Johnson Family - grace grits and gardening

Nana’s little table

December 5, 2013 By Talya Tate Boerner

In October, in honor of Old Farmers Day, I wrote about Nana and Papa Creecy and how they set up housekeeping in 1936 buying the following goods: (Click HERE to read the original story.)

Somewhere buried within this original invoice included a side table. Although the little table wasn’t individually listed, it has been part of our family since day one of Nana and Papa’s life together.

Momma remembers when the table originally had a shelf around the bottom. She broke the shelf climbing and playing on it when she was a little girl. I remember playing underneath the table too when it sat in the entryway across from the front door of our house.

Lots of hair brushing took place in front of the mirror that hung above the little table. It’s where Momma wrangled our hair each Sunday morning, pulling and tugging it into a tight ponytail or some style appropriate for church.

Before bedtime we brushed our hair at the table—one hundred strokes to make it silky…

One summer Momma stripped the wood and antiqued it greenish-white (pictured below in this first day of school picture).

Me, Lesa (cousin), Staci (sister)

Fortunately at some point, she restored the table to its natural wood finish.

When John and I bought our 100-year-old house in Munger Place, Momma passed the table on to me. She said it fit our house better.

For years, we’ve wondered why the table wasn’t listed on the original invoice. Maybe it was lumped in with ‘living room suite’ of $10.00?talya

Grace Grits and Gardening
Farm. Food. Garden. Life.

Land Johnson, Louisiana State Fair-1953

October 17, 2013 By Talya Tate Boerner

throwback thursday #TBT

Paul Land Johnson
Birth: August 7, 1914 (Mississippi)
Death: June 15, 1978 (Louisiana)

This is a picture of my Great-Uncle Land Johnson taken at the Louisiana State Fair in 1953. Didn’t he look like a movie star?

There are two things I know about Johnson men (seven original Johnson brothers and many, many more now)…

1. They ALL (had) have smoldering good looks.

2. They (were) are all natural born story-tellers.

The most incredible story about Uncle Land involved his ‘argument’ with an alligator. Although the yarn has grown through the years as most great tales do, I can only relay the story as I’ve heard it from Uncle Bud (Land’s son), another handsome Johnson yarn spinner…

As Uncle Land and his friend Emil spent a peaceful afternoon trotline fishing on the Mississippi River, a curious alligator swam up to their aluminum boat. The unusually clear water allowed the men a perfect view of this monster.

What to do?

Instead of hightailing it to shore or trolling in water not infested with predators, they poked him between the eyes with an oar… The beast went berserk. He bumped and rocked and pitched the boat, nearly dumping them into the river.

Being prepared farmer-hunters, the men had firearms on board. Uncle Land shot the alligator with his 12 gauge, making him even more crazed. His second shot, fired with a 22 rifle, killed the thing.

For days, Uncle Land hauled the alligator around town in the bed of his truck proudly showing off his 8+ foot trophy. Eventually he skinned, cleaned and cooked it but didn’t much like the taste. His son, Bud, took the alligator head to school which no doubt impressed all the girls.

I left out the part alleging Uncle Land death-rolled the alligator underwater like Tarzan, King of the Apes. Whether or not that happened is up for discussion among the cousins. One thing’s for sure—we all agree Uncle Land didn’t let the big one get away.

Land Johnson with his alligator…

talya

Grace Grits and Gardening
Farm. Food. Garden. Life.

“Taking pictures is savoring life intensely, every hundredth of a second.”
― Marc Riboud

Musical Pairing:

Hank Williams, I’ll Never Get Out of This World Alive

(#1 hit song, January 1953)

Old Farmers Day

October 10, 2013 By Talya Tate Boerner

throwback thursday

Saturday is Old Farmers Day. I stumbled upon this quite by accident as I googled Angel Food Cake Day (which is actually today). Recognized each year on October 12, Old Farmers Day is the national day set aside to honor the American farmer. The day hearkens back to the 1800s when farmers celebrated the end of another grueling harvest season with a day of feasting and relaxation.

I’m a farmer’s daughter, a farmer’s grand-daughter, a farmer’s great-grand-daughter, a farmer’s niece, a farmer’s cousin… How had I never heard of Old Farmers Day? I can tell you how….There was never a moment the farmers in my family paused to breathe or reflect on their year, much less stopped to enjoy an entire feast. Daddy barely slowed down for Thanksgiving and often enjoyed his turkey and dressing on the turnrow leaning against a cotton picker.

Even so, I love the idea of Old Farmers Day. I imagine the first farm-to-table meal to be a lavish Pilgrim-like spread with corn and roast chicken and fresh baked bread with pear preserves (minus the Indians).

As long as people have poked seeds into the soil, harvest has been a time of celebration, a time to give thanks for their over-flowing bounty of food and fortune, a time to honor the fertile land.

Now a bit of history to honor my farming roots…

Reven and Frances Creecy

Nana and Papa Creecy were married October 8, 1936 (four days before Old Farmers Day), at Brother Smith’s house on Highway 140 in Athelstan (Arkansas). After honeymooning in Blytheville at the Hotel Noble, they made their first home in a little house on the corner of the Creecy home place between Crews Lateral and Coleman Lateral.Here’s a list of items from the original N. G. Cartwright & Sons invoice for the items they bought to start their life together.

Papa made his first crop that year with a $75.00 loan from Keiser Supply.

After paying off his debt, he bought eighty acres up the road in Dell and began clearing land while Nana managed the house, cooked and hunted with a 22 pistol strapped to her waist. Papa Creecy said she could shoot a cotton boll off the stalk…