned that 'Gee' meant to turn right and "Haw' meant turn left. A team got good at pulling in a straight row. A farmer was proud of his straight rows. Going down the road, you always looked up the rows and admired them---or saw that they were not straight.
The metal point of the plow would 'wear off', and it couldn't be held down in the dirt. Rocks would turn it to the side and wear it quicker. You had to unbolt the plow point off the plow and take it to the blacksmith shop to be sharpened. The blacksmith had a hot fire, the better grade of coal made the fire hotter.
The plow point would be heated white-hot and laid on an anvil and the point beaten out to a sharp point. Sometimes another hot piece of metal would be laid onto the plow point and beat until it made a longer point, it was 'welded on'. The blacksmith quickly stuck it in water to 'temper' it. It made a hissing noise and clouds of steam, when the water boiled when it touched the hot metal. If it wasn't tempered right, it would be 'to soft' and wear off to quick. If it was 'to hard', the point might break when a rock was hit. Sometimes a new blacksmith would 'set the point' at the wrong angle. Then as the plow was going through the dirt, it might keep coming up out of the ground or it might keep 'angling' deeper down into the ground.
After it had been plowed in the winter, we would 'catch it just right' in the spring when it was drying out. We would harrow it down. A harrow was a flat scratcher with 'teeth' that raked over rough plowed dirt and leveled it. Then we would lay off the rows with the cultivator, for planting. That was all done while someone was walking behind, in the plowed soil. It was hard, walking in plowed soil. After the row was 'opened', a cotton planter was pulled over it, to drop the seed.
A 'plate' could be changed inside the planter and it would drop corn,
a 'corn-plate'. If it was soft sandy land, we could use a 'lister' instead of a turning plow. It made a big bed of dirt. We could plant on top of the ridge or make a furrow in it and plant seed in the furrow.
'Cotton plowing' got most of the weeds and grass. To-many cotton seeds were planted, to be sure of a 'good stand'. Then, if it all 'come up', some of it had to be 'chopped', so that each cotton stalk would be eight inches apart. Walk along and 'chop' with your hoe between each stalk of cotton, that made it the right distance apart. You cut down any weeds or grass as you went along.
We all had a problem with Johnson grass, it has a deep spreading root.
It spread by it's seed or it's many jointed roots. If the root dried and it got a little water and soil over it, it would start growing, and crowd anything out.
We would try to get rid of Johnson grass out of the cotton land---before planting cotton. We would plow it in the winter and turn the roots up to freeze. Or plow it up, in the hot dry summer to let it dry out and die.
Some farmers plowed it in the 'light of the moon' to kill it.
A Johnson-grass field made good grazing. Then before it got dry and tough, we would cut and bale it. It made good feed for the stock in the winter.
Cotton was our 'cash crop'
Poppy rented land and we planted 60 or 70 acres of it. There was a lot of hard work to raise and harvest a crop of cotton. Everybody worked in the ‘cotton patch', picking cotton. The 'cotton wagon' was set in the middle of the field, when it was ready to pick. Each sack of cotton that was picked, was weighed and then dumped in the cotton wagon. It had tall sides to hold all the loose cotton.
Each family brought our own 'water jug'. It was a glass gallon jug, that had wrapped and sewed layers of 'tow-sack', gunny sack, around it. That was to keep it from breaking and you would pour a little water on it and keep it damp outside and cool inside. It usually had a corn-cob for a stopper. We set it in the shade and we all drank out of it. The kids were cautioned not to drink 'to much', we didn't want to 'run out'. And if a friend come along, we offered him a drink too.
Weighing the cotton, getting a drink of cool water,
it gave a short break from all that bending over, and pulling the heavy cotton sack. You could stop and straighten up any time, but then the others would get ahead of you. Most pickers picked along together. There was always one that picked faster than the others, they 'picked on ahead'.
There wasn't much talking, it slowed most everybodys cotton picking down.
The ‘cotton wagon’ was a regular wagon with high rickldy sideboards that would hold 1500 pounds of ‘loose cotton’. We picked the cotton, drug our heavy sack up to the wagon, weighed it and then it was emptied it into the wagon. We got a little drink—and started picking cotton again. An older one of us kept a careful written record of how much that each sack of cotton weighed. It took a lot of ‘tromping’ to get 1500 pounds of loose cotton on a wagon.
A team was hooked on to the wagon and it was pulled to the gin. The wagon would be 'pulled over the scales' and weighed and then a big vacuum tube would suck the cotton out. The empty wagon would be pulled over the scales to be weighed again, to see how much cotton had been brought to the gin. Then the team would pull the wagon back to the field, to be filled again.
The seed was removed, it had been 'ginned'. That made a bale of about 500 pounds of lint cotton.
I was with Poppy on a load of cotton, when Raimey, the gin owner, said it weighed 300 pounds short. That would be a loss of 7 or 8 dollars. Poppy finally told him' 'Your scales are wrong, or you are a thief." I thought there was going to be trouble. Raimey made up most of it.
At one time there was two gins in Porum and one in Warner.
The price was about the same, you couldn't afford to haul it far with a team.
The bale of cotton was sold to a local buyer and would bring from 5 to 9 cents a pound. Sometimes the price would change---from one day to the next---the prices might 'fall out'.
The sale price of a bale of cotton was from 25 to 45 dollars. The sale of the cotton seed, would usually pay for the 'ginning'. That was the process of removing the cotton from the seed.
The 'nut' in the cotton seed is deep yellow. It is processed for the oil. 'Cotton seed cake' is expensive. It is pressed into solid golden yellow bars, nearly an inch thick. the rest of the seed is ground up for livestock feed.
Cows gave more milk, and their butter is a brighter yellow, when some cotton seed cake is put in their feed. As a cow got old, her teeth got bad and she couldn't chew her food good. She didn't give as much milk.
We would buy ground up 'shorts', sometimes we would wet it, put a little cotton seed cake in her feed and she would just 'lap it up' and 'give' a lot more milk.
Cotton grows in a round 'bole', small and hard at first, they are from 1 to 3 inches. They are hard and good for throwing. But you better never get caught at it. It wastes cotton, and you should be busy picking or hoeing it.
As it matures, the bole dries out and opens. If we didn't spray the cotton when it was in bloom, bole weevils would 'sting' the bole and lay eggs in it and hatch more weevils. Those boles would fall off.
The fields 'get white', as it gets ready to 'pick'. The bole opens in a star shape and the opening points are dry and sharp. You reach your fingers inside the burr and pull the cotton out and put it in your sack. You are grabbing fast. The points prick your fingers, they would get sore, sometimes bleed. Gloves don't work at all. You had to 'pick it clean', not leave any in the burr, nor leave a burr unpicked. Anyone could look back down the row and see the cotton that had been 'left'.
A hard blowing rain would blow the mature cotton out and sometimes string it down into the dirt. That was when the whole thing was put in your sack. It was called 'pulling boles', the farmer got a lower price for that cotton. It had to be processed more to clean it.You got less for pulling it.
I used a 9 foot cotton sack, The strap across my shoulder was three and a half inches wide. Some men used a 12 foot sack. I would 'get to the wagon', dragging 60 to 80 pounds in my cotton sack. You could 'shake the cotton down' in your sack, and pick further. It made a ‘heavier drag' too. The underside of the cotton sack had an extra layer of duckin, heavy cloth, to make it last longer. When that wore through, the sack could be patched and later 'turned over' and the straps sewed on a different place. You didn't want to waste your 'cotton picking money', buying another cotton sack, until you had to. 'Weigh up', empty, and then do it again and again. Sometimes I would walk to the far end and 'pull back', to the scales. Some men would pick two rows, 'away from the wagon and three rows back', to the wagon. No one liked to waste time where the cotton was 'skimpy' or 'scattered'.
200 or 300 pounds in one day, was good picking. Most people never got over 200. Pulling boles, I could get 1000 pounds in a day. That was from 'sun till sun' (sun-up till sun-down) It was all bending over, and pulling the heavy cotton sack. If the cotton was real thick and 'good picking', some men bought leather 'knee pads' that buckled on. They crawled along on their knees, sometimes picking 3 rows at a time. There was lots of bragging.
It was all settled when they 'weighed up' at the scales.
Women would pick, when they had time. They would bring their babies and ride them along on their sack. Their children that were to young to pick, would run along and play. Mamas made shorter cotton sacks for their older kids, they started picking young.
Most cotton was ready to be picked about the middle of September. After six weeks, most of it would be picked and then school would start again. Children picked a big part of the cotton. For most kids, it was a happy time of the year, picking along with our friends and talking about the new shoes and winter coat, we would buy.
Boys would buy two pair of overalls, a dollar a pair, and they were expected to last until 'cotton picking' the next year. We didn't carelessly climb a tree and tear our overalls. We took care of our clothes, we knew that we couldn't get any more.
When we picked 100 pounds of cotton to get a new pair of shoes---we took good care of them. We did not 'scuff' our feet as we walked, or get them wet if we could help it. We put cardboard inside, when the soles got thin and leaking. Our Poppy tacked leather on the bottom, for 'half soles'. All shoes were leather, there were no canvas or plastic. One pair of brown oxfords lasted all winter, until school was out in the spring. We very seldom had another pair of 'Sunday Shoes'. And sometimes we had no shoes at all, in the summer. Some families had to use all the 'cotton picking money' that their kids made, to have money to pay debts, or to 'live on'.
We were watched that we didn't 'miss any', that we didn't put any leaves in our cotton sack. Sometimes there were so many green leaves on the cotton stalk, the big white fluffy boles would seem to hide. Later years when the cotton was ready to pick, it would be sprayed and all the leaves would fall off the stalk.
After the cotton was picked, usually there would be a little 'late cotton'. It would 'open up' along the low places, where it had more moisture. The woman would go out and 'scrap it'. When there was a 'passing', it was took to the gin, and the seed removed. Our Mamas and Grandmothers 'carded' it. A carder was like a paddle, one was held in each hand and the short wire teeth were brushed together, to 'work' the cotton into thin even layers. QUILTING
This layer was quilted between a pieced 'top' and a seamless 'bottom' cloth, and it made a warm covering for our beds. We went to bed when it got dark. We were tired and the 'coal oil' lamps were not bright enough to do anything except necessary work. Cold rainy days, the quilt would be 'worked on'. Usually the 'top' was pretty 'blocks', all the same design. The blocks were 'pieced' (hand sewn) from little pieces of material left over from our shirts and dresses that our Mamas had sewed for us to wear. The combinations were very colorful, using just what she had, a light and a dark color, side by side. Any time a woman had time, she set down and 'pieced blocks'.
Favorite block patterns were 'handed down' or traded. Each quilt block pattern had a name. A pretty pattern might have a different name, in a different part of the country. The most common was the 'nine patch'. Most all girls started that simple pattern for the first quilt, for their 'hope chest'. When she married, they would need quilts. It took 20 or more of the blocks sewed together, to 'make a top.'
Other common patterns were, 'Grandmothers Fan', 'Wedding Ring', 'Log Cabin', 'Flower Garden', 'Road to Arkansas' and 'The Wild Goose Chase'.
A 'friendship quilt' was made by having friends or neighbors embroider their name and maybe the date, on a 10 or 12 inch block of white material. It was 'set together' with pretty colors and treasured. Some were very elaborate and colorful.
We must not forget the 'string quilt'. We would take a 12 or 14 inch square of newspaper and lay a strip of cloth, never over two inches wide, from corner to corner. Lay another strip face down over it and sew the edges of them together. through the paper. Turn that piece 'up' and lay another strip face down on it, and sew it, too. You tried to put a light color and then a dark color. Keep sewing, using narrow strips, until the paper is covered. Cut away the material that sticks over the edge of the paper, and there is a quilt block. The many colors and light and darks always are so pretty together.
The strips are pieces that are to small, to use to cut the pretty pattern blocks.
Our Mamas used every scrap that she had, to make quilts to keep her family warm. There have always been blankets, but the ordinary family never had them. They were expensive and other things were needed more.
The quilts that are made now, they are very different. They are made with new, specially purchased material, in colors that match. The patterns are more elaborate. The filler or batting is specially processed to hold together. The rows of quilting stiches, do not have to be as close together. No one has the time, need or desire to set for hours and prick their fingers and 'quilt', any more. It is harder to quilt, 'by the piece or around a curve. There are 'quilting machines' that do beautiful curving patterns and it is so much quicker.
Then the quilt was 'put up'. Four screws were in the ceiling, with cords hanging down. Four one inch pine boards about two and a half inches wide, were used to tightly stretch the 'lining'(bottom) material, in the frames.
The cotton 'batting' was laid on next. It must be smooth and thin enough to put the quilting stitches through. The 'top' was stretched tightly and pinned, then it was ready to 'quilt.' That was making short stitches through the lining, batting and the top. Women 'prided themselves' on making short even stitches.
Few women can make the perfect 'ten stitches to the inch'. It was hard stooping work. A 'full size' quilt was usually 75 X 82 inches.
The quilt was 'put up' in a room where you could 'get around it.' When you quilted as far as you could reach, you could roll one side up and reach another row. At night, the corners of the quilting frame would be wrapped with the hanging cords. That raised the quilt enough to be out of the way, usually from over a bed where someone slept.
When a quilt was 'took down' and hemed, it wasn't long before another one was put up in it's place. It was ready when our Mommy had a few minutes to set down and 'quilt'.
Sometimes a 'heavy quilt' was made out of the 'good pieces' of worn out men's pants. These were to thick to be quilted. They were 'tacked'. A long stitch of 'twine string' was made in rows all over the quilt, three or four inches apart. The string was cut between stitches. Then the quilt was 'tied'.
Our houses all got cold at night and we used quilts to stay warm in bed. Kitchens and living rooms were the only rooms with a stove. There was usually a bed in the living room, the ones sleeping in there were lucky. It was warm when they went to bed. It was cold for everybody to get out of bed in the morning. We all 'laid out' our clothes the night before. We put them on and rushed to the kitchen, to get to the warm stove that was cooking breakfast, and put our shoes on. That was the way it was at everybodys house. None of us knew anything else.
Most cotton was 'dry land' farming. A 'bale to the acre' was real good. Rain was depended on, to come at the right time, and 'produce the crop'. Sometimes it did, sometimes it didn't.
Some cotton, mostly in west Texas, used to be irrigated, sprayed on or water run down the rows. Water started 'playing out', under ground.
(2005, in west Texas, irrigation lines are laid 15 inches under the ground, so no water is lost. Cotton seeds are planted exactly the right distance apart. Two quarts of 'Round Up' insecticide are put-- to the acre. There are no weeds and no hoeing. Hives of bees are brought in trucks to the fields during blooming time, to pollinate. Big tractors, with radios and air conditioning too, plow many rows at a time. The cotton is picked mechanically.
Farmers are producing three bales of cotton to the acre !!)
Thelmer remembers, "We were all in the field hoeing. Our cotton was still small enough to plow. When it got a little bigger, the plow would not go over it, and it would be 'laid by' A little old thunder cloud come across, not real big, we were used to them. It was a mile and a half to the house, it would take to long to get there. We got under a tree at the end of the field, for a little protection from the rain. There was a straight up and down lightning strike. Thunder! and Noise! Dust flew! We thought our ear drums were gone, our ears rang for no telling how long. It didn't rain much and we went on back to hoeing. By the end of the day a big circle of cotton started withering. In the middle of the field, a circle---about 40 ft across, of cotton died. It just died.
It was unusual for lightening to not strike a tree. A close call for all of us who were standing under the tree at the end of the row.
When the corn got to big to plow, without breaking the stalk over, it was 'laid by'. Then we took a horse and plow, 'up the middle' and planted a row of beans or peas in the middle. They would grow and be picked before the corn was ready to be gathered. We planted a few watermelons along in the rows of cotton. When we were picking cotton in the fall and it was hot, it was good to find a ripe one, laying there in the shade. I would bump it on the ground a few times, 'to loosen up the heart'. Then bump it hard enough to bust it open, and pick up the whole seedless 'heart' with my hands--and eat it. And you won't ever forget it.
Drought and the bole weevil and the depression was bad in 1930. Cotton was dead, we never planted any more.
We would sew 40 or 50 acres of oats. They made good winter and spring pasture for our cows and work stock. We grew corn to feed the horses and mules and to make cornbread for us. We raised peanuts for feed and we liked to eat them too. Hegari (Hi-Gear) to thrash for grain and to feed green to stock. The chickens always pecked and ate everything they could reach.