SIMPLE TIMES B Y S U Z Y M c C R AY
THE CO-OP PANTRY
Sweet Canning Memories My heart was pounding almost in rhythm with my stomach churning as I walked across the dusty concrete of the Blount-Oneonta Agri-Business Center. I tried to act nonchalant. I had brought three halfpint jars of jelly and entered them in the Blount County Fair that Sunday afternoon after church. Judging took place that Monday night and early Tuesday, and we were allowed into the fair as it opened that Tuesday at 5 p.m. Why was I so nervous? Nobody had known I entered anything and nobody would know if I didn’t win
a thing … as a matter of fact, I really didn’t expect to win anything on my first year of entering … but there is always hope! It was the late 1900s and jelly making was just one of the many homestead activities I’d been working on for almost two decades. What got me interested in entering the fair was an article a fellow reporter at the Gadsden Times had written about his own jelly experiences. Darrell Norman was the distinguished-looking suitand-tie-wearing reporter who covered the same capJuly 2020
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