The Rankins Family of the Mohawk Valley

06/06/2025

Part 9

A continuation of letters Granpa Rankins wrote to my Uncle Dick. Writing was his way of unwinding after working a factory second shift before heading to bed.

Feb 3 1958

Dear Dick,
When I was six Dad moved the family from Sandy Lane over to Paradise in the town of Danube. Somebody must have had a wry sense of humor when they named Paradise. It was all right after one got there, but for about nine months of the year it sure was hell getting in and out, what with mud and snow. It was here Izzy was born, December 30, 1908, and bob, August 14, 1910. It was here that I started in school in old District #9 in the fall of 1908. At that time there were only seven pupils-- the four Staffords, Earl, Reba, Allie and Irene and two Gardiniers, Harold (Cappy) and Harvey, and myself. Our teacher that year was Elizabeth Kennedy. In the five years that we lived in Paradise we had seven different teachers. Harvey Gardinier was always selling something to get a premium or win a prize. This one time he was selling “Bluine”, a wash day bluing which came in little paper envelopes as a powder. One day he fell into the creek back of the school with a whole pocketful of “Bluine”. The creek ran blue for a week!
The house we lived in was old, and the floors of the kitchen and dining room sloped to a common center, being about six inches lower on one side than the other. One morning Ken and I who slept in the bedroom over the kitchen, were horsing around and tipped over the pot. It was pretty well filled and due to the sloping floor ran hill, down the stove pipe hole, onto the kitchen stove where Mom was baking pancakes. Boy did we get hell.
The rooms, especially the ones in the back of the house were low and the doorways were lower yet. The door between the kitchen and dining room was just about six feet and as Dad and Uncle Wick were both over six feet tall, they continually were bumping their heads. All the time we lived there all the drinking water and most of the wash water was dipped and carried from a well across the road. The sink emptied into a wooden butter pail set under the drain hole. And of course, the outhouse was in the back yard. Then sometimes the creek would overflow into the back yard and leave the shanty on an island.
When Bob was three months old all five of us came down with the whooping cough, and we really had it. It seemed as tho we'd never get over it. The first spring we were there dad had yellow jaundice.
It was here the summer I was 10 that I started in helping in haying, and driving horses. There were many times when I would rather have done something else but Dad's word was law and he'd back it up with a harness strip. He was always swapping horses, never had but one good horse (and he fell into a gully in some manner and broke his back), but he knew horses—how to doctor them, how much work they could stand—and managed to get his work done with them. I wouldn't try to tell you how many different “plugs” he had in five years.
The summer I was ten Uncle Ben Ingraham (Mom's youngest brother) got out of the navy, came home with a pocketful of money, and bought me that little Stevens .22 repeater. That was the nicest present I ever got. But it was a long time before I could use it alone. While he was here, we had quite a time hunting and trapping woodchucks.
It is now forty-five years since we moved out of that neighborhood. The old house burned years ago, and was replaced with a newer style, smaller house. The old wagon house (where Granddad Rankins used to take his bath in warm weather) and the pig pen and hen house are gone, only the barn remaining and looking much as it did then. Just about all the old neighbors are gone. There were the VanAllens next door where we sometimes bought our butter, and Jonses, (old Bill Hank, his son Dave and his son Jim. On the hill back of us was Aunt Em Stafford and her sister-in-law Kitty Andrews, both widows. Next door, to the north was old John Robinson, beyond was the Ed Staffords, Gilbert Mosher, Gene Robinson and Steve Stafford (the slowest talking man in the country)
Will have to tell more later
Good night
Pop

06/06/2025

Part 8

Here is another remembrance by my Grandfather as told in a short letter to my Uncle Dick.

January 30, 1958

Dear Dick,
Of Stafford & Holts and the gang that used to work there, and where I got my start as a machinist back in 1918, one could write a book, if one could put down in black and white all the happenings of
“Skids” Failing, the boss of the machine shop, “Blink” Stafford, “Swamp” Cat Mosher, “Pickles” MacDonald, Charlie “Bif Dome” Kelly, Brownie” Kennedy, “Big Dan Tinkler whom I once saw pick up a four-hundred-pound casting from a lathe to the window ledge and then back again, “Wild Bill” Praine, and dozens of others who made life interesting as only a shop gang can. “Bobbie” Holts who came from the knitting mills down around Cohoes and Troy knew knitting machines and had the “line” to sell purchasing agents. Walter Stafford-- the “Old Boy” – was the mechanic of the firm. A clever mechanic but a man of terrific temper. I recall one instance when he had plenty of trouble with a sleever-- a knitting machine of a size to knit the sleeves of long johns. It finally reached a point when he fired the whole top assembly out the window, and the window wasn't open—into the river. After he cooled off a bit, he sent a couple of the boys down the back way to fish it out again.
Another I forgot to mention was old Ernie Eberle, a good mechanic, a hard drinker, and as tough as they come. Those who worked with Ernie will always remember his favorite and original expressions, most of which wouldn't look well in print. Ernie stuttered and had a big crooked nose. When anyone said anything about straightening it for him, he'd say “Listen, mister, it was a better son of a bitch than you that bent that nose”.
Another was “Dingy” Bill Troy. What a guy! He'd fry his grandmother in axle grease for a laugh. But it was all for fun. If he did or said anything by chance that really hurt another, no one felt worse than he. The first time I saw him he was singing that little ditty “The Old Red Flannel Drawers that Maggie Wore”. Later I will tell you about the man in the blue shirt, “Ebbie” Sheridan was another. I first worked with “Ebbie” in the old Reddy Machine shop on Mohawk St., Little Falls, later in Stafford and Holts, again in Re*****on Arms, Ilion, and later for a long time in Cherry Burrell.
“Skids” Elmer Failing was quite a drinker and he like the women, but he was one of the best bosses I ever worked for.
“Wild Bill” Praine, a French Canadian, who blew in from the north country years ago was a great teller of yarns and probably the butt of more jokes than anyone else in the shop. Like the day someone climbed up and tied a heavy cord to the belt shifter on his lathe, ran it over a ways and thru some hangers and then down. About the time Bill got a good long cut started and had settled down on his stool for a good snooze, somebody would pull the cord and stop the machine. It took Bill nearly all day to find out what was happening.
“Bobbie” Holts used to have real hot arguments with the boys from time to time, but he never seemed to hold a grudge. As I look back now, I believe he enjoyed a good argument. Stafford was different. His usual approach was, in his slow talking way “I guess you’d better pick up your tools and get to hell out of here. You ain't no god damn good anyway”. Maybe before the fellow was packed up, “Staff” would change his mind and hire him back again. But I always got along with both fairly well.
Well, its bedtime again, so will close for this time.
As ever
Pop

03/04/2025

Part 7 My Grandfather Rankins evidently had been asked questions about the family by my Uncle Dick. Some of the information is a repetition of writings I previously shared but there are some new remembrances shared.

January 29, 1958

Dear Dick,
I am going to put down from time to time some of the happenings, something of the people I have known, of those many I have worked with. Should I repeat myself, bear with me. The people that we live with, work with or for, are what make us what we are, good, bad, or indifferent. The things said or done by my father, my mother, my grandfathers, my aunts and uncles, the many I have worked with, yes and the kids I have seen grow up are often times remembered. They cannot help but influence what I am today. Who can say there is no life everlasting! Because as I am I cannot but help influencing others some way or other.
My earliest recollection is of living on the Casler farm on Sandy Lane. All of Mom's family and Dad were then living with the exception of my two grandmothers. Within my memory there has always been Ken, although we never got along very well as kids. I remember the day Gene was born. That's the morning Dad took Ken and me down to aunt Mittie”s in Little Falls to watch the circus unload. I can just remember my Uncle Gene, Dad's younger brother- how he made a little pick-ax and crow bar (the crow bar is still in my tool box) and how he showed me how to pick up the gravel that Dad had tamped down near the back door. Later that fall how he and Uncle Wick stopped at the house on their way home from hunting and how they did target shooting on ripe cucumbers thrown in the air with a 12 gauge shotgun. A few nights later we had a telephone call- he was very sick. I remember Dad hitching up old Tom and driving to Little Falls. The next morning Uncle Gene was dead. I faintly recollect the day of the funeral- a light early November snow- and all the fellows he had worked with at Stafford & Holts marching in a body behind the horse drawn hearse. And probably no one ever worked there who raised more hell, or played more tricks than he. Anyone that he could pull a gag on was a likely victim. My grandfather (his father) was at that spot as often as anyone. Grand dad was quite a guy for building things and they were usually more useful than ornamental, and about three times as strong as necessary. Grand dad made a saw horse in the usual pattern. Gene chained it to a post. Grand dad wanted to know what in the hell he did that for. Gene answered, “to keep it from suckin' the cows.” When it came to drinking Gene could hold up his end. My dad to the best of my knowledge never drank (neither could he use to***co). Gramp was always holding up Dad as an example to Uncle Gene, until one night the two of them had been to a corn husking. Dad had a little too much hard cider. By the time got home and a bed he was awful sick. Uncle Gene routed Granddad out of bed, “come in here Pa, I want to show you something”. As I said Dad was pretty sick, “Look at him now, there's the goddam example you've been holding up for me.” Nothing malicious or mean, just something to talk about.
Well, but it is quarter of three A.M. So I will close for today, more later. Pop

02/13/2025

Part 6 Mohawk in 1920 as described by my Grandfather, Russ Rankins. My, what a busy village it was!

When we moved to Mohawk in November 1920, the trolley cars were all running strong. One could get a car to Herkimer of Frankfort every 15 minutes, and to Little Falls or Rome and Utica every half hour. The big cars of the Southern New York Railways were then running altho I don't remember their schedules.
At that time Charlie Prince and Jim Nolan were running the print shop on East Main Street where Rinald Robotham is now. He had worked for them for some time and was later a partner until Jim died. Next door to the west in the brick building on the corner of Warren Street, now occupied by Fred Ludwig's liquor store, and taking in the entire first floor was the grocery store of Charlie Johnson. The hardware store on the west corner was run by Burt Richardson. About 1925 this was taken over by Ray Harter and Harold (Red) Ray. Next door was the waiting room and ticket office of the Southern New York Railways. Later L.W. (Lee) Branch ran the Red and White grocery store here for about twenty five years, selling it to John Pumilio about 1953. Next was the icecream parlor conducted by the Frateschis for many years. That store is now John Mayton's “Ye Olde Shoppe”. Next to the west where Mitch McCormack's tailor shop is located was Mike Bogan's pool room. Then came the Mohawk Creamery run by the same Lee Branch. After the repeal of Prohibition in 1933 Doug Cook and Howard Chambers had a bar and lunch room at this location. Carrol's grocery was next door. These two stores have been occupied by Robinson Brothers (appliances) for a number of years now. Shackleton and Anderson had a dry goods store where the Town's Clerk Office is now located. Some time later George Anderson continued the business by himself. After he died his wife continued the business for a number of years until she sold out to Tom Fahey. It was Anderson's for many years. On the first floor of the brick block on the corner of North Otsego St. now owned by Stanley Biasini was an ice cream parlor and soda fountain run by Tommy the Greek. At the rear and facing North Otsego St. were the village offices. On the second floor, Judge Rafter had his law office. On the third floor over this office a group of young fellows had their club rooms. Later the Mohawk Fife and Drum Corps had their rooms here and here they used to practice.
Acros Otsego St. in the Bates block, a Mr. Firman ran a Variety Store, the same one that Dwight Cook took over and ran for so many years until the block was destroyed by fire in early December, 1966. Next to the Variety store was the Judson Restaurant owned and operated by a Mr. Russell. Later Irv Lake and Butch Arthur operated a grill and restaurant until Butch left the partnership when Lake continued the business until the time of the fire. Beyond the lunch room was Alec Swartwood's newsroom. Later George Sweet took over and continued the business for a long time until his death. Sweet was in business here in 1922. Al Lief continued the business for some time for Mrs. Sweet and then took over and the store for himself for a long time. Beyond the news room was Art Robbin's pool room. This later became the Market Basket store, managed by Clyde Petrie. At the time of the fire Jack Zito had been running a grocery store and meat market here for several years. Next was the Masonic Temple and beyond that was Tony Bresher's clothing store and tailor shop. Earl Palmer ran this for a short time later, and then Jack Harry did business here. Next on the street was the A&P store. This later expanded and took over the former clothing store. DeWitt Allen’s furniture store was in the three story wooden building on the corner of North Washington Street, now occupied by Wright’s Furniture, which was started by Ernest Wright and has included the two store areas to the east formerly occupied by the A&P store. Across Main St. was the old Mohawk Valley National Bank which closed its doors in October 1931. What is now the parking lot of the Oneida National Bank, and next to the brick building to the east was a one story wooden building housing a Chinese laundry. Tony Henela later ran a meat market in this building for a number of years. In the brick building Oscar Day had a jewelry store for a long time. Not long after his death his son Robert sold out the business. Next to the east was the Post Office and beyond that was Del Ford’s hardware store. Del was Charlie Ford’s father. On the corner of S. Otsego St., William R. Clark had a shoe store. This was where Ted Gloo’s Insurance Office is now. The town clerk’s office was upstairs over the post office, and the Town Clerk was Jerry Sayles. Across Otsego St. was the Rexall Drug Store run by Harold Jarvis. Renwick Thomas had a barber shop next door. There was also a meat market along here and on the corner of Columbia St. was Tuttle’s Grocery. On this same corner on a narrow strip of ground Tommy Davis, who had been badly crippled in an accident, had a tiny cigar and to***co store. Around the corner on the Columbia St. side was Leon Warner’s Insurance Office. Sykes’ shoe repair shop and the office of the Mohawk Coal and Lumber Co. were also along here. Just south, in the building now the office of Dr. John Hershfield was Atkins and Robert’s monument works. About 1929 all of these buildings with the exception of the Jarvis block and the monuments works were torn down. About this time Mrs. Morgan Edwards ran a lunch room in a small one story building close by the Jarvis block. This was moved away when Socony (later Mobil) gas station was built. Al Marmet ran a meat market where Walkers store is now. The Mohawk Hotel stood where the Gulf gas station is. Harry Lake did barbering in the little shop where Sam Licari is now. Davis and Carp ran a tire and battery shop and sold accessories where the laundromat is at present. A short time later they decided to enlarge and built the large brick building to the east now used as the bus garage. Apparently, they bit of more than they could chew, for they went broke in the venture.
The three story building used for many years as the Municipal Building was the Aubrey Hotel run for a long time by Louie Buff. On south Otsego St., between this building and the Jarvis block was a house where Nick Such ran a speakeasy in the prohibition days. This was destroyed by fire about 1922 and was never rebuilt
Up West Main St., between Erie and Lock St., Andy Bacon ran a little home grocery. A little farther west across Fulmer Creek was the car barns, a busy place in those days. (trolley cars) This is now occupied by Holt Bros. Auto Sales. Between the car barns and the creek was Robinson’s Grocery. Across the street was another grocery run by a Mr. Youngs. Frank Johnson ran the garage where Jochmus is now. Fred Jochmus bought out Johnson in 1926.
There was another grocery next door to the garage on the corner of Pettingill St. this was the building lately occupied by the Valley Electric Co. To the east was a wooden building that housed a Ford garage.
The old Erie Canal bed was still open, as it was only five years since it had been abandoned at the opening of the Barge Canal in 1916.
On East Main St., occupied until recently by Mohawk Mill Bargain Center was the Elastic Spring Knit Mill operated by the Shauflers. The Duofold Mill was also running at this time.
To the best of my recollection there were four doctors practicing in Mohawk at that time: Dr. William Brooks on south Washington St., Dr. Williams on North Otsego St., and Dr. Crowe and Dr. Jennings on Columbia St.
John Cameron had a bakery in the brick building on Warren St., just back of the hardware store.
At this time the high school baseball and football games were played down on Casey’s flats, north of the West Shore Railroad tracks below the pump station. The basketball games were played in the Mohawk Armory.
John Ranney ran the coal yard on Johnson St. Later W.R. Clark ran the coal yard for many years. There was a blacksmith shop on the corner of Johnson St. and North Otsego St. Later Lynn VanHorn conducted a garage here for many years, Across the street was Pete Brown’s hotel. Up the street and just back of the Bate’s block was the Bate’s Theater. On South Otsego St. back of Clark’s shoe store was the Citizen’s Co-Op grocery. Walter Bronner was Chief of police and for a long time after this the only police in the town. Frank Dubois was the head of the Municipal Commission. Fred Graves was the Justice of the Peace and also conducted an undertaking parlor on North Otsego St. A Mr. Joslin also had a similar establishment on North Washington St.
As I recall, the only paved streets at that time were Main, Walnut, South Washington, North, West, North Richfield St., and Warren St. They were paved with concrete. The other streets have mostly been black-topped at a later date.
Rev. Maynard Beach was pastor of the Methodist Church, Rev. Boynton of the Reformed Church, Father Gage of the Episcopal Church and Father McCarthy of the Catholic Church.
Perhaps there are errors or omissions in this brief record, but forty-seven years is quite a long time and there have been many changes.
Omission corrected: George Graves conducted a drug store just east of the Masonic Temple – between that and Robbins pool room.
Since this was first typed, Rinald Robotham has passed away.

Russell Rankins
January 6 1968

01/10/2025

If you are a new viewer of this page please scroll back in time through my postings. I have been posting various information for some time. I think you will find if most interesting to start from the beginings of this page.

12/30/2024

Part 5
My grandfather Russ Rankins always enjoyed the lighter side of life. Jokes, teasing, stories were all part and pacel of the man I knew. Here he takes a break from family genealogy and in his own words describes a part of the past many of us have little familiarity to.

SOME PRIVIES I HAVE KNOWN

This could turn out to be a smelly subject but history is history and can't be changed. The first one I remember was on the Casler farm on Sandy Lane. This was a well built three holer, with three sizes--- one for Papa Bear, one for Mama Bear, and one for Baby Bear, the one difficulty being the height of the seat made it necessary for Baby Bear to climb upon a box to get seated. I will say now that all privies had one thing in common, or two, wasps' nests in the summer and a cold frost ring in the winter. Oh, those good old days or nights. When one felt the call of nature on a winter night, one must needs light the kerosene lantern, pull on his boots, cap and overcoat, get the snow shovel and start out. By the time one had done what he had started out to do the frost would have been melted off the seat. This little building was the end of the road for the mail order catalog and the telephone directory.
The outhouse on the Gardinier farm in Paradise was less elaborate, being a simple two holer, but it served us well and faithfully for five years. The one at school, District #9, left much to be desired as to sanitation. Actually it was a mess. The backhouse on the Deyo farm was also a two holer with a little square opening in the door for light and ventilation(?) And it was thru this little window that I threw a hard green pear while my Grandfather was having his morning rest, tho I didn't know until too late. What a yell he let out! Whether it hit him or not I never knew, for by the time he got out I was a long ways off.
By this time the school toilets were becoming better built and cleaner, so there is little to be said of these from now on.
When I went to work in the old Reddy shop in 1917 there was a flush toilet-- for the summer time. In the winter it was impossible to keep it from freezing so the water was shut off and we had to go downstairs, which meant going thru the machine shop, down thru the foundry, down some more steps into the cellar, across the bridge to the throne. How the wind would whistle down thru there! We could sit there and watch the rats run around. The Foley boys used to bring a gun along and pass the time taking pot shots at them. A sort of two birds with one stone thing. From then on the shop toilets were more comfortable if not always too clean.
The one I must not forget is the one I had to use in an emergency at one time when we were hunting up above Stratford on the Pleasant Lake road. It was one that was connected with and old abandoned country school house and the hedgehogs had been chewing on the seats. That was about the roughest seat I ever had. But time marches on and I hope that history doesn't repeat itself along those lines.

December 2, 1977
Pop

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12/22/2024

Russell Rankins, my Grandfather, astride his Indian Motorcycle in about the year 1920. He always spoke well of his adventures on it through central New York. There was a side car too. He grew up in a time when a driver's license was not required in the state for motor vehicles.

12/22/2024

Here is the only photo I think exists of my Great Great Grandfather Norman Rankins. He sports a full beard. My Great Grandfather James Freeman Rankins is to his right wearing the bow tie. I believe in front of James is my Great Grandmother Esther. The children and the other two adults are unidentified.

12/16/2024

Part 4

My Grandfather Rankins gave a close look at the foods enjoyed on farms in the Mohawk Valley before the first World War. In this remembrance he also describes chores assigned to youngsters on the farms.

EATIN' ON THE FARM

Much of what we ate came from the farm and garden. Wherever we lived we had a big garden, and it was usually well tended all thru the season. The first thing out of the garden in the spring was usually the little red radishes, then onions from sets, followed by lettuce and later by onions from seed. Then we had beet greens and young carrots, altho we never seemed to care so much for the greens, but the young beets were always good. Shortly after came the string beans, cucumbers, summer aquash, peas, early potatoes and sweet corn. That was the day! What we didn't eat was canned or pickled. The string beans were canned or pickled, the sweet corn was canned, the tomatoes were eaten fresh, canned, or made into chili sauce or ketchup.
Of course the first berries of early summer were the field strawberries. What short cake they made especially when topped off with good rich cream. There was never enough left over to can. A little later came the blackcaps and red raspberries. These went the same route as the strawberries. Then came the long black berries. There was always plenty of these for the picking. These could be made into shortcake (but they couldn't compare with the earlier berries) eaten as a side dish, canned or made into blackberry jam which always tasted mighty good on a slice of home made bread. The elderberries used fresh made very good pie and canned still made good pie.
The farms that we lived on all had apple orchards with quite a variety of fruit from early to the late winter. There were Northern Spies, Greenings, Baldwins, Spice Apple, Russets, Pound Sweets, Tallman Sweets, and others I've forgotten or never knew. But they all tasted good. Another was the Ben Davis, a red apple with a tough skin and a woody taste at picking time, but by April they had mellowed and were fair eating. Maybe that was because they were the only ones left. We always had eight or ten barrels of apples in the cellar going into winter. The culls and windfalls were carted to the mill and made into cider. At least one barrel of cider and sometimes two or three went into the cellar each fall. When it got too hard to drink it was used to replenish our vinegar tub which was usually kept upstairs where it was warm enough to keep it alive. In those times everyone kept a cruet of vinegar on the table, the same a salt and sugar. Apples then as now made good pies and apple sauce.Worm holes didn't bother us, we just ate the other side, altho sometimes we ate too far. Pears always hit the spot. They tasted almost as good canned the next winter as they did fresh. Tree ripened plumssweet as honey couldn't be beat for flavor. If any happened to be left over they were canned and eaten as a side dish, or were made into jam. Cherries were canned for pie. And grapes that had ripened on the vine after the first frost had a satisfying flavor all their own. They were usually made into jam or jellies for the winter. If one didn't have a couple hundred quarts of canned stuff in the cellar by the time winter set in they were considered lacking in something or other.
About the time the fall winds began to blow thru the corn stubble was the time to begin picking apples, cutting the cabbage, gathering the pumpkins and winter squash and digging the potatoes, turnips and rutbagas. If there happened to be a surplus of pumpkins they were busted up and fed to the cows. The pumpkins and squash had to be stored where it was cool and dry, so they wouldn't freeze and rot. Some of those big winter (Hubbard) squash were so hard they had to be cracked with a hatchet, but what a tasty dish they made when baked. After we had what we considered enough potatoes in the cellar to see us thru to spring and new potatoe time, the rest were sold or traded at the grocery store.
There was usually a barrel of sauer kraut to go down cellar also. When Grandfather was with us he always supervised the making. The heads of the cabbage were trimmed, quartered and the cores cut out. Those cores with a little salt made pretty good eating for us kids. Then the cabbage was shaved into the barrel and after a certain amount had been cut salt was added and then it was pounded down with the stomper, a block of wood about four inches in diameter and a foot long with a handle stuck into one end. More cabbage was added and more salt, followed by more stomping, and so on until there was enough kraut or they run out of cabbage. Then it was allowed to set in the kitchen until it had stopped working. It was then cleaned of on the top, covered with a clean cotton cloth, a wide board and the whole held down with a well cleaned stone. Then it had to be lugged down cellar. Each time any kraut was taken out the cloth, board and stone were washed, the kraut leveled off and the cloth, board, and stone replaced. That cold crisp kraut sure tasted good.
One thing I forgot to mention, when we had plenty of cider, some of it was boiled down to a syrup. This was used in making mince-meat and sometimes it was thickened and made into pie.
When the weather got cold enough, came the time for butchering the hogs. We usually had at least two and sometimes four ready. After they were scalded, scraped and gutted and shaved, they were allowed to hang until cold, then came the job of working them up, The hams and shoulders were trimmed and put in pickle, a mixture of water, salt and salt peter (the salt peter was added mostly to give the meat a rich red color). They were left in this pickle for two or three weeks, depending on the size after which they went to the smoke-house to be smoked with corn-cobs or beech chips. That was a matter of choice. Any kind of wood seemed to work except that which contained pitch. In working up the meat the surplus fat was trimmed off, cut into about inch squares, put into a big kettle over a slow fire to try out the lard. When this had simmered along enough the hot fat was poured off into earthen jars, the chunks of fat or what was left of them were put into a cheese cloth bag, hung in a handy place and the remaining fat squeesed out with a lard squeezer, two boards about three feet long and hinged together at one end. The belly was cut into strips about five inches wide and put down in brine for salt pork. I don't recall that we ever made bacon. The heart, liver and tongue went into liverwurst. Most of the rest of the lean meat went into sausage. Some used to clean the intestines and fill them with sausage. We never did. Sometimes we would have a cow to butcher or a young bull but not very often. Any surplus of meat at butchering time always found a ready market, either at the market or someone who wanted a pig or half a pig to work up for themselves. I've known Uncle George and Aunt Mittie Untz to do that.
We always kept a few chickens, probably not more than 25 or 30 at a time. Every spring three or four hens would set on a dozen or so eggs. When they hatched the hen and chicks would be put in a coop together until the chicks were well feathered. As they had the run of the farm they grew well so that by fall the young roosters made many a fine chicken dinner. I think that the chicken and biscuits my mother used to make were the best ever. When there was a surplus of eggs they were put down in an earthen crock in water or were packed in oats and salt. These were mainly used for cooking when the hens took a vacation.
In the spring of the year when the cows began to freshen and before cheese factories opened we would have plenty of milk for a while, which meant cream for everything and whipped cream for all. Some milk went to fatten a veal calf now and then. These Dad would butcher when they would dress out at about 180 or 200 pounds. These usually found a ready market. Sometimes we made butter for our own use but I don't think we ever sold any. Another dividend of the surplus milk was ice cream made in the old hand cranked freezer.
Another standby from the farm or garden were winter beans. When the pods began to ripen the beans were pulled and stacked around poles set in the ground. After they had dried as much as they would the stakes were pulled and the whole stack was taken to the barn floor until there was time to thresh them out with a flail. Then on a windy day they were taken outside and poured from one tub to another to blow out the chaff and dust. When it came time for a bean dinner us kids had the job of sorting over dry beans to pick out the bad ones and the small stones that might have gotten mixed in during harvest. But those beans baked with a liberal chunk of salt pork always made up for the trouble of sorting.
When we lived in Paradise there was a row of maple trees along the road, these are still standing). We tapped these once or twice, boiling down the sap on the kitchen stove, and making a few quarts. This was a change from sugar syrup my mother used to make for our pancakes, which were our usual fare for breakfast during cold weather, altho sometimes we had oatmeal or other cereal. It seems that we used quite a bit of cornmeal , either for Johnny cake which was always welcome, or cornmeal mush which went pretty good on a cold fall or winter evening.
As for chores it seems I can't remember when I didn't have to w**d garden or hang up my brothers' diapers. Of course every farm boy is expected to bring in the cows and that was my job for a long time. But that wasn't so bad, as at that time we had our old dog, Brownie, who being sent would go backover the hill out of sight and bring the cows down to the head of the lane. My father never kept more than nine cows and as my grandfather was living with us at that time my help was not needed and so I never really got around to learn to milk until much later. The summer that I was ten I started in helping with the haying, and turning the grindstone whenever it was necessary to sharpen anything. When I was thirteen I started to do the raking with the dump rake, but I never got around to do any mowing, or plowing, or cultivating. I don't remember when I started helping build fence. One of the jobs all of the kids got stuck with at some time or other was picking potato bugs and dropping them into a can which held a little kerosene oil. And they all got into the act of picking up potatoes at digging time. In the spring when the potatoes started to sprout in the cellar us kids had the job of sprouting the potatoes, that is, going thru all the potatoes in the bin and breaking off the sprouts to help keep the potatoes in eating condition until the new ones were big enough to eat. We burned wood in the kitchen stove most of the time, and it seemed that the wood box was always empty. Another summer job for kids was feeding the baby chicks and mother hen. Picking stones before planting was another spring time chore. This wasn't so bad because we knew it couldn't last very long. When we got big enough we had the mowing of the lawn to take care of. Ken had the job one day and he figured that Gene could help by hitching a rope on the the front of the mower and having Gene pull in front. Gene had a better idea. He tied the rope to the back of his suspenders and went on that way with his hands free. They got in an argument and Ken yanked back on the mower. The rope held but the suspenders didn't.
All the farms that we lived on had butternut trees close by and we always made sure that we had a bushel or two of butternuts stowed away by the end of fall.
The last year we lived in Paradise I got involved in threshing. In those times most of the farmers put their grain in the barn and later someone with a threshing machine and gasoline engine would make the rounds of the country to thresh for them. John Gardinier had a good outfit and did our threshing for us that year. It took about a dozen men to do the job and as we were a little shorthanded, I was given the job in the straw mow, the dustiest place of all. That was when I learned I could spit black.
I suppose there were a dozen other chores that us kids could do such as taking a drink to the men in the fields, or bringing up a pan of potatoes for dinner or bringing in the washing from the line or folding the babies diapers just as well as a grownup. Anyway we always had enough to eat and clothes to keep us warm so I guess we were not so bad off after all.
My mother made most of our clothes, either from yard goods or from hand-me-downs. She always made Dad's shirts because he was unable to buy shirst with sleeves long enough to suit him. She baked her own bread, sometimes as much a seven loaves every second day. This was done by hand for a long time until she got a bread mixer. That helped because one of us kids could turn the crank after she had put in the flour and rest of the mixin's. Washing was done by hand and the wringing too until we moved to Mohawk. I have often wondered of late years how in the world she managed to do all the things that she did with what she had to work with.

Russ Rankins, 1969

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