School me on Tobacco Flavorings

[mateusbrown]

know a few guys that still coon hunt. They're the youngest 70-80 year old men you'll ever meet.

One of my students in 12th grade traps and sells raccoons, especially around Christmas, as lots of folks around here (super-rural south-central Georgia) include them in their Christmas dinners and festivities. He offers the option of shooting it before delivery, or he will deliver it live. I think he said he gets $20 a piece. He offered to bring me one but I declined. Really nice kid, very mature for a 17-18 year old.
This anecdote might seem like a parody or something for a laugh, but lots of the young guys are really into hunting all sorts of creatures and have enviable outdoor skills: they trap wild hogs, know where to find the ducks, talk about the occasional bear someone got on a trail cam, have all the big bucks in their sights, and bring deer jerky to school to share. They show up everyday in camouflage jackets. They love it. Of course some have no hesitation when it comes to shooting a deer illegally from the road on someone else's land, like the kid who shot seven deer in one morning, but most of them are decent. We actually have a wild hog festival every year (Abbeville, GA)--arts and crafts, hog-baying contest, etc. Pretty sure none of them are smoking pipes, though. They seem to be into the vaping, or probably stole a pack of their dad's cigarettes or something.

 

[makhorkasmoker]

When I was very young, my dad was trying to cash in on the high price for coon skins. It was either the late seventies or the early eighties. He trapped them (in South Georgia) and took me with him to set and check the traps, but by the time we actually got any, the prices had dropped, and he made next to nothing.

I kept asking him why we didn't use dogs, like in Where the Red Fern Grows. That seemed to me so much more exciting than traps. He said: There's no way I'm running through the dark woods after dogs.

He did not smoke a pipe, but chewed plug tobaccos. One brand I believe was "Applejack." Another was "Bull of the Woods."

 

[Briar Lee]

When I was very young, my dad was trying to cash in on the high price for coon skins. It was either the late seventies or the early eighties. He trapped them (in South Georgia) and took me with him to set and check the traps, but by the time we actually got any, the prices had dropped, and he made next to nothing.

I kept asking him why we didn't use dogs, like in Where the Red Fern Grows. That seemed to me so much more exciting than traps. He said: There's no way I'm running through the dark woods after dogs.

He did not smoke a pipe, but chewed plug tobaccos. One brand I believe was "Applejack." Another was "Bull of the Woods."

The recession of 73-4 was utterly brutal.

Times were a bit better in 75-6.

But there was a glorious little period of prosperity from about the middle of 1977 that came to a crashing halt when the Federal Reserve raised interest rates to about 20% to fight inflation.

I’ve heard it called Jimmy Carter’s Indian Summer.

In the late seventies, some good, heavy, northern coonskins touched $100, and $50 or $60 was common.

Coons shot with a rifle, even in the head, are docked by the fur buyers.

I’ve tried to shoot them in the eye, and even then those fur buyers knew.

A trapped $75 coon in 1979 would be about $300 today.

The fur market has never gotten close again to the late seventies.

 

[Chasing Embers]

I highly recommend this tobacco to anyone who likes a fruity and refreshing smoke.

Though I love it and fortunately have quite a bit in jars, it was discontinued a few years ago.

 

[JackofNone]

Killing racoons for 5 bucks.
Yep. That's enough internet for today.

5 dollars in the 70s was a premier steak dinner and bottle of wine. I'd go hunting for that if I was a kid.