Cotton Pickin' (Arlington, Marshall, Corinth: gated, camp, live)

[GayleTX]

TexasReb......re ArizonaTexan's post - most migrant workers were not just 'cotton specialists' - they migrated wherever the work was - they might pick cotton in Texas but apples in Michigan - whatever the local crop and season had available for them to do. Can you imagine what a life that must have been.....traveling thousands of miles each year to strange places, living among strange language and customs.

[SAtoDallas]

Interesting topic. Cotton is what brought one of my grandmother's family to San Antonio from Pierdas Negras in the late 20's and my grandfather who was born on a farm in Waelder,TX whose family were sharecroppers until WWII and he joined the Army.

In another way cotton took my great-grandmother from my mom's side of the family to San Antonio as well since her family was originally from Kennedy,TX she worked as a seamstress.

We really need to give thanks to our parents,grandparents,great-grandparents for working so hard to give the opportunity to live such comfortable lives.

[TexasReb]

Originally Posted by GayleTX

TexasReb......re ArizonaTexan's post - most migrant workers were not just 'cotton specialists' - they migrated wherever the work was - they might pick cotton in Texas but apples in Michigan - whatever the local crop and season had available for them to do. Can you imagine what a life that must have been.....traveling thousands of miles each year to strange places, living among strange language and customs.

Thanks for the correction and explanation! And yeah, I can only imagine what kind of life that must have been!

[TexasReb]

Originally Posted by SAtoDallas

We really need to give thanks to our parents,grandparents,great-grandparents for working so hard to give the opportunity to live such comfortable lives.

Exactly right, SA. Especially appropriate on THIS day!

On that general theme, I always thought the movie "Places in the Heart" one of the best I ever watched. In fact, I remember reading once that the plot itself was based quite a bit on stories he recalled his own grandmother telling of her growing up years in Waxahachie, Texas.

[JamesAbilene]

Both of my parents grew up in large families in Grassland, TX (Between Tahoka and Post). They moved to the big city of Pampa because they hated having to hoe and pick cotton. They always encouraged me to go to college so that I would never have to hoe or pick. They hated it and had terrible memories and stories of it until they died.

[TexasReb]

Something interesting I thought:

Ratio of Cotton Farms to All Farms

Mississippi: 82.9%

Alabama: 80.4%

Texas: 70.5%

South Carolina: 70.0%

Louisiana: 69.6%

Arkansas: 69.2%

Georgia: 67.4%

Oklahoma: 42.3%

North Carolina: 27.6%

Tennessee: 27.3%

Florida: 9.5%

Virginia: 2.0%

Kentucky: 0.2%

SOURCE: Regionalism and the South: Selected Papers of Rupert Vance. Contributors: John Shelton Reed - author, Daniel Joseph Singal - author, Rupert Bayless Vance - author. Publisher: University of North Carolina Press. Place of Publication: Chapel Hill, NC. Publication Year: 1982. Page Number: 101.

[ArkansasTraveler]

Originally Posted by lonestar2007

I've pulled bolls before.
One thing good about it, it taught you the lessons of hard work and the value of a dollar.

Been there - done that bra - penny a pound...

[kittytoes2006]

Yeah, I'm one of the kids that was told the cotton pickin' stories as I was growing up, as a matter of fact up until I was grown. Obviously it was a horribly hard way of life, because my mother never forgot about it, not even when she had strokes and couldn't remember anything else. My mother was born in Rainbow, Texas (I believe out close to Glen Rose) and her family were sharecroppers and eventually became landowners themselves from their exhaustive work. Granddaddy bought some land where now fuel tanks for D/FW Airport are sitting. They continued to plant and pick cotton on the new land. She would tell me stories of not being able to go to school until the cotton "said" she could go to school. It was a hard life, but obviously one that taught people to be hard workers and a lot more humbling than today's "gimme gimme" society. How I wish I could hear one of Mama's cotton pickin' stories just ONE MORE TIME. I'd listen with a stupid grin on my face. I miss her so much!

[Lakewooder]

Yep kitty, my late Daddy talked about the cotton - he was born in 1921 southeast of Paris - sharecropping family with no electricity nor water. He was the first since "The (Civil) War" to go to college in his family. I know all about those cotton sacks and choppin' etc. Yes, really I started tearing up watching "Places in the Heart" because it was exactly like all those stories I heard.

All that stuff is so ingrained in me I can almost hear my Daddy when I run water until it is hot --

"You wouldn't do that if you once had to fetch water from a creek!"

[gatorduck]

Yes Kitty, Rainbow is right east of Glen Rose, by Nemo Tx. I was born in 50, but my parents were both older than other parents I knew. My Dad lived in Menard and Huntsville and my mom was from Haskell, no. of Abilene. They both told the long tales about when they were young. Mother always talked about eating lunch with the Mexicans. The set up a fire, two ladies cooked beans, tortillas and what ever they had. The workers would stop long enough to get 1 or 2 tortillas and load them with whatever, eat them out of hand without plates or napkins get a drink of water, wipe their mouth with their sleeve and go back to work. Dad gave me a copy of "The Painted House" by John Grisham. He said that that book was as good as his own biography. He did live in town, delivered groceries for a nickle, trained under the butcher, took scraps home for his mom to cook.
In the 60's when we moved to Detroit, Tx. the house we lived in had a cistern in the kitchen. When friends from Dallas came up to see us, we jokingly had them draw the water and boil it to take a bath with.