CHAPTER SEVEN

THE EARLY THIRTIES

The crash of the stock market and the monetary system in 1929 affected, first and foremost, those who were following the illusion of wealth without working. The extension of the problem was a loss of jobs. For farmers and ranchers the primary effect of the Depression was the absence of money because of a loss of their cash markets. Some of Kay's neighbors made their farm payment by borrowing on insurance policies.⁽¹⁾

Kay and Marie went into the Depression with a good house, car, and farming equipment. They had a good garden and orchard, and hogs and chickens, so very little money was needed. Pressure cookers were new on the market and everyone got one to can food. The Cooperative Extension Service was very active through Mr. White, the county agent, and home demonstration agent programs related to the preparation and preservation of foodstuffs. In 1931 feed was almost too cheap to sell, and finished hogs were selling for $5.00 a head. Kay and Marie held on rather well and were able to make their farm payment each January.

During the Depression Kay's cousin, Clarence Dallum, came by the place hungry. He was the son of Ambrose's sister, Mary. Clarence was typical of many caught in the economic throes with no job and no money. They struck out across country staying with relatives and hunting a job. Kay and Marie boarded him for two weeks and bought him his Bull Durham tobacco. Clarence helped them kill hogs and a beef. They then gave him $5.00 to help him on his way.⁽²⁾

Son McKay came in on a freight train about this time and in about the same situation. Era and the boys had remained in New Mexico. After a brief stay, Kay gave him $5.00 to help him as he searched for work.⁽³⁾

Beck Community is Begun

In the early spring of 1931 Kay sold the ten-acre southwest corner of his place to brothers, Robert "Bob" and Voile Beck of Lubbock, Texas, as a site for a cotton gin. They quickly constructed the gin, drilled a water well for steam power, and built an office and a house for a ginner. The gin construction and installation of the huge machinery created a lot of community excitement for both adults and children.

They were up and running in time for the fall crop. This first year, and for several years thereafter, they received more cotton than they could handle, even running night and day. Trailers would be lined up all over the gin yard ready to be pulled under the suction tube in turn. The gin created a lot of activity, including traffic up and down the road in front of the Brantner house. Bob soon had a telephone installed at the gin--the first one in the community.

Robert and Gladys built a home east of the gin so Bob could manage the gin. The Becks and Brantners remained close family friends for the remainder of their lives. From the start, milk was sold to the Becks, and one of the kids would deliver a jar each day. They did not mind the walk as Mr. Beck usually tipped them a dime. That fall, Ralph joined Irene on the bus adventure to school.

In 1932 Kay made bond and put in a cotton yard next to the gin. He served as public weigher for two seasons, weighing and sampling bales for the cotton buyers.

The community needed a grocery store and Kay considered building one, going so far as to contact a wholesale grocer. Instead, Ted and Thedda Mae Walker built one across the road (west) of the gin on the corner of Trey Gaston's farm. Ted was the brother of Trey's wife, Hazel. A small café also operated near the store for two or three fall seasons. The Baptists and Methodists had located churches nearby, which added an additional sense of community to the one now known as Beck. For the Brantners, it was now a short walk to buy bread, soda pop, candy, or gum. Ted later added gas pumps and had an ice house.

There were civic duties besides voting and serving on the school board. The county seat was located at Olton, in the northeast corner of the county (later moved to Littlefield). Court jurors were predominately farmers, so court sessions were scheduled in the winter as much as possible to accommodate the cropping season. Women did not receive suffrage until 1920 and were still not being used for jury duty. Usually, several men in one community would be scheduled for the same week and they would car pool to Olton. This meant getting up at 2:00 A.M. in freezing weather to milk the cows and feed the livestock. There were no heaters in the automobiles, and quilts would sometimes be draped over the radiators to keep them from freezing. The hardship was balanced by the interesting break from farm chores.

Kay and Marie continued to attended the Church of Christ in Sudan, which met in the school house. The congregation decided to build a church building, but it was slow getting started due to the depressed economy. About that time, the school house burned, so the group met with the Amherst congregation for a couple of Sundays. The men quickly built a building in Sudan.

The church didn't have the $25.00 necessary for a baptistry so Kay told the elders that he could spare the money and would help put it in if the elders would keep it anonymous. After the baptistry was built, the preacher, Brother Speck, got up before the congregation and told how proud everyone was of the baptistry, and "that a good Christian family that lived not many miles from Beck gin had paid for it." Everyone turned and looked at Kay and Marie as they were the only ones living near Beck.

After several Church of Christ families had moved into the Beck community, Kay tried to persuade the men to buy the old Baptist tabernacle south of the gin for a church. They decided, instead, to build one about four miles north and west of Beck, and called it the Friendship Church of Christ. Kay and Marie worshiped at Friendship until they left the Plains.

The small Friendship church used visiting preachers in its early days. But when late summer came, and the crops were laid-by, it was gospel meeting time. A noted preacher would be hired for seven to ten days of preaching, with morning and night services. Gospel meetings were community events, and non-members would attend to be supportive and neighborly as well as to hear the Bible taught. Because of the heat and the larger crowds, it was common to move the benches outside the church building and conduct services by lantern light. Of course, bugs were a problem, swarming around the lanterns, and more than one preacher had to stop and cough up a bug just as he reached his oratorical crescendo.

Sundays were also a time for neighbors to visit back and forth. The children often carried play clothes to the morning service, spent the day with a friend, and then rejoined their family at the evening service.

Neighbors and early church members included the families of Tiny Fife, Quinton McCaughren, Lovie Fox, Lonnie Fox and his mother, Earl Myers, the Withrows, Mr. Ray, who often led the singing, and the Aubrey Newmans from the Pep community.

Other neighbors not previously mentioned included the families of Virgil Beauley, Frank Lane, B. O. Byerly, Chess Campbell, Ed Fowler, and Earnest Gaston, brother of Ed.

There was a strong sense of community closeness and helpfulness during the early years. Neighbors shared labor when barns needed to be built or crops needed to be gathered. They shared in the joys and hardships and were always on hand to help with marriages, births, deaths, or whatever the times and circumstances dictated. Families gathered on Saturday nights for games of "forty-two." Everyone loved to sing, and Aubrey Newman, of the Pep Community, always had his song book handy to try out "The New Song" or any other one with a good foot-patting, four-part harmony, or songs with good alto or bass leads. And when Bush Thornton came visiting the Brantners and Gastons, you could bet he had his fiddle with him.

It thrills my soul to hear the songs of praise, \ We mortals sing below,

And tho it takes the parting of the ways, \ Yet I must outward go,

I hope to hear thru-out unnumbered days, \ The song earth cannot know,

They sing in heaven a new song, \ Of Moses and the Lamb.⁽⁴⁾

On August 13, 1932, John Brantner married Opal Pierce, just eleven days short of his twenty-fourth birthday. Opal's parents, William Franklin and Josephine Turnbow Pierce had moved to the Girard, Texas area in 1920. They were farming near Steel Hill (southeast of Spur) when John met Opal.⁽⁵⁾ To Kay and family, John was always "John," or "Uncle John." To Opal and to close friends in the Dickens County area, he would always be known as "Johnnie."

"Pass Dat Ice Tea, Amos!"

In 1932 the family got two more appliances to enhance their lifestyle. An ice house was built in Littlefield that year and began making twice-a-week deliveries in the country. So Kay and Marie got an icebox that held a fifty-pound block of ice in the top and had a cooling compartment below for milk, butter, etc. Before iceboxes arrived, a wooden or galvanized metal shelf was built outside the house that would hold 2-4 inches of water and could be reached through an opening in the wall or through a window. It served as an evaporative cooler for jugs, jars, and similar containers.

The ice company provided a cardboard sign that had the different weights of block ice on each edge. The card was placed in the window and the iceman knew by the number on top how much ice was wanted. Extra ice was often bought from the deliveryman or in town for making ice cream in a hand-cranked freezer. Some had a special padded tarp to wrap up the ice extra ice until it was used. Lemonade was also a special treat on Saturday nights or Sundays, and iced tea and Jell-O became very popular.

That fall they also bought their first radio--a battery-operated Philco. Each day at noon they heard, "The Light Crust Doughboys are on the air," broadcast from Dallas. The Doughboys were "a big delight" and they obviously helped sell plenty of Light Crust flour. Much of their program then was religious songs. One particular Doughboy sold himself well--W. Lee O'Daniel eventually became the governor of Texas.

Other popular radio programs were Little Orphan Annie, Amos 'N Andy, Fibber McGee and Mollie, The Shadow, The Green Hornet, and the Lux Radio Theater.

Ralph and Doris were inseparable. They wore one-piece blue and white coveralls and went barefoot whenever they could. She would play with his toys, and he would play dolls with her. She didn't mind the games of cowboys and Indians so much, but he really detested playing dolls. She therefore felt a little smug when she could get him to do something so beneath him. They robbed sparrow's nests and made mud pies with the eggs, and even ate a few. And they carved their initials on the cottonwood tree in the front yard.⁽⁶⁾

Ralph and Doris once got scratched crawling under the barbed-wire fence and went bawling to their daddy. Kay gathered them up, rocked them, and sang his mournful ". . . poor little babies, way out on the Plains . . ." to them. They felt even sorrier for themselves and squalled even louder. The squalling and hugging was good medicine and Kay was always a comforter to little ones.

One summer afternoon, both Kay and Marie were sick and staying in the house. Ralph and Doris made a mud puddle near the windmill, took off their clothes, and smeared mud all over themselves. They climbed up on the washhouse that held the water storage tank, and lay down to let the sun dry the mud. Ed and Seveatus Gaston stopped by from their Saturday trip to town to check on Kay and Marie. Seveatus asked Marie if she knew what the kids were doing, and Marie was quite humiliated by this stunt, as all the neighbors were passing by that day.

Marie would frequently walk down the road to visit Mrs. Snapp. She admonished Ralph and Doris to behave and not ask for anything. But as soon as they arrived, the kids asked for a biscuit with butter and sugar on it. They escaped a spanking, but got one of Marie's better tongue-lashings. Doris would always remember Mrs. Snapp when Doris' own children and grandchildren would pull a similar stunt.

The family grew a big garden near the house and Kay always had a truck patch in the field where he grew pinto beans, black-eyed peas, sweet corn, popcorn, and peanuts. Summertime meant canning the vegetables and the kids did their share of snapping and hulling beans and peas in the shade of a cottonwood. Doris especially dreaded corn shucking because the flies would swarm and the corn silk would stick to their sweaty legs.

Most Septembers the family would make their annual trip to Fort Sumner, New Mexico. There was a pretty little valley there with lots of old orchards. They could buy apples, peaches, and pears very cheap. The trip always included a picnic and "cokes" in the park and a visit to the grave of Billy the Kid, a well-known tourist attraction.⁽⁷⁾

In the fall of 1932 Doris' first-grade teacher was Miss Baccus. Doris was always talking out-of-turn in class and would be rapped across the knuckles with a ruler. Miss Baccus really impressed Doris when she slapped her hands with a pair of scissors.

The girls wore dresses, long underwear, and tan cotton stockings. The stockings were held up by a garter belt that fit over the shoulders and around the waist, and had supporters that hooked onto the stockings. Irene wore black sateen bloomers, but Doris wore white ones made from cotton sugar sacks. The girls wore slips and changed their underwear every day. Doris was proud of her bloomers, as some of the young girls only had drawers and stockings to wear.⁽⁸⁾

Marie made as many of the kids clothes as she could, using her Singer treadle sewing machine that Kay had bought in Lubbock. Each year before school she would go to Lubbock to buy clothes, material, and whatever school supplies she knew to get. One August she took the oldest four and bought coats, shoes, dress and shirt fabric, Ralph's pants, and everyone's winter underwear. She told Kay she spent $50.00--what the kids thought was an astonishing amount of money.

Syrup buckets were still common school lunch containers, although some children had metal lunch boxes. They had biscuit sandwiches; sausage left over from breakfast, or potted meat or jelly. Fruit or hard-boiled eggs were often included. Marie once asked Irene why she didn't eat her hard-boiled egg. Irene explained that it was rotten, when actually it had been boiled too long and was dark around the yolk.

Riding the school bus, with all ages of children, was an experience and education itself for the young ones. The school buses now had some steam pipes that ran the length of the bus. The kids had to be careful not to touch them. A neighbor boy in high school would sit by Doris, which made her so proud and big. The bus was usually standing room only by the time they reached school. One day, two of the high school girls got in a fight, screaming and pulling hair. The young kids were terrified. The mild-mannered driver, Mr. Holzclaw, meekly asked them to stop. Finally, he opened the door and the two girls fell out. Each afternoon, the bus would load in the order that children got off.⁽⁹⁾

Disease traveled rapidly through the schools--the usual measles, chicken pox, whooping cough, mumps, and pink-eye. Head lice were common, but Marie guarded against them by frequently washing the kids heads with lye soap.

Boils were common and Kay would lance them so they would drain and heal. One attempted prevention against boils was the spring ritual of blood purification--a tablespoon of Black Draught mixed with water. The thought and taste of it was so bad the kids would all gag and choke. Kay would get all the kids in the back yard, dip a spoonful out of the box, add a little water and stir it with a wooden match. He would finally get it down them.

Cleanliness was the main prevention of the itch, but the children caught it one winter. Marie was "sure that it came from the little Collins kids" who lived in the little house by the gin. She smeared them with a sulfur and lard mixture. Each day they had to bathe, get greased, and put on clean underwear. Daily bathing was a chore, especially in the winter.

A Three-Room House, With None To Spare

In the little three-room house, the front room served as living room and had a bed for Irene and Joyce. It had a little coal stove and sometimes the sides would get red from the heat. The middle room had two beds; Ralph and Doris slept in one, Kay and Marie in the other. In the winter the house was cold and drafty. They slept under so many quilts they could hardly move. One knew it was winter when Marie put the flannel-like sheets on the beds. (She used these until her youngest left home in 1954.) When it snowed it would filter in around the windows and the sill would be covered. When the school teacher told the class they should sleep with a cracked window, the kids were put out with their mother who said they were getting plenty of fresh air as it was. And while the summer days were hot, the nights would cool down such that a light cover was usually needed.

The back room of the little house was the kitchen, with the new coal oil stove, the table Brose had made, the ice box, and the cream separator.

In 1933 Joe Thornton assumed management of the Red Lake Camp of the Matador Ranch in northern Dickens County near Afton. Their only child, Joe Lavon, was eighteen at the time. Joe and Reba would remain here for 23 years, moving to Azle, Texas in 1958 following Joe's retirement as a longtime Matador cowboy and cowman.⁽¹⁰⁾

The Depression would continue to ravage the nation for the decade. In 1933 the government set the minimum wage at 40 cents. The big news that year, however, was the beginning of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's nine years as president, and the implementation of his New Deal. His Works Progress Administration (WPA) occupies a significant part of our economic and social history, and the memories of millions of penniless, jobless men with families. Many roads, bridges, buildings, parks, historical sites and monuments, and similar constructions came into existence through the WPA programs and stand today as monuments to the circumstance and the solution.

The Civilian Construction Corps (CCC), a part of the WPA, was in operation from 1933 until 1942, employing three million men, especially the grown boys and young single men with blue-collar-type skills. The pay was $30.00 a month plus housing, food, and medical care. Twenty-five dollars had to be sent home, the remaining five dollars was for clothes, tobacco, and other incidentals. The Corps was organized into companies.

Similar projects were implemented for the professionals or white-collar workers who were out of work. The Federal Writer's Project, established in 1935, was one example. Writers were engaged in such projects as the American Guide Series, a state-by-state encyclopedia or compilation of factual material. The non-relief workers made about $150-175 per month: the relief workers were paid about $39 per month.

Doris remembers Doyle and Travis Hoover coming by Sudan from their CCC camp to help with the crops. They pitched a tent in the back yard containing their cots and belongings. Marie told Doris and Ralph to never go in the tent. But, of course, they did. They found some little white pills--no telling what kind. To get rid of the evidence, they threw the pills in the horse trough. When the horses drank, they became loco and ran through the barbed wire fences, cutting their legs. Kay had a difficult time catching the horses. He had found pills on the ground and knew exactly what had happened. She and Ralph were terrified by the experience.⁽¹¹⁾

T. C. and Isabel Gonzales ⁽¹²⁾

Field help, including hoeing, was whoever you could get. The kids hoed, and sometimes kinfolks came to hire out. Crews of field hands, usually Mexicans, came from the Pecos Valley area to pull cotton. T. C. Gonzales and his wife Isabel came eight seasons from the Fort Sumner, New Mexico area with a crew. When the cotton was about ready for picking to start, Kay and Marie would go to Fort Sumner and tell them exactly when to come, as it varied each year. T. C. was well known as he and Isabel had jobs and a neat little house and yard. But they wanted the extra money that they made pulling cotton.

Marie would buy heavy ducking to sew into cotton sacks on her treadle machine. These were long sacks with a shoulder strap that were dragged by the puller and held about 100 pounds of seed cotton, more or less, according to the length of the sack. When full, the sacks were carried to the trailer, weighed and dumped. The longest sacks, about 12 feet or more, had a tie string at the bottom end so that the sack could be dumped at both ends. About 2000 pounds of seed cotton (lint, seed, trash) would gin out a 500-pound bale of lint.

T. C. and family stayed in one end of the two-room shack. It only had a bed frame with springs and a cast iron heater. But Isabel provided the rest. She got on hands and knees and scrubbed the place with lye soap and hot water, and it was clean when she finished. The coal-burning heater got the same treatment, because its top would be her grill for making tortillas and for other cooking chores. She spoke very little English, but the kids liked to hang around the shack door to watch her work; and also, she would give them a warm tortilla to eat. They had one child, a nice-looking young man of whom they were very proud because he was finishing high school.

T. C. was mostly a crew leader. But Isabel was usually the fastest puller in the crew. They worked hard all week. But when Saturday night came it was Fiesta! The Gonzales's went to Littlefield for Mexican music and card games. T. C. wore a large expensive felt hat and a large diamond ring. Isabel wore a Spanish lavalier of gold, diamond centered, around her neck. With her hair pulled back and her rather exotic-looking dresses of rich, wine velvet or perhaps green satin, she was transformed before their eyes. In one respect T. C. and Isabel represented a different culture and language. In another way, they were just family friends, and the Brantners looked forward to renewing acquaintance in Fort Sumner each year and to their coming for the fall harvest.

The Beck community needed a blacksmith shop, so Kay built one near the gin in 1934. Melvin and Ray Lil Rankin came to run the shop and Kay bought the small "ginner" house from Bob Beck for them to live in. It was a short walk across the pasture to visit, which the kids did often. Aunt Ray had little yellow singing canaries in cages. She made a spicy tamale pie and would sometimes let the kids cook. In addition to being an accomplished seamstress, she did art work and painted. She told great stories and had the kids write and draw for her. Ralph was a good artist, and somewhere in the family today there exists Marie's first family library table with some of his drawings on the underside. Aunt Ray made for Ralph a farm animal quilt with blocks of pressed crayon-painted animals.

Picture shows continued to improve and gain in popularity. The rough-tough, cowboy-horse combinations, such as Tom Mix and Tony of the silent movie days, were giving way to the popularity of the singing cowboy. In 1934 Gene Autry arrived in Hollywood to make his first of 95 movies that would span 19 years. Roy Rogers began a year later making his "hundreds of movies." He is quoted as saying, "I made pictures where I wasn't allowed to kiss the girl because the little boys would say, 'leave that mushy stuff out of the pictures . . . ."⁽¹³⁾

The predominate boys' toys were homemade slingshots, rubber guns, and tops. All kids had their tobacco sack full of marbles and Doris could play mumble peg with her own pocket knife "as good as Ralph." Holes would be put in tin cans and binder twine run through the holes. They would stand on the cans, holding the twine, and walk. Spinning tops were made by putting a wooden peg in one of Marie's empty thread spools. Doris once stole a top from one of the Snapp kids. When Marie found out, she told Doris that the sheriff would come get her and lock her in jail. Doris was terrified and wouldn't get out of Marie's sight for a while. Irene would always be the bookworm of the family and amuse herself with reading and less tomboyish pastimes.

The kids read "big little books" which were the forerunner to comic books. Kay read Zane Grey western paperbacks. Store-bought children's games included dominos, checkers and Chinese checkers. In 1934 an unemployed Germantown, Pennsylvania real estate salesman, Charles B. Darrow was inventing gadgets and games to fill his idle time. His game of Monopoly would soon reach the windy plains of West Texas and become a favorite of both adults and children.

For Joyce the lone preschooler, the shopping trips were special. She recalled, "Mrs. Beck and mother were very good friends. Mrs. Beck didn't drive and would get mother to drive for her when she needed to go shopping. They usually went to Littlefield and Lubbock and I got to go, as Irene, Ralph and Doris were in school. The outings were nice for mother even though she didn't buy much. Going to Lubbock was always a treat and we would eat out at lunch. They always ordered fish for me. I can still remember the big houses and tree-lined brick streets."⁽¹⁴⁾

The Weekly Routine

Each day started out in the kitchen where Marie spent a lot of time cooking on the coal oil cookstove. Breakfast was a big meal, with either sausage, bacon, or ham, and biscuits, eggs, and oatmeal. Marie kept flour in a pan and each morning she would make a well in the flour. Into that she put lard, baking powder, salt, and milk. She worked in just enough flour into the mix for her big pan of biscuits. Noon was another big meal, with fried chicken or some other meat, vegetables, biscuits, and pie or cake. Supper was often a lighter meal, such as pan-fried potatoes covered with gravy, and cornbread. The meals had to have something sweet at the end, even if it was just buttered bread and homemade preserves. Everyone drank a lot of milk and it was great to skim off cream that had risen on the whole milk and put it on a bowl of home-canned peaches.

When the kids were all at school, Kay and Marie's noon meal would sometimes be cornbread crumbled into a big goblet of either sweet or clabbered milk. Like most country folks all across the South, dinner was the noon meal, supper was the evening meal, and lunch was something you packed off to school.

Every Monday was wash day. Marie had a black cast-iron wash pot in the back yard. Coal was used to make a fire as there was no wood. She would boil the clothes using lye soap and a long, wooden paddle to stir them. After a hard scrubbing on the rub board, the clothes were run through two tubs of rinse water, with Grandma's Bluing in the second tub. The clothes were wrung between each tub. The whites came out snowy, but the colored clothes would fade badly as there were no colorfast dyes at the time. Dresses, shirts, pants, pillow cases, and tablecloths would be taken in the house and run through a big pot of thick starch so that they came out like boards. Next the clothes were hung on the lines which had been wiped clean. Finally, the clothes that were to be ironed were sprinkled with water and rolled up overnight in a big wicker basket for ironing. Marie simply dipped her hand in a bowl and flicked water on the clothes. Later she got a little sprinkler head that could be stuck in a big bottle.

This same big iron pot was used at hog-killing time to cook the fat for soap making, as described below. When not in use, the big iron pot was propped upside down so that it would not rust inside. This prompted a riddle that Kay loved to tell to his kids and grandkids: "Whitey went under Blackie. Whitey came out from under Blackie. Whitey left Whitey under Blackie." Of course, he had to explain the big "black" pot to the grandchildren.

Later they bought a Maytag washing machine. It had a hand-cranked wringer and a gasoline engine that turned the agitator inside the tub. They put it in the wash house under the windmill storage tank and Kay built two benches to hold the two rinse tubs. It was a major time-saver for Marie but would often be hard to crank. That kept Kay coming back and forth from the field to stomp on the foot crank.

Tuesday was ironing day. Kay had sawed out a board for ironing, shaped similar to modern ones. Marie padded and covered it. One end lay on the table, with the tapered end resting on the back of a straight chair. Big flat irons were heated on the stove and used with detachable handles. The iron was tested by licking a finger and touching it to the bottom of the iron. Ironing had to be fast or the clothes would scorch.

Marie later obtained a gas iron, probably similar to the Good Value Iron, Instant Light Model 12 made by The Coleman Company, Inc. of Wichita, Kansas. It operated on white gas and was a big improvement, but "it sure smelled."

Saturday was bathe-and-go-to-town day. The galvanized wash tub was brought into the kitchen and water was heated on the stove. Everyone used the same water, only more hot water was added to warm it up a little. Later, a longer, rectangular tub was bought which made the task a little easier. Eventually, Kay and Ralph would rig up an overhead faucet in the wash house so showers could be taken.

Kay was the family barber and he was pretty good at cutting both girls and boys hair. He used regular barber scissors and comb, and hand clippers. The girls wore their hair straight on the sides, shingled in back, and with bangs, all of which made the cutting easier.

Saturdays meant shoes had to be polished. And if they needed resoling, Kay would glue on rubber soles. New leather heels would be tacked on and trimmed with his pocket knife. Marie, in between the normal routine and the children's bathing and haircut ordeals, would usually do some extra baking for the Sunday meals and days following.

Fried chicken meant Marie catching the fryers by the leg with a heavy wire that had a hook in one end. She grabbed each chicken by the neck, gave it about two twisting turns and the headless chicken hit the ground flouncing around until thoroughly dead and bled. After the insides were removed, the fryers were plunged into hot water to loosen the feathers for plucking. The naked chicken was then held over a stove flame to singe off the pin feathers. It was ready to be cut into pieces. The gizzard was cut, emptied of gravel, and saved with the liver.

Obviously, several fryers would be killed at one time. Most farm children retained a vivid memory of how bad chicken insides and wet or burned feathers smelled--and how good that fried chicken tasted. Marie always ate the back and wings, leaving the meatier parts for others.

When everyone was spruced up, the family headed for town. First stop was to sell the eggs and buy chicken feed. Kay and Marie would spend the afternoon visiting, buying various supplies, and eventually purchasing groceries. Sometimes Marie would drop Kay off at the blacksmith's to get something repaired or sharpened while she shopped. The kids would head for the picture show and later go buy a five-cent ice cream cone in the always-cool drug store.

Sunday, the day of rest, was one of the most active days of the week. But it was uplifting and a reprieve from the more arduous farm work. After the stock were milked and fed, Kay would work some more on his Bible lesson and pick out his songs--he was often teaching and leading singing.

After breakfast, and along with her other necessary chores, Marie would usually cook two meats for the noon meal--one had to be fried chicken. Four or five pies would be readied and a variety of vegetables, fresh or canned would be ready to warm. Then she would try to get the kids properly dressed for church.

After church services families would trade out visiting one another, often until the evening service. The kids would take play clothes along so they could play kick the can, hide and seek, red rover, or pop the whip, in addition to all the activities that could be done in the barns and cotton trailers and on the feed and hay stacks.

Farm life has always revolved around the growing/harvesting season. Timing was usually altered only by the weather. The process was fairly standard, but changed as better equipment came along. Farmers would "put up their land" in January-March, plowing deep furrows to turn under the cotton and feed stalks, to slow soil erosion, and to enable the soil to soak up "bottom," or beginning-of-season moisture. The farmer wanted to have his land and equipment ready for planting as soon as the danger of a killing frost was past.

In early spring a place was fixed for baby chickens. Brooders were first used to hatch the eggs, but this was discontinued as soon as hatchery chicks became available. About 100 would be purchased at the hatchery. Sometimes an order had to be placed, and the mailman would bring them along on his route when they came in. They were put in the kitchen in a big box or tub to keep them warm. When electricity became available, lights would be used for warmth. The children were always fascinated with the baby chicks.⁽¹⁵⁾

May 10 was Kay's cotton planting date--as early as possible past freezing weather, in order to stretch the growing season on the front end. The grain crops were planted behind the cotton, as they had a shorter growing season.

Some hoeing was usually necessary in the summer, following cultivation. The kids were expected to hoe and Kay hoed along with them. He sawed off hoe handles as needed, to fit each child, did the sharpening using a file, and instructed them in the hoeing art. Marie would sometimes hoe with the children. Large glass jars or jugs were wrapped in burlap to keep drinking water cool. Joyce said, "Mother had us wear bonnets and long-sleeve shirts so we wouldn't sunburn, but they were usually shed as the sun got hotter."⁽¹⁶⁾

Irene, the oldest, recalled that they got a very early start in the morning. About 10:30, they began keeping an eye on the road for Mr. Moore, the mail carrier. When he delivered the Fort Worth Star Telegram, they were allowed to walk back to the house and read the "funnies," have lunch, and rest until about 2:30. Then it was back to the field to hoe until time for late afternoon chores. All of the farm families' children did the hoeing, so they could usually look across the fields and see others doing the same thing. Frequently they stumbled upon some fragile surprises--a bird's nest full of eggs built on the ground, little grey-brown cottontail bunnies, horned toads, lizards, snakes, etc. that broke the monotony.⁽¹⁷⁾

Sausage, Cracklin's, and Soap