Apple Butter Party
Returning from the cold, clear spring that bubbled out of the base of the ridge behind the cabin, Nannie tucked a stray wisp of graying brown hair back into the bun on top of her head with one hand. She walked across her rock strewn, sparsely grassed yard, balancing a tin dish pan full of water on her hip with the other hand. Uncovering her high top shoes when she pulled her long skirt up, Nannie stepped from the plank sidewalk onto the porch, then she paused at the kitchen door, and turned to survey the laughing, shouting children playing Ante Over around the smokehouse. A good portion of those children were hers, and she searched for one in particular.
"Sarah Elizabeth!"
Wiping her straight, brown bangs from her eyes, Bess, waiting for the ball to sail over the smokehouse, studied a barn swallow's vacant dried mud, bowl shaped nest attached to the underside of the roof. A few weeks ago to protect her babies, the sassy barn swallow would dive down on the children when the ball came too close to her nest. Now the nest was empty.
At the sound of her mother's voice, Bess turned. "What, Mama?" When Mama didn't call her Bess, she knew she was in trouble for something.
"Ya and Jimmy Bob Parkins quit playen and take yer turn stirren the apple butter kettle. Alma and Jacky Tyler told me ya been shirken yer turn, and they’s getten tired of stirren."
"All right, Mama. Come on Jimmy Bob. We've got to go stir now."
As they turned to leave the game, a big red ball sailed over the tin smokehouse roof, and Bess heard a thud, then a loud, "Ow!" She looked back into Jimmy Bob's pained face. He was gingerly rubbing the unruly shock of black hair on the top of his head.
"Ouch. Bess, that dang ball hit me square on top the head. That hurt!"
"Surely not, Jimmy Bob. There's nothen up there to hurt, is there?" Bess giggled then darted off to the corner of the yard with Jimmy Bob chasing after her.
That corner of the yard was bare of greenery due to the frequent fires under the large, black kettle that was used for soap making, lard rendering, heating water for wash day, and apple butter making. The only living plant within that corner of the yard's wattle fence was the mulberry tree. Now with the very sweet, blackberry like fruit long gone, the tree showed the fall coloring of mid September.
Right away Bess noticed the grouchy look on Alma's flushed face. She was tired of standing over the steamy, bubbling apple butter mixture while it simmered. Handing over a long stick with the T- paddle board tied to the end of it, Alma grumbled, "About time ya two took over. Yer late. Jimmy Bob, get some more wood from off that rick yonder. The fire's getten low," ordered Alma.
"I'm sorry, Alma. I hated to miss out on the fun," Bess confided, lowering her voice to a whisper, "Besides why do I always get stuck with Jimmy Bob? It’s not fair that he never wants to stir. Makes me do most of it while he sits and talks."
"Cain't hep that. We had our turn and then some. Come on, Jacky." Bess watched wistfully while Alma and Jacky ran to join the fun around the smokehouse.
Arms full of wood, Jimmy Bob returned. He threw a stick at the fire under the kettle then dropped the rest, scattering it on the ground.
"Jimmy Bob, don't throw that wood down like that. Ya jest got ashes all over my apron."
"So? It'll wash."
"Wash day's not fer two days yet. I'll jest have to turn it over and use the clean side when we're done, but I'll know it has ashes all over it on the underside," growled Bess.
In those days, the girls were given three dress and two Mother Hubbard aprons. One dress was for good and the other two for ever day. One of the ever day dresses was worn to school for a week. The first two days an apron covered it, then the last three days the dress was worn without the apron. The next week, Bess wore the other ever day dress and apron while that dress and apron were in the wash.
Looking at the dried brown ring crusted on the top of the fifty gallon iron kettle left as the apple butter boiled down, Bess wondered if the apple butter wasn't thick enough to empty out of the kettle so they could start over. "Jimmy Bob, go to the kitchen and tell the women one of them should come take a look at the kettle and see if this apple butter is done."
As she watched Jimmy Bob scurry for the cabin, Bess listened to the sounds of happy voices and laughter coming from the kitchen while the women worked together. The neighboring farmers had dropped their women, children and apples off early that morning. As soon as two or three big wooden barrels of apples were pared, a fire was started under the iron kettle, the apple slices dropped in, and a little apple cider added to keep the apples from scorching. While they shared stored up gossip and family happenings, the women peeled apples and prepared a noon meal of smoked ham, sweet potatoes, corn, boiled potatoes, turnip greens, and of course, apple pies.
Outside the children played games while waiting for their turn to stir the apple kettle. For some reason, the children were always paired, a boy and a girl, to take turns. Bess suspected it was because the boys didn't like to work so this was the way the women made sure the apple butter wouldn't burn.
Stick thin Mrs. Parkins came from the house, carrying a large crock to ladle the apple butter into. "Sit down, younguns and rest while I empty this kettle then we'll bring out more apples for ya all to start stirren again." She talked so slow that Bess wanted to finish her sentences for her to hurry the conversation along, but Mrs. Parkins had always been a hard worker. Jimmy Bob’s looks favored his mother, but he sure didn’t inherit worken from his mother, Bess thought.
Sometime later as she wipe sweat from her brow, Bess pleaded, "Jimmy Bob, take a turn stirren. I got to get away from this fire fer a minute."
"I reckon I kin take a turn," Jimmy Bob drawled out.
Forgetting about keeping her dress clean, Bess flopped down on the ground in the shade of the mulberry tree so she could stretch her dusty, tanned legs out before her. She spotted the blue-gray blur of a mockingbird when it fluttered through the branches above her, causing almost as much of a gentle swinging motion to the tree limbs as did the light breeze.
"Jimmy Bob, feel that cool breeze. It's comin' off the ridge. I kin hardly wait fer evening to bring some coolness, then it won't seem so hot by the kettle fire directly."
"Yep," grunted Jimmy Bob as he half heartily moved the T- paddle around in the kettle and at the same time wishfully watched the children playing by the smokehouse.
It’s somethin’ how quiet Jimmy Bob gets when he has to work a little, mused Bess while she watched the boy. "Jimmy Bob, did ya ever see so many apples as people brung this time? This year must have been the biggest apple crop in years. My Pap said there must have been ice hangin' on the tree branches on Valentine Day fer sure this year. He says that's a sign of lots of fruit in the fall." She shifted positions, then continued, "I didn't think the men were ever goen to get all those apple barrels unloaded and carried up by the house this mornen."
"Yep. Sure was a lot of apples. Is it yer turn now?" Jimmy Bob backed away from the kettle and quickly sat down before Bess could answer.
Late that evening in the yellow glow from the pitch pine torch stuck in the middle of the yard, the younger children listened to ghost stories told by the older children. From the underbrush on the ridge, whippoorwills cried their lonely cries, "Whip - Poor -- Will." The resounding hoot of a barred owl echoed across the ridge, adding to the uneasiness the children felt from listening to the ghostly tales. They watched weird shadows rise up, grow, disappear and reappear on the cabin wall as the women moved back and forth from the kitchen to across the yard, emptying the kettle for the last time.
All the women furnished a portion of molasses or brown sugar to flavor the apple butter before they ladled the thick, brown mixture into one and two gallon crocks. White cloth lids were cut and securely tied on to prepare for the journey home on the dusty roads. Once home the apple butter would be stored in the cool underground storm cellar or in a spring house where it’d stay while portions of it were ladled out to use on hot biscuits.
Around eleven o'clock the party began to break up. Bess, head nodding, roused at the creaks and groans from horse drawn jolt wagons and oxen carts coming down the lane. The ridge farmers were returning to pick up their families. The empty apple barrels were loaded on the wagons by the men while the women brought out their crocks of apple butter, then gathered their children to settle them in the wagons. By then everyone was exhausted from a long day of work and play and ready to go home to their beds. Bess, along with her brothers and sisters, headed to bed too as soon as everyone left.
This was the first book I wrote. The inspiration behind the book was from a copy from a newspaper my mother, Sylvia Bullock, kept in her sideboard in the kitchen. My grandmother, Veder Bright, gave it to her. This was Veder's sister, Bess's interview by a granddaughter for a Four H project. The questions were about the Bishop's family life in the Blue Ridge Mountains near Riner, Virginia at the beginning of the 1900's. Bess was two years older than Veder, and they were near the end of a brood of 12, one of which was stillborn. They lived on a hardscrabble seventy acre ridge farm until they moved to Lakota, Iowa that was called Germania in 1910. Bess was ten and Veder was 8 at that time. Bess's memory of how hard life was in Virginia was still etched in her mind at an elderly age so she gave an interesting interview.
I got the title and ending for the story from my Grandma Bright's bible. After she passed away, one of the daughters was looking at the family page. Grandma had put down each child. After the last one, number eleven, was born she had a hysterectomy. Under his name was the passage My children are more precious than gold. Life was never easy for Veder and John Bright with so many children to take care of, but they were loving parents and raised great children.
Not all of the stories in the book are from Veder's childhood. There's one my father told about fishing with dynamite, and another about robbing a bee tree for honey on a cool fall morning when Dad took John and I along.
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| Harold on the ladder picking apples |
I did a author interview for Smashwords.com last week where I sell my books and ebooks. I want to share the link with you https://www.smashwords.com/interview/booksbyfay
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