1946 or 1947 family affair

[hurleyjd]

In 1946 or 1947 My Father and two of his brothers cut and baled a hay meadow owned by their Sister Lil Osborn. I will try to explain the operation as follows. Uncle Carl cut the meadow with a horse drawn sickle mower with a four foot bar. After the hay was cured they borrowed a baler that was powered by a horse. The transport wheels were taken off and the baler set on the ground it was maybe forty or fifty foot long on the ground. Set up in shade for evening work. The horse walked in a circle at the far end of the baler opposite of where the hay was fed in walking in a circle pulling a lever that powered a bell crank that moved the plunger head back and forth. There were wooden blocks made with grooves that wire were fed through to tie the bales. A block was placed between each bale. The bale hooks in the baler would catch the block and keep everything from backing up. My Uncle Earl drug the hay to the baler with a sulky rake and My Father and Uncle Carl fed the baler with pitch forks.The wire being used was in a long bundle and place along side and inline with the baler. My cousin Ladale Hurley would poke a wire through the backside of the block that divided the bale and when the next block showed up that divided the bales I would poke the wire back through on the front side of the block and Ladale would tie the bale off. Two wires for each bale. My Father paid me a penny a bale for my work. I made $7 that summer and bought a pair of Yellow Acme cowboy boots. My older Brother Cecil drug the bales and stacked them away from the operation and kept the horse walking. Each brother divided the bales equally. I can remember this as it was yesterday sure wish my mother would have taken a photo with her Kodak for history's sake.

 

[TennesseeTuxedo]

Hi hurleyjd, been a minute.

 

[MurraysMutts]

In 1946 or 1947 My Father and two of his brothers cut and baled a hay meadow owned by their Sister Lil Osborn. I will try to explain the operation as follows. Uncle Carl cut the meadow with a horse drawn sickle mower with a four foot bar. After the hay was cured they borrowed a baler that was powered by a horse. The transport wheels were taken off and the baler set on the ground it was maybe forty or fifty foot long on the ground. Set up in shade for evening work. The horse walked in a circle at the far end of the baler opposite of where the hay was fed in walking in a circle pulling a lever that powered a bell crank that moved the plunger head back and forth. There were wooden blocks made with grooves that wire were fed through to tie the bales. A block was placed between each bale. The bale hooks in the baler would catch the block and keep everything from backing up. My Uncle Earl drug the hay to the baler with a sulky rake and My Father and Uncle Carl fed the baler with pitch forks.The wire being used was in a long bundle and place along side and inline with the baler. My cousin Ladale Hurley would poke a wire through the backside of the block that divided the bale and when the next block showed up that divided the bales I would poke the wire back through on the front side of the block and Ladale would tie the bale off. Two wires for each bale. My Father paid me a penny a bale for my work. I made $7 that summer and bought a pair of Yellow Acme cowboy boots. My older Brother Cecil drug the bales and stacked them away from the operation and kept the horse walking. Each brother divided the bales equally. I can remember this as it was yesterday sure wish my mother would have taken a photo with her Kodak for history's sake.

Thanks for sharing! I'm with you, pictures would be very neat!

 

[Silver]

I can picture it in my head and that's enough to exhaust me. I am not tough enough to have lived in that generation.

 

[Rafter S]

Thanks for posting that. I remember hearing my father and grandfather talk about baling hay that way, but it was before my time (born in 1961). I remember them using the terms "bull rake" and "pony rake" instead of "sulky rake."

I think the pony rake put the hay in windrows and the bull rake brought it to the baler, but I'm not sure about that.

 

[greybeard]

Uncle Carl cut the meadow with a horse drawn sickle mower with a four foot bar.

I had one. My niece has it now, but all cleaned up and painted as proper yard art near Little Rock Ark.. What it looked like right after I drug it out of the woods.


I had to cut it loose from a tree that had grown up in it. Stump stayed on part of it and is under the bucket.
Our old sulky rake is at my sister's place up the road from me.

 

[Ouachita]

There was a lady on this forum years ago that posted about doing hay this way, and had also posted pictures.
From Winnie Texas maybe?

 

[Ouachita]

Curiosity bested me. I'm sure it was Chippie or Coleen. What happened to them?

OK chippie, what's there to do in Winnie

Hey chippie, I thought your location used to say winnie? Anyway, I been driving all day. Had a stop in Kountze, overnighting now in Winnie, and on to Bellville tomorrow. Whats to do in Winnie that m 10 year old daughter might enjoy? Any must see's? Thought I would continue down 124 tomorrow so...

www.cattletoday.com

 

[greybeard]

That would probably have been Coleen.. they raised Brafords between Winnie and Stowell Tx.. Chippie was down the coast a ways, down below Sugarland Tx. I haven't seen Chippie or Coleen post in a number of years.

 

[sstterry]

We had a guy that worked for us from time to time when I was growing up. He plowed, mowed and raked hay with a team of horses. He did not bale the hay though, he put it up in shocks.

 

[bbirder]

I recall helping my grandfather bale with a similar baler except it was powered by a Wisconsin single cylinder I believe instead of the horse. I know he could not have afforded such a baler, so I assume he either rented it or traded labor for its use. I was always amazed with the wooden blocks and the wire tying. He kept me busy with a pitchfork and I was about 10-12 yrs old. He only baled what fit inside the old house on the farm. The rest was stacked on a pole outside for first use.

 

[Mrcopier]

I had one. My niece has it now, but all cleaned up and painted as proper yard art near Little Rock Ark.. What it looked like right after I drug it out of the woods.

View attachment 12834
I had to cut it loose from a tree that had grown up in it. Stump stayed on part of it and is under the bucket.
Our old sulky rake is at my sister's place up the road from me.

Funny I have one just like it in our flower bed as well

 

[Lucky_P]

I've got a photo of my Dad, as a late teenager, on a horse-drawn sicklebar mower, cutting kudzu for hay.

I barely remember it, but my granddad would drive the little Farmall 'A' 30 miles up the highway to a second farm my dad had bought, to cut a field of sericea lespedeza. Dad would come up the next day with rake, and bigger tractor on a flatbed, pulling the baler behind. I remember feeding some of those bales out of the barn loft... not much more than a bundle of sticks. Darned glad I was too little to be involved with hauling those in from the field... or getting them up into the barn loft.

 

[hurleyjd]

I've got a photo of my Dad, as a late teenager, on a horse-drawn sicklebar mower, cutting kudzu for hay.

I barely remember it, but my granddad would drive the little Farmall 'A' 30 miles up the highway to a second farm my dad had bought, to cut a field of sericea lespedeza. Dad would come up the next day with rake, and bigger tractor on a flatbed, pulling the baler behind. I remember feeding some of those bales out of the barn loft... not much more than a bundle of sticks. Darned glad I was too little to be involved with hauling those in from the field... or getting them up into the barn loft.

Uncle Carl had a meadow with Sericea in it he also was raising a few acres of corn. The family milked a few head of cows to sell grade B milk. He would scoop the bed of the pickup full and then top it off with some lepedeza and off to the feed mill. They would run it through the hammer mill and he would have cottonseed meal and molasses added and it was sacked and then it was used for the milk cows. Uncle Carl was very tight with his spending. He did a lot of carpenter work and would alway bring the bent nails home and straighten them for his own use.

 

[Rafter S]

Uncle Carl had a meadow with Sericea in it he also was raising a few acres of corn. The family milked a few head of cows to sell grade B milk. He would scoop the bed of the pickup full and then top it off with some lepedeza and off to the feed mill. They would run it through the hammer mill and he would have cottonseed meal and molasses added and it was sacked and then it was used for the milk cows. Uncle Carl was very tight with his spending. He did a lot of carpenter work and would alway bring the bent nails home and straighten them for his own use.

I did some carpenter work years ago. We built a house for a guy who was "difficult". As a courtesy, when we were working outside and had a bent nail, for example from pulling it out of some temporary scaffolding, we'd toss it through the nearest window so the home owner wouldn't hit it with a lawn mower. At one point we were finding slightly bent nails in the boxes of new nails. We figured out that the home owner was picking up these nails, straightening them the best he could, and putting them in the box. This was a cost plus job, so I guess he thought he was saving money.

After we figured that out we'd throw them outside in the grass so we weren't wasting our time trying to drive bent nails.

 

[greybeard]

Between age 10 and age 12 I bet I straightened a million bent nails.
That and sorting out old washers, nuts and bolts by thread and diameter.

When the carpenters built my house in '09, they were forever prematurely dropping out the strips of nails from their guns if they got down to about 15 nails left in the magazine..especially when working on the roof framing. There were partially full strips all over the ground outside the house footprint.
Told their foreman one day that there were more nails on the ground than there were in the framing...
I had to run a magnet all over the yard before a year was out after we moved in.

 

[hurleyjd]

Here is another experience I had with Uncle Carl. When I was twelve of so I yearned for a Rod and Reel. I was saving my money for one that was at the Jim Masters Western store in Sulphur Springs Texas it was priced at $7.50 cents. Every Saturday we were in town which was a ritual for was us. I would look at that rod and reel. After several Saturdays with me yearning for that rod and reel the salesman named Leland Talley came over and said "You need to buy that rod and reel. I told him I was saving up for it. He asked how much do you have. I had a little over $5.00 he took my money and sold me the rod and reel. Had to beg borrow and steal to get enough money for a spool of line. I practiced in the front yard with a nut on the line. You had to really master using the rod and reel as it would backlash and you would have birds nest to untangle. Here is where Uncle Carl came into the story. I was in Quitman Texas and at Cains Hardware and there were maybe a half dozen lures on the counter. I was google eyeing them when Uncle Carl asked if I thought they would catch a fish. I said not sure but would buy one someday. They were 50 cents a piece. Uncle Carl grinned and said he would loan me the money. I picked up a Hawaiian wiggler No. 2 made by Fred Abrogast. Finlly connected with a 4 lb bass and I was really thrilled about the fish have a photo of me with it somewhere holding it with me with out a shirt and jeans and bare footed. The fish grabbed the lure as it was sinking. I had a birds nest black lash and had to lay the rod down and well rope it in. Another one of life's store that happened years ago that I remember. Amazing that I can remember that in my mind and cannot find a wrench that I was using less than 5 minutes after using it.

 

[Rafter S]

That reminds me of my Zebco 202 reel. That was quite a step up from a cane pole, which is all I ever had before.

 

[greybeard]

Zebco 202s and Fred Arbogast............ takes me back. (I'm a hulapopper and jitterbug guy myself)

My father had one of these: A Great Lakes Whirlaway.



As a kid, I thought it was magic since it had no buttons at all to push. Just hold your thumb over where the line comes out in the very front of the reel, rear back and sling 1/4 mile of line out...it seemed.

Then, I saw it with the cover off. You released the bail by turning the outside crank handle backwards about 1/4 turn, which I never noticed when he was using it.
He bought it JD, from a big hardware store in Sulphur Springs.

 

[hurleyjd]

Zebco 202s and Fred Arbogast............ takes me back. (I'm a hulapopper and jitterbug guy myself)

My father had one of these: A Great Lakes Whirlaway.

View attachment 13347

As a kid, I thought it was magic since it had no buttons at all to push. Just hold your thumb over where the line comes out in the very front of the reel, rear back and sling 1/4 mile of line out...it seemed.

Then, I saw it with the cover off. You released the bail by turning the outside crank handle backwards about 1/4 turn, which I never noticed when he was using it.
He bought it JD, from a big hardware store in Sulphur Springs.

View attachment 13348

Craver Brothers had a large hardware store in Sulphur Springs. They also had a lake and cabin not o far from where your cousin Kenneth lived outside of Yantis Texas.,