If you’ve been stopping by here to see what I have to say now and again, then you know I’m a country girl. I grew up on a farm where my dad raised beef cattle although we never said beef cattle back then. They were just cows. Usually a mixture of colors and kinds. Dad did prefer Herefords. They were dark red with a white-face. Dad raised corn and wheat for his own use mostly and cut hay for the cows. He also raised tobacco like most every other Kentucky farmer back then. At that time you got an acreage allotment according to how much land you owned. Tobacco was the cash crop that made it possible for most small farmers to buy those farms and feed their families.
I can talk about tobacco crops another time. Tonight I’m thinking about corncribs. That’s because on the way to church this morning, we passed my grandfather’s farm as we always do. But for some reason my eye caught on the only building left in the barn lot now. The corncrib. There used to be two barns but they’re gone now, past their usefulness and torn down. The corncrib is past its usefulness too, but it’s still standing solidly on its little plot of ground in the middle of the barn lot. It was built up off the ground on poles to make it harder for the varmints to get in the crib and so the corn could stay dryer. I’m guessing on that, but it sounds reasonable to me.
This corncrib looks a little different from the one on the farm where I grew up. This one appears to have a full door. My dad’s corncrib had a half door, so when you went to get corn for the chickens or the pigs, you had to climb up and crawl in if there wasn’t enough corn close enough to reach. Then there was a small opening up high on the crib where the farmer shoveled in the corn after picking it in the field. You can see that little door on this corncrib. Things like that are done by machine these days, conveyor belts, etc. Back in the day the machine was the farmer, and he shoveled the corn in flat scoop shovels and pitched it through that high window. I can still remember the sound of that shovel crunching down in a load of corn when my father was unloading the corn into the crib.
Anyway, this morning when we drove by that corncrib, memories popped up in my head and the dry dusty smell of the corn in the corncrib was suddenly in my mind. Of course, there was some mouse smell too because if you had a corncrib, the mice were ready to move in and enjoy easy living. My grandfather used to try to make their living a little harder by catching a big black snake to put in the crib. But my dad didn’t like snakes so I don’t think he ever did that. We did have plenty of barn cats that stayed busy keeping the mouse population down in the hayloft.
One of my cousins once had the fabulous idea of having a war against the mice and see how many we could kill in the corncrib. He thought it was fabulous anyway. I don’t think I was an enthusiastic participant, but he and his brother had a great time throwing things at the mice. Gave them some exercise anyway. Boys and mice.
I mostly remember fetching corn for the chickens and being worried a mouse might run out of the corn onto my hand. Also, under the crib made the best place for a dog or cat to hide when you were trying to catch them. I never really liked getting under the crib. In places it wasn’t bad since it was high enough off the ground that I didn’t have to crawl, but other places, those better hiding places for whatever critter I hoped to catch, were harder to get to. I also liked to catch a hen to stroke its feathers now and again the way Granny Em did in These Healing Hills. Granny Em was a fun character to get to know and a good place to have known her would have been around a corncrib. Having an ear of corn helps in catching hens.
My mother milked a few cows for a while and she would chop up the corn still on the corncobs to make food to put in the stanchions for the cows to eat while she did the milking. I remember how the hogs that were in a pen on the side of the barn that was only a few yards from the corncrib would start grunting, grumbling and squealing when they saw you at the crib because they wanted to be fed. I never got fond of the hogs. I was always a little afraid of them. So it never bothered me when we had hog killing day after they were fattened up on that corn from the corncrib.
While I didn’t think about it back then, now I can see that a full corncrib meant things were good on the farm and everything and everybody was going to have plenty to eat until it was corn picking time again.
Do you have any corncrib or farm girl memories?
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I have lots of memories from being raised on a farm and then my husband and I ranching for many years. I could write a book about the adventures my husband and I have had with him being a veterinarian. James Herriot is not the only one who has had harrowing escapades.
But, the story I’m going to share is a favorite family story about my husband’s Grandma & her sister. As young girls, their job was to bring in the cows each evening. Naturally as kids, they decided to make this daily chore a little more exciting so they would make the bull stay back (he must have been fairly gentle) until the cows got all through the gate to the barnyard then they would let him go through. This must not have been lively enough for them because they next decided that they would close the gate and then make the bull jump the gate. Well, things went along just fine until one day their Grandpa came to visit. It was a rainy day and when it came time to go get the cows in, he insisted on going to bring in the cows and for the girls to stay in the house. That evening at the supper table, Grandpa told the girls’ dad: “Son, you better sell that bull of yours. He’s crazy! He wouldn’t come in with the cows. I tried & tried to get him to go through the gate but he wouldn’t budge so finally I gave up and closed the gate and went on to bring the cows in and you know what that fool thing did? He jumped the gate!!! Son, you better just take that bull to the sale barn.” Grandma’s dad didn’t know what in the world his dad was talking about. Grandma & her sister never said a word and didn’t dare look at each other…they knew they just might be in a heap of trouble.
I’m so thankful to have been raised on the farm where we never were bored…course we knew if we ever said we were, we would find ourselves with some new chores to do. 😄 What wonderful memories we have, especially with our cousins, from growing up on the farm.
Thanks, Ann, for sharing your memories!
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Love it, Connie. What a great story. Can’t you just imagine the grandfather’s face when that bull jumped the gate. The question is did the dad sell the talented jumping bull. Might have been hard to keep him in a field after learning to jump. Your husband’s grandmother should have gone into animal training. Quite a trick they taught the bull. He must have enjoyed it.
Being a farm girl does make for some good memories. And maybe you should write that book about your farming and ranching adventures.
I do have corn crib memories! Ours had full doors and two rooms. One year, in particular, I remember one room being empty. I swept it clean, found an old chair, and bits and pieces of real household items, such as a magazine rack. My toy phone was installed. There were only occasional visiting kids, so mostly I entertained myself, playing tend-like (pretend). Once my snooty cousin from Illinois was in for a visit. She played with me some out there. It was time to bake a mud pie and she decided it would be a contest to make the best one and one of our grandparents was be the judge. So happened, her dad had brought us a pack of Lifesavers a piece and although I loved candy, I figured it would be worth it to win the contest. SO… I sacrificed mine to decorate my mud pie and when I won, she complained to her parents that I had WASTED what was given to me. I’m sure someone tried to make me feel bad for it, but I still thought my prize- winning pie made up for any guilt I might feel. Another time, a guest had arrived before I got there and was “climbing the walls” waiting for me.. you guessed it – a black snake! I was never again too eager to return.
Even more fun was had riding in the old team- pulled wagon and gathering ears as we traveled through the field. It was also fun to pull up and throw the ears in through the opened door of the crib. However, shucking the corn and grinding it by the hand- turned contraption or shelling by hand could easily become chores!
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Thanks so much for sharing your corncrib memories, Sandra. Loved them. Like Margaret, you had a fancy corncrib and what fun to turn it into your own personal “office” or “room.” I know all about tend-like. My sisters and I did that tend-like all the time. Maybe I should do a post on that word. We also made mud pies, but with my sweet tooth, I don’t think I would have sacrificed my lifesavers even to been a snooty cousin. LOL. We did pick various weed berries for decoration though. That snake would have kept your room free of mice, but maybe you’d rather have the mice. 🙂 My grandfather had a hand turned corn sheller. That was sort of fun for two or three ears, but everything gets to be work when you have to do a bunch.
Yes. I remember playing out in the corncrib and the smells of feed and corn. My dad was a hog and beef farmer and we also had horses, dogs, and cats to play with outside. Our corn crib had 3 separate rooms in the one building with a little hallway between them. Honestly I am not sure how the corn got in there, probably an auger. Us girls did not do many outside chores as I had 7 brothers. We had so many great memories of growing up on the farm.
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You lucked out on getting to stay out of field or barn with all those brothers, Margaret. And that was one fancy corncrib. Wasn’t it fun have so many animals to make into pets? My dad didn’t have horses, but I loved my dogs and cats.
My grandparents had a corn crib which sat down the hill from the chicken house.
My cousins & I were in the crib & got called to the house. Hogs were eating a the slop trough. I ran & scared the hogs, who turned on me. My barefoot got caught on the barbed wire . I was left hanging there with my foot very near the hogs mouths. Finally after screaming my grandma came & rescued me. Yeah…only now the REAL pain began. They had to clean it an used mercurachrome on the wound…BURNED LIKE FIRE!!!!! Never went to the crib every again.
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I guess my corncrib stories didn’t bring up any good memories for you, Betty. I would have been terrified to be stuck close to the hogs because my dad was always warning us not to fall into the hog pen because they might try to eat me. I guess I’ve gotten my revenge by eating a lot of bacon. And you are so right about mercurachrome. That stuff probably disinfected but you’re right. It burned. Made a kid hide any scrapes or cuts to keep from getting that treatment.
Lots of memories on my grandparents farm. I remember scrambling up in the corncrib more than once to escape a mean rooster. And another time to avoid the bull. I’m sure there were plenty of small critters in there, but nothing was more scary to me than that rooster and bull.
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Your words awoke a memory for me, Lavon. I think I ran for the corncrib and an escape from a bull once. I was never afraid of a rooster, but I was terrified of a sow that ran me when I was a little girl, probably 5. I remember somehow getting in the car to escape. I was very wary of being anywhere close to it after that. 🙂
My Pa had a corn crib just a few steps away from the barn where he milked his three cows.I remember the hogs were right beside the barn,also close to the corn crib.I also didn’t like the critters that might run,or crawl out of the corn .
My Pa only milked those three cows ,by hand,but Daddy milked 50-60 cows in a milk barn with electric milkers and big milk tank to catch the milk in and keep it cold. I remember us three girls getting in the tank and scrubbing it clean after the milk truck came to collect the milk.
We raised tobacco,hay,corn and one year My brother even had a cucumber cash crop.
Lots of good memories on the farm that I wouldn’t trade at all.
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You were definitely a farm girl like me, Lisa. My dad did some milking before I can remember when they separated the cream somehow. The apparatus for that sat on our back porch but I never could fathom how it worked. I should look that up. But my mother gave me some wise advice when I got married and that was to never learn to milk or it would become my job. My husband did milk a while after we married. I did have to clean the milkers sometimes. But like you, I wouldn’t trade being a farm girl for anything.