By Nancy Miller Heald
When we were small, sister Patty, cousin Jimmy, and I delighted in Carl Knights bone-jarring wheelbarrow rides. Children who were unkind to or teased Carl did not get to ride. The ride usually began at the garden, across the lawn with its bumpy maple roots, and down the driveway to the barn. Occasionally we could cajole Carl into giving us each a ride all the way from the barn to the tarred road and back, just for the ride.
At night, while parents and grandparents visited, Carl was usually agreeable to a game of Old Maids, checkers, rummy, double solitaire, Uncle Wiggly, or Chinese checkers with us children. The cards and game boards were old and worn, but no one minded. On a winter’s evening, Carl often popped corn on the black iron cook stove using a long-handled wire mesh popping box. Constant shaking ensured the desired results.
There was a lot more to popping corn than pouring the right amount of corn in the popper and shaking. The fire had to be brought up to temperature first. “Biscuit wood” would do the trick – small dry sticks that burn hot and fast, such as choke cherry.
While the stove was heating up, Carl would bring in several ears of popcorn to be hulled. One did this by holding the ear stationary with one hand while twisting or wringing with the other. The rock hard kernels would stab and tear at your hands. We children were seldom very successful at separating many kernels from the cob. Carl, on the other hand, with his work-hardened, callused hands made short work of it. Before popping, our job was to check for and remove bits of cob or husk.
At last Carl would choose one of us to pour the corn into the basket and set the basket on the stovetop. Soon Carl was shaking with practiced vigor. He would allow us to try our skill – manual dexterity or not. During the final moment of frenzied detonation, Carl would resume control. He wasn’t having any young upstart ruin a batch of corn that he had tended and hoed in the scorching August sun!
Many evenings we would find Carl busily replenishing his cigarette supply. He would set up his paraphernalia on the oil cloth cabbage roses covering the kitchen table beside the tented condiments. Amid the cigarette papaers, tobacco cans and assorted containers, Carl would roll a dissimilar assortment of cigarettes by means of a metal contraption, about three by six inches, called a cigarette roller.
I regarded this as a fascinating toy. Place a paper lengthwise in the designated trough, mound with a pinch or three of tobacco, close the cover down, and presto! A finished cigarette popped out. At some point in this operation you were to wet one long edge of the paper with your tongue to the proper degree of wetness. The tobacco had to be placed evenly in the trough or your product would be lumpy or lopsided, bearing little resemblance to the store-bought variety. It took some skill to achieve the store bought look. Any child could do it.
When television came to the Drinkwaters, Carl seldom popped corn or rolled his own cigarettes when we came by. In order to visit, my mother would usually shut the TV off as soon as the show ended. It was a good thing that most shows were only half an hour back then. This impolite behavior really was necessary as no one could ignore the flickering black and white picture, and Gramp was hard of hearing and soft of voice. His stories were better than any TV drama ever written , short of “The Wizard of Oz.”
Gramp, Pa (or Puppa) would launch forth for Patty and me with: “When I was a little girl…” We would be standing on either side of his rocker on the rockers or hanging onto the arms of the chair and leaning in. Of course, we denied that he was ever a little girl, but he persisted and pressed on to adventures in the woods with the horses on ice snow or mud. He often encountered Swamp Wauggelers that were larger than a moose with feet so big they could walk on top of the water and mire. Other times he might see a Side Hill Guldger. They were quite common and had bamboo legs on one side and webfeet on the other. One set of legs was longer than the other so they could comfortably graze on the numerous hills in Maine. The different legs and feet were to deal with water and keep from sliding off a hill. Sometimes in mid-story a Filly-loo-loo bird might fly by, which only he ever saw.
Besides the woods stories there were some that dealt with gardening. One story was how to grow macaroni the easiest way. All you had to do was to plant it between the corn rows, and the corn borers would make the holes up the center and cut it off before it got too tall. Adults got versions of these tales woven into his more traditional hunting and working in the woods stories.
Card parties and family reunions were a common event. Mother would take us girls and her cleaning supplies, home perm curlers, or wallpapering equipment and head for Gramp and Gram’s. Patty and I would dust table and chair legs after washing the ever-present black sink, full of dishes. The iron rich hard water made few suds and no fun – ask cousins Ramona and Jean.
Carl would fill the stove and mop the floors after Mother swept them. Gramp could be found down cellar adding more posts so the house wouldn’t fall down full of family and friends. There was a post about every food or so under every carrying timber. Millie McCormick, Gram’s friend, would take on windows and door casings, having already changed all the beds. Gram would be tending multiple pots of baked beans, making filled “Surprise” cookies and directing all activities large and small.
As long as Great Gram Lena [Hart] Gray lived, family reunions were annual and very large for a Cape style house in winter. Her children Cora, Clyde, George, Justin, and Hazel produced about ten grandchildren who had twenty something great grands in her 90+ years, as well as the extended family members, friends and neighbors who never missed a reunion.
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