NEWS FROM THE HILLS
The author is John Greenleaf Whittier.
Heap high the farmer’s wintry hoard
Heap high the golden corn,
No richer gift hath autumn poured
From out her lavish horn.
Through vales of grass and meads of flowers
Our plows their furrows made,
While on the hills in sun and showers
A changeful April played.
We dropped our seed o’er hill and plain
Beneath the sun of May
And frightened from the sprouting grain
The robber crows away.
All through the long, bright days of June,
Her leaves grew green and fair
And waved in hot midsummer noon
Her soft and yellow hair.
And now with autumn’s moonlit eves,
Her harvest time has come.
We pluck away the frosted leaves,
And bear her treasure home.
Where’re the wide old kitchen hearth
Sends up its smoky curls
Who will not thank the kindly earth
And bless our farmer girls?
Let earth withhold her goodly root,
Let mildew blight the rye,
Give to the worm the orchard’s fruit,
The wheat field to the fly.
But let that good old crop adorn,
The hills our fathers trod
Still let us for his golden corn,
Send up our thanks to God.
We found this hand written poem, on a sheet of yellowed paper, when we went through Mom’s belongings. It was titled “The Corn Song,” and I haven’t been able to find it anywhere. It may have come from one of her textbooks when she was a girl, and stored in her memory all these years.
It is amazing what the mind retains. It must have been at least 75 years since she memorized this poem, and yet she can’t remember how to find her way to the bathroom. This disease (Alzheimer’s) that robs a person of their mind is so cruel. Still she seems content to snooze in her recliner, and has a good appetite.
This poem must have appealed to her, since corn was a major crop when she was young. Farmers then plowed vast fields for their corn crops, and harvested bushels for their needs. It was used in so many ways—ground for their winter’s supply of meal, and made into hominy. Corn supplied feed for the livestock, and grain for the horses and poultry.
It was a back-breaking task to raise a crop of corn. The fields were plowed with horses and a shovel plow, day after searing hot day. The seed was dropped by hand or with a corn planter—still a hand job. And then the hoeing—from sunup to sundown, day after day, each hill of corn had to be hoed. It may have taken weeks to finish all the fields, and then it had to be hoed once more before it was “laid by.”
In addition to working their own fields, they would hire out to their neighbors for fifty cents a day. I’ve heard Mom remark often that “she’d hoed corn for many a day for fifty cents.” We didn’t have it that hard. It would take us three days to hoe the corn here, and that was enough. I can remember finally getting it “laid by” and throwing my hoe down to sprawl full length under the apple tree.
Of course the crop wasn’t finished yet. The cornstalks had to be cut and bound in shocks, then left to dry. When the ears were ready, shucking time began. Old-time farmers used a shucking peg, which was often made of metal. We have the old hand carved shucking peg, made of walnut wood, which belonged to Criss’ brother Ted.
These tools were used to strip the shucks from the ear of corn, which were heaped into wagons to be carried to the corncrib. The cornstalks were then tied into huge corn shocks, to be fed to the cattle as fodder.
Many times neighbors gathered together for “corn huskings” and enjoyed a harvest party. Young people were ready for some merry-making after a hard summer of toil. Husking corn and molasses making were probably the last of the fall chores, and more fun than work.
Farmers breathed a sigh of relief and thankfulness when summer’s work was finished. There was corn in the crib for the cattle and poultry, corn to be ground into meal for bread, and security for the coming winter.
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