Farming in the Matheson Cove

Work never ended on the farm.  Raising livestock and crops took a lot of time and labor.


Bob Ledford worked sunrise to sunset in the Matheson Cove.  He was a small man, but strong and handsome.  Farming began each spring.


He got the turning plow, hitched the mules, and prepared the ground for planting.  Like other mountain folks, he consulted the "Farmer's Almanac" to plant according to the signs.


After plowing the field, he went over it with a disc harrow and laid off the rows.  Then all the family:  Ma, Rondy, Reba, Ralph, Robert, Robenia, Rena, Reuben, and Ray got compost from the barn.


They planted corn, cane, sweet potatoes, Irish potatoes, green beans, and watermelons. When the vegetables ripened, Ma and the girls canned them.  They also pickled beans, corn, and cucumbers.  They dried fruit and made kraut from cabbage.


Each fall they dug the potatoes.  Since there was not enough room in the cellar for everything, Bob piled potatoes on a bed of straw, covered them with dirt.  The boys took sweet potatoes to the neighborhood curing house.


After harvest, the Ledford family butchered the hog around Thanksgiving.  They dipped it into hot water, lifted it, and scraped off hair.  Then they hung the hog upside and took out the insides.  The liver, lights (lungs), and heart were saved. 


They wasted no part of the hog.  The guts were split, washed, and boiled with lye to make soap.  It didn't smell well, but sure cut the dirt.


Labor never ended on the farm, but they worked together.  The children learned responsibility, work ethics, and the value of family and community.


by:  Brenda Kay Ledford

The Prodigal Son

 

 

            Bob and Minnie Matheson Ledford’s deepest desire was to rear their children to become upright citizens in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Clay County, North Carolina.

            That was a challenge during the 1930’s.  Eight children could find many things to lead them astray in the Matheson Cove.  The boys got into fights and the girls argued.  Peace often alluded the Ledford’s household.

            No wonder Bob grabbed a hickory switch and led rowdy kids to the woodshed.  Reuben stuck his brogans into his mouth often.

            One day Reuben and Rondy got into a fight.  Reuben loved to tease his older brother because he “bossed” him around.  About the time the boys started to hit each other, Bob stepped up.

            “Break it up!” he hollered.  “I’m fed up with your boys fighting.  I’m going to tie your tails together and throw you over the clothesline like two old tomcats.”

            Reuben stuck out his tongue at his pa and told him to shut up.

            Now the fat was in the fireplace.  Bob broke a limb off the walnut tree.  “I’ll make you holler ‘calf rope.’  No son’s going to backtalk me.  Let’s go to the woodshed.”

            Reuben took off like a scaled foxhound to Shewbird Mountain.  Bob gained ground on Reuben.  But the rebellious kid climbed a poplar tree before Bob grabbed him by the seat of the overalls.

            Bob told him to come down, or he would whip the shirt off his back.

            Reuben laughed, unbuttoned his shirt, and threw it to the ground.

            Bob’s face turned red as a cherry tomato.  He stomped the ground and shouted, “Wait until you get home!  Just wait!” He headed to the house and drank a dipper full of water from the bucket in the kitchen.

            When it got dark, Reuben shimmied down the tree and slipped to the barn.  He climbed the ladder and spent the night shivering in the hay loft.  The next morning his stomach growled.  He could just taste Ma Ledford’s biscuits, gravy, sausage and fried eggs.  Whipping or not, he was hungry and decided to go home.

            Ma, Pa, and the young’uns were wolfing down breakfast at the kitchen table.  Reuben sneaked like a chicken-killing dog and took his place beside little Ray at the table.  No one said a word.

            Pa peered over his spectacles at Reuben.  “Want some biscuits?” he asked and passed the plate.

            Reuben wondered why Pa never took him to the woodshed.  Perhaps he had learned his lesson staying all night in the barn alone, cold, and hungry.  The Prodigal Son came home.

 

 

 

 

Wash Day

 

 

            Angry clouds loomed above the Matheson Cove in 1930.  Ma Minnie Ledford urged her daughters to help with the laundry before the afternoon storm stuck.

            “Let’s go to the creek, girls,” said Ma Minnie.  “It’s wash day and we need to get the laundry done before an afternoon storm pounds the cove.”

            “I don’t want to wash clothes,” said Robenia and flipped flaming red hair from her freckled face.  She played forward on the basketball team in the old rock gym at Hayesville High School.  She lived, breathed, and savored basketball.  The school was having a break for spring planting in the Blue Ridge Mountains.

            “Look, here, Beanie,” said Ma.  “There’s more to life than basketball.”

            Robenia pouted and ambled to the spring with Reba and Rena.  Robins landed in the yard and spread an orange blanket on verdant grass.  Jonquils dotted the woodland trail and perfumed the Matheson Cove.  Cattle bawled in the pasture.

            Pa, Rondy, Ralph, Robert, and Ray were planting corn seed in the field.  They raised corn to feed the family and livestock.  When they harvested the crop, the boys took tow sacks of grain to the mill to grind into cornmeal.

            Rena pointed to the field.  “Why don’t the boys help us wash?  That’s not fair.  They get out of doing the hard work.”

            Ma ignored Rena and wiped sweat from her brow as she built a fire.  An iron pot hung over the fire.  She would boil the clothes after they washed them in a tub of soapy water.  After the clothes boiled, they rinsed them in a tub of fresh water.

            Ma and the girls dipped the clothes that needed to be ironed into a bucket of starch before hanging them on the line.

            “Well, we’re finished with the washing,” said Ma.  “Thanks girls.  Let’s go to the house and fix supper for Pa and the boys.”

            After a hardy meal of leather breeches, fried Irish potatoes, cornbread, buttermilk, and custard pie, the girls got the clothes off the line.  They sprinkled the garments with water and wrapped them in a towel to stay damp.  Dry cotton would not iron well.  Tomorrow they would spend most of the day ironing.

            Irons were heated on top of the woodstove or in the fireplace.  They had to be careful and wipe off any ashes that got on the iron. 

            Wash day and ironing took a lot of time and work.  But Ma Minnie Ledford wanted her family to be clean.  The Great Depression would take away her dignity.  After all cleanliness was next to godliness.

 

Moonshine Capital of the South

            Robenia Ledford pounced on her Ma during the spring of 1942 way back in the Blue Ridge Mountains of Clay County, North Carolina.

            “Ma, can I spend the night with Ida Mae?  You never let me do anything fun.”

            “I don’t know, Beanie,” said Ma.  “Ask your pa.”

            Robenia heel staved to the corncrib with red hair flying in the wind.  Breathless, she asked Pa if she could stay all night with her best friend.

            Pa looked up from shelling corn.  “Good help is hard to find.  You’re just in time to help feed the livestock.”

            “Ain’t got time for that.  I want to stay all night with Ida Mae.”

            Pa frowned and spat tobacco juice on the ground.  “Thunderations!  That family lives at Tusquittee.  It’s the moonshining capital of the south.  Ain’t safe to spend the night there.  Go help your ma churn buttermilk.”

            Robenia stomped her feet and headed to the house.  She wiped tears from her freckled face.

            Reba and Rena asked why she was crying.  They begged Ma to let Robenia spend the

night with Ida Mae.

            When Pa came to the house, Ma had a “chimney corner” meeting with him.  After a lengthy discussion, Robenia’s parents gave her permission to spend the night with her friend.

            Robenia took off like a racehorse to her friend’s house.  She stopped at Emma Dean Passmore’s home and her pa took them in his wagon to Tusquittee.  He let them off at the foot of Julie Knob.

            They cut through the woods to Ida Mae’s place.  Frogs croaked on Tusquittee Creek and shadows fell over the trail.  Emma Dean grabbed Robenia’s arm when the sky filled with a shower of sparks. 

            “My goodness!” yelled Emma Dean.  “The world’s coming to an end.”

            Robenia giggled.  “Don’t you remember our science lesson at school?  Mr. Penland told us the Lyrid meteor shower would come in April.”

            The girls tromped over the trail to Ida Mae’s house.  They jumped when they heard an explosion on the creek.  The girls didn’t stop running until they reached Ida Mae’s front porch.

            Later they learned that some moonshiners were making white lightning on the creek.  The still exploded, but they dove into the thickets and escaped injury.

            When Robenia returned to the Ledford’s house, she spun a tall tale.  Pa laughed and reminded her that she got fair warning about the “Moonshine Capital” of the South.