todays photo

IanC

Well-known Member
My Dad had taken a load of cars down into the Carolina's and brought back some tobacco seedlings. Dad said there were some almost accidents as people rubber necking as they drove by tried to figure out what it was. Oak Grove hasn't been raised and widened yet so must be summer of 1960. There was still some of it hanging in a couple buildings when I was still little, but old enough to remember, It smelled wonderful. I've thought about trying to grow some more just for that smell. Some of you from tobacco growing areas may be able to identify it.
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The wife and I were just talking about something similar last night. She won a bunch of seeds in some drawing and they came yesterday. There was some peanut seed in there. My cousin grew some peanuts up here in Michigan when I was in my teens. He dried them in the oven. I think we're gonna have some growing this year.
 
From what my Dad said S.E. Michigan used to grow quite a bit of tobacco. I guess they still do in S.W. Ontario. There used to be a tobacco drying barn on the east side of Latson Road south of M-59. Long gone now, just a good crop of houses.
 
That would be a fun thing to do. I tried two years ago and failed at it. You should post on it as things progress. I would say the same for anyone growing tobacco or other unusual garden plants. Pushing zones in the garden is a lot of fun but the year always seems to come when the weather wins. I had bamboo in my garden for many years. Took it up to 16' high before a bad cold snap killed it back.
 
Hey Ian, since you mentioned Latson Rd. Did your family have any connection to the Walker or Eager families? They homesteaded just a few miles south/southeast of where you are.
 
We grew it on our farm and all the local neighbors did also in Southwestern Wisconsin back in the 60's,lot's of work,hoed many roes over the years,plus the stripping and chopping and suckering and picking off worms,spearing,etc.Now the Amish grow it around here,most of ours was for cigars.Never smoked in my life,sure don't miss the tobacco.
 
My dads aunt used to grow a small row of peanuts here in N.J.The soil in our area was clay and rocks.She always got a few buckets of mason sand from my dad,mixed it in the row ,and grew some peanuts.I kind of remember my grandma and her roasting them in the oven.
 
What is pictured looks like Broad leaf Tobacco mostly used for cigars and outer wrappers, I grew up in Conn. And worked Tobacco at age 13 to 15. the Tobacco Farmers would come to the schools and set up tables in the halls you needed to be 13 yrs. old To get working papers. Shade grown tobacco was grown under nets where the temp. could reach 120 deg The big time Shade Grown Tobacco farmers would bring in Jamaicans to work under the nets. They picked the leaves and put them in baskets that were pulled to the outside then picked up and loaded on wagons and brought to the barns. The white kids worked in the barns. The girls sewed the leaf?s onto lathes then the boys hung the full lathes on racks called tiers. The higher up in the barn the pay went up a few cents the highest tier was called the pearl tier the older boys got the higher tiers the pearl tier had bragging rights. Broad leaf Tobacco was grown out in the open and the entire plant was chopped off at the ground and the entire plant was attached to a lathe and hung in the barns the same way. The barns were built with every other board hinged at the top so they could be propped open for air circulation. Large propane heaters speeded up the drying process. Usually around October the tobacco was shipped off to the cigarette and cigar manufactures. I am going back to the early to mid-60?s so I may not be 100% accurate on my description so don?t beat me up over details. LOL
 
No relation, but dad knew the Walker Farm as that is where Kroger is now. The house just to the north of Kroger truck dock is the walker farm. When M-59 didn't go through there was a gas station right there and dad said the pumps got hit by somebody going through the end and burning it down a couple times. Where the elder apartments are now on the S.W. corner is where Mr. Walker pastured his sheep.
 
In the SE corner area of Pennsylvania "Lancaster cty." the Amish grow fields and fields of several types of tobacco. Some is very dark green, then a medium color, and there is a very brilliant green with stripe markings. The Kinzer steam tractor show is mid August and that just hapoens to be when they are starting to harvest it. You see the women folk in their dark blue dresses and bonnets with a couple of older kids chopping and putting it in rows. I love the smell of it. It also makes a very good bug repelent on many garden plants. Make a tea of it and rub it on the leaves. Least that is what the anti pesticides crowd says. Have grown peanuts just for giggles but if you realky want to try something neat jet hold of some Cotton seeds. Actually grew in NJ but were very small plants due to growing season. They have stunning beautiful big purple flowers.
 
We live in the heart of tobacco country in W. Ky. Can't tell the variety but it looks like a dark tobacco used in chewing tobacco. Our county is a major producer of tobacco both air cured and dark fired. It is still a highly labor intensified crop and most tobacco farmers around here have upwards of 30 acres with one neighbor growing over 100 acres. Labor comes mostly from H2A workers. We grow tobacco but we are small timers compared to most. Tobacco is our leading cash crop and by far the best profit per acre. Passing through in the fall one will see hundreds of tobacco barns with smoke bellowing out during curing season. Barns lost to fire is an every year thing. We have lost two over the years. If I learn how to post pictures I'll try to show the growing and curing process this year. Tobacco is a tropical plant that thrives on hot, humid weather. We have contracts with tobacco companies where we grow contracted lbs. per year. The average yield per acre is around 3500lbs. Hope this helps those of you not familiar with the crop. Bill
 
I bought a bag of chewing tobacco, $7 gasp!, to make some repellent for afids, I think it made the bugs happy.
 
Tobacco used to be grown in central MN. Stearns and Meeker counties. There was a tobacco plant in our town where the owner bought tobacco and shipped it out. It was the kind used for cigars. Still see drying sheds around here, with the vertical board walls, although often the spaces are covered up (keeps the snow off of the machinery stored inside!). Some farmers still had county tobacco allotments 40 years ago, although none was grown then, or since. During WWII, Meeker grew a lot of hemp for rope.
 

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