From The Arbor Hurray for Sumertime  Hurray for summertime! On June 21 summer slid in with
all its clear skies and heat. In just a few days we will be celebrating our
Independence Day, July Fourth. To many it will just be a holiday with barbecue,
hot dogs, and a cold drink; possibly a romp at the lake, a favorite park,
or a rest ‘under the arbor.’ I do not condemn these activities;
I’ll probably indulge in some of the festivities myself.
However, I trust you will set aside some time to remember those brave soldiers and patriots that stood for their beliefs and formed an independent nation, The United States of America. Very prominent and wealthy men of the 1700s pledged their life, their worldly goods, and even their families to this end. Many were to pay that price in full. So many others, who were not so wealthy or prominent, lost their lives, homes, and families in the struggle to be free, a freedom most of us take so lightly. Since December 27, 2010, when our grandson Sgt. Garrett Misener lost his life in Afghanistan, I have realized anew and afresh how costly freedom really is. We find ourselves in a precarious situation today, not from foreign oppression, but from a struggle within our own ranks. We who would save our nation from liberalism, big government, self-serving politicians, and bureaucratic rule must stand and fight for our freedoms. We have allowed liberals, politicians, courts, lawyers, politically correctness, greed, and all sorts of self-serving things bring our nation to its knees. Our once proud and powerful nation is now apologizing and poking money into the hands of every nation, group, religion and minority that whines about their plight. Government seems to be trying to be everything to everyone and is failing miserably on all fronts. We find ourselves fighting wars that are not necessarily ours, and the big kicker is, the powers that be, will not let us win. About as close to winning as we get is to fight to a draw, then try and negotiate a settlement. Whatever happened to Unconditional Surrender? With the price of oil and with the cost of men and material we have used to protect the good folks in foreign countries; why do we not own several of those oil rich countries lock, stock, and barrel? You can tell I’m not a politician, nor am I politically correct, but I am right. Getting down off my soap box; I hope you join with me in doing what we can as average citizens and elect officials that share our conservative point of view and the hope of returning to the beliefs and dreams of our forefathers. Let’s join together and celebrate some really important events in July: National Barbecue Month, Hot Dog Month, Baked Bean Month, Softball Month, and National Safe Boating Month. There are other important birthdays and events: Amelia Earhart’s birthday, Neil Armstrong’s moon landing (1969), Disneyland opening (1955), and the battle of Gettysburg. Although equally important, but less known, let us not forget: the invention of the ice cream cone in St. Louis (1904), "Stay Out of the Sun Day," and best of all; "I Forgot Day." Lest we forget; those of us here at the Bodock Post wish you a most happy Independence Day; may your drinks be cold, may your mosquito repellent work, the sunscreen do its job, and your boat not sink! Happy Holiday from all of us to all of you! God Bless America! ~ By Ralph R. Jones, Editor Rose Care In July Fifth In A Series On Rose Care Caring for your roses in the month of July means water, water, water. During these hot months such as July, roses will require more water than usual. I recommend that you water deeply at least twice a week and to water in the morning instead of the afternoon. I also recommend not to water overhead, but instead use a drip system or sprinklers close to the ground. If you do not have an irrigation system, just turn the hose on low and lay it at the base of each plant and let it run for about a half hour per plant. This will water the root system deeply and keep them from needing watering so frequently. Fertilizing your roses should be kept to a minimum and should only be a water soluble type. The only other form of fertilizer that I would recommend would be organics. My formula is nine pounds of organics (equal parts of bone, alfalfa, cottonseed, blood meals and approximately two cups of fish emulsion) to thirty gallons of water. I stir it twice a day and let it steep for at least 48 hours. This will make a good drench for your plants. I like to give each large bush a gallon and the smaller bushes half a gallon. This is only for the hybrid teas and the English roses. Most of the other roses don’t need any extra fertilizer except what they get in the weekly spray program. My spray regimen for July is as follows: mix one and one half teaspoons Honor Guard, three teaspoons Mancozeb, two ounces Monty’s Joy Juice, and two ounces fish emulsion. This mix is for three gallons of water and I spray this mix every seven to ten days. You can substitute blue water for the Monty’s Joy Juice. I try not to use any pesticides during July, as I grow vegetables in and around my roses and other flowers. Last, but not least, keep your roses deadheaded. This will allow them to prepare for the next bloom cycle. I cut the stems back just past the first set of five leaves and about half inch above an outward facing bud eye. Be safe and try to do your gardening in the early morning if you can while it’s cool. Ms. Janet and I try to be out by 6:00 AM and get as much as we can done by 7:00 AM. So far we have been able to keep up. If you have any questions or comments send me an email at colorsbytim@hotmail.com or find me on facebook, www.facebook.com/mastergardner You can also tune in weekly to "That Gardenin’ Guy" at 8:00 AM Saturdays on WNAU1470 AM or listen online at www.wnau1470.com and click on high school sports and then click on the player that is on your computer. Don’t forget to call in with your questions at 662-534-8133. Happy Gardening and Keep Digging in the Dirt ~ By Tim Burress, Master Gardener, Union County Musical Extravaganza Pontotoc At Its Finest Patricia Henry credits her father’s influence in developing her musical abilities at an early age. Her father, George Young, was a gifted musician in his own right. He could play a piano, pump organ, violin, mandolin, accordion and harmonica, all proficiently. Additionally, he taught singing schools, both traditional music and that of shape-notes used by singers of sacred harp music. By the time Patricia was in the fourth grade her father had decided she was old enough to play piano for his men’s quartet. She still recalls the day he came to pull her out of class so she could accompany the quartet at a funeral near Houston, Mississippi. Miss Vera Salmon was Patricia’s piano teacher, but after Patricia had several years of lessons "under her belt" Miss Vera felt she had gained enough knowledge to teach others. Thus, at age twelve, Patricia began her teaching career, one that now spans sixty years. Bobbie Segars, now Bobbie Young, was Patricia’s first student, but it wasn’t long until others signed up for lessons. Patricia recalls how some of her students walked home with her for weekday lessons after school. Others came on Saturday, and it wasn’t long until she had all the students she could manage.
You’d think she might have rested on Sunday, but it was then that her father needed her to play for his quartet at various church functions throughout Pontotoc County. Well before Patricia was a high school senior, she was known county-wide. Patricia feels her exposure to a larger community than just her hometown led to her being a highly sought-after piano teacher while still a teen and her attaining the highest and most respected office a student could hold at Pontotoc High School in her day, namely that of President of The Student Council. Doubtless, her mother’s admonition played a role, also, "Be careful what you say and be careful where you go, because you never know when a young child is watching you and trying to pattern their life after you." Patricia’s marriage to Wallace Henry would uproot her from her hometown a few years later. "Daddy had to sign for me to get married, as I wasn’t twenty-one," she recalled. "It was hard to give up my students in Pontotoc and move to Tunica." Leaving Tunica seven years afterwards to return to Pontotoc was just as hard on her as leaving Pontotoc had been. "I told Wallace, I didn’t ever want to move away from my students again," she remembered. Fortunately for Pontotoc County, she hasn’t. "When we got back to Pontotoc," Patricia stated, fondly, "Mother had lined up more than fifty piano students for me." However, Pontotoc was experiencing growing pains in the city school system in 1967, and the school could not provide a room for her to teach students. Undeterred, Patricia received permission to pick up her students directly from school and transport them to her home studio, an arrangement that proved highly successful and accommodated all parties. Asked as to the number of piano students she has had through the years, Patricia provides this clue, "I think if you take fifty students for the average year and multiply that times the sixty years I’ve taught, that would be close. There have been very few years I’ve taught less than fifty. Some years I’ve had more than 120 students, but fifty is a good average." Three thousand students, is an astounding number but such would certainly account for the many churches in Pontotoc County who have an organist or pianist who was taught by Patricia. For the past several years Patricia has brought together many of her former students to perform in a spectacular fashion in a series of annual musical extravaganzas. These along with music club members and talented area pianists have amazed and wowed large audiences with a variety of favorite piano selections. Selections this year included something for practically everyone, classical, folk, a movie theme, popular standards, Christmas music, and a grand patriotic medley. More than ninety individuals participated in the most recent musical extravaganza. In addition to pianists and an organist, Patricia brought in two flautists, a piccoloist, a clarinetist, and violinist. A total of thirty five different churches were represented among the musicians with these spanning eight cities or counties in Mississippi, two in Tennessee, and one in Louisiana. Of the thirty-five representatives, nineteen individuals are presently playing for churches in Pontotoc County. Needless to say, a larger number comprises all churches in Pontotoc County that benefit by having a pianist once taught by Patricia Henry, but that number has not been documented. It’s almost unheard of to combine eight pianos, three keyboards and an organ with sometimes twenty-four players playing three or more musical parts and for all to keep near-perfect time, but somehow Patricia and her gifted participants have pulled it off time and again. Compared to other parts of this great country, Pontotoc may be considered rural, even a small town, but the musical talent recently witnessed by hundreds should rightly rank among the best to be found anywhere in America. It represents, as State Legislator and Pontotoc resident, Dr. E. Mac Huddleston phrased it during the reception held in Patricia’s honor after the program, "Pontotoc at its best!" Beth Luther Waldo considered the modest fee charged to see the latest performance, that of $5.00 per person or $10.00 per family a bargain. "After I had been listening to the performances for about a half-hour, I told myself, ‘I’d pay a hundred dollars to hear something this good,’ then after hearing more I decided, ‘No, I’d pay two hundred dollars.’"
Patricia Henry has lived a life dedicated to music and in doing so is leaving a legacy not likely to be soon surpassed, if ever. The seeds of her love of music, which have been sewn in the thousands of lives she has touched these past sixty years, have produced an unbelievable abundance of fruit. Today, those lives are producing musical fruit and planting still more seeds for an even larger harvest one day. Fortunately for Pontotoc, Patricia has no plans to retire as long as she is able to continue teaching others. She hasn’t set a date for the next extravaganza but doubts she’ll choose something in the month of June, due to all the extra activities such as vacations, sports’ events, church-sponsored youth trips, weddings, and all that calls her performers away from times of practice. But, we who have been privileged to see and hear the June program, this year, look forward to the next time Patricia brings together scores of performers for another musical extravaganza. ~ By Wayne L. Carter, Editor & Publisher
The Lesser Traveled Enjoying The Back Roads Often whenever my wife and I travel, we take the most expedient route, do the tourist thing, business engagement, or whatever the trip was designed for; but when returning we usually go the less traveled roads. We take the country roads through the small towns and communities. The old highways take us through the "business" part of towns and some of these towns we knew as being bustling centers of activities when we were young, are becoming dilapidated, even to the point of falling down with age and neglect. Not all these small towns are giving up; they are making lemonade out of the lemons they have inherited. Many downtowns are looking for the tourist to come and save the day like "Mighty Mouse" in our cartoons of yesteryear. Old stores are being refurbished inside and out, bright new paint is being added, new porches, awnings, windows, etc., are installed to enhance the facade. These towns are encouraging businesses that do not require a huge amount of traffic, because of less available parking, to locate in these areas and enhance the older style architecture. New, up-scale businesses are springing up all around. My feeling is that these towns will be around for many years to come, serving not only tourist, but home folks as well. Sad to say, however, there are other towns that have stuck their heads in the sand and pretended nothing is happening. Their town is dying and someone could just as well write the word "Icabod" across the town sign. Nothing is happening except the decay. Down on the corner a rundown beer joint remains open and much of the day those woebegone, out of work people, some probably homeless, stand about as if waiting for the ultimate fall. Recently I was in Helena, Arkansas, just across the river from the casinos of the Mississippi Delta. Driving around through the downtown area one might miss some of the things going on there. Although some buildings are empty, and some still need repair, there is a feeling of optimism. Helena is not sitting on her laurels and letting Father Time destroy it all. She has taken a positive approach and is in the process of making a large caldron of lemonade. Dead stores are being brought back to life, progressive businesses and even a preparatory school livens up Main Street. It is a clean city, many buildings beyond repair have been removed, and in general it looks like someone cares. New walkways, overviews, and other vantage points are being planned to better view ‘Old Man River.’ They have secured more touring ships to make stops there in a short while, and civil war sites are being enhanced and rebuilt. One of the best kept secrets in our wonderful South is the World Class Arts featured in Helena at Phillips Community College. Classical stage performances, art exhibitions, operas, ballet, world touring orchestras, singers and musicians are a regular at the college and all absolutely free to the public. Performances like "Carman," "The Russian Symphony Orchestra," and "Madam Butterfly" have been performed there not long ago along with other most magnificent events. These are all done by the professional actors and singers from the stages in New York City. You just never know what you will find on the less traveled roads of our beautiful South Land. Did you know there is a ‘golden hand’ with an index finger pointing up to heaven atop a church steeple in Port Gibson: a wonderful antique automobile museum in Tupelo, a world renowned military Air Force base in Columbus, two of the finest colleges around, Old Miss and Mississippi State, are located in north Mississippi, and among so many other places of interest, Hernando Desoto spent the winter here in Pontotoc County. What you learn from the most unlikely places, or on the most unlikely roads, will surprise you. Don’t hesitate to get off the well beaten path, talk to the guy in bib overalls wearing the yellow John Deere cap, or visit a spell with the lady in an apron at the roadside vegetable stand. Many times these folks know more by accident than the historians do on purpose. ~ By Ralph R. Jones, Editor The Roundup At Locke's Not-So-OK Corral Three strapping young men; Jared, Jake and and Tyler came prepared to capture the wild cattle of Locke's Hardscrabble Ranch where the best crops are bitterweeds and ticks. They were prepared, each with their quarter horse, cowboy hat and rope. Not only that, but their ace(s) in the hole were impressive, six Rhodesian Ridgeback dogs, bred for no other purpose than to find and herd unruly cattle. The plan was to let the dogs "work" the cattle; i.e., find them, give chase and bay them. If the cattle played according to the rules, they would stay together in a wad for an hour or so while the dogs ran around in circles baying (barking at) them at which time the cowboys and their horses would enter the picture and escort the herd to the loading pen. They were soon to learn that Locke bred cattle do not play by the rules. They did not stay bayed very long, and when they broke and ran, it was every bovine for him or herself. They would not run out across the open pasture so the cowboys could get a good throw with their ropes, but used the brushy draws and ditches to their advantage. Three of them ran right through a four-strand barbed wire fence bordering the bottom, made a bee-line across the newly planted cotton field, across Berry Branch and on to the back side of the place, AKA the Quail Creek side; obviously, they preferred a nicer subdivision than where they were. The rest went through my electric fence like greased lightning. Apparently the electricity was not a deterrent to their flight.
But wait! The dogs bayed again, just behind the pond levee. While the cowboys headed that way, I stayed on the hill on the John Deere Gator. There followed more barking, then bellowing; lots more barking, lots more bellowing; one animal was not having a good day; I assumed they had a rope on something, preferably a bovine and not a bear! After much more barking and bellowing, my cell phone rang; it was Jared. "Do you have a tractor with a loader on it?" "Yes, I do." "Can you bring it down here? Every time we try to get this yearling out, he falls in a ditch!" So I maneuvered the tractor through the bushes to where they had the bull yearling all tied up just like they do in the rodeo. The cowboys rolled him into the front-end loader, and I gave him a free ride to the trailer. Somehow, I don't think he was all that thrilled with the ride. Because horses are loaded in the front of the trailer, Bully got the rumble seat. The Cowboys untied him and leapt onto and over the sides of the trailer with a great deal of vigor. Some of their ego was soothed and some pride regained, though that swagger in the step that marked their arrival was subdued, at best. Final score: Locke Cattle 5, Cowdogs/Boys 1 ~ By Don Locke, Contributor Biographical Sketch: Don Locke grew up on a family farm at College Hill, Lafayette County, MS and later graduated from the University of Mississippi, as well as from Reformed Theological Seminary in Jackson, MS. He and his wife, Ruth Gean Locke, have two daughters, a son and five grandchildren. Don is a former school teacher, school administrator, and has worked for the American Family Radio Network, a Christian radio network with 192 stations in 35 states. He has served as pastor of Houston Presbyterian Church (PCA) since 1999, and has recently taken over the family farm at College Hill Photo Credit: Thanks to Esther Garvi. World At My Feet As Viewed From A Backyard Swing My children gave me a porch swing for my birthday a year or so ago. As it was made of pressure-treated wood, I let it season for a year before staining it. Truthfully, I was waiting for the right time to do something with it. The right time came last fall when I re-stained our deck. While it is a porch swing, we have it in a metal frame that once was our children’s gym set. It sits comfortably in the shade of my pecan tree and a couple of cypresses. My neighbor was kind enough to let me use part of her yard for a party last summer, a section where grass doesn’t grow well, and I’ve left the swing there ever since. Being retired, I’ve spent a great deal more time outside this summer than I have in many a year. I do all the yard work for my home as well as my sister’s, and since February, I’ve been helping construct a house for Habitat for Humanity. With all the hot weather we’ve had since late May, I’ve enjoyed several days of excessive perspiration. My wife prefers an air-conditioned environment, preferably one near seventy degrees, which is far cooler than I can enjoy, as I am now acclimated to hot weather. So, whenever I want to warm up or simply to relax, I often find myself sitting in the backyard swing.
The swing brings back memories of my childhood when I visited my Carter grandparents at Thaxton back in the early fifties. They had a porch swing, which, back in the days without air-conditioners, was a cool place to relax after a day working in the fields. Their front porch was screened-in. It didn’t prevent every fly from getting inside the porch, but it held back most of them. A boy can do a lot of thinking while swinging and swatting the occasional fly. My grandparents later moved in with my parents on Woodland Street in Pontotoc in the late fifties. They brought the swing with them; Dad screened-in the larger part of our front porch, and I got a whole new set of swing memories from that experience. The other day I was sitting in my swing, warming up from an afternoon nap on the couch in a cold room. I was enjoying the gentle sway of the swing as I worked my feet and legs to create a relaxing motion. In the shade, the warm breeze was not too warm, and I might have sat there an hour or more but I saw my wife returning from a wedding shower, and I knew she’d soon be looking for me. Yet, before I left the world of my swing, I took note of all that I could see near me. There were a couple of brown thrashers, which were likely feeding their young in a nearby hedge and were continually searching for insects in the short grass. The mockingbird that serenades all within earshot of my house made a near ground-level flyover, as though it were its duty to patrol the grounds. It was too early for lightening bugs to glow, but I spied several near me. At my feet the ground was alive with wandering ants, which I could only presume were looking for food, as they were not moving their colony or marching in an organized manner. There were rounded tops of mole tunnels near the azaleas in front of me where moles had been mining for grubs, though I detected no give-away movement to indicate the moles had not moved elsewhere. A blade of grass caught my eye, in that it seemed unnaturally bent. A ladybug had crawled near the tip, and its weight had bent the grass’ leaf downward. While watching it, I saw two more ladybugs within the same square foot of earth. Just then, and near the ladybugs, the soft breeze lifted a single strand of spider-silk, which reflected enough of the sparse sunlight breaking through the overhead canopy of green leaves to capture my attention. The silken thread disappeared from sight as it seemed to go nowhere but skyward. Truly, there was a world at my feet. Admittedly, it’s one I don’t explore very often, but still it was an enjoyable one. Luckily, I left the swing and returned to the house in time to stifle a near-panic attack by my wife who had no luck locating my whereabouts. Perhaps, I should leave her a note the next time I decide to explore the world at my feet. ~ By Wayne L. Carter, Editor & Publisher Soakings A Good Soaking Effects Change Whatever happened to the art of soaking things? I can remember folks once soaked all sorts of things; vegetables, clothes, mechanical parts, even kids, just to mention a few. Has society just quit the practice or is it that I’m so out of touch with real life that I just don’t see it anymore? When our son, Joey, was very young he sometimes came in so dirty that his mom would draw a tub of water and tell him to soak for a while. As a youngster I can remember coming home from school with grass stains on my overall knees and the elbows of my shirt with dirt pounded into every inch of everything that I wore. Mom didn’t ever fuss. "We’ll just soak them tonight, it will come right out," she would say. The dirty clothes were put in a # 3 wash tub filled with water and a bit of lye soap added and left overnight. The next day she would wash them with the regular clothes and that ‘ground-in’ dirt would come out almost like magic.
A sore toe, foot, ankle, or even a boil often got a good soaking in Epsom’s salt, boy, did that ever make it feel better. Mom kept a large container of that around all the time for that deep healing application. During dry weather, some of our garden just got watered, but other parts got more water. Dad had a soaking hose that did not spray water; it just oozed out all along its length and the moisture was swallowed up by the thirsty ground. During dry spells Dad would often say, "What we need is a good soaking rain." If you think about it, there are some non-tangible things that you hear and see that need a bit of soaking. A hot-shot salesman may try to entice you to buy on impulse, or a late night infomercial may sound too good to be true; however, a good soaking will help to make a better choice. My granddad use to say, "Let’s sleep on that before we make a decision." He was just getting me to soak it overnight. By morning, much of the cloud would be removed and a better conclusion could be drawn. I’m afraid that soaking, of all kind, is a thing of the past. We do not have time to soak clothes. Our society does not have time to ‘sleep’ on ideas anymore. Items and proposals that are up for approval and need to be ‘slept’ on are often passed and adopted seemingly with little or no soaking time. A bus driver that I know said that the automatic transmission on his vehicle may have looked good on the drawing board but they did not think it all the way through; they did not soak it enough. Holy Scripture; as good, helpful, rewarding, and fulfilling as it is on initial reading, often needs to be soaked. A new perspective, a different thought, a new truth may be found if it is soaked for a while. Reading, re-reading, memorization, and meditation on what we have read is a form of soaking. Bill Gothard of ‘Basic Youth Conflicts’ instructed people to meditate on Scripture to glean the most from the passage, i.e.; soak it thoroughly. The soaking process hardly ever fails to change things from their original state; hopefully for the best. After the process things are hardly ever quite the same again. In our modern day of instant soup, instant communication, instant gratifications of all sorts, we still need to take the time to "soak it." ~ By Ralph R. Jones, Editor Boys Being Boys Fun Which Few Can Have Anymore Here a while back, several of us who were sitting around the bar down at the waterin’ hole got to remembering some of the things we did for fun as youngsters back during the middle ages, otherwise known as the early 50s. Maybe it wasn’t quite the middle ages, but it was definitely pre-modern, at least in this neck of the woods. All of us grew up out in the country or in small towns, which meant there were daily chores to do, however after the chores were done we usually managed to find some time before dark and on weekends to do "kid things". Here’s a little taste of what it was like to be a rural or small town boy on spring and summer afternoons and weekends, back during those days. To start with, we didn’t have computer games, Nintendo, Game Boys, or anything like that to occupy us, primarily because personal computers hadn’t been invented yet and even if they had, most of our families couldn’t have afforded them. In fact, we didn’t have much of any kind of store-bought toys and really didn’t need them. On these afternoons with some play time we managed to find plenty of things to do -- many which you couldn’t do now and some we probably shouldn’t have done even back then. Instead of toys we all had weapons, mostly BB guns, but some of the younger kids had sling shots and some of the older ones had pellet rifles. That was the rule. You couldn’t be a kid without a weapon. Well, girls could, and the Humble area had some mighty fine girls, but they had girl things to occupy their time and minds and we were a couple of years away from figuring out about playing with girls. We boys employed our BB guns as hunters and gatherers for our tribes, although much of what we hunted was seldom gathered. Our prey were mostly turtles, snakes and nuisance birds such as sparrows, starlings, rice birds and such, none of which made very appetizing table fare, although on occasion we tried them all cooked over a campfire. Of course, today BB guns and pellet guns would be forbidden from pre and early-teen boys without direct adult supervision and it would still probably send some mothers screeching and hiding under the bed and calling the sheriff. Most folks nowadays would be hard pressed to even know what a sling shot is, much less how to make and shoot one (They weren’t called sling shots in those days, but political correctness prevents me from calling them by that name).
Our country was different back then, and the South was an even more disparate
part. Nobody much watched over us since they had adult business to take care
of and they figured we were plenty old enough to see after ourselves... that
left us free to do sensible things, like put a couple of shotgun shells up
on a fence post and see who could hit the primers from twenty steps with
BB guns. Contrary to what you might think, although this made a bang, it
didn’t produce what you would call a big bang because the shell wasn’t
confined in a gun, but all things considered, it was a pretty good bang...at
least it got old lady Burch out on her back porch hollering that she was
gonna tell our mamas if we didn’t quit shootin’ them shotguns so
close to her house.
Back then shotgun shells were made of heavy waxed paper and sometimes when they got old they would swell and jam in shotguns, so they were often discarded. We found lots of uses for these old, discarded shotgun shells. Sometimes we’d use our pocket knives to cut the front part off the old shells. Pocket knives weren’t illegal back then. Nowadays we’d probably be arrested as terrorists for carrying them, even though we were just something like twelve years old. In those days, they were just plain old pocket knives. Every boy had one and nobody cared. We went for years and years and years, never hearing a word about a case of pocket-knife terrorism, especially one involving young boys. Anyway, we’d dump the powder from the old shells and carefully insert it through a small hole we’d cut in a Ping-Pong ball until we had the ball filled. We’d then insert a fuse from an M-80 firecracker we had saved, into the hole and then wrap the whole thing tightly with several rounds of electricians’ tape.-- when we set it off it made a splendid boom. Things were probably kind of unsupervised by today’s standards. Without a doubt, today we couldn’t do some of the things we did back then. We’d need some kind of "caring adult" to be in charge, which meant some tiresome old blue-haired church lady or old maid teacher who thought we should play some dumb playground games and didn’t think we ought to be making black powder or stuff like that for blowing things up... We were fascinated with making compounds that went boom and believe it or not, actually made black powder from sulfur, saltpeter and charcoal from a formula we found in an encyclopedia in the school library. We contemplated attempting guncotton and nitro glycerin, and although we found the formulas for both, for some reason good sense ruled and we decided they were too complicated and dangerous for us to try. Now don’t y’all go to thinking all we did was run around the woods like a bunch of heathens, killing birds and animals, making bombs and wreaking who knows what other kinds of havoc on the countryside. That certainly wasn’t the case; we did a bunch of other stuff. One thing we did that didn’t involve explosives, BB guns and other mayhem was to build castles and forts from hay bales stored in the loft. We’d make secret passages, hidden dungeons and every kind of tunnel and room you can imagine. We even had dining rooms and bedrooms, but our parents would never grant permission to sleep in our secret castles and forts overnight. We did spend a lot of nights sleeping outdoors, starting out with backyard campouts and after several years camping with the boy scouts, graduating into spending entire weekends alone in the woods. Many of those outdoor hours were spent lashing together things using pine saplings and binder-twine -- lean-tos, towers, animal traps and rustic bridges across streams and gullies -- we loved to build stuff. We usually camped in Mr. Lewis’ pasture and had his permission to cut some small trees for building materials. Had he known how many and the size of the trees involved, he would likely have been somewhat reticent to grant permission. However, we were able to partially repay his kindness when he came down sick and bedridden with cancer and we spent several weekends repairing and replacing about a mile of fence where his cattle kept getting out on the road. Those were the good old days. I wouldn’t mind returning for a brief visit, but I think that, all things considered, I prefer today. ~ By Newt Harlan, Contributor High Tunnel Houses How To Extend Growing Season High tunnels, it’s the new buzz word for an unheated greenhouse. They are also known as low tunnels, hoop houses, caterpillar houses, and cold frames. They can be bought as kits that you put up or be made from materials that can be bought from any home improvement center or lumber yard. Any one of these structures can be used in the home landscape to protect flowers or small vegetable patches and may be commercial sized structures used in commercial farming. Extending your growing season has become a great concern for farmers these days. Commercial farmers and truck-patch farmers alike are constantly looking for ways to extend the growing season, thus allowing them to produce more vegetables in a given space. The advantages of these structures are an extended growing season, adding approximately four weeks to both ends of the season, which will increase yield, provide frost protection and high wind protection to young plants, and will help with water management through irrigation practices, which can discourage some plant diseases, and, of course, help with temperature management. These structures also give added protection from deer, rabbits, and other animals that like to feast on plants. The disadvantages of these structures are that snow may accumulate on houses that do not have a higher pitch in the roof bows, and they require strict attention to control the internal temperature.
You will need some sort of anchoring system to keep the wind from picking the structure up and sending it on a sailing trip. If you live in an area where there is a good amount of snow fall, you might want to have a higher roof pitch to encourage faster runoff. If you are using a prefab kit, everything will be pre-cut and detailed instructions will be provided. We built a demonstration structure at the fairgrounds for display during the home and garden show, March 25th and 26th. This particular structure is made from a 12 x 26 tent frame. We used 2 x 6 pressure treated boards along the ground to attach to the frame. We also anchored the structure by drilling holes in the 2 x 6’s and driving 3’ anchors made from rebar into the ground. We used pressure treated 2 x 4’s to frame the ends of the structure and to give extra strength to the structure. Ribbon boards (1 x4’s) were attached to the structure along the sides to add more strength and to give a secure place to attach the plastic cover along the sides. This is where we attach the plastic for the roll up sides. The sides are attached in a fashion so that they can be rolled up on warm days to let heat escape and let back down at night to keep the cold out. There is usually a 10 degree temperature variance from the outside to the inside. The inside temperature at night will be 10 to 15 degrees warmer than the outside temperature. This will allow plants to have that added edge in colder temperatures. These houses give the home gardener the ability to have fresh produce and/or cut flowers an extra eight to ten weeks per year. The same criteria applies to the commercial farmer. If you have an interest in building a high tunnel house, please contact me if you need more information, colorsbytim@hotmail.com
~ By Tim Burress, Master Gardener, Union County
Bodock Beau Surely God Laughed At These Childlike faith is a precious thing, as are the prayers children lift to our Heavenly Father. Below are a few we think are for real, so we’ve not corrected punctuation or spelling. Dear God, I went to this wedding and they kissed right in church. Is that ok? Neil Dear God, Instead of letting people die and haveing to make new ones why don’t you just keep the ones you got not? Jane Dear God, I think the stapler is one of your greatest invention Ruth M. Dear God In bible times did they really talk that fancy? Jennifer Dear God, I think about you sometimes even when I’m not praying. Elliott Dear God, I am Amearican what are you? Robert Dear God, I bet is very hard for you to love everybody in the whole world. There are only 4 people in our family and I can never do it. Nan Dear God – Please put a – nother holiday between Christmas and Easter. There is nothing good in there now. Ginny Dear God, If you watch in Church on Sunday I will show you my new Shoes Mickey D. Dear – God – if – we – come – back as – something – please – don’t let – me – be Jennifer – Horton because I – hate her. Denise Dear God Maybe Cain and Abel would not kill each so much if they had their own rooms. It works with my brother Larry Dear God, If you give me a genie lamp like Alladin I will give you anything you want except my money or my chess set. Raphael Dear God, We read Thos. Edison made light. But in Sun. School they said you did it so I bet he stoled your idea. Sincerely, Donna Dear God, If you let the dinasor not extinct we would not have a country. You did the right thing. Jonathan Dear God, Please send Dennis Clark to a different camp this year. Peter Dear God, Thank you for the baby brother but what I prayed for was a puppy. Joyce Cajun Warning Reverend Boudreaux was the part-time pastor of the local Cajun Baptist Church. Pastor Thibodaux was the minister of the Covenant Church across the road. They were both standing by the road erecting a sign, that read: 'Da End is Near! Turn You Self Around Now! Before it's Too Late!' As a car sped past them, the driver leaned out his window and yelled, "Religious nuts!" From the curve they heard screeching tires and a big splash . . . Bro. Boudreaux turned to Bro. Thibodaux and asked,"Do ‘ya tink maybe Da sign should jus' say: 'Bridge Out?"
Cuzin' Cornpone A Bodock Post Exclusive Our loveable friend, Cuzin' Cornpone, appears only in The Bodock Post.
Our Mission Purpose - The Bodock Post It is our desire to provide a monthly newsletter about rural living with photographs of yesterday and today, including timely articles about conservative politics, religion, food, restaurant reviews, gardening, humor, history, and non-fiction columns by folks steeped in our Southern lifestyle. Copyright © 2011 ~ The Bodock Post. Return to home page. Open This Issue with MS Word
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I suppose people with dentures still soak them overnight, however,
I think that is just to give their mouth a rest more than to get them clean.
Some of the "greens" from the garden would be put in water overnight, and
any dried beans or peas would be soaked for a while. If Dad had a greasy,
messy machine part, oft-times he would drop it down in a bucket of kerosene
(coal oil for my country friends) and by morning the yuck could be readily
removed. At the LeTourneau Factory in Texas where I worked while in college,
we would often remove parts from machinery that would be so encrusted with
oil, grease, and dirt that they were hardly recognizable. We would simply
soak them in solvent, and they came out looking like new.
Building these structures large or small is basically the same
process. The first step is to level the grade of the area that you want to
build on. Next, decide on the size of your structure and make a materials
list. Since this structure will be covered with plastic, you will want to
put your roof bows no more than five feet apart. This will give ample support
to the structure and give the plastic cover more strength from the elements.
