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Virginia Dark Fired Tobacco Harvest

Started by Wudman, October 11, 2021, 06:56:27 PM

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Wudman

I grew up on a tobacco farm here in Southern Virginia.  I didn't see a future there, so I moved on, but my Dad continues to grow a small crop of Virginia Dark Fired.  (He exited the bright leaf [cigarette tobacco] business some years back).  It is a very labor intensive crop, so the family chips in to help with the harvest.  Dad was going to retire 2 years ago when he lost his R.J. Reynolds contract (Reynolds cut much of its US production for cheaper product from Brazil), but a call from Lancaster Leaf tobacco company prompted him to plant another crop.  Virginia Dark Fired is a specialty product used primarily in cigar leaf and wrappers.  My Dad has been know for years as a premium grower.  He is still going strong at 81.



 

With this variety of tobacco, the entire stalk is harvested at one time.  We use a "draw knife" to sever the plant.  In keeping with the forum, our draw knives were made from used sawmill blades (6" bands from a local production mill).  A tool called a "spud" is placed on a stick and the tobacco stalk is shoved down on the stick for transport to the curing barn.  Our sticks are predominately hand split shortleaf pine.  Splitting follows the grain and produces a strong stick.  They are well in excess of 100 years old and have been used for generations.  We have a few sawn sticks that are either shortleaf pine of yellow poplar.  I am 54 years old and we have not procured a "new" stick in my lifetime.



 

The sticks are placed on a scaffold trailer for transport.  That's my brother in law, Tim, hanging that stick.  He is an agriculture teacher at the local high school.  Not pictured are my two sisters.  The younger is a kindergarten teacher and the older is a PhD college (ag econ) professor, that spent some time as a college dean.  



 

That's a 1965 model year 135 Massey Ferguson hooked to that trailer.  A 1965 model year Ford 5000 is behind it.  They are the two most modern tractors on the farm.  Dad bought the 5000 new in 1965.  We acquired the 135 in 1972.  Both have been rock solid through the years.



 

The tobacco is passed by hand into the barn where it is hung on tier poles to dry.That's me in the orange hat.  I am standing on a table that is about 3 feet high to pass the sticks up into the barn.  The fellow facing the camera is James.  He has been helping Dad out for years.  He is the only one in the operation that is not "blood", but he qualifies for family too.  There are two people in the barn hanging the tobacco.  This barn was built on the foundation of a hog barn that was decommissioned in 1983.  We built the tier poles high enough that we can drive a tractor through the building.  That building is 140 feet long.  The entire crop can be housed in one place.  Prior to it, we had tobacco scattered across the area.



 

This picture is standing on the ground looking straight up.  The barn is 5 tiers high.  It's about 25 feet from the ground to the top pole.  Those poles are shortleaf pine and were hand peeled with a draw knife as well.  That was a job in itself.  To hang, you straddle from pole to pole.  I hung about 600 sticks the other day for the first time in ages.  I had some muscles aching that I had forgotten about.



 

That's a view of tobacco hanging in the barn with a couple of trailers parked in there as well.



 

That's a view looking down the length of the barn.  





This variety is cured with wood smoke.  It produces a dark colored flavorful leaf.  Dad actually likes green sweetgum butts to produce smoke.  You build your fires beside them and add wood over time.  That sweetgum butt will smolder and smoke for days.



 

That's Dad building fires in the barn.  We use fatwood (lighterwood, litewood, fat pine) to start the fires and oak or hickory for the most part.  There was a pecan on the trailer.  As a forestry site prep contractor, Dad has an assortment of drip torches.  That is not standard farm issue, but comes in pretty handy.  Once all the fires are burning, you close up your doors and let her smoke.  In this big barn, fires are left open.  In the lower hanging barns, we would lay tin over the fire to keep it smothered.

When dry, the tobacco is removed from the barn and sent to the pack house where the leaves are stripped off the stalk and graded.  In the old days, it was hand tied and delivered to market in hogsheads.  Today, it is packed in cardboard boxes.  Historically, everything was sold in open auction.  Auction day at the tobacco market was a social event.  Today everything is sold on contract.  If you make grade, you know your price.  There aren't many folks still producing this variety.  Dad is already planning on next year.

Wud  

"You may tear down statues and burn buildings but you can't kill the spirit of patriots and when they've had enough this madness will end."
Charlie Daniels
July 4, 2020 (2 days before his death)

snobdds

As a guy from Wyoming, I had no idea how tobacco is grown, harvested, or cured. 

Very interesting. 

btulloh

That's a really nice documentary Wud.  Thanks for taking time to post that. 

Wouldn't mind seeing an overall picture of the barn from the outside if you feel so inclined. 
HM126

hacknchop

That was very educational and interesting,thank you for showing us how tobacco is harvested. Your father  is a great example of how to make America great, work.
Often wrong never indoubt

Resonator

Reminds me of one of my neighbors, he was farming well into his 80's when a stroke made him retire. Watching him work and listening to him tell stories, I'd get a sense of the sheer determination it took to get the work done, and keep everything running 7 days a week. 
Under bark there's boards and beams, somewhere in between.
Cuttin' while its green, through a steady sawdust stream.
I'm chasing the sawdust dream.

Proud owner of a Wood-Mizer 2017 LT28G19

JohnW

Yip, that looks pretty labor intensive.  That's an amazing amount of tobacco.

One of my friends told me that hanging tobacco in the barn, when he was a kid, convinced him that he wanted to steer clear of an occupation that involved manual labor.

Don P

I had to carefully time visits to my cousins  :D  Wudman didn't mention the surprise snake that always seemed to be up there somewhere.

I was working in southern WI and was surprised when I saw tobacco. I asked around and was told they were growing cigar wrappers.

Both sides of my family grew flue cured bright leaf. When we moved up here it is burley tobacco, harvested and hung much the same as yours but not smoked.

About the old MF's "If you don't overrev it, it'll outlast your grandchildren".

Southside

It wasn't in the barn but Wud did save a King snake this weekend.  He (Wud) sure has some moves.   :D
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VB-Milling

Thank you so much for posting this @Wudman !

I was just telling my wife and son about my broad leaf tobacco picking days as a kid/teenager in CT in the 90s.  I started when I was 10 or 11 and stopped when I went off to college at 18.  My son is going to be 12 this week and, despite my best efforts, wouldn't know a day's work if it came out of his phone screened and slapped him.

At least now I have some visuals to show them.  The process is similar to what you have posted.

So many similar experiences to what you have described.  I worked for a small family operation.  50's era tractors, walking the shed poles.  I was the guy who went to the top of the shed because I was young, flexible and lighter than all the grown men.  I think their trust of the aging shed beams expired sometime in the 70s, and with it, any desire to be 25ft up in the shed on 98 degree days with no ventilation.

The shed was where I learned a lot about life and being a man.  Most of the time, the two other guys would forget I was up there and just blindly hand me the sticks of 6 plants.  We called them lath.  On occasion, the person hooking the plants on the trailer in the field would pull too hard and break a lath.  Without fail, the farm owner Norm would say "What the heck is wrong with you?  Don't you know those are antiques!"  He would always put them aside and during lunch, we'd pull the iron hooks out and he'd put them in an old coffee can.  "I'll saw up some new lath over the winter" he'd say....7 years....never saw any new lath....just the ever-growing amount of hooks in the coffee can.

Your post and writing my response and having those memories just made my day, so thank you.
HM126

Wudman

The snakes don't concern much, but I have seen a man jump from the top when he laid his hand on a big black snake up there.  The red wasp get my attention.

Wud
"You may tear down statues and burn buildings but you can't kill the spirit of patriots and when they've had enough this madness will end."
Charlie Daniels
July 4, 2020 (2 days before his death)

thecfarm

Not much tobacco grown around here.  :)
Thanks for the story.
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Ron Scott

~Ron

Roxie

When you said that Lancaster Leaf Company called, would that be in Lancaster Pennsylvania?  If so, that would be where all our Amish contracts go.  They do it identical to what you're doing but with horses and very large families. They do however strip the tobacco during the winter months by size of the leaf and it's delivered in tied bales.

One of my fondest childhood memories is my grandfathers tobacco farm in the hills of Sparta North Carolina.  There was no electricity, no indoor plumbing, the outhouse was behind the house and  up the hill. There was a pump in the yard to bring in water and refrigeration was a small stone building over one of the springs. Children that misbehaved were  tossed in the spring to teach you something.  Everything came from the farm with the exception of biyearly trips to the town to get kerosene, sugar, and occasionally flour, and grandpa's case of beer.  There was a cow for milk, two pigs a year, and free range chicken before a free range chicken was cool. There was no motorized vehicle on the place, no car, no tractor. Grandpa plowed using a one-man plow and if we were there, he had a hitch he made for the cow and one of us would lead the cow for him. Hay was cut with a scythe and forked on hand made wagons we would pull and forked loose into the loft.

The above mentioned wagons were  what we pulled when he cut the tobacco. He would cut the stalk off and then remove the leaves in the field lay the leaves on the wagons.  The leaves were then taken to the women and they would string them with wire each leaf separately on the wire and attach it to the poles. The remainder of the hanging process is identical to Wudman's. He didn't smoke his but popped the side slats out to dry. His tobacco was always picked up by the company and he just dropped the loose leaves into a pile and tied bundles with baling twine.

Pest control is everything with tobacco and that again was us. You'd take a hoe with you and a sardine tin that had a few spoons of kerosene and bugs went in the tin, worms were crushed by bare feet and you just moved down the rows. We loved it and we loved him and those conversations out in the fields whether you were talking or just listening are among the most humorous and educational a kid could have.

I totally understand the Amish shunning modern convenience and slowing down life.

Thanks for bringing back those memories Wudman.
Say when

WDH

In the summer of 1976, I worked as an intern for Weyerhaeuser based out of New Bern, NC.  Tobacco fields everywhere.  Some of the guys would come after the weekend with yellow stained hands after "working tobacco".  
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Tom King

That's the way my Wife's Grandfather raised it, and she helped when she was little.  The whole family pitched in at harvest.

Tobacco was not only the main cash crop in Virginia, during Colonial times, but was also used as currency.  You paid your property taxes in tobacco, and traded it for things like horses.  You were required to attend church, Church of England, every two weeks, and there was a required tithe of a pound, and a half of tobacco.  If you missed a Sunday, you had to pay five pounds the next Sunday.  Prayers included pledges of loyalty to the King, and your betters.

In those colonial times, three acres was considered the typical maximum that one person, including slaves, could produce.  The large farms had big wooden screw things that packed it into hogsheads (barrels) to ship off.  You weren't paid in cash for it, but it was shipped off the England, the only place you were allowed to sell it to, and you didn't know what you would get back for it.  You sent a list of things you needed to an agent, and after the next years crop was in the ground, you would receive some of what you had asked for.

I have one friend whose family raises 6,000 acres of tobacco every year.  Their family has had the land since the Crown was giving it away in the early 1700's. None of it is touched by hands. Rows are the exact length to fill a harvester, and it goes directly into bulk barns.  They used to sell it at auction, but now it's in contract to Japanese buyers.  The buyers send their Japanese inspectors, and it's loaded directly out of the bulk barns into shipping containers.  Their propane bill for drying is over one million a year.

I'm glad I have never smoked.

Wudman

Quote from: Roxie on October 12, 2021, 07:59:17 AM
When you said that Lancaster Leaf Company called, would that be in Lancaster Pennsylvania?  If so, that would be where all our Amish contracts go.  They do it identical to what you're doing but with horses and very large families. They do however strip the tobacco during the winter months by size of the leaf and it's delivered in tied bales.

One of my fondest childhood memories is my grandfathers tobacco farm in the hills of Sparta North Carolina.  There was no electricity, no indoor plumbing, the outhouse was behind the house and  up the hill. There was a pump in the yard to bring in water and refrigeration was a small stone building over one of the springs. Children that misbehaved were  tossed in the spring to teach you something.  Everything came from the farm with the exception of biyearly trips to the town to get kerosene, sugar, and occasionally flour, and grandpa's case of beer.  There was a cow for milk, two pigs a year, and free range chicken before a free range chicken was cool. There was no motorized vehicle on the place, no car, no tractor. Grandpa plowed using a one-man plow and if we were there, he had a hitch he made for the cow and one of us would lead the cow for him. Hay was cut with a scythe and forked on hand made wagons we would pull and forked loose into the loft.

The above mentioned wagons were  what we pulled when he cut the tobacco. He would cut the stalk off and then remove the leaves in the field lay the leaves on the wagons.  The leaves were then taken to the women and they would string them with wire each leaf separately on the wire and attach it to the poles. The remainder of the hanging process is identical to Wudman's. He didn't smoke his but popped the side slats out to dry. His tobacco was always picked up by the company and he just dropped the loose leaves into a pile and tied bundles with baling twine.

Pest control is everything with tobacco and that again was us. You'd take a hoe with you and a sardine tin that had a few spoons of kerosene and bugs went in the tin, worms were crushed by bare feet and you just moved down the rows. We loved it and we loved him and those conversations out in the fields whether you were talking or just listening are among the most humorous and educational a kid could have.

I totally understand the Amish shunning modern convenience and slowing down life.

Thanks for bringing back those memories Wudman.
Lancaster Leaf is in Lancaster, PA.  It is one in the same.  They have a receiving station here in Kenbridge, VA.  I am just old enough to remember my Grandaddy having mules in the field.  He was producing brightleaf flu cured (used in cigarettes) at the time.  The mule would stay with the "pullers" (the folks removing the tobacco from the stalk).  When his ground slide was full, you could point him to the barn and he would go by himself.  The people at the barn would unhook him, hook him to an empty and send him back.  As the mules aged, they would be used in the field but a tractor (8N Ford) would transport the tobacco from the field to the barn.  Those same mules skidded a few logs in their day.  
You mention that your Amish neighbors are baling their tobacco.  Through the years, we progressed from hand tying to baling to boxes.  I think the boxes allow them to pack more product into their warehouse.  Nice uniform cubes are easier to pack and stack than the bales.
It was somewhat of a trip down memory lane for me as well.  I made a right off that lane years ago.  Those 18 hour days and chasing day labor pointed me in a different direction.  The government is not a tobacco growers friend either.  :(    

Wud
"You may tear down statues and burn buildings but you can't kill the spirit of patriots and when they've had enough this madness will end."
Charlie Daniels
July 4, 2020 (2 days before his death)

samandothers

When I was a co-op student in '80,'81 working in  South Boston Va I would help a guy out around his farm after work.  He had some tobacco so I'd help when my work sessions over lapped the tobacco season.  Fortunately I was there when it was time to plant and not pull the tobacco!  Planting was pretty easy, ride on the planter pulled by the tractor and feed in the plants as the machine placed them!  Tobacco as a cash crop has really dropped off!

Enjoyed the other stories! 

metalspinner

Wonderful story and thread, Wudman!
That picture of the tobacco hanging in the barn is beautiful. 
I do what the little voices in my wife's head tell me to do.

Roxie

It sure is a small world. Every February I drive Amish neighbors up to Quarryville to sign their contracts with Lancaster Leaf. 

Cigarettes will soon be the new crypto currency. 

In addition to all the above work mentioned, tobacco plants have to be topped or they'll go to seed.  I wish I had a dime for every top I've cut. 

Say when

21incher

Thanks for sharing a great educational story for those of us that have never seen a harvest before. 
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Old saw fixer

     I learned to tie dark tobacco back in the 60's helping a friend's folks.  Over Southside's way in Wilsons. 
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mike_belben

Quote from: VB-Milling on October 11, 2021, 09:29:17 PMMy son is going to be 12 this week and, despite my best efforts, wouldn't know a day's work if it came out of his phone screened and slapped him.

Im trying so hard to keep gadgets out of my kids hands and this is why.  Boy is a worker but daughter is quite lazy. 
Were you around enfield area?  Lots of tobacco up there. 
Praise The Lord

VB-Milling

Quote from: mike_belben on October 12, 2021, 02:54:47 PM
Quote from: VB-Milling on October 11, 2021, 09:29:17 PMMy son is going to be 12 this week and, despite my best efforts, wouldn't know a day's work if it came out of his phone screened and slapped him.

Im trying so hard to keep gadgets out of my kids hands and this is why.  Boy is a worker but daughter is quite lazy.
Were you around enfield area?  Lots of tobacco up there.

Close Mike!  But no cigar  :D :D :D

West Suffield
HM126

VB-Milling

Quote from: WDH on October 12, 2021, 09:16:40 AM
Some of the guys would come after the weekend with yellow stained hands after "working tobacco".  

Ah yes.  Took a few showers and hand washings to get that off.  No one ever wore gloves come to think of it.  Nowadays, people wear gloves to put the 2ft x 2ft piece of plywood from the Home Depot cart into their Prius. 
HM126

mike_belben

Quote from: VB-Milling on October 12, 2021, 03:09:55 PM
Close Mike!  But no cigar  :D :D :D

West Suffield
we're the same age, and i was raised in ludlow. ive snuck around DOT on 187 and 202 many times. 
Praise The Lord

Wudman

Historically, in our area, tobacco was the "cash crop" for these small subsistence farms.  Allotments were controlled by the government through a quota system.  It served to protect the small farmer.  Each farm would have a few acres of allotment and this was the primary source of income.  As Roxie stated, many of the farms produced what they ate.  My Grandparents used to trade butter and eggs for sugar and coffee with the local store.  We had little country stores scattered every few miles and they were the WalMarts of their day.  You could get about anything you needed to survive.  I can remember riding with Granddaddy to the roller mill to have wheat ground for flour. 

Over time, most of these small farms disappeared.  Their tobacco quotas had a cash value and were sold and aggregated by larger farms.  At our height, we were farming about 50 acres of tobacco (and 1500 acres of corn and small grain - along with cattle and hogs.)  40 of that was flue cured used in cigarettes and the remaining in dark fired as shown above.  In 2004, Congress abolished the tobacco program and the small farmer was pretty much toast.  Production (especially flue cured) became concentrated under the larger producers.  Many of these farms have mechanized using mechanical harvesters.  The small guy couldn't afford the capital expenditure.  Tobacco prices have not increased through the years, but input costs have increased substantially.  Reduced margins killed the little guy and concentrated production in larger farms.  The United States used to be number one tobacco producer in the world.  We are now number four behind China, India, and Brazil.  China and India each have north of a billion residents.  About 30% of them smoke, so the worldwide consumption of tobacco continues to increase.  About 14% of the US population smokes tobacco.  Our government is trying to end that......but promoting cannabis.......go figure. ::)

Wud       
"You may tear down statues and burn buildings but you can't kill the spirit of patriots and when they've had enough this madness will end."
Charlie Daniels
July 4, 2020 (2 days before his death)

Wudman

Quote from: mike_belben on October 12, 2021, 02:54:47 PM
Quote from: VB-Milling on October 11, 2021, 09:29:17 PMMy son is going to be 12 this week and, despite my best efforts, wouldn't know a day's work if it came out of his phone screened and slapped him.

Im trying so hard to keep gadgets out of my kids hands and this is why.  Boy is a worker but daughter is quite lazy.
Were you around enfield area?  Lots of tobacco up there.
I always said that I didn't  want my kids to have to work like I did growing up........but about the time they hit 15, I decided that working the crap out of them wouldn't have been so bad.   ;D ;D

Wud
"You may tear down statues and burn buildings but you can't kill the spirit of patriots and when they've had enough this madness will end."
Charlie Daniels
July 4, 2020 (2 days before his death)

sawguy21

This is interesting. I remember seeing tobacco fields near my grandparents home in south western Ontario but apparently it is all soybeans now, no money in it at least for Canadian producers. After bucking bales and hauling grain to the mill I went along with my dads idea and stayed in school, farming is a noble vocation but wasn't my thing.
old age and treachery will always overcome youth and enthusiasm

Ed_K

 My first job at 13 was tobacco, we chopped weeds till the dew was off then we would sucker, after a few weeks came flower topping so the drips of juice wouldn't eat holes in the leaf. Then came stripping where we pulled 2 leafs off and stacked in a cloth box. the farm I worked on contracted to consolidated cigar company (CCC).I only worked the one yr, decided working at Rita's family dairy farm was more fun  ;D.
Ed K

VB-Milling

Quote from: Wudman on October 12, 2021, 04:50:13 PM
In 2004, Congress abolished the tobacco program and the small farmer was pretty much toast.  
Wud      

So would you chalk up your dad's success and weathering the storm to his reputation as a premium grower? Seems like he doesn't plant yearly, correct?
HM126

VB-Milling

Quote from: mike_belben on October 12, 2021, 04:05:41 PM
Quote from: VB-Milling on October 12, 2021, 03:09:55 PM
Close Mike!  But no cigar  :D :D :D

West Suffield
we're the same age, and i was raised in ludlow. ive snuck around DOT on 187 and 202 many times.

I always see middle TN near your avatar and forget your a New Englander.  Been through Ludlow many times.  Wonder if we met at one point in the last 40 years LOL :D
HM126

Wudman

Quote from: VB-Milling on October 12, 2021, 05:53:41 PM
Quote from: Wudman on October 12, 2021, 04:50:13 PM
In 2004, Congress abolished the tobacco program and the small farmer was pretty much toast.  
Wud      

So would you chalk up your dad's success and weathering the storm to his reputation as a premium grower? Seems like he doesn't plant yearly, correct?
He plants every year.  It is now more a labor of love than anything else.  The family has been doing it for generations and he has been doing it all his life.  If you looked at it from purely a financial standpoint, it doesn't make sense.  In his case, he has the farm, he has the facilities, he has some time, and it keeps him moving.  With family labor, he makes a little bit.  He did cut his production in half this year as compared to recent years.  He was working himself too hard (and has been dealing with cancer for the last 10 years as well) and not feeling well a good bit of time.  His oncologist said that he responded to his treatment so well due to his physical fitness......so it's a double edged sword.  Working in it keeps him going, but a lifetime in it possibly caused the cancer.

Wud
"You may tear down statues and burn buildings but you can't kill the spirit of patriots and when they've had enough this madness will end."
Charlie Daniels
July 4, 2020 (2 days before his death)

beav

Aah yes, the memories-
Congestive heart failure, lung cancer, pneumonectomy!
I'd kill(or die) for another gritt!

VB-Milling

Quote from: Wudman on October 12, 2021, 06:27:22 PM

He plants every year.  It is now more a labor of love than anything else.  The family has been doing it for generations and he has been doing it all his life.  If you looked at it from purely a financial standpoint, it doesn't make sense.  In his case, he has the farm, he has the facilities, he has some time, and it keeps him moving.  With family labor, he makes a little bit.  He did cut his production in half this year as compared to recent years.  He was working himself too hard (and has been dealing with cancer for the last 10 years as well) and not feeling well a good bit of time.  His oncologist said that he responded to his treatment so well due to his physical fitness......so it's a double edged sword.  Working in it keeps him going, but a lifetime in it possibly caused the cancer.

Wud

Good for him despite being 81 and all his hardships.  Plenty in the world today would use either one of those as a reason to give up on most, if not all, things.

I wouldn't mind pickin' tobacco some day with you for old time's sake.  8)
HM126

newoodguy78

The guys around here had it tough with tobacco this year. Such a wet year a lot molded in the field prior to  harvest. 
Just yesterday I saw loads of it going by in manure spreaders apparently what some put up was right on the edge and didn't make it either. 
I know next to nothing about it other than watching the neighbors work theirs. I will say that it is extremely labor intensive, with a lot of inputs. 
I feel bad for them losing their crops.
Great pictures Wudman

Roxie

Quote from: beav on October 12, 2021, 07:41:59 PM
Aah yes, the memories-
Congestive heart failure, lung cancer, pneumonectomy!
I'd kill(or die) for another gritt!
Please bare with us, it was a kinder, gentler and more polite time. Before everything will kill you and you would be judged by the crops you produced. Who knows?  Maybe in the next decade folks will be chastising you for your memories of killing trees.
Say when

SwampDonkey

Quote from: Wudman on October 12, 2021, 04:50:13 PM
Historically, in our area, tobacco was the "cash crop" for these small subsistence farms.  Allotments were controlled by the government through a quota system.  It served to protect the small farmer.  Each farm would have a few acres of allotment and this was the primary source of income.  As Roxie stated, many of the farms produced what they ate.  My Grandparents used to trade butter and eggs for sugar and coffee with the local store.  We had little country stores scattered every few miles and they were the WalMarts of their day.  You could get about anything you needed to survive.  I can remember riding with Granddaddy to the roller mill to have wheat ground for flour.

Over time, most of these small farms disappeared.  Their tobacco quotas had a cash value and were sold and aggregated by larger farms.  At our height, we were farming about 50 acres of tobacco (and 1500 acres of corn and small grain - along with cattle and hogs.)  40 of that was flue cured used in cigarettes and the remaining in dark fired as shown above.  In 2004, Congress abolished the tobacco program and the small farmer was pretty much toast.  Production (especially flue cured) became concentrated under the larger producers.  Many of these farms have mechanized using mechanical harvesters.  The small guy couldn't afford the capital expenditure.  Tobacco prices have not increased through the years, but input costs have increased substantially.  Reduced margins killed the little guy and concentrated production in larger farms.  The United States used to be number one tobacco producer in the world.  We are now number four behind China, India, and Brazil.  China and India each have north of a billion residents.  About 30% of them smoke, so the worldwide consumption of tobacco continues to increase.  About 14% of the US population smokes tobacco.  Our government is trying to end that......but promoting cannabis.......go figure. ::)

Wud      
You're describing the dairy business and rural New Brunswick and to some degree the potato business. I suspect much the same across the continent. My grandmother made and sold all kinds of butter up until about 1986, and by then the government controlled anything dairy including who and how much. My grandmother was going to have her butter. :D

Interesting story about processing tobacco. Labour intensive for sure. But that's farming, the old fashion way. :)
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

SwampDonkey

Quote from: Wudman on October 12, 2021, 04:52:23 PMI always said that I didn't  want my kids to have to work like I did growing up........

Wud
Not to be judgmental here, but these are my words I use on anyone giving me those lines. :D ;D That is why with a lot of kids you can't get any work out of them these days. In work I do, most are 40 +. I've seen young fellas last maybe a couple weeks, then the production declines rapidly after that to maybe 2 days, 2 hrs each. :D

When I was in school, vacation was working vacations and lots of other kids were sitting around or actually vacationing someplace, not working. :D Not encouraging kids to work does no good at all. ;)
"No amount of belief makes something a fact." James Randi

1 Thessalonians 5:21

2020 Polaris Ranger 570 to forward firewood, Husqvarna 555 XT Pro, Stihl FS560 clearing saw and continuously thinning my ground, on the side. Grow them trees. (((o)))

Don P

Growing up there was 7 miles of warehouses around American. The smell of blending tobacco on a warm night smelled good for miles. Michelle's Dad was their mechanical/ maintenance dept engineer. When she got a partial scholarship at State from Phillip Morris we never told him  :D. Their yard and plenty of others were built up with heavy applications of composted floor sweepings, snuff.

I was working in a furniture components shop and someone stopped over there and got some empty fiber drums for scrap barrels beside our saws. When we popped the lids it about took your head off. They had been menthol shipping barrels. We were all clear as a bell for days  :D.

Tom King

Tobacco played a larger, formative part in our history than most realize.  It was the reason slave trade grew as large as it did, with Tobacco being an extremely labor intensive crop to produce.

In a not so round about way, it's the reason the main characters we know from our History, from Virginia, like Thomas Jefferson, and George Washington were willing to get involved with the Revolution, and why it was successful.  They had such an insurmountable debt, due to a short-sighted, and fairly crazy Monarch, that their only way out was to fight for it.

There are some very good, old books on that part of history, but it's not taught in schools.  Here's a small glimpse:  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tobacco_in_the_American_colonies

We are what we are today, in no small part because of tobacco.

gspren

A few weeks ago we sat on the front porch of our new house and watched the Amish neighbors picking tobacco, the work horse pulling the collection wagon seemed to move forward about 30' and then stop totally with verbal commands, didn't look like the farmer ever touched anything.
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Kas

Haven't posted much, and haven't posted in a long time.....but man this brings back memories. My Grandpa had a farm in Feeding Hills/Agwam, MA and grew tobacco. As a 6 yr old during harvest, my job was to lay out the slats every six plants while the grownups went along cutting and spearing the plants, and then set on a trailer just like in your pictures. My older brother got to drive the tractor, an old Farmall. We had a barn again just like in your pictures, and my brother and I got to climb up in there and help with hanging the slats on the poles.  Mom was not happy about us "kids" doing the climbing and helping, but dad insisted that we help. I'm glad he did! I was too young to really know anything about the tobacco itself, but they did not use fires to smoke/dry the plants, just swung open alternate panels on the sides of the barn to get air circulation going.

Years later after this, my dad dismantled the barns and brought a lot of the siding wood home with him. He built a shed with some of it, and when you went into the shed you could still faintly smell the tobacco!

The whole process is still a distinct memory for me some 60 years later!
Scott

Don P

Tom touched on the fortunes and history. I've heard that the little pouch of Bull Durham was the first consumer packaging, prior to that just about everything was bought from bulk at the store. It was in a handy prepackaged consumer sized pouch. Later on the Dukes absorbed Bull Durham, RJR and others and formed American Tobacco. After the Supreme Court forced them to break up, James B Duke took his millions and among other things started Duke University.

Tobacco money and ROTC put my Dad through school. Grandad's boss at the dairy let them work his allotment and keep a share for school money. Growing up, when it was ok to have tobacco as wall decoration in your house, there was a hand of tobacco, neatly tied with a folded leaf, hanging on the wall in the entry of our house. It was an old symbol of peace and welcome.

Probably the first anti smoking campaign, in the early 1600's King James, yup that King James, wrote "A Counterblaste to Tobacco". They were already hooked on the tobacco and the trade.

mike_belben

Quote from: Don P on October 13, 2021, 05:28:07 PM
... that the little pouch of Bull Durham ..
i never knew thats what the lyric referred to, thanks don.
The old maid's waitin' for leap year to come
The crooner's just waitin' to sing
The old cow's standin' by the Bull Durham sign
Just awaitin' for the grass to turn green


Praise The Lord

btulloh

Tobacco smells good enough to eat at certain stages. I remember going into the big tobacco warehouses at America Tobacco with my dad when I was young. Rows of hogsheads 4 or five high all filled with tobacco being aged. Smelled great. By 1970 they started using a chemical process to achieve consistent taste in a brand. Before that it was done by careful blending of the naturally aged tobacco by highly skilled humans. BTW - my dad quit smoking completely when the chemists took over. I've always been curious whether health issues from tobacco use increased around that time. 
HM126

SawyerTed

We grew flue cured/bright leaf. My father-in-law was a tobacco wizard of sorts Those were good times around the field and at the barn.  For us the mid 1990s pretty much did us in.  The profit was no longer there for the small farmer.  We raised 10 or so acres. Used to be we could make money aka it was a cash crop.  It was bitter sweet getting out of the tobacco business. Tobacco money paid many of our bills and if course raised my wife.  The fellowship with neighbors and family was the best part of all of it.

Thanks Wudman for posting this.  Good to see the family is still involved.
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Wudman

Time to bring this post full circle.  I showed the process of getting tobacco in the barn.  Now, here is the process of getting it out.



 

Here is the tobacco after it has been dried.  It was cured with wood smoke.  The next issue with getting it down during the winter months is moisture content.  You have to wait on a good rain to raise the moisture content enough to be able to handle the tobacco.  Otherwise, you are dealing with snuff.  The process is reversed to get it out of the barn.  Two individuals up in the barn hand it down to a person on the ground.  After drying, you can pass it down two sticks at a time.  It has lost a lot of weight.  Inbound, it is 50 pounds to the stick......Outbound, just a fraction of that.  We place it on a trailer and carry it up to the packing house.  Notice Pop there swinging the maul splitting the remaining wood to take up to the house.  



 

The tobacco has been transported to the packing house.



 

The stick is placed on the "stripping horse" to remove the lower leaves.  This is the low grade from this type of tobacco.  We call them the "primings".  Other names are "sand lugs" or "dirt lugs" (because they tend to be covered in dirt).  The sorting boxes are on the table behind him.



 

After the low grade is removed, the stick is passed over to Mr. Eddie.  The stalks are removed from the stick and the up-stem tobacco is removed from the stalk.  The stalks will be returned to the field and plowed under.  They have a good bit of nutrients tied up in them.  Mr. Eddie is our Senior Technician at 84 years young.  He says that he gets all of the work that he wants, because the young guys don't want to work.



 

That's James at the sorting table.  He is sorting into 3 grades.  Tobacco is sold based on grade.



 

 The tobacco then finds its way into boxes.  Those boxes will end up weighing in the neighborhood of 300 pounds each.  We roll them out on a handtruck and load them on the trailer with a front end loader.  They make their way to the buying station where they are weighed and graded.  You are paid based on contract prices.  I'll have to find a picture of the loaded truck.  Dad was happy with his sale and said he guessed he'd do it another year.  It keeps him moving.  We'll be seeding greenhouses for this year's crop soon........a few more cigars down the road.

Wudman
"You may tear down statues and burn buildings but you can't kill the spirit of patriots and when they've had enough this madness will end."
Charlie Daniels
July 4, 2020 (2 days before his death)

newoodguy78

Great post. Are you just getting the stuff down now? Was so dry around here this year a bunch of the tobacco guys ended up having to steam it in the barns to get it down. Usually the tobacco around is sold from the end of October through November. Very labor intensive process. 

JD Guy

Really glad this post thread was continued as I thoroughly enjoyed reading it. Especially from a "first person account".

Thank You!

Wudman

Quote from: newoodguy78 on March 13, 2023, 05:29:54 PM
Great post. Are you just getting the stuff down now? Was so dry around here this year a bunch of the tobacco guys ended up having to steam it in the barns to get it down. Usually the tobacco around is sold from the end of October through November. Very labor intensive process.
There was a slight delay in making the post.  The tobacco came down a little before Christmas.  He is normally selling about that time, but this year the sale was delayed until February.......and then the Post Office lost his check.  It's still out there somewhere, but the company did direct deposit his funds when he contacted them. :-\
Wud
"You may tear down statues and burn buildings but you can't kill the spirit of patriots and when they've had enough this madness will end."
Charlie Daniels
July 4, 2020 (2 days before his death)

samandothers

Thanks for posting this next step in the process!  Glad the company is helping by direct depositing the payment.  

I have enjoyed the journey.

Southside

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