Not rich in dollars but rich in memories and experiences. Life on a family farm with three brothers and four sisters was busy, chaotic, and interesting but never boring. From time to time I remember some event from the past. Most are pointless and somewhat random. I am typing a few of these remembrances. The stories are told as seen through my eyes. This account is not necessarily accurate but as remembered at 73 years old. 

My first memories go back to being a toddler when we lived in the Smith home. I do remember the building and the general appearance of the house and out buildings. I will make a sketch of the house and yard as I remember it later. In Thoreau’s words “I was born in a nick of time” and in the middle of God’s country. Brother Autry would often welcome us to God’s house on Sunday mornings at Pine Grove Church. I took this literary as a small boy. I did sometimes think that the Almighty God had a rather small house given His power to create anything He desired. The church was full of God’s saints that went to their knees to pray. Mr. John Hale usually had a loud strong voice. When he prayed his voice shook with humility. Clearly he was speaking to and with the Almighty God. Other older men also prayed with that deep humility that moved even a child. People at that time used old English pronouns and archaic words that gave unusual majesty to prayer. Words such as thy, hath, thou, thee, ye, knoweth, loveth, and other King James words were often used in prayer.

I could write books about the wonderful people in the little world of my childhood and youth. The people who lived in the Able’s Store Community and along Beck Springs Road were helpful, kind, and tolerant. There were no modern homes in the bottom when I was a child. I think Grandma’s house was the first up to date home built on the road. In its day, the Smith home was the finest house in the area.

Grandpa Smith 

The Smith house was located a couple of hundred feet east of the current Johnson Ormon home. The Smith home was where Grandma Ormon was raised. In its time, it was the finest house in area. The house was a dog-trot style house painted white with a grey slate roof. Great Grandpa (Samuel Franklin) Smith owned a very large farm covering thousands of acres. He liked to dress nice and sit tall on a fine horse. Grandma said that they had a very nice buggy when she was young. She and her sisters would be dressed up and step out of the buggy in style at church. Their buggy was pulled by a matched pair of horses with good harness. Other families arrived in wagons pulled by mules. Grandpa Smith liked to kiss women. Any female without regard for age got kissed on the mouth when visiting Grandpa Smith. I remember Pauline, dad’s sister, saying that they liked to visit Grandma and Grandpa Smith except for having to kiss grandpa. Daddy said his byword was "pshaw". Grandpa Smith was known for his ability to predict the weather. People would come to him before cutting hay to see if they had three day before rain.

The Beekeeper

Dad had a bee yard when we lived in the Smith house. There were 12 or 15 hives. The bee yard was located just north of the storage shed and West of the Smith house. The bee yard was fenced so I never went inside the fence but watched dad when he inspected his hives. He did not wear any gear when he was just checking the bees and hives. I remember clearly watching dad rob the hives. He wore the hat with netting around it, gloves and perhaps other protection. He put some oily rags into a smoke puffer and lit the rags so that it smoldered. There was a trigger like handle that he could pull to make a puff of dense smoke. I watched as he puffed smoke into the hives to calm the bees before removing the honeycombs. He placed the big chunks of comb into what looked like big tin lard cans. He gave me a lump of honeycomb to eat. It was very good and a new experience. Someone told me not to swallow the wax after chewing out the honey. The honeycomb was placed in a machine that spun the honey out of the wax combs. The machine had a handle that was turned to make it spin. The honey was strained through a white mesh into gallon buckets. The wax was also kept. I suppose there was a market for the wax. Dad must have sold most of the honey as there was much more than a family could use. 

I don’ have any memory of the bee yard after we moved to the Ormon house. Dad had an interest in all farm creatures including bees. 

40’s and 50’s

 Daddy and Johnson traded houses when I was just a few years old. The reason for the trade was to be closer to the land they farmed. Daddy had several mules and at least one horse at that time. Two big mules were named Pigeon and Clyde. Sometimes he would let me ride a mule home from the field. He would lead the mules by the reins. I sat on the left hand mule of the team. It felt like I was 50 feet off the ground.

We moved into the old Charlie Ormon house that was located about 70 or 80 feet south of the location where Grandma Ormon would build her house. There was a large cistern at the southwest corner of the house. The house had a tin roof. There was movable gutter that could be moved into position to direct rain water into the cistern. When a rain started you waited a short time until the roof was washed clean. Then you moved the gutter to drain into the cistern. Milk and butter were placed in a bucket and lowered into the cistern to keep cold when there was no ice in the icebox. The iceman came about once a week. He placed a beautiful clear block of ice in the wooden icebox. He carried the ice block with a set of tongs. Some ice was chipped off the ice block for tea at lunch most days. There was a pan under the ice box to catch melt water that had to be emptied every day. Mom later got a kerosene refrigerator that made ice. There was no electricity in Tippah Bottom at this time. Mom washed clothes in a washtub with a rub-board. The clothes were rinsed in clean water; hand wrung and hung on the clothes line. Sheets and white clothes were boiled. Water for washing was heated in the wash-pot over a fire. Mom got a washing machine sometime after Mark and Clark were born. Cloth diapers were used by all mothers at this time. The washing machine had gasoline engine with a kick starter. You still had to heat water in the wash pot and carry water to the washing machine in buckets. You had to run each of the clothing items through the wringer when washing and rinse was finished. 

Electricity came to us while we lived in the Ormon house. Up until this time all lighting was with kerosene lamps. We only had electric lights at first. Each room had a single bulb hanging from a long cord in the center of the room. There were no wall switches. You turned the light on or off by pulling a string from the bulb. There was somewhat of a ceremony the first night of electric lights. Supper was on the table and mom suggested turning on the electric light. Someone pulled the string and the light came on. Dad immediately covered his eye with his hand and told mother to turn that thing off and get a lamp. He then said "Now I know why most city people wear glasses. They burned their eyes out with those electric lights”.

The Ormon house burned when I was a small child. Mark and Clark were babies. The fire started from the wood cook stove in the kitchen. Mom has just started the stove fire with some kerosene soaked kindling as she always did. There must have been a chimney fire that ignited dust and lint in the attic. The fire spread rapidly through the attic of the of the old pine house. I can still remember seeing the flames through the cracks in the ceiling boards. Everyone rushed outside. I realized that all I had on was my underwear. People were rushing in and out of the old house saving furniture. I ran back in to get my clothes. The fire was roaring in the attic and had broken through into the kitchen. It was already hot and smoky in the front room where I slept. I grabbed a handle at one end of my foot-locker and dragged it out the back porch door. I kept going until I was outside the back fence. Flames were now shooting out the top of the house. People were wetting quilts and blankets to through on grandma's house. The heat was causing the roof of her house to smoke. The Holly Springs fire truck came to the fire. The house was too far gone to bother with when they arrived. It burned to the ground. I dug around in the ashes in the days after the fire. I remember finding the silver dollars Uncle JW Crum gave Mark and Clark at their birth. The coins were recognizable but melted togeather. The coins are still at mother's house to this day. JW gave each family child a silver dollar at birth. I have no idea what happened to my silver dollar.

Our family moved into an existing house a few hundred feet west of grandma's house after the old Ormon house burned. The house was sound but abandoned and rundown. I don’t know who lived in the house previously. I think it could have been Brooks Hayden, but uncertain. The old house was updated before we moved in. A kitchen sink with hot and cold water was added. An electric range and an electric refrigerator were also added. Dad also built a new out-houses. It has two "positions", a concrete floor and a deep pit under it to reduce odor. This is the only two seat outhouse I have ever seen. I can't remember ever sharing it with anyone. An old Sears-Roebuck or Penny catalog was used for both reading material and finishing the project. A night jar, we called it the "pot", was kept in the house at night. The chore of dumping the pot into the outhouse was passed among the children who were old enough. This was the most hated chore at our house. It made me shudder to think about having to do this chore.

We heated the house with two sheet metal stoves in that house. One stove was in the kitchen and the other was in the living room. The wood pile was behind the house next to the old log smoke house. I can still remember using a pole ax to break the frozen sticks of wood apart in the winter. Some wood was placed in the wood box behind the kitchen heater to use the next morning. The heater fires were banked at night in the hope that enough coals would remain to start the fire the next morning. The morning fire was restarted by putting a few pine knots on the leftover coals followed by small sticks then larger sticks of firewood. Dad built the morning stove fires very hot to warm the house. Many mornings the heaters would get red hot and start making a “woofing” sound. Dad would say that the heater is walking. It did sound like someone walking in deep snow. Sometimes mornings were very cold in those old drafty houses. There was no heat at night no matter how cold the temperature. All the boys slept in one room in that old house. My brother’s breathe created columns of steam as they slept. We wasted no time grabbing some clothes and running to a heater to get dressed when we woke up. 

We took turns milking the cow before school. You coaxed the cow into the milking stall by giving her some good feed. Then you put the "kickers" on her to prevent kicking the milk bucket over. We usually had a jersey cow that gave rich creamy milk. The cream would rise to the top of the milk jug in a few hours. Mom would sometimes skim off the cream for whipped cream on desserts. After milking, we changed clothes to go to school. Sometimes the cow got a taste for onions in the early spring. The onion taste would immediately flavor the milk. Onion flavored milk sometimes made us shudder and make faces. We drank it anyway. During the summer, the cow would start eating a few bitter weeds when the grass was short. The bitter weed flavored milk was worse than onion milk. Other unidentified weeds would give the milk a strange flavor. 

We had some simple favorite foods when we were growing up. I think we all liked "cornbread and milk". Crumble some cold cornbread in a glass or bowl, pour milk over it, and eat. "Cornbread and sorghum molasses" Split hot cornbread, cover with butter, pour on molasses, eat. A major treat was fried bologna on "loaf bread". Another treat was hoop cheese melted in an iron skillet on hot biscuits. We all loved mother’s potato soup. The potato soup was often eaten poured over crumbled cornbread. During cotton picking season, mom made potato soup by the dishpan full. That was about three gallons. This fed us and many other cotton pickers. Some people still rave about how good it was. The Autry kids almost always ate dinner with us during “cotton picking “season. We called the noon meal "dinner" instead of lunch at that time. Dinner consisted of potato soup, corn bread and sweet iced tea. Once in a while there would be plain sheet cake. We ate corn on the cob from the blister stage until the corn it started to dent. I always loved boiled corn in the blister stage. There is a certain flavor that is lost as the corn matures.

Dad added a "freezer house" after we had lived there for a few years. This little building still exists. It is behind the new house (built about 50 years ago at this writing). It has a freezer in it to this day (Aug, 2013). Prior to that time Mom and Dad rented a frozen food locked in New Albany. Meat would be carried over to New Albany after killing hogs or having a calf killed. Mom would go over to pick up some frozen meat every two or three weeks. Mom would sometimes pick me up at school to go to New Albany. It was exciting to get out of school and walk around town.

Dad was in inventor. We had a solar heated shower when I was very young. He had a shower head welded to a 55 gallon metal drum. This was mounted on a platform about six feet high. A wooden pallet was the floor of the shower. He hung “tote sacks”, burlap bags, around it to provide some privacy. We filled the drum with water and let the sun do the heating water heating. The shower was located about 40 feet southeast of the house. I can remember dashing out the shower naked carrying nothing but a towel and a bath cloth. I usually waited until dark to shower. I don’t remember if any of my sisters used the shower.

Water Boy

Sometimes things stick in your mind. This story happened in the late nineteen forties when I was four or five years old. Daddy and several hands were working in the field east of the branch south of the road later named Beck Springs Road. There were 3 or 4 teams of mules being worked in the field. Mother sent me to the field with water for the field workers. The cool cistern water was in two half gallon jugs. The jugs has handles kind of like pickle jugs. We lived in the old Ormon house behind the site where grandma's house would be built. That made the distance to the field about a half mile. I got tired and rested several times on the way. The water jugs were heavy. I could hear the sound of workers well before getting to the field. Shouts of "gee”, "haw”,"yea" in strong loud voices from all over the field. 

The first person I reached was Bill Elliot. He lived in the Erye house with Molly at that time. Bill was a black man. At that time we referred to black people as colored people. Bill stopped his team and waited for me to hand him a water jug. I said “Mama told me which jug was for colored men and which are for the white men but I have forgotten!" Bill laughed hardily. Bill then said “The one with the wire handle is for the colored men. The wood handle one is for the white men." Things were easy from there on. I was very grateful to Bill for helping me remember which jug was which. I didn't tell mama about Bill's help. 

Daddy would walk up to Bill Elliot's to play checkers occasionally when I was a small boy. Bill lived in the Erye house with Molly at that time. The entire Erye house was about 14 by 20 feet divided into two rooms. The front room had pot bellied stove, a bed, a couple of trunks, a small table and a few straight chairs. The tiny back room was a kitchen equipped with a small wood stove and an ancient wood icebox. Daddy and Bill would play checkers at the front room table by a kerosene lamp. Molly would sit at the table sewing apparently ignoring the checker game. Bill would sometimes hesitate touching a checker. Molly would glance over at the checker board. Then Molly would quietly go back to sewing. Bill would move his hand indicating he had finished his move. In some instances, Molly would make a quiet "Mmmm" sound as she resumed her sewing. Bill would pull his checker back and rethink the move. Daddy pretended not to notice Molly’s help. Daddy would often laugh about this as we walked home.

Learning from Citizen Warren

Citizen Warren was a very interesting man. He lived and worked on dad's farm for many years. Citizen’s wife was named Willie May. She was a big kind sweet person. I think she sometimes babysat Paul and Jane. Perhaps I misremember.

Clearing land and farm work can be monotonous, boring and backbreaking. Citizen made such work interesting and tolerable by telling stories and giving advice. Citizen told many stories of hardship when he lived and worked "down on Saint Francis" in Arkansas. It seems that Citizen took a job on a large farm on the St. Francis River in the Arkansas delta. The job turned into virtual slavery. Citizen was not allowed to leave the farm. One night he saw an opportunity to get away. He and his family fearfully sneaked away in the middle of the night. He could mimic his fearful face looking behind him for followers as he told the "escape from Saint Francis" story. You could imagine every night sound turning into hoof beats as he told the story. He would have us helpless with laughter. In looking back, I'm sure the escape was very frightening.

Citizen has another story that we loved to hear. The story begins with Citizen getting lost in Tippah County. Somehow he had ventured into the Hatchie Bottom area. At that time black people were not only unwelcome but in danger in that area. Citizen drove over a hill and noticed that a man was chopping wood beside his house. The man raised his ax and spotted citizen coming up the road. The man locked his eyes on citizen and held the ax over his head until Citizen passed over the next hill. Citizen then guessed where he might be. Citizen said he was petrified with fear. He said that his hat was pushed forward as hair stood up on his neck until he could barely see. He said every person stared at him until he was out of sight. He could mimic every fearful look and the hat rising as he told the story. 

Citizen had many stories. I wish I could remember them all. He had a serious side too. The serious advice often started with "Let me tell you something white folks.” We, of course, listened carefully. Citizen would deliver some sage advice that had the sound and flavor of wisdom from a great philosopher. Unfortunately, I frequently did not understand. I guess you had to have walked in Citizen's shoes to appreciate the advice. I would love to hear Citizen tell stories and give advice again.

Sometimes wonderful life experiences seem trivial at the time. Reminiscing makes one wish that such moments had been savored more.

Indian Mound School

My education started at Indian Mound School. This one room school was located at the top of Renick Hill on the North side of the road. Grades one through eight was taught by one teacher. Patty Sue Ormon was the teacher at the time I attended. Actually I was only four when I started to school. I guess mom saw an opportunity to get one kid out of the house for a few hours. I was the only “first grader” there. The older children helped teach the younger children. One of the eighth grade girls often helped me with my lessons. I can’t remember her name but she was very pretty. I enjoyed my days at Indian Mound. Patty Sue would pick up a car load of kids in the mornings. The remaining children walked to school. There were no paved roads in the community at that time. Many mornings we had to get out of the car and push it up Renick Hill through the deep mud. We had a wood heater in the school room. The boys would get out of school sometimes to gather pine knots for fire starting. Of course, there was a lot of playing, running through the woods, in addition to gathering kindling. 

The County consolidated all schools the year after I went to Indian Mound. Mom started me over in the first grade at Hickory Flat as I was only five years old and small for my age. First grade at Hickory Flat was boring as I could already read and do almost all first grade work. I got my first spanking for working ahead in my workbook. I had already been warned not to do tomorrows work but I got caught. Mom never knew about this. Spankings took place in the cloak room. There was a sign over the door “Cloak Room”. I have sometimes wondered when people stopped calling a heavy outer coat a cloak. 

The Lunch Room

Lunch in the lunch room was 15 cents when I first started to Hickory Flat School. Mom gave me 75 cents each Monday to prepay my lunches each week when I was in the first grade. I remember the food being basically good but far more than I wanted to eat. You got a sucker if you cleaned your plate. I often struggled to eat it all to get that sucker. I had a thing at about six years old of being unable to eat mixed up food. If they dripped some juice from the peas on my potatoes, then I could not eat the potatoes. No sucker. I did learn that I could smear uneatable mixed up food all over the plate making it appear that some of everything was more or less consumed thus earning the sucker.

The lunch room was open at recess. You could get a half pint of chocolate or regular milk for 3 cents. I often got a regular milk and chocolate milk if I had the 6 cents required. The milk was in little glass milk jugs at that time. I liked the taste of the "bought" milk better than the raw milk we has at home. Raw milk is good but the taste depends on what the cow ate yesterday. Early spring milk tasted like onions if the pasture had wild onions. Summer milk tasted like bitter weeds if the cow developed a taste for them. 

We had a candy store at school that opened at recess. Essentially everything cost 5 cents. Ice cream bars, candy bars, peanuts, cracker jacks and etc. There was a small tubular container of peanuts that cost a nickel. The package said that coins from a penny to a half dollar were placed in some packages. I sometimes bought this but only got a penny once. 

Pocket Knives 

I noticed on the news that a child was expelled from school in Memphis. His infraction was carrying a small pocket knife. This made me remember how things change. No boy would be without his pocket knife even when I was in elementary school. Owning a "Case" or "K-Bar" raised your status. Most of us only had cheap dime store knives. I don't remember any significant injuries. A finger was cut here and there. I don't remember any case of fights or threats with knives. Of course, there were plenty of differences settled by fist fights. I lost all of my fights. Mom seemed to ignore my black eyes and scrapes. A few boys carried "frog stickers" in junior high and high school. These were essentially folding hunting knives. 

We played a game called mumble-peg with our knives. The game went something like this. The long knife blade was fully opened. The short blade was opened only halfway. The knife was positioned standing on the ground on the small blade. The played flipped the knife into the air a short distance with his index finger. The knife rotated in the air a couple of feet. Points were awarded based on how the knife landed. Most points were awarded for landing sticking up on the big blade. 

We would often "drop knives" at recess. This was a blind knife swap. The players would hold a knife over the other person’s hand. At a signal they would drop a knife into the other person’s hand. The rule was that you got what you got. Obviously all dropped knives were "plugs". A plug was a knife in very poor condition. Plugs had broken blades, missing blades, bad springs, cracked handles and perhaps all of these issues. You simply hoped to get a somewhat less dilapidated plug when you did a knife drop with someone.

We did make honest knife trades sometimes. The negotiation could get fierce on the amount of "boot" for the better knife. Boot could be as little as a few cents and could be as much as sixty cents. This was significant money because adults only earned 3 dollars a day (12 hrs) for hoeing cotton at that time.

Raising Cotton

We had cotton, corn, hogs, cows, chickens, peacocks, guineas, dogs, mules and horses on the farm when I was very young. Dad continued to be a diversified farmer all his working life. I remember many mules and horses when I was a child. A number of families lived in the tenant houses on the farm. Many laborers were required to farm before the wide use of tractors in the 1950's. Weed and grass control in crops were done with hoes. Any child old enough to know the difference between grass and crop worked in fields in the summer. Hoe handles were cut down for smaller children. Usually older hoes that have been sharpened many times were used by the kids. Children over 5 or 6 were expected to hoe and pick cotton. Babies were laid on pallets under shade trees watched over by toddlers. Mothers would stop work to breast feed their babies from time to time.

 I looked forward to being 10 years old so that I could drive a tractor instead of hoeing cotton. Field workers worked from just after daylight until just before dark. This was sometimes 14 hours. Adult cotton choppers were paid three dollars a day when I was a boy. Children were paid two dollars or less per day. Sometimes we would get caught up for a few days and I could chop for a neighbor. I would spend all day planning what I would buy with the three dollars I would earn. Cotton picking was paid on a per pound basis. The rate was usually 2 or 3 cents per pound. A really good cotton picker could pick 200 pounds in 10 or 12 hours. I was never a good cotton picker. Both Mark and Clark could pick a lot of cotton. Everybody older than toddlers picked cotton. Sometimes very small children picked and put the cotton in their parent’s sack.

We sometimes had families working that did not get along. Dad would arrange to have these families work in different fields to keep the peace. I never learned, or cared at the time, what the problems were.

There were a few time when the cotton field was filled with wonderful hymns. It sounded like a choir in a black church. A lead singer would sing a verse in a strong high voice. Then all the singers would chant or sing the chorus. On some songs they would move from unison to parts with no obvious direction. The singing did not interrupt the cotton picking. 

The Autry children were as close as brothers and sisters during cotton picking season. Jerry, Lanny and Martha were there every day. Martha picked perfectly clean cotton. She picked out every bur and leaf particle. Dad placed her cotton in one corner of the truck with the hope that her cotton would come out in the sample.

Mother would come to the front of the house and wave a towel when dinner time came. We would wave our hats to signal that we got the message. We named the meals breakfast, dinner and supper back then. Gail took over fixing dinner when she was old enough. I think mother liked field work better than kitchen work. Eventually Judy became the cook and towel waver. The duty passed to Louise when she was old enough. Family farming was over before Jane got to be the cook for the field hands.

Dad had some cotton land rented several miles from home. When we picked cotton in those fields it was not practical to eat dinner at home. Mom would write down our orders for dinner. Each picker would put in an order expecting to have the cost deducted from his daily wages. The food was usually picked up at Able’s store. People order all sorts of food. Mostly people ordered a cheese, lunch meat, or liver cheese sandwich. The meat in the sandwich was around a half inch thick. There were a few slow pickers who had little wages left after deducting the dinner cost.

  We had a split school session when I was young. School would start earlier than most school systems. School would then turn out for a few weeks of "cotton picking". The split session system was terminated when I got into high school. Dad kept us out for the first six weeks of school to pick cotton. Somehow we would catch up each year with some help from the teachers. 

Fishing 

Fishing was a favorite thing to do in the spring and summer from childhood until I was grown. We would get the fishing gear out when it was too wet to hoe or plow. We mostly used "set hooks" to catch catfish on the Tippah Channel and the old run (original Tippah River). The channel dug early in the 1900's was beginning to become clogged with logs and drifts. It was still a swift flowing waterway. We would use ground puppys, spring lizards, wood sawyers and other baits. By other names the bait was spotted salamanders, yellow stripped salamanders and betsy bug larva. The black spotted salamanders were the preferred bait. You turned over old rotting logs and grabbed them before they could run away. The slime from their skin was difficult to get off your hands. 

Poles were cut from saplings and sharpened so that it could be jammed into the river bank. The fishing line consisted of about 4 or 5 feet of strong nylon line with an eagle claw hook at the end and a heavy lead sinker tied about 4 inches above the hook. The fishing line was looped to the end of the sapling fishing pole. We would work together gathering bait. One or more of us would cut and prepare poles, others would attach fishing lines and bait the hooks, yet others would find likely places and jam the end of the poles securely into the river bank. We would sometimes set 50 or even 100 hooks late in the afternoon. 

We often checked the hooks later in the night. This was very exciting to me when I was young. Fresh bait was put on hooks where the bait was missing. The big thrill was to hear a pole splashing into the water. You knew you had a big one! We took turns dragging the fish in. The hooks were checked again early the next morning. Usually the lines were removed to be used next time. Poles were stuck in the ground on the bank for possible reuse. 

Sometimes we would set hooks on the Old Run, original Tippah River. You would catch mostly smaller yellow catfish. We dressed and ate anything that would make two bites. 

When I was a teenager we often fished the sloughs and beaver ponds with cane poles for bass and whatever else would bite. Uncle John and Glenn Cossitt would to fish with us sometimes. Uncle John liked to catch big bream. He would drop his line around brush and logs. He would often get his hook hung on something. Glenn and I would be rolling in laugher at Uncle John’s colorful language and his violent attempts to get his hook loose. We would occasionally hook a big Grinnell also known as bowfin. These things were huge and often broke our fish lines. 

A new Tippah canal was dug when I was in my early twenties. This essentially ended the canal fishing. One could wade across the new channel without getting more than ankles wet. This also drained the sloughs and reduced the old run to a stagnant crooked ditch.

Hunting

Dad loved to hunt, especially quail. He kept one or more bird dogs most of his adult life. He has a preference for pointers. I think this is mostly because the many cockleburs that tangled in setter long hair. He did have a couple of setters. They would wear their teeth out pulling cockleburs out of their hair. Dad wore the barrel of his old pump shotgun so thin that that the end of the barrel was sharp as a knife. 

Hunting with dad was serious business. There was no talking or fellowship stuff. We usually walked side by side with him preferring the left side. In this way, straightaway single birds were for whoever got the shot off first. Birds angling left were his and those to the right were mine. All communication was by hand signals or whistles. When a dog was out of sight for long enough to suspect a point on a covey we would separate and search. A short whistle indicated that the dog was sighted on a point. We would simply point to the dog and approach the dog to flush the covey. A dead quail is difficult to see especially in mixed leaves and grass. The only words allowed were a call of “dead” when a bird was killed. The dog, if good, would immediately begin searching the area to recover the bird.

Dad taught all of his sons to hunt as soon as we were old enough, 8 or 10 years old. Boys at that time started hunting as soon as they were big enough to shoot a single shot 410 or 20 gauge shotgun. All four of us sons loved hunting and hunting dogs. For many years we kept one or more pointer bird dogs. Dog names I can remember were:

Neil - Dad's bird dog that he hunted with about the time the old Ormon house burned.

Roadrunner - That dog hunted in a straight line. She would never break a point. Unfortunately, you could never find her on a walking hunt. When dad got where he could not walk any distance, he started a new hunting method. He would go to some dirt back road and turn Roadrunner out. Roadrunner would run the road with dad following in has pickup. You could be assured that roadrunner had found a covey if she lifted her head and left the road. Dad would get out of the truck hunt the covey and then back on the road. He carried several older men on great "roadrunner" hunts. Of course, that hunting method is now illegal.

Sue - This was a free dog I was given by a guy in Pascagoula. I hauled Sue up to North Mississippi in the trunk of my car. We noticed that Sue has a good nose right away. Unfortunately, she would only hold a point for a few seconds and then flush the covey. Clark gave her an unforgettable "WHOA" training session. She was extremely cautious not a flush a covey from that time on. She was a great dead bird finder. We had many great hunts with old Sue.

Sport - I think this was Mark's dog. We hunted with Sport and Whitey several for several years. I think Sport was killed in an accident of some kind.

Whitey - Whitey's death ended most bird hunting at the S. E. Ormon home. Whitey belonged to Clark. Whitey was a good dog that usually stayed a reasonable distance from the hunters.

We at times had a squirrel dog. Our favorite was Brownie. He was a part Chihuahua and stood maybe 13" high at the top of his ears. He was a great squirrel dog and a terrific retriever. He loved to finish things off if you could get the squirrel on the ground. Brownie got run over by a car while following us on a bird hunt. I think we would have all cried like babies if we had been alone. 

As time went on, Mark, Clark and Paul took up deer hunting. I hunted the deer a few times but never really got into the deer hunt. I continued to hunt the birds, quail, until our last dog died. Clark's Whitey died after a good day of hunting.

Our family was fond of eating wild game. We greatly enjoyed bird suppers (quail). Mom would fry up a couple of dozen birds, a bowl of brown gravy, mashed potatoes and a pile of biscuits. It smelled wonderful and tasted better. Wild quail and quail gravy has an aroma and taste that can't be duplicated.

We ate squirrels mostly at breakfast. Mom parboiled the squirrels to tenderize them. The squirrels were then battered and fried. Brown gravy was then made from the frying fat. Squirrel gravy also has a unique savory flavor. It is wonderful on homemade biscuits.

Mom usually baked ducks with sweet and Irish potatoes. It took 4 or 5 ducks to make a meal for our gang. All that would be left is a platter of duck skeletons.

Chickens

Almost everyone had yard chickens when I was a kid. Grandma kept chickens as long as she could care for them. The chickens were for both eggs and eating. She had nest boxes nailed to the side of some of the outbuildings. She placed a white glass egg in each nest. This “nest egg” encouraged the hens to lay in the nest. `The nests were placed about 4 or 5 feet above ground level to discourage snakes. Snakes, especially chicken snakes, love to eat eggs. Snakes are good climbers and often found a way to get into the nest where they swallowed the eggs whole. An egg filled snake is a strange sight. Each egg makes a lump in the snake’s body. It is easy to kill a snake full of eggs as he can barely crawl. I helped grandma kill several egg filled snakes. Grandma had no mercy on any snake. All were killed on sight usually with a hoe. She hung dead snakes on the back of the garden fence. I can't remember why.

I spent a lot of time with Grandma when I was very young. She taught me many things. When I was perhaps 5 or 6 she would get me to help her catch a chicken to eat. She kept a lot of yard chickens for eggs and eating. She would point out the chicken she wanted. I would corner it and grab it by the legs and then hold the chicken by the wings. She chooses older hens for making broth and dressing. A young chicken was picked for frying. I really enjoyed my job as chicken catcher. Grandma would kill the chicken by holding both wings behind the chicken, laying its head on a chopping block and chopping its head off with a hatchet. She had a chopping block beside the smoke house for this purpose. She told me that she placed the chopping block there so that the other chickens would not see their comrade being killed. It always interested me that she used the word comrade instead of friend. I will never forget that she was concerned even for the feeling of some chickens.

That makes me think of chicken dinners that mom prepared for us. We often had the freshest chicken that could be imagined. The fried chicken we ate was pecking happily a couple of hours ago in the back yard. I can remember how good chicken frying in lard smelled. Mom cut the chicken up so the there were a lot of pieces. There were two legs, two thighs, two pieces of breast, a pulley bone, the back, the liver, the craw, and the neck. Mom would say “I want the back”. She got no argument as the back had very little meat. 

Mom often raised a brooder full of pullets each spring. She would bring home a box of 50 or so fresh hatched chickens. The baby chickens were often delivered by mail. The baby chickens grew rapidly to frying size in a few weeks. We would have a chicken killing to prepare the chickens for the frozen food locker. Different people had different methods for killing the chickens. Mark and Clark particularly enjoyed doing the pullets in. I remember one time when they were trying to wring two chicken's necks at the same time. That is, a chicken in each hand. Mom put the chickens neck under a stick held down by both feet a pulled the chick by the legs. Chickens will flop about when they lose their heads. Mark and Clark liked to kill them quickly so that chickens were flopping everywhere in the back yard. The dead chickens were dipped in scalding water to wet and loosen the feathers. We picked the feathers off the chickens then passed the chicken quickly over a flame to singe the fuzz away. We gutted them and then mom cut the chicken up. Finally the chickens were wrapped and carried to the frozen food locker. We didn't have a freezer back then. Mom and dad rented a frozen food locker in New Albany at that time. The frozen food locker was a huge freezer with compartments that could be rented. From time to time mom or dad would pick up some frozen chickens. The refrigerator has a small frozen food compartment to keep the chicken in until it was used.

Dad liked yard fowl. He at times kept some strange looking chickens. Some had feather all the way to their feet. Others had strange looking combs and tail feathers. At several times he kept some peacocks and guinea hens. The guineas were somewhat like watch dogs. Any strange person or animal entering the yard would set them off making their “pot-rack” noise and looking in all directions. They could be loud. Unfortunately, they are not good at watching for cars. Dad’s guineas had a lot of causalities on the road. A large flock of geese were kept in the cotton fields to eat weeds and grass. 

Raising Hogs

Dad loved raising livestock of all kinds. He kept a herd of cattle all of his life and knew his cows by name. He also raised hogs. When prices were good he would keep a sometimes 20 brood sows. Each sow would have litters of six to ten pigs. We would turn the pigs in to corn fields when the pigs got big enough to be weaned from their mothers. The pigs would learn to ride down corn stalks and eat the corn. This saved having to harvest the corn and handle the corn in feeding. Old Tippah River ran nearby to provide water for the hogs. Hogs are wasteful, but even so, this was cost effective. The hogs would become basically wild animals. The hogs would become quiet nearby when you walked through the field. The hogs all froze when they heard the "strange creature" approaching. Then a single hog would make a "woof" sound. All hogs fled for their lives away from you. 

At some point we would round the hogs up for their shots and surgical procedures. I forget the diseases we vaccinated against. I think each hog got three shots. This was an assembly line process. We also performed all necessary surgery including turning boars into barrows and repairing hernias. Hogs are remarkably resilient. I have observed that most of my hernia repair patients actually survived and thrived. 

We would have a roundup when the hogs reached the "top" hog weight of 200 to 240 pounds. This was usually total chaos as the hogs fled in every direction among the corn stalks. On one roundup we had the drive perhaps a hundred hogs across the paved road in front of Grandma's house. Evidentially, the hogs thought the pavement was the river. None of them would set a foot on the pavement. We had to drag almost all of them across the pavement by the back legs. No easy task when the hogs fought and screamed all the way across. The remaining hogs thought there comrades ware being tortured and became even more frightened. 

On another occasion, we had to corral and load possibly 20 or 30 hogs on the truck to carry them to market. These were the some of the wild corn field hogs. We had a loading chute leading up to the truck bed. Ordinary hogs will see the chute as a possible escape route and one how will run up it with the others following. Not these hogs. They press as tightly into a corner with all head pushed tightly into the crowd. I grabbed a hog be the hind legs and dragged him up the chute hoping the rest would follow. The hog screamed so loud it made my ears hurt. He kicked so fast it blurred my vision. The remaining hogs wedged even more tightly into the corner. Dad was getting annoyed and I was getting angry. There was only way to load them. Drag each and every one of them up the chute. When I secured the truck tailgate, dad said “That was a damn good job son.". I will never forget how overwhelmed I felt at that moment. That was the first of two complements I received from dad. The "damn" in this instance raised the magnitude of the complement to an unbelievable level. Little did he realize that my action was mostly the result of an angry temper fit.

By the way, this does not mean that dad did not let me know he was pleased with a job I has finished. If he said nothing or nodded his head that ment acceptable work. If he said "I would have done this or that" then he wasn't completely pleased. Of course I would be thinking “Why didn’t you tell me, this or that, before I started?". All in all, we got along and I learned to read his mind so to speak. Intentional or not, dad taught me to work independently, solve my own problems and finish even difficult jobs. Dad taught me to do quality work and take pride in accomplishments.

Hog killing

Early on a frosty morning we would hitch up a wagon and go to the hog lot. We would have from three or four hog weighing around three hundred pound penned up ready to be killed. The hogs were shot in the head with a 22 to stun them. Then the major arteries were severed to bleed the hogs. The dead hogs were loaded on a trailer and hauled home. We would boil water in a couple of wash pots, Caldrons, to be used to scald the hogs. The boiling water was put in steel 55 gallon drums buried at an angle in the ground. The hogs were dipped in the hot water to loosen the hair. The hair was then scrapped off. The hogs were then hung by the rear legs and the guts removed. The intestines were cleaned for chitterlings by some of the people on the farm. Some families also ate the sweets meats consisting of kidneys, pancreas, and lungs. We only kept the heart, liver, and brains for our family use. The carcass was cut up into hams, shoulders, middling (bacon), various roast cuts, pork loins, and etc... The fat was cut into approximately 1 inch cubes and put into the pots to render the lard. The rendering process had to be stirred from time to time. It smelled delicious. After the rendering process the cracklings were strained out of the liquid lard. The lard was strained and put in tin containers for use as cooking fat. 

Dad prepared his sugar cure mix for preserving the hams, shoulders, and middling. The sugar cure consisted of sugar, salt, black pepper and perhaps other seasoning. He rubbed the mixture over the entire surface of the meat and packed ever crevice and hole in the meat cut. Each cut of meat was wrapped in plain brown paper and placed in a cotton bag. The bags were hung from cords in a shed. The hams were the most delicious I have ever eaten. They had that wonderful country flavor without being extremely salty. Mom would bake one of the hams for Christmas.

Lunch on hog killing day was fresh tenderloin just sliced and fried with biscuits and gravy. Breakfast the day following hog killing was brains and eggs with biscuits.

The Tempest

I could have just called this story “The Storm”; but I named it “The Tempest” from Shakespeare’s play for greater drama effect.

My neighbor, Arthur Sunday, and I spent a lot of time fishing, shrimping, and boating when we lived on the coast. We were generally careful to be near land when a storm approached. Even so, there were two occasions when we were caught up in a real violent tempest. The worst was while we were shrimping just north of Round Island in the channel. It was a beautiful summer afternoon. The sky was clear in all directions. The sea was flat with hardly a ripple. A number of other small boats were also shrimping in the area.

We were catching a good many white shrimp. We were using a 16 foot wide net. The net was pulled behind the 15 foot boat I had at the time. The trawl (net) lines were about 60 feet long. We would pull the net along at about a walking speed for about an hour and fifteen before we would pull the net in and dump the catch in the “picking tray”. The “junk” would be tossed overboard and the shrimp would be put in an ice chest. 

We had just put the net back overboard and were picking the shrimp out of the catch when I noticed something. There was a thin dark line on the eastern horizon stretching south to north. I pointed this out to Arthur. He said “storms don’t come from the east this time of year”. We continued sorting the catch. I looked back a few minutes later. The dark line had grown to a dark stripe grey at the bottom and black at the top. Arthur said “we better watch this”. Moment by moment the cloud grew into what looked like a long cigar shape that appeared to be rolling rapidly. I could see other boaters looking at this boiling cloud. Arthur said “let’s get out of here!” He tossed me a life jacket and put on his life jacket. By the way, that is only the third time I observed Arthur in a life jacket. I immediately began pulling in the net and boards. The storm was now approaching at a tremendous speed. Arthur said “cut the lines and start the motor!” I said “I don’t want to lose the net and boards”! A couple of minutes later I had the net and boards in the boat. We quickly dumped the catch. I started the motor and headed away from the storm at top speed. Unfortunately the storm quickly caught up with us. I had to slow down to keep the following sea from spilling into our boat as we had a heavy load of gear. We had to circle around the island to turn east to get to the dock. We were less than two miles away from the boat landing. We were now headed into the strong wind and blinding rain. It became as dark as night at the height of the storm. Arthur was bailing with a bucket. I was at times making no headway against the wind. All I could do was keep a heading into the waves to avoid getting swamped. The waves were running in crazy directions. Several time we topped a wave crest that took the propeller out of the water. I had to throttle back fast to prevent shearing the shear pin when the prop bit into the water again. If the prop shear pin sheared I had no steerage. We would be swamped quickly in the heavy seas. It was a slow and scary two miles but we made it. As we approached the boat landing the storm suddenly stopped. We could see it moving rapidly westward. 

We bailed and loaded the boat on the trailer. The storm was dissipating and the sun was peeping out. It seemed very strange that it was now so peaceful when less than an hour ago we were struggling to stay afloat. 

Several boats did sink in the storm but there was no life lost. Some boaters who waited too long to start in simply ran their boats aground on the island to escape the storm. Some boats were driven well upon the island. It probably took a lot of work to get them back in the water.

Respect

This story happened many years ago when I was about 40 years old. It was approaching fishing season one spring. My old Chevrolet pickup has sat in the back yard all winter unused. The wheels had sunk into the ground so that the frame was on the ground. This happens on the coastal sandy ground around Gautier where we lived at that time. I had to dig trenches under the truck to jack it out of ground. The hole under each wheel had to be filled with sand. The muffler was crushed so I had to replace it. This was a nasty job as I had to crawl under the truck in the mud. I noticed that the universal joint was worn out while under the truck. I was a greasy dirty mess when I finished. I charged the battery while doing all the repairs. I was eager to test all my repairs so I started the old truck.

 I decided to drive a few miles for a road test. I was dirty, greasy wearing an old throw away t-shirt. I think I had a beard at the time. The old truck was quite ugly because of rust from salt water boat launches. As I was driving along a county patrolman began to follow me. After a mile of so he pulled me over and walked up to the door of my truck and asked for my drivers license. I complied. He asked “Where did you get those tools back there, Hoss”. The light came on in my head. A dirty man in an ugly rusted out truck driving along with a lot of tools in the back sure looks suspicious. I explained why my tools were there. He then told me to have a nice day. I was left with the feeling of disrespect because I drove an ugly truck and was dirty. 

The disrespect incident did not trouble me for long. All I had to do was go home, clean up, put on nice clothes and drive around in my better car. The next day I can go to work where my name is Mr. Ormon and am treated in every way with dignity and respect. That is not an option for many, many people.

I have remembered that incident and tried to treat people with dignity and respect without regards for their apparent status or wealth. It is good for us to be on the receiving end of disrespect to properly tune our empathy for those who constantly receive it. I would like to follow Albert Einstein who said “I speak to everyone in the same way, whether he is the garbage man or the president of the university.” 

Genealogy

The best I can trace our linage back is to James Ormond Senior who was born in 1669 and died in 1766. He is buried in Charlotte, Mecklenburg County, North Carolina at Providence Presbyterian Church. He was a solder in solder in King George II’s army. He had one son, James Ormond Junior. 

 “The name "Ormond" took on a few changes once in America: Around the time of the Revolutionary War (or so the family legend goes), those who supported the Crown kept the second "o" in their name, while those supporting the Whigs changed that "o" to an "a," creating a family called "Ormand." As the family migrated west into Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama and Mississippi, some families chose to drop the "d," becoming "Orman." All these names point to the same family tree, but with different spellings.”  

Ref: https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/soc.genealogy.britain/LEtuBY0Gpm0

Abstracts of Early Wills 1763-1790 (1749-1790), Mecklenburg County North Carolina

James Ormond Junior’s will is given below.

Will Book E, p. 48, C.R. 065.801.22

Will of James Ormand, 18 Nov 1769 of Mecklenburg County, being very sick & weak in body... I will that the tract of land that belongs to me in Tryon County containing 400 acres to be sold and the money to be laid out for the purchase of the place whereon I now live & what is overplus to be delivered to Mary Ormand my dearlybeloved wife... until my two youngest sons John & Adam & my daughter Sarah come to mature age; the said tract of 300 acres to be equally divided between John & Adam quantity & quality, Sarah to have all she calls her own with whatsoever her mother thinks proper to give her, Benjamin and Jacob to have the tract of 400 acres on the waters of twelve mile creek to be equally divided between them; Mary my wife and Benjamin my son Exrs...

Wit: John Ramsey

William Reid

James Ormand Proved Jany ter 1770

Coda

There is much more to say. Pointless details come to mind even as I review what I have written so far. I could write endlessly about day to day events with my parents, siblings, and friends. It reminds me of the famous writer, Marcel Proust. He published a seven volume book about his life between the years 1913 and 1927. He rewrote the books numerous times as he continued to remember overlooked details. By the way, you may notice that I left out a many stories where I was the butt of a joke or did something foolish. As time goes on, I may well add to my remembrances. Charlie Eldon Ormon 2017