Memories of growing up on the farm

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‘Little boy blue, come blow your horn!’

Memories of ‘Big Red,’ good neighbors, and life on the farm are still precious after all these years

by HELEN LEDFORD

“The sheep’s in the meadow, the cow’s in the corn…” These lines from the familiar nursery rhyme bring back many nostalgic farm memories. We had no sheep, but we did have cows, mules, pigs, chickens, pigeons, cats, dogs, ducks, etc. And we once had a billy goat that was a “guest” belonging to a gentleman who moved to our town and had no suitable place for the lively beast on which to romp. My younger siblings and I teased that billy goat unmercifully, and he chased us constantly, horns lowered. Yes, we had lots of animals to enjoy!

Members of a typical farm family, each of us was expected to share the workload. Our crops included tobacco, peanuts and various other growing things that fed our big crew of humans and four-legged critters. Corn was a major crop, and we had several fields. Much of it, when harvested, was shelled, stored, and later hauled (as needed) to our historic local grist mill to be ground for corn meal. Some was set aside for seeding next year’s crop, and a portion saved for winter and the making of hominy.

In summer, corn fields flourished, guarded from marauding crows and other wild things that considered tall green stalks heavy with ears of tender sweetness fair game for the taking. “Big Red” was a large mule belonging to our good friends, the Johnsons, whose land bordered ours on the east side. Our corn fields drew him like flies to sugar… Mr. Albert Johnson and Miss Eurie, an AfricanAmerican couple, were the best of neighbors. Miss Eurie was a short, buxom little woman. Mr. Albert raised hogs, and in the springtime the most beautiful violets grew below the large pig lot, fertilized by many Johnson oinkers and their ancestors. During those times many years ago, farm folks helped each other, borrowed from each other, and never locked their doors. Everyone got along and shared the tough struggles that came with the Great Depression and WWII.

The Johnsons’ long-eared work animal was pastured behind a barbedwire fence. He was a handsome dude, with gleaming orangey-red haunches, but was prone to break jail quite often and head for one of our corn fields.

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