I don’t know if the Pioneer Valley tobacco growers still hire UMass kids, but an ex who went there in the early 90s pointed the barns out to me when were out there visiting some of her friends once and said they used to hire students. I still spot those barns when I have the occasion to drive down 116.
2 Likes
Yes, the white nets were for shade, or tent tobacco, which is also broadleaf, cigar wrappers, and is picked and sewn leaf by leaf to be hung. Field tobacco may also be sewn, or speared, but is whole plant. Polacks never agreed on this, and some farms did one, some farms t’other.
1 Like
Those very barns on 116 are the Jekanowski farm, (furthest South visible from 116) where I chopped a gazillion tobacco plants. Yep, hired students, problem was, no young kids would do the work for the pay. It’s brutal, hot, dirty, you can fall from a rafter, chop a foot, put a spear through your hand, or get run over by a tractor. You had to have your wits about you, it took a special breed.
The stories I heard from the old timers, like Jack, 70 years old qnd still hanging top tier in a 6 bent barn, we’re awesome. Back when horses pulled the racks. Fill a rack, cluck your tongue and they’d go right to the barn. And come back.
My wife drives 116 every day to work.
3 Likes
In my travels down south I seen some of those tobacco drying shacks.
2 Likes
tobacco row how many times do you till the soil does the sand was away or does it blow away do we pan the gold or do we mine for it with are hands to find the nugget instead of the flake.
Hell ya, the old man used to drive the tractor, and he’d whack you with a stick, usually a lathe, the sticks laid out in rows to spear on, if you were slacking… As time went on, this became illegal, yet I witnessed illegal workers and legal workers being abused in not just the tobacco fields but on bigger farms where illegals are routinely hired, as late as 2015. Today, I don’t think it happens much, but it might.
The Emerald triangle is a place where you can not only get abused, you can lose your life working the illegal grows.
Never saw abuse at Jekanowkis, but did see workers that couldn’t hang get walked off the property, paid and tresspasssed.
the Tabaco prime years are a bit before my time but I’m in the right area lol.
1 Like