What meat did country folk eat in the 20's-30's in Georgia?

[Artfuldodger]

Dad said they mostly ate some type of smoked pork and chicken on Sunday. I guess they were happy to eat what they had. Plus I'm assuming most farmers and their boys would hunt and fish as well. But there would be times when they would be too busy on a farm to do much hunting and fishing.
Fresh pork at hog killin' time and fresh fish from time to time, plus whatever they got from a hunting trip. I'm not sure if trapping was a big thing for meat purposes.

 

[The Original Rooster]

My mother said almost the exact same thing about growing up in Wheeler county during the 30's and 40's. @Nicodemus was born earliest in our family so he could say more on this.

 

[NCHillbilly]

According to my mom and dad who were born in the early 30s, around here it was mostly cured pork, fresh chicken, bear meat, small game, and fish. Not a lot of beef eating back then, because they had no good way to preserve it. And deer were scarce as hens' teeth back then.

 

[Ruger#3]

E KY was the same. My Pap raised hogs and chickens. We had a dairy cow and bartered dairy items for things we needed. It had always been this way. We did eat game and fish, weren't many deer around by 50s and 60s when I was on the farm.

 

[Toliver]

My uncle, in his early 80s, said he would be given two .22 bullets and told to bring home 2 rabbits. So if he missed, he better figure out a way to make up for it. He got real good with a flip just for that reason. And of course they always had chickens. (Apparently hens weren't rare in Mississippi like they were in North Carolina)

 

[specialk]

My grand folks were the same...most everyone had hogs and chickens...

 

[Nicodemus]

Pork, home grown and home cured or smoked. Home grown chicken on occasion. Wild turkeys and wild ducks in the winter. Lot of squirrels.

Other than coffee, sugar, salt, rice, and flour, our folks were very nearly self sufficient.

 

[Hillbilly stalker]

I would imagine the gator herd got worked on also.

 

[Batjack]

"Daisey" (90 in May) said same as above except to add that her Dad taught all of the kids to run rabbit boxes. He'd cage them and sell to buy the stuff they couldn't grow or raise on the farm. They always caught a lot more than he could sell, so they were a staple around her house.

 

[HermanMerman]

Granddad grew up on a cotton farm in the 30’s in Sylvester with 11 siblings. They ate everything they could get their hands on, and they ate every edible ounce.

 

[redeli]

anybody ever wrung a chickens neck

 

[HIGH COUNTRY]

Swamp Gravy play in Miller county had a scene where the local sherriff was visiting a poor sharecropper family, and they asked him to stay for supper. they had tortoise gopher, tasted just like fried chicken...e

 

[Artfuldodger]

anybody ever wrung a chickens neck

I've seen plenty of older folks doing it as a kid. When I was a teen we hung some by their feet on the clothes line and chopped their heads off. The scalding smell is what I remember the most. I almost couldn't eat chicken that night, lol.

 

[Browning Slayer]

anybody ever wrung a chickens neck

I've also heard my momma threaten to wring mine on many occasions...

 

[Artfuldodger]

Swamp Gravy play in Miller county had a scene where the local sherriff was visiting a poor sharecropper family, and they asked him to stay for supper. they had tortoise gopher, tasted just like fried chicken...e

I heard they ate a lot of those gopher tortoises during the Depression.

 

[Jester896]

My grandparents always seemed to have a pig in a stall at the barn. Cured or smoked pork from that. They didn't have a chicken coupe...they had a chicken yard with coupes in it. In the chicken yard there was an 8 or 10 stall rabbit coupe along with the Scuppernong vines. There were a bunch of blueberry trees too. Trapped quail and shot squirrels a bunch...house was in a 30 ac pecan orchard. Grew peas, butterbeans, corn, okra, watermelon and potatoes.

 

[kmckinnie]

I grew up in the 60tys with my grandparents a lot. Mom & dad worked. I stayed with them. I would get up early to go shoot a rabbit in the garden area. That was at the age of 5. Then work in the garden. We picked and caned. By 6 I was allowed to go small game hunting by my self. I had a 410 then. Shot rabbits squirrels mostly. We scalded hogs in the winter. Smoked and salted. We fished a lot. I cleaned my rabbits and squirrels myself.
I remember my 1st rabbit. I was 4 and we drove to the hog pen to feed. I seen a rabbit run off. I was sitting in my daddy’s lap as he drove. It sat behind a little bush. He couldn’t see it. I asked to shoot it. He said if I shot and no rabbit was there. I couldn’t shoot no more. I shot and the rabbit fell over. I got to shoot from the truck as we rode around after that. Shot a many rabbits.
I had a pet turkey hen. Are a lot of her eggs. Found her nest and would get the eggs.
How I long for them simple days again. Watch all the old men gather around a new truck and lift the hood. Talked about how they where not as good as the older ones. This was in the late 60tys. They said can’t believe they cost around 2000.00. New !

 

[Batjack]

anybody ever wrung a chickens neck

Yeah, that was still the "young'n's work" at my MaMa's house till she passed in 2001 (103y.o.)

 

[Hillbilly stalker]

I grew up in the 60tys with my grandparents a lot. Mom & dad worked. I stayed with them. I would get up early to go shoot a rabbit in the garden area. That was at the age of 5. Then work in the garden. We picked and caned. By 6 I was allowed to go small game hunting by my self. I had a 410 then. Shot rabbits squirrels mostly. We scalded hogs in the winter. Smoked and salted. We fished a lot. I cleaned my rabbits and squirrels myself.
I remember my 1st rabbit. I was 4 and we drove to the hog pen to feed. I seen a rabbit run off. I was sitting in my daddy’s lap as he drove. It sat behind a little bush. He couldn’t see it. I asked to shoot it. He said if I shot and no rabbit was there. I couldn’t shoot no more. I shot and the rabbit fell over. I got to shoot from the truck as we rode around after that. Shot a many rabbits.
I had a pet turkey hen. Are a lot of her eggs. Found her nest and would get the eggs.
How I long for them simple days again. Watch all the old men gather around a new truck and lift the hood. Talked about how they where not as good as the older ones. This was in the late 60tys. They said can’t believe they cost around 2000.00. New !

That “shooting out the winder” really sticks with a fellow too dont it ?

 

[Toliver]

Yeah, that was still the "young'n's work" at my MaMa's house till she passed in 2001 (103y.o.)

I wrung a few necks but the last one wasn't to prepare him for the pot. He flogged my little girl. The pot was just a side effect for him.