Thanks for sharing that, Lee. Fascinating. Here in England our.farms are nothing like as big as those in the US and there are a lot of animal farms, rather than arable. Machines aren’t the monsters you have over there, although Lamborghini tractors are a thing recentl!y. Stupid waste of money - fields are too small!My father raised GMO corn, but not like today’s.
I loved to go to the fields with my Daddy.
Scots Ozark culture was maternal. My Daddy was the boss of the fields and barn and church but Mama ruled the children and the home and with an iron fist. I was on loan to my Daddy when I was out in the fields and we both knew it.
To raise and harvest corn like MM does and my father did, required first plowing the fields and discing them, then making a seed bed with a harrow.
Daddy planted Funk’s G Hybrid, he had to buy from the Farmer’s Exchange. I knew not to eat it, and the seed sacks had skull and crossbones warnings because it was coated in rat poison.
But the old time corn planters also had a hopper for phosphate fertilizer. My father’s was so old it had a seat on it where his father pulled it with draft horses.
Daddy would make big piles of seed and fertilizer bags and then go make a round on a forty acre field, which is a quarter mile square.
While he was on a round, I started throwing up fertilizer from broken sacks in the air, and playing in the dust. I was about four, and old enough to know better.
All of a sudden I couldn’t breathe.
I waved at Daddy across the field and he was watching the rows.
I knew I was going to die, and when I did Mama would kill my Daddy over it.
Daddy did come around, saw my distress, took me to Mama who held me while Daddy drove 90 miles an hour to Humansville to Dr Robinson and by the time I got there I was just fine, nothing wrong at all.
Dr Robinson went with us across the street to the Shady Noon Cafe where I had a good cheeseburger and some ice cream.
Hybrid (GMO) corn then might make forty bushels an acre, each bushel worth as much as two dollars ($20 in our money).
Today corn is $4 a bushel (40 cents in 1962 money) and they plant it with half million dollar tractors and harvest it with million dollar combines.
But 200 bushels an acre is almost a crop failure now.
Missouri Meerschaum plants 1940s hybrid corn using antique harvesters and antique sellers.
You or anybody else could make a cob pipe, but only MM has that hybrid corn.
I just took a motorcycle ride through Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Illinois, Missouri, Kansas and a few other states, sticking to backroads all the way. I was amazed at the amount of corn being grown. In the past I would see it rotated with soybeans and other crops. This time it was corn, corn, corn with the most in Illinois and Missouri, but nevertheless it was like anybody who could grow corn was. When I finally entered wheat country, I felt somehow they wished they could grow corn. It’s all the “new” type they plant so much denser than they used to. It was something to see, but a bit ominous somehowMy father raised GMO corn, but not like today’s.
I loved to go to the fields with my Daddy.
Scots Ozark culture was maternal. My Daddy was the boss of the fields and barn and church but Mama ruled the children and the home and with an iron fist. I was on loan to my Daddy when I was out in the fields and we both knew it.
To raise and harvest corn like MM does and my father did, required first plowing the fields and discing them, then making a seed bed with a harrow.
Daddy planted Funk’s G Hybrid, he had to buy from the Farmer’s Exchange. I knew not to eat it, and the seed sacks had skull and crossbones warnings because it was coated in rat poison.
But the old time corn planters also had a hopper for phosphate fertilizer. My father’s was so old it had a seat on it where his father pulled it with draft horses.
Daddy would make big piles of seed and fertilizer bags and then go make a round on a forty acre field, which is a quarter mile square.
While he was on a round, I started throwing up fertilizer from broken sacks in the air, and playing in the dust. I was about four, and old enough to know better.
All of a sudden I couldn’t breathe.
I waved at Daddy across the field and he was watching the rows.
I knew I was going to die, and when I did Mama would kill my Daddy over it.
Daddy did come around, saw my distress, took me to Mama who held me while Daddy drove 90 miles an hour to Humansville to Dr Robinson and by the time I got there I was just fine, nothing wrong at all.
Dr Robinson went with us across the street to the Shady Noon Cafe where I had a good cheeseburger and some ice cream.
Hybrid (GMO) corn then might make forty bushels an acre, each bushel worth as much as two dollars ($20 in our money).
Today corn is $4 a bushel (40 cents in 1962 money) and they plant it with half million dollar tractors and harvest it with million dollar combines.
But 200 bushels an acre is almost a crop failure now.
Missouri Meerschaum plants 1940s hybrid corn using antique harvesters and antique sellers.
You or anybody else could make a cob pipe, but only MM has that hybrid corn.
Which I've read is only sustainable due to government subsidies; I also read the energy input is less than the output / return. But, you know, "green".
I’ve had this one for years for « display purposes ». Still no idea how to smoke it
The straight one is easier to clench.I’ve had this one for years for « display purposes ». Still no idea how to smoke it
