Now & Then : Helping Granddad plow the corn by keeping the horses in line
Posted on Wednesday, May 14, 2008
URL: http://www.nwanews.com/tnebc/Community/4443/
Have you ever wondered why we can vividly remember certain minor things, but can’t recall some of the important things we wish we could remember ? This is one of those “ I don’t know why I remember it” things.
When I was really young, Granddad and Grandma Nichols lived on the farm just north of ours. I always saw Granddad at work, or at church, or at the house, or driving past, but I don’t recall going places with him. But one day, when I was 5-yearsold, my mother told me that later in the day I was going to get to help Granddad plow corn. She and my Dad would be going to Bentonville for awhile. This was a pretty big deal, and I wondered just how I would be helping ? I was really excited about getting to work with Granddad, and the afternoon dragged on, until, about three o’clock, I finally saw Granddad coming across our field, riding the cultivator behind his two black horses.
Unlike my Dad’s walk-behind cultivator, Granddad’s cultivator was a riding cultivator. Rather than controlling the cultivator shovels by walking along holding the curved wooden handles, Granddad could operate his machine from the molded metal seat. There were two iron-spoked wheels, mounted on an axle shaped like a U turned upside down. With this design, the cultivator could work in waist-high corn without breaking over the stalks. We were to be working in tall corn, doing the last cultivation of the season in Granddad’s cornfield in the bottom land bordering our farm. After this cultivation, the corn would be “ laid by, ” as we called it. By this time the corn had grown well ahead of any weeds, and could take care of itself until the harvest.
On the way to the field, I rode the top of the cultivator, climbing about like kids do on the monkey bars at the park. At one point, as we were nearing the field, I asked Granddad how I would be helping ? His said, “ we’ll work it out when we get there. ” I couldn’t think of much that I could do, since I was only 5-years-old, but it was an opportunity and an adventure. We soon arrived at the cornfield, and Granddad had me climb up on the left horse’s back, and get situated where I could hang on while we worked. My assignment was to make sure the horses kept going straight down the rows and didn’t stray over and knock down the corn. That way, Granddad could watch the cultivator shovels and be sure to plow out all the weeds. Then, when we reached the end of each row, I was to turn the horses around, and line us up on the next row.
It really didn’t seem like I was helping much. The horses knew how to go straight down the rows without much guiding, and when we were turning around at the ends, Granddad seemed to be able to straighten up the horses whenever they didn’t line up for me. But anyway, we were making progress, and after an hour or so, the cultivating was done and the corn was laid by. I was pleased to help Grandpa work, but it still looked like he didn’t need much help from me.
That was in 1945, as the end of World War II was drawing near. Farming was very different in those days compared to the farming we see today. Not much field corn is being grown in Benton County these days, and some of the farms are disappearing as housing developments spread. In 1945, most of the farms around us were worked with teams of horses, pulling mostly walk-behind implements. My Granddad’s riding cultivator was “ really uptown, ” or so I thought. Most of the tractors we saw back then were old, noisy, rusty, iron-wheeled hulks that required lots of work to drive and to keep them running.
We would eventually get our first tractor in 1948, and with it we got a two-row mounted cultivator. But even that didn’t seem as fine as my Granddad’s horse-drawn riding cultivator. Even after we got a tractor, we kept our horses, old Pat and Mike, and there always seemed plenty for them to do, though the tractor took over the heavier work.
Before my wife and I moved back to Pea Ridge in 2002, we had lived for many years in eastern Arkansas. Over there, corn is a huge crop even today, along with the wheat, rice, soybeans and cotton. But rarely do today’s crop farmers in east Arkansas use a cultivator of any kind. So many farms rely on chemical herbicides to control the weeds in the corn. That’s nowhere near as dramatic as riding the horses while Granddad plowed out the corn.
I never did figure out just how I was helping Granddad that day. I have a suspicion I was being baby-sat while I was helping him cultivate the corn. A little later in the fall, in November, I had a new little brother, John. I don’t know if that had anything to do with it or not !