I asked my maternal grandparents Ronnie Miles and Yvonne Miles about their experiences and what they thought about the changing times and how they reacted to major events in the past.
M=Yvonne Miles ("Mimi")
P=Ronnie Miles ("Papaw")
Do you know anything about the Great Depression time period?
M) “Mother talked about it. The food was rationed. You had to stand in bread lines, gas lines. How mad it was. People out of work. Couldn’t find work. It affected rich and poor. Some of the rich lost stuff too. You’ll find out Papaw is pretty opinionated.”
P) “You had people staying with their relatives. You had people who would go out and plow up potatoes in the field. People would dig through the dirt for roots of the potatoes to cook. People who …show more content…
M) “Visiting. Everybody got together for Sunday dinner. People got together for reunions. We kids loved it because there would be tables of food. We’d make homemade ice cream churned by hand. All the kids got out and played horseshoes and hide and seek when it got dark, jumped rope. It was family time. People just don’t have that anymore. My grandmothers and mothers made homemade butter, whipped cream. Daddy made his own corn mill. Grandma Jenny sewed and quilted and cross-stitched. She did all the stitching, embroidery, she made dollies.”
P) “In the winter time our grandparents would have hog killings and process the meat. Me and my brothers and dad and aunt. We would get out and build a fire and boil water. We would kill the hogs and put the hog in it and spin him around and pull him out and scrape the hair off. We’d cut him up. We’d cure them in salt. We’d grind up meat for sausage and put it in freezers. There were hams and shoulders and put them in saltboxes. We cut the fat off their bellies and made lard. You bought tin pots with a top on them and you put the lard and strain out the cracklings. You’d put the lard through cheesecloth. We might go spend the week with a cousin somewhere or they’d come to spend the week with us. You know, play ball. Stuff like that .We never had time to play football or baseball for the high school, you were plowing a field or mowing the yard or digging
M=Yvonne Miles ("Mimi")
P=Ronnie Miles ("Papaw")
Do you know anything about the Great Depression time period?
M) “Mother talked about it. The food was rationed. You had to stand in bread lines, gas lines. How mad it was. People out of work. Couldn’t find work. It affected rich and poor. Some of the rich lost stuff too. You’ll find out Papaw is pretty opinionated.”
P) “You had people staying with their relatives. You had people who would go out and plow up potatoes in the field. People would dig through the dirt for roots of the potatoes to cook. People who …show more content…
M) “Visiting. Everybody got together for Sunday dinner. People got together for reunions. We kids loved it because there would be tables of food. We’d make homemade ice cream churned by hand. All the kids got out and played horseshoes and hide and seek when it got dark, jumped rope. It was family time. People just don’t have that anymore. My grandmothers and mothers made homemade butter, whipped cream. Daddy made his own corn mill. Grandma Jenny sewed and quilted and cross-stitched. She did all the stitching, embroidery, she made dollies.”
P) “In the winter time our grandparents would have hog killings and process the meat. Me and my brothers and dad and aunt. We would get out and build a fire and boil water. We would kill the hogs and put the hog in it and spin him around and pull him out and scrape the hair off. We’d cut him up. We’d cure them in salt. We’d grind up meat for sausage and put it in freezers. There were hams and shoulders and put them in saltboxes. We cut the fat off their bellies and made lard. You bought tin pots with a top on them and you put the lard and strain out the cracklings. You’d put the lard through cheesecloth. We might go spend the week with a cousin somewhere or they’d come to spend the week with us. You know, play ball. Stuff like that .We never had time to play football or baseball for the high school, you were plowing a field or mowing the yard or digging