I’m sure that by now if you have been reading me you know how I love to tell a story. Life of course is made up of one story after the other. From the day you were born until that day you pass away. Now I am going to tell a story of course but it is more like I am going to try to retell a story told to me by a relative .My great Uncle Roy told me this many years ago and I feel it was one that is very true. So here I go.
My Great Uncle Roy was a man I referred to as a retired eccentric. He was a self-taught and educated man who looked at the world through a pair of closely observant eyes. A man who saw things for what they were and what they might not have been. Other than the first 18 months of his life he lived until the age of 91 and he resided on the same farm. Roy was the youngest of three boys. He grew up to be a long six foot three inch and lanky man who was conditioned to work long and hard all of his life. These three brothers of Archie, John and Roy grew up to be good hard working men and proved this I feel by how they worked every day they were alive.
Now their dad was a successful farmer and raised a lot of burley tobacco. So having three big strong sons helped him greatly as farming in those days took even more manual labor than it does these days and it still does take a lot of labor. Since they were born in the late 1800s’ this story was about when they were young men. So that would have placed it between 1910 to 1920. Try to place yourself in that period of time. (Remember that is what I am trying to do as I try to tell this,) I doubt it was greatly needed to remind someone that things were done by hand as it almost all was. Modern farming was anything that could be done with a team of horses. Life on a farm in those days had to be six days of hard work and rest on Sundays. Whatever entertainment there was individuals would have had to create that and I doubt they were held often and no way near to how we can entertain ourselves these days.
Before I move on further I need to point out that in those days and I would think even more so on the farms the men created and carried out competitions as a form of entertainment and to reduce boredom. I think it has always been this way and when I farmed there were still competitions to see who the strongest or fasted or best aim was or even who could spit the furthest. Whoever won got to carry the title at the best at whatever it was he had won at.
Now as my Uncle Roy told it was one fall when he and his brothers were still at home on the same farm and their dad was raising over twenty-six acres of tobacco. To any reader out there who has never raised tobacco that amount is a monumental amount. Especially in those days. Every plant was set in the ground by hand and that had to break many backs just in the bending. To cut tobacco was always very hard work but in those days it was even worse. You see when I cut tobacco we used what was called a tommy hawk tobacco knife with the blade at the end of the handle and a metal sphere shaped tool that had a needle like point and this would be placed on the stick so a cut stock could be impaled onto a tobacco stick. In those days there had yet to be invented the sphere and what was called a tobacco knife was a blade on the end of a six inch rod that was connected to a handle that was gripped between the middle and ring finger. After chopping off the stock from the ground and in order to allow it to go over a stick the men would have to take the knife and split the stock so it could slide onto the stick. I have tried it just to see how it was done and I must say it made the tommy hawk and sphere look like a great improvement. My evaluation of it was that it was the hardest thing I think I ever tried.
So as the late summer and fall was moving along and the harvesting of all this tobacco was beginning to get late into the season and I guess Uncle Roy’s dad began to worry about getting it all in before frost. A neighbor told their dad he had hired a man from Kentucky who was the fastest tobacco cutter in Kentucky and since he was about done would Uncle Roy’s dad want to hire him. He naturally said yes. So I think he was to come to help them on a Monday. Uncle Roy said that he and his brothers weren’t too keen about this man coming to help. They had met him and to their way of seeing it he thought an awful lot of himself and didn’t wait to be ask if he was any good at cutting tobacco but would just up and tell you he was the best in Kentucky.
That’s when the brothers decided that one of them was going to have to race him and see if he was really as good as he said. So Uncle Roy said that they drew straws to see who was going to cut against him. He said he could never prove it but he always felt that his brothers cheated and fixed it to where he drew the short straw and he got the chore of racing him. I am going to do some guessing here but I would bet that a contest like this spread throughout the neighborhood and when Monday morning arrived there probably was a small crowd there to watch. Probably each thought up a good reason to have stopped by.
Uncle Roy said they began at eight that morning and cut through the day only to stop for a lunch that was brought to them in the field. Now this man was tall but he wasn’t quite as tall as Uncle Roy and even though I wasn’t there I know my uncle had the stamina and of course he wanted in the worst way to win in front of family and friends. Also I recall him telling me that his brothers bet him he couldn’t win. He said that was probably the hardest days’ work he ever did but at the end of the day he had out cut the champion of Kentucky and on top of that he had surpassed over a thousand sticks cut. (A thousand sticks cut has always been the goal that put you into a limited group of men.)
Nearing 90-years-old is when Uncle Roy told me that story and as he told it he smiled a grin that I had never seen him grin before or after. He was very proud of his accomplishment that he had done so many years before. We never forget things like this as with the win comes the bragging rights and he kept his the rest of his life as he well should have. Oh and by the way he collected from his brothers on the wager. He said a bet was a bet and he had earned it. It is a story I loved when I heard it and just felt that maybe it might be enjoyed by others.
Rick Houser grew up on a farm near Moscow in Clermont County and loves to share stories about his youth and other topics. If you are interested in reading more of his stories they can be found in his books ‘There are Places to Remember” and’ Memories ARE from the Heart.” He may be reached at [email protected] or mail to P.O. Box 213 Bethel, Ohio 45106.