These knives are not needed around here anymore....

[Ky hills]

You can't spike/spear dark as you go. It has to wilt, before putting it on a stick. Just a hard tap with a sharp knife and gently lean it over. Gravity and time will lower it to the ground. When properly wilted, you spike/spear from the opposite direction you cut from. Once on the stick, scaffolded and parked in the shade. To fully wilt. Sunburn takes ahold quick on dark. Can't leave it out. If you cut 600 sticks a day, you lean over to the ground about 8000 times.

Never done dark. Was it placed in a barn and fire built to heat it? I seen that in central VA years ago.

I've never seen dark tobacco done. It was always the Burley type here in the eastern part of Ky. I have heard some of the older folks talk of dark fired tobacco, maybe some did a that around here years ago before my time.

 

[herofan]

Those are some great pics Nesi. Makes me appreciate my soft and easy life.

For sure. I don't know any farmer around here who actually has to work like we used to. Most farm work around here is spent riding a tractor, pickup, four-wheeler, etc. Even manual labor has so many gadgets that make it so much easier than it once was; it's not a back breaker like it once was. I'm not complaining whatsoever; I just don't pretend I'm killing myself like most people do.

It's interesting to read how people did tobacco differently. Everyone I cut for always had a cutter and spiker working together. Four to six plants were put on each stick. Two were leaned together and left in the field for at least a day so it would wilt. It was then loaded on a flat bed wagon and housed on the tier poles in the barn.

 

[Bigfoot]

Those are some great pics Nesi. Makes me appreciate my soft and easy life.

For sure. I don't know any farmer around here who actually has to work like we used to. Most farm work around here is spent riding a tractor, pickup, four-wheeler, etc. Even manual labor has so many gadgets that make it so much easier than it once was; it's not a back breaker like it once was. I'm not complaining whatsoever; I just don't pretend I'm killing myself like most people do.

It's interesting to read how people did tobacco differently. Everyone I cut for always had a cutter and spiker working together. Four to six plants were put on each stick. Two were leaned together and left in the field for at least a day so it would wilt. It was then loaded on a flat bed wagon and housed on the tier poles in the barn.

Burley was cut the way you describe around here. I'm always amazed at how many different ways the same thing could be done.

I ate lunch with a tobacco farmer today. Spent all of lunch speaking of how busy he was........smelled like after shave, and not a scuff on his shoes. Times they are a changing.

 

[kenny thomas]

Bigfoot, can you imagine in the 60's through the 80's the owner of the tobacco fields having lunch and being clean instead of being in the field leading the crew? No Mexican labor then and a lot of the labor being kids or neighbors. We swapped work to get a lot of ours done. Rarely did anyone get paid for their labor.

 

[Beefeater]

I have enjoyed reading and learning from this thread, thank you for sharing.

Any good book recommendations on the history and harvesting of tobacco?

 

[Ky hills]

I have enjoyed reading and learning from this thread, thank you for sharing.

Any good book recommendations on the history and harvesting of tobacco?

Not sure of who it's by but I've heard of some paintings referred to as The twelve months of tobacco. As far as books I don't know of any, but I'm sure there are several. Tobacco played quite a role for centuries.

 

[sstterry]

Bigfoot, can you imagine in the 60's through the 80's the owner of the tobacco fields having lunch and being clean instead of being in the field leading the crew? No Mexican labor then and a lot of the labor being kids or neighbors. We swapped work to get a lot of ours done. Rarely did anyone get paid for their labor.

Did you burn or gas your beds?

 

[Ky hills]

Bigfoot, can you imagine in the 60's through the 80's the owner of the tobacco fields having lunch and being clean instead of being in the field leading the crew? No Mexican labor then and a lot of the labor being kids or neighbors. We swapped work to get a lot of ours done. Rarely did anyone get paid for their labor.

Did you burn or gas your beds?

I'm not Bigfoot, but years ago the folks burned the beds here then as far as I can remember they gassed them.

 

[sstterry]

Bigfoot, can you imagine in the 60's through the 80's the owner of the tobacco fields having lunch and being clean instead of being in the field leading the crew? No Mexican labor then and a lot of the labor being kids or neighbors. We swapped work to get a lot of ours done. Rarely did anyone get paid for their labor.

Did you burn or gas your beds?

I'm not Bigfoot, but years ago the folks burned the beds here then as far as I can remember they gassed them.

We burned early on and then later gassed them. Gassing was a sight less work!

 

[Bigfoot]

I have enjoyed reading and learning from this thread, thank you for sharing.

Any good book recommendations on the history and harvesting of tobacco?

On Bender Knee. It's a sort of fictional sort of not account of the Night Rider raids. It was an attempt of the tobacco farmers to have I guess what one would call solidarity. Basically trying to demand more for their crop. This was the turn of the century, and turned violent. Our historical society used to do a re-enactment of it every year. It's a good read.

 

[Bigfoot]

Bigfoot, can you imagine in the 60's through the 80's the owner of the tobacco fields having lunch and being clean instead of being in the field leading the crew? No Mexican labor then and a lot of the labor being kids or neighbors. We swapped work to get a lot of ours done. Rarely did anyone get paid for their labor.

There was a family here in the 80's. Brought a grill and a cooler of beer to the field everyday. Would sit in the shade and watch hired men work. First ones in the choppin block, when the rain stopped.

 

[herofan]

Did you burn or gas your beds?

I'm not Bigfoot, but years ago the folks burned the beds here then as far as I can remember they gassed them.

We burned early on and then later gassed them. Gassing was a sight less work!

That's how it was done here. Later on, they had float beds/water beds, but I was not involved at the time, so I know nothing about those.

 

[kenny thomas]

I was too small to help much but remember burning the tobacco beds to kill the weeds seed. 10'x100' plus a little . Gassing them to kill the weeds seeming like a miracle. I quit before the greenhouse float plants started.

 

[sstterry]

How many remember having to go through and "suckering" the tobacco before they invented "Sucker-Stuff®"? In my memory it was the worst work because it was hot, humid and stifiling in that late summer heat surrounded by a jungle of tobacco leaves and stalks. And the sap from lose leaves was impossible to wash off!

 

[Logan52]

My old knife and spear still hang on the wall of the shed by the house but have not been used for 25 years.
It would be hard to relate how much the needs of the tobacco crop regulated life in my home county when I was younger but it is about all gone now.
It was tobacco that saved the Jamestown colony in the early 1600s and my family moved westerly in search of "new ground" for most of two centuries before finding a home in Kentucky. Some left Kentucky for southern Indiana and Missouri where they continued to raise tobacco.
There is an actual tobacco culture, people related by genetics, speech patterns and attitudes toward work and religion.
It is rapidly fading away in this new digital age.

 

[jltrent]

How many remember having to go through and "suckering" the tobacco before they invented "Sucker-Stuff®"? In my memory it was the worst work because it was hot, humid and stifiling in that late summer heat surrounded by a jungle of tobacco leaves and stalks. And the sap from lose leaves was impossible to wash off!

Remember it well. Also have many memories of carrying a 5 gallon back pack spray through and spraying with MH-30. I am surprise that being covered with those chemicals many times soaking wet (no protection) and back then never ever though about the potential long term harm I have not had some complications from it or dead.

 

[Ky hills]

How many remember having to go through and "suckering" the tobacco before they invented "Sucker-Stuff®"? In my memory it was the worst work because it was hot, humid and stifiling in that late summer heat surrounded by a jungle of tobacco leaves and stalks. And the sap from lose leaves was impossible to wash off!

Remember it well. Also have many memories of carrying a 5 gallon back pack spray through and spraying with MH-30. I am surprise that being covered with those chemicals many times soaking wet (no protection) and back then never ever though about the potential long term harm I have not had some complications from it or dead.

Suckering tobacco was one of my most disliked jobs of it. I liked topping it. When I was in my late teens we got a little spray rig that was basically a plastic bucket with spray booms running up the side and nozzles pointing outward and handles to pull it with. We used that for about 7 or 8 acres worth. Some larger producers had high boys to spray and drop sticks from. We dropped our sticks by hand.

 

[herofan]

What about stripping tobacco? People had different environments for that. Some just stripped it in the driveway of the tobacco barn with no heat; however, if the conditions were right, such as a nice fire in the stove and a pot of coffee, it would attract several in the community. Some of the retired old timers would help strip just for the social interaction and expect no pay.

 

[Logan52]

Worse than the MH-30 were the pesticides used to combat the tobacco worms and aphids. These were strong stuff to spray with a back pack sprayer. The generation before used "Paris Green" which I think had lead as a major ingredient. Before that and even into the 1940s kids were sent into the tobacco patch to pick the long green worms by hand and drop them into a bucket.
The part I liked best was tobacco stripping on wet cold days fit for little else. The "warm morning" stove would glow red and it was getting closer to sale day. Older men like my grandfather could tell tales so funny I still laugh some 50 years later when I think of them.
One was told of the boys all getting together trying to break a young steer to work. They only had a double yoke and no broke steer to hitch him with. They volunteered young Leonard from down the road to have the other side of the yoke hooked to himself and have him walk along as the steer learned what to do. All went well for awhile until the steer spooked and took off running up and down the bottom with Leonard struggling to keep up. The boys tried in vain to get Leonard unhooked and followed along, only spooking the steer more. Finally, an exhausted Leonard hollered out, "Unhook the steer! Unhook the steer! I'll stand".

 

[sstterry]

What about stripping tobacco? People had different environments for that. Some just stripped it in the driveway of the tobacco barn with no heat; however, if the conditions were right, such as a nice fire in the stove and a pot of coffee, it would attract several in the community. Some of the retired old timers would help strip just for the social interaction and expect no pay.

I was lucky enough that I never had to strip and grade. I was normally in school so we paid some ladies to do that when the tobacco was "in case".