Here I am proudly displaying a nice crop of corn which I grew single-handedly. I grew the crop as a high school project when I was 15 years old. All the work was done with single mule equipment. The land was turned with a single plow pulled by our faithful mule, Liz. The seed were planted by a single row corn planter pulled by Liz. The corn was thinned and weeded by a hoe in my hands. It was cultivated a row at a time with a single mule cultivator, and finally it was bedded up with a single plow. It was harvested a ear at a time with a corn peg, and each ear was tossed into a horse cart to be carried to the corn crib. Our last mule, Liz, and I worked hard to produce this corn. And, Liz crunched on the golden grain with well earned satisfaction the following winter.
Sometime around 1925 Hattie's house caught fire and burned to the ground before my eyes. It was a sad affair and the turning point in our farming. From then on, Dad farmed pretty much alone. He did hire day labor on occasion, but we had little money for labor. The farm was without tenant laborers. He carried on valiantly growing vegetable mostly for the local market. By the time I became 15, he depended upon me for all of the assistance I could provide, and I became a partner of sorts. Fortunately, much of the work could be done in the summer after school was out. I worked in the fields with him and did much of the selling of produce on Market Street, in downtown Norfolk.
I wanted desperately to earn some money on my own. And I kept after Dad to let me grow a crop of soy beans. At that time we called them stock peas, because they could be mowed while still green and made good hay. Mr. Tom Dowdy had an eight acre cut that had grown poor after repeated crops of corn grown with no fertilizer. I had read that the soy bean had the property of gathering nitrogen from the air and thus provided some of their own nutrition. Against my Dad's better counsel, I leased the land from Mr. Dowdy for something like two dollars an acre. My brother, Elbert, loaned me the money for rent and for seed.
Dad let me use his old Fordson tractor to plow and disk the land. It was slow work and I rode the tractor late into the night watching the furrow by the dim light of the red hot exhaust pipe. I planted the soy beans in marked off rows and waited for nature to do its work. There was not time enough in the days for cultivation and I depended upon the shade of the closely planted beans to keep the weeds down - not so good. But, I did grow a crop of sorts, the yield was poor. After the beans had matured and we had witnessed a heavy freeze or two, I engaged Speed Paxton to harvest the beans. He had the only combine in the neighborhood. He graciously helped me out. But, his combine became mired in the field for several days before the task was completed. He harvested just enough beans to pay for his labor. My labor was for naught, and I was unable to repay brother Elbert. I should have listened to Dad.
Dad had many friends in the city market. The city market occupied a large and beautiful building on the corner of Market Street and Monticello Avenue in downtown Norfolk. One of Dad's friends, Mr. Lambert, ran a produce stand in the market. Mr. Lambert gave me a Saturday job when I was not selling our own produce out on the street. Mr. Lambert specialized in selling freshly ground coconuts. He imported them in large quantities and had a walkin refrigerator loaded with large bags of coconuts. The bags were of a heavy grade of burlap which was necessary to keep them from bursting. (more about this later.) Mr. Lambert maintained a chopping block in his market stall and a very keen hatchet. He had through the years developed the skill to chop the hard shell off the coconuts and still keep his fingers. He would not let me do this dangerous job, but he gave me the less risky task of grating the coconuts on his motor driven grating machine. I would drain the coconuts and grate perhaps a dozen at a time to keep the shreds fresh for the customers on demand. Coconut butter would build up in the machine, and I would dispense of it with gusto as needed. We sold snap beans two pounds for a quarter. I took pride in weighing out the beans in a paper sack to the almost exact weight before placing them on the scale. (Two handfuls did the job.) Now, back to the burlap coconut bags I was telling about. I prevailed upon Mr. Lambert to let me have the bags to take home, and I acquired a dozen or so of them. Dad, had a sturdy sail maker's needle that was curved and the eye would accept burlap string. We ripped open the large coconut bags to a single thickness, and then Dad sewed the edges of the bags together to form a long burlap tarpaulin for use in covering our hot beds at night. (more later.)
Tomatoes were our most successful crop. In prior years when times were good, Dad had bought about twenty hot bed sash. These sash were about three feet wide and six feet long. They were well constructed like window sash with longitudinal mullions that separated some five rows of glass panes. We kept them stored in the shed, and they were quite heavy for one man to tote to the area of the cold frame. Dad constructed the cold frames to accommodate the sashes. The frames were judiciously located on the south side of a heavy privet hedge that bounded the barnyard. The cold frames were made of wide rough sawn pine boards. Dad complained about the high cost of the boards which cost two cents a board foot.
All of this work was done in the cold January weather. In mid February about four inches of hot manure was packed in the bottom of the cold frames. This manure was hauled directly from the stable where it had accumulated to a depth of a foot or so, and it was moist and rank with ammonia from frequent urination of the mules. The application of the manure transformed the cold frames into hot beds. A four inch layer of good humus soil was shoveled in on top of the manure. While all of this was going on, Dad had tested the germination rate of the tomato seed by placed a sample between moist cotton bats on the warm mantelpiece above the living room stove. Over the years we grew crops of June Pink, Detroit, and Marglobe tomatoes. June Pink was grown because it matured earlier than the other varieties, and early tomatoes brought a higher price. But Marglobe yielded better, and was more marketable. Around the first of March Dad planted the seeds in neat rows in the hot beds. He did this by sifting the seed through his trained fingers in an impression made by a straight rod. After planting, germination was encouraged by the heat of the sun shining through the glass sash, aided by the heat of the manure going through a chemical reaction. Each evening we had to bed down the hot beds with the burlap blanket that I told you about. An abundant layer of pine straw was placed on top of the burlap to help retain the heat. Needless to say, each morning we had to uncover the beds to let the sun in, and then in the evening cover them up again for the night. All of this was done to grow our own early plants to be set out as soon as danger of frost was over.
After the seed had germinated and developed their second leaves, each row of plants had to be thinned to a plant every inch or so. Temperature and growth control became important and was an art. If the beds became too hot, the plants would become fragile, and if the temperature was too cool, the growth would slow. We adjusted the temperature during the heat of the day, by raising the lower end of the sash to allow ventilation. Dad tried to time the growth so that we had nice sturdy plants available for transplanting in the field when it appeared that the last April frost was over - quite often, after the last full moon in April. If the plants grew to fast, Dad and I together would prune the leaves of each plant with household scissors. We would carefully snip off the tips of the leaves and the stems would grow more sturdy. Also, if the plant were growing too fast, we would dirt them up. Dad had made a long bottomless tray with tapered sides that would fit between the rows of tomatoes. We could fill the tray with soft friable dirt and delicately lift it to deposit the dirt against the stems of the tomatoes. In a few days, the stems would issue little roots into the new added soil.
When the time approached for setting out the plants, the rows in the field had to be freshly turned. Dad laid off the rows on 4-1/2 foot centers. We set the plants out on 3-1/2 foot centers within the row. The width between rows was set accurately by a piece of farm equipment called a marker. The spacing in the row between plants was approximate, as judged by the person who dropped the plants. This spacing required about 2500 plants for an acre. So, you see, we had to grow about 5,000 plants to set out a two acre patch. On planting day, we would hire one or two hands to help us. The plants were carefully forked from the hot bed into the mule cart and carried to the field. Quite often I was the dropper, the person who dropped the plants at equal spaces on the row. Two or three persons would follow the dropper with hand trowels or sawed off hoes to open a hole, place the plant, and tamp the earth around the plant. If tomato plants become too tall, the plant can be set out in a little trench to accommodate the additional height, thus leaving just enough stem above the ground to have the plant stand upright. If we kept the exposure of the plants to the air at a minimum, and if the earth was sufficiently moist, the plants would scarcely wilt. We prayed for a rain soon, because watering 5,000 plants by hand was out of the question.
During the early growing season I cultivated the field with Liz and the one-row cultivator. Liz and I worked well together, and pulling a walk behind cultivator is less arduous on the mule than plowing. Guiding the cultivator as close as possible to the plants without damage requires skill, not unlike riding a bicycle. A certain amount of hand hoeing was required to keep the weeds and grass down. Dad and I did most of it, and Maryland would help us when necessary. Tomato worms, also called tobacco worms, were a constant menace. They are large, ugly, green worms with a ravenous appetite. They not only devour the foliage, but also chew holes into the tomatoes. We could not allow this, and frequently Dad and I would search the field, row by row, and shear the worms in half with a pair of scissors. It was tiring and disgusting work, but we were able to keep the worms in check.
In early July we could start picking tomatoes. The very first local tomatoes to reach the Norfolk market would bring a premium price - maybe a dollar and a quarter for a 15 pound basket. Dad took great pride in the quality of the tomatoes we packed. In the first place, we only picked the nicest tomatoes in the field. Many of the tomatoes were soiled because heavy rains would splash mud on them. All of the picked tomatoes were brought to the yard, where under the shade of a mulberry tree, we would clean the tomatoes one at a time with a damp rag, grade them, and pack them into peck tomato baskets which had a handle on top. The 'Select' grade were the finest tomatoes we could produce, and many of the city grocery store buyers sought us out. We also tried to sell the less desirable tomatoes - those with scarfaces and cracks as a cull grade, and we were lucky if we could get 25 cents a basket for them.
One day, a storm was brewing as we picked the tomatoes. We hurriedly brought the tomatoes to the front lawn and emptied the baskets under the shade of a large mulberry tree. There we sat in a circle on the ground and cleaned and packed the tomatoes in peck baskets. The rain moved in, and for a while we were sheltered by the mulberry tree. Soon, it began to pour, and our leaky umbrella was inadequate. Better minds sought shelter, but I was determined to finish the job. Soon, I was drenched to the bone. It was a hot July day, and I first thought it was fun, but the rain was cold and I became chilled; it was fun no more. After a while I found myself sitting in a pond of water. I had met the challenge and finished my job.
It was my job to take a truck load of tomatoes to Market Street and find the best place to park along the curb. There was heavy competition for the preferred spots, and in order to get the best spot, I would take the truck in on a Sunday afternoon, find a good location, and prepare to sell the tomatoes at daybreak on Monday morning. We did not move the truck for the entire week for fear of loosing our spot. Dad would replenish my produce supply every day or two by bringing a carload of tomatoes to town. We had removed the seats of the '32 Chevvie and installed shelves to load it as full as possible. On one occasion during the peak of the marketing season, I spent the entire week on the truck, day and night, without a change of clothes. I slept a few hours each night between 11:00 PM and 5:00 AM sprawled across the truck seat. It was grueling, but necessary. One season in mid June we had a terrible hail storm that mutilated our finest tomatoes, and the crop was almost a total loss. If we had a good season we would make a few dollars more than expenses for the months of hard work. That was farm life for us during the depression. So much for the good old times. hail storm
We also grew fields of cantaloupes and watermelons. Both of these crops are iffy to grow and depend on just the right amount of rainfall. I sold the melons on the market from the truck bed, as I have explained above. Not only did I sell them by the basket, but I also retailed them one or two at a time to passing shoppers. I sold to drive-by customers late at night, when the movies closed. On one occasion I passed a nice melon through the car window from the truck, and the driver immediately sped away without paying. I was determined that this would never happen again. So, I kept a good hard melon at hand to crash against the windshield of any would be culprit, if another attempt was ever made. Fortunately, I never had to use my weapon.
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