Agriculture

AGRICULTURE

FARMING METHODS

"In clearing new ground, everyone f1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, p.44ollowed the ancient custom of girdling the tree trunks and letting them stand in spectral ugliness until they rotted and fell. This is a quick and easy way to get rid of the shade that otherwise would stunt the crops, and it prevents such trees as chestnut, buckeye and basswood from sprouting from the stumps. In the fields stood scores of gigantic hemlocks, deadened, that never would be used even for fuel, save as their bark furnished the women with quick-burning stovewood in wet weather. No one dreamt that hemlock ever would be marketable. And this was only five years ago!" (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, p. 37.)

"The tillage was as rude and destructive as anything we read of in pioneer history. The common plow was a 'bull-tongue,' which has aptly been described as 'hardly more than a sharpened stick with a metal rim.' The harrows were of wood, throughout, with locust teeth....Sometimes no harrow was used at all, the plowed ground being 'drug' with a big evergreen bough. This needed only to be withed directly to a pony's tail, as they used to do in ancient Ireland, and the picture of prehistoric agriculture would have been complete. After the corn was up, all cultivating was done with the hoe. For this the entire family turned out, the toddlers being left to play in the furrows while their mother toiled like a man." (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, pp. 37, 38.)

"...Without terracing, which I have never seen practiced in the mountains of the South, no field with a surface slope of more than ten degrees (about two feet in ten) will last more than a few years. As one of my neighbors put it: 'Thar, I've cl'ared me a patch and grubbed hit out--now I can raise me two or three severe craps!' (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, p. 36.)

"Then what?' I asked.

'When corn won't grow no more I can turn the field into grass a couple o' years.'

'Then you'll rotate, and grow corn again?'

'La, no! By that time the land will be so poor hit wouldn't raise a cuss-fight.'

'But then you must move, and begin all over again. This continual moving must be a great nuisance.' He rolled his quid and placidly answered: 'Huk-uh; when I move, all I haffter do is put out the fire and call the dog.' His apparent indifference was only philosophy expressed with sardonic humor; just as another neighbor would say, 'This is good, strong land, or it wouldn't hold up all the rocks there is around hyur.'" (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, p.36.)

FARM ANIMALS

"Most of our farmers had neither horse nor mule. For the rough work of cultivating the hillsides a single steer hitched to the 'bull-tongue' was better adapted, and the same steer patiently dragged a little sled to the trading post. On steep declivities the sled is more practical than a cart or wagon, because it can go where wheels cannot, it does not require so wide a track, and it 'brakes' automatically in going downhill. Nearly all the farmer's hauling is downhill to his home, or down farther to the village. A sled can be made quite easily by one man, out of wood growing on the spot, and with few iron fittings, or none at all. The runners are usually made of natural sourwood crooks, this timber being chosen because it wears very smooth and does not fur up nor splinter." (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, pp. 41, 42.)

"The hinterland is naturally adapted to grazing, rather than to agriculture. As it stands, the best pasturage is high up in the mountains, where there are 'balds' covered with succulent wild grass that resembles Kentucky blue-grass. Clearing and sowing would extend such areas indefinitely. The cattle forage for themselves through eight or nine months of the year, running wild like the razorbacks, and the only attention given them is when the herdsmen go out to salt them or to mark the calves. Nearly all the beasts are scrub stock. Jerseys, and other blooded cattle thrive in the valleys, where there are no free ranges, but the backwoods- man does not want 'critters that haffter be gentled and hand-fed.' The result is that many families go without milk a great part of the year, and seldom indeed taste butter or beef." (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, pp. 42, 43.)

"Few sheep were raised in our settlement, and these only for their wool. The untamed Smokies were no place for such defenseless creatures. Sheep will not, cannot, run wild. They are wholly dependent on the fostering hand of man and perish without his shepherding. Curiously enough, our mountaineer knows little or nothing about the goat--an animal perfectly adapted to the free range of the Smokies. I am convinced that goats would be more profitable to the small farmers of the wild mountains than cattle. Goats do not graze, but browse upon the shrubbery, of which there is a vast superfluity in all the Southern mountains. Unlike the weak, timorous and stupid sheep, a flock of goats can fight their own battles against wild animals. They are hardy in any weather, and thrive from their own pickings where other foragers would starve. (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, p. 44.)

"The chickens ran wild and scratched for a living; hence were thin, tough, and poor layers. Eggs seldom were for sale. It was not of much use to try to raise many chickens where they were unprotected from hawks, minks, foxes, weasels and snakes" (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, p.45.)

"A good milch goat gives more and richer milk than the average mountain cow. And a kid yields excellent fresh meat in manageable quantity, at a time when no one would butcher a beef because it would spoil.... But our native mountaineers--well, a man who will not eat beef nor drink fresh cow's milk, and who despises butter, cannot be interested in anything of the dairy order." (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, pp. 44, 45.)

FARM PRODUCTS/CROPS

"Corn was the staple crop--in fact the only crop of most farmers. Some rye was raised along the creek, and a little oats, but our settlement grew no wheat--there was no mill that could grind it. Wheat is raised, to some extent, in the river bottoms, and on the plateaus of the interior. I have seen it flailed out on the bare ground, and winnowed by pouring the grain and chaff from basket to basket while the women fluttered aprons or bed-sheets. Corn is topped from the blade-fodder, the ears gathered from the stalk, and the main stalks afters used as 'foughness' (roughage). The cribs generally are ramshackle pens, and there is much waste from mold and vermin." (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, p.38.)

"The Carolina mountains are, by nature, one of the best fruit regions in eastern America. Apples, grapes, and berries especially, thrive exceeding well. But our mountaineer is no horticulturist. He lets his fruit trees take care of themselves, and so, everywhere except on select farms near the towns, we see old apple and peach trees that never were pruned, bristling with shoots, and often bearing wizened fruit, dry and bitter, or half rotted on the stem." (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, pp. 38, 39.)

"So, too, the gardens are slighted. Late in the season our average garden is a miniature jungle, chiefly of weeds that stand high as one's head. Cabbage and field beans survive and figure mightily in the diet of the mountaineer. Potatoes generally do well, but few farmers raise enough to see them through the winter. Generally some tobacco is grown for family consumption, the strong 'twist' being smoked or chewed indifferently." (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, p.39.)

"The truth is that mountain beef, being fed nothing but grass and browse, with barely enough corn and roughage to keep the animal alive through winter, is blue-fleshed, watery, and tough. If properly reared, the quality would be as good as any. Almost any of our farmers could have had a pasture near home and could have grown hay, but not one in ten would take the trouble. His cattle were only for export--let the buyer fatten them! It should be understood that nobody had any provision for taking care of fresh meat when the weather was not frosty. (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, p. 43.)

"On those rare occasions when somebody killed a beef, he had to travel all over the neighborhood to dispose of it in small portions. The carcass was cut up in the same way as a hog, and all parts except the cheap 'bilin' pices' were sold at the same price: ten cents a pound, or whatever they would bring on the spot. The butchering was done with an axe and a jack-knife. The meat was either sliced thin and fried to a crackling, or cut in chunks and boiled furiously just long enough to fit it for boot-heels. What the butcher mangled, the cook damned." ( 1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, pp. 43, 44.)

"Honey often was procured by spotting wild bees to their hoard and chopping the tree, a mild form of sport in which most settlers are expert. Our local preacher had a hundred hives of tame bees, producing 1,500 pounds of honey a year, for which he got ten cents a pound at the railroad." (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, p.45.)

"The mainstay of every farmer, aside from his cornfield, was his litter of razorback hogs. 'Old cornbread and sowbelly' are a menu complete for our mountaineer. The wild pig, roaming foot-loose and free over hill and dale, picks up his own living at all seasons and requires no attention at all. He is the cheapest possible source of meat and yields the quickest return: 'no other food animal can increase his own weight a hundred and fifty fold in the first eight months of his life.' And so he is regarded by his owner with the same affection that Connemara Paddy bestows upon 'the gintleman that pays the rint.' (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, pp.45, 46.)

"In physique and mentality, the razorback differs even more from a domestic hog than a wild goose does from a tame one. Shaped in front like a thin wedge, he can go through laurel thicket like a bear. Armored with tough hide cushioned by bristles, he despises thorns, brambles and rattlesnakes alike. His extrava- gantly long snout can scent like a cat's, and yet burrow, uproot, overturn, as if made of metal. The long legs, thin flanks, pliant hoofs, fit him to run like a deer and climb like a goat. In courage and sagacity he outranks all other beasts. A warrior born, he is also a strategist of the first order. Like man, he lives a communal life, and unites with others of his kind for purposes of defense. (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, p.46.)

"The pig is the only large mammal I know of, besides man, whose eyes will not shine by reflected light--they are too bold and crafty, I wit. The razorback has a mind of his own; not instinct, but mind--whatever psychologists may say. He thinks. Anybody can see that when he is not rooting or sleeping he is studying devilment. He shows remarkable understanding of human speech, especially profane speech, and even an uncanny gift of reading men's thoughts whenever those thought are directed against the peace and dignity of pigship. He bears grudges, broods over indignities, and plans redresses for the morrow or the week after. If he cannot get even with you, he will lay for your unsuspecting friend. And at the last, when arrested in his crimes and lodged in the pen, he is liable to attacks of mania from sheer helpless rage. (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, pp.46, 47.)

"If you camp out in the mountains, nothing will molest you but razorback hogs. Bears will flee and wildcats sneak to their dens, but the moment incense of cooking arises from your camp every pig within two miles will scent it and hasten to call. You may throw your arm out of joint: they will laugh in your face. You may curse in five languages: it is music to their titillating ears." (1913 Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, p. 47.)

HARVESTING NATIVE PLANTS

GINSENG

"A source of revenue to the country, or rather to the traders, has been the ginseng-root. The root of the ginseng, called 'sang' in the vernacular (Panax quinquefolium), when prepared after a particular fashion, very much resembles the true aritcle (Pannax ginseng), and commands a high price in China. When some enterprising trader discovers a large quantity of it in the woods, he opens a stock of goods in the neighborhood, and offers to sell his commodities for cash or sang. The neighbors, therefore, turn out en masse in the proper season, and proceed to dig ginseng, for which they get a few cents a pound in goods, and make twice the wages for the time being they could at any other employment. There are traders who, from this apparently trivial source, have accumulated fortunes." ("The Hill-Country," Appleton's Journal: a Magazine of General Literature. Vol. 8, Issue 195. December 21, 1872. P. 700)

"An interesting crop in our neighborhood was ginseng, of which there were several patches in cultivation. This curious plant is native throughout the Appalachians, but has been exterminated in all but the wildest regions, on account of the high price that its dried root brings. It has long since passed out of our pharmacopoeia, and is marketed only in China, though our own people formerly esteemed it as a panacea for all ills of the flesh. Colonel Byrd, in his 'History of the Dividing Line,' says of it: '[Ginseng] kept up my Spirits, and made me trip away as nimbly in my half Jack-Boots as younger men cou'd in their Shoes....Its vertues are that it gives an uncommon Warmth and Vigour to the Blood, and frisks the Spirits beyond any other Cordial. It cheers the Heart, even of a Man that has a bad Wife, and makes him look down with great Composure on the crosses of the World. It promotes insensible Perspiration, dissolves all Phlegmatick and Viscous Humours, that are apt to obstruct the Narrow channels of the Nerves. It helps the Memory and would quicken even Helvetian dullness. 'Tis friendly to the Lungs, much more than Scolding itself. It comforts the Stomach and Strengthens the Bowels preventing all Colicks and Fluxes. In one Word, it will make a Man live a great while, and very well while he does live. And what is more, it will even make Old Age amiable, by rendering it lively, chearful and good-humour'd.' (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, pp. 39-40)

"A successful ginseng grower of our settlement told me that two acres of the plant will bring an income of $1,500 to $5,000 a year, planting 100,000 to the acre. The roots take eight years to mature. They weigh from one and a half to four ounces each, when fresh, and one-third of this dried. Two acres produce 25,000 roots a year by progression. The dried root, at that time, brought five dollars a pound. At present, I believe it is higher. Another friend of mine, who is in this business extensively, tried exporting for himself, but got only $6.50 a pound in Amoy, when the U.S. consul at that port assured him that the real market price was from $12.60 to $24.40. The local trader, knowing American prices, pocketed the difference." (1913, Kephart, Horace. Our Southern Highlanders, pp. 40, 41.)

See also Medical Practice in Western North Carolina, William Walls Collection, UNCA Special Collections