This is why we hope the old guys will chime in
LOL! Well.. it wasn't just ME.. G'Parents kept all manner of stuff around the farm as went back to the days of THEIR G'parents. They had blacksmithing capability, timbering and sawyering, iron-bound wooden block & tackle, lasts and such to make their own shoes (left and right the same shape. Let sweaty FEET give them the differentiation!), milled their own grain, made their own wine, whiskey, vinegar, and soap, extracted sugar from crushing sorghum, shelled dried corn for the geese, made butter and cheese, "caned"chairs, made feather beds, rope and rope "bedsprings", dried, smoked, pickled, and canned all manner of edibles and some that were more medicinal than edible.
The old outbuildings were chock-a-block with CAST IRON (the cheap molded plastic of its day!) weirdness, much of it explained to a curious kid, if not also still in regular use .. or close enough to be demonstrated.
The hand-cranked apple-peeler was my favourite as the blades traced a curve as it was cranked. The peelings and the honey we "grew" made a nice desert I preferred over the cider-apples. Not the best for apple-eating, but made nice dried-apple pies with some berries and our own rendering of lard for shortnin'.
The"old ways" were simply more "locally" self-sufficient ways, and "barter" days at the weekend farmer's market .Those were by and FOR farmers, not Mex'can veggies off a trailer-truck. Whatever your place had produced lookin' good and in surplus went to market. You didn't come back with cash. Your taters had been traded and better half-runner beans than your crop had made that year came back to be put-by as pickled or canned. Fodder beans you dried, up under the eaves or attic.
Squash did better than expected one year. Dad took to engineering at it after the harvest, just of the back of boredom in his retirement.
Him, his aged Mum, and elderly sister on the old farm.
Waddyah DO, three souls only, with NINE .. lovely picture-perfect .....I say again NINE....
TONS ...of four kinds of squash? And sixty year since you last raised the sort of critters as could eat of 'em?
Dare you NOT 'low them to rot and "volunteer" for the NEXT year!
Fire up the Farmall and plow 'em DEEP! Brush-hog the buggers as they try again. Like something out of a sci-fi movie takin' over the remains of civilization!
Practical trading for next year's meat AND/OR entertainment and socializing was a livestock auction....
And how far BACK is "old"? anyway?
Depends a good deal on WHERE as much as WHEN.
There was not much difference, any persuasion, from the Amish or Mennonite way of life back before MOST folk had any of electricity, motor cars, or cash-money for store-bought goods from fewer stores, and smaller ones.
All were too far to go to but every now and then ... because you were on foot or behind a horse. "On foot" didn't necesarily mean "shod" for you, only for the horse as NEEDED that more.
G'G' Dad ran a "General Merchandise" store, was the local Justice of the Peace and Postmaster. Next nearest store wudda been over five mile of dirt road or up or down the adjacent B&O railway line. And the rail line for that area was still a NEW thing. We'd been in those mountains a hundred year, and longer yet back in Eastern Virginia before the railroad reached us, War between the States era.
Then again.."Old Guys"
now prolly
left those farms about 70 years ago, if not earlier, even if still kids.
Right around the time War Two kicked off and labor went scarce..so..
"Old memory", too.
And everyday gadgets? Other than your best rifle?
Most don't have a high "remarkability" about them.
"Life" and folks, their doings and don't-ings got the "memorable" attention.
Not "stuff"!
I think we got that priority right, actually. People. Evaluated AS people.
By their character and behaviour. Not by their accumulated goods.
Back then, anyway.
'Murricans surely do travel with a lot of s**t nowadays..
.... and generate even more of it to go to war over.... mostly with each other.
Go figure we call that "progress".
