OK,  memory time.

"Running around like a chicken with its head cut off."   It's a fine phrase based on what was once a common rural experience. Seems like several of us still have personal experience of the phenomenon but as fewer people do, the saying is likely to go the way of "dialing" a phone, or "sounding like a broken record."

My Mom didn't like letting the executed chicken run and flap around very much, and also didn't like holding on to its feet waiting for the death throes to subside.  Her solution was to tie the chicken's feet up to a clothes line, grab the head and cut the head off with a good sharp butcher's knife.  All the flapping and spraying of blood got confined to the immediate vicinity. I'm sure there were lots of variations on techniques for the initial step of chicken processing.

Of course, once the chicken has been slaughtered, the fun of plucking all the feathers off begins.

And at least in our house, the heart, liver and gizzard were the prized delicacies that occasioned a lot of "negotiations" about who got the last one and who should get the next one.




Richard D. Davis
CSU Research Associate for
Fort Campbell Cultural Resources 
 
 


-----Original Message-----
From: HISTORICAL ARCHAEOLOGY [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Dan Allen
Sent: Thursday, August 30, 2007 11:20 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: poultry consumption

Fried chicken or chicken and dumplin's (and cornbread)were also a Sunday (after church) meal where I grew up in Middle TN.  One of my most horrific memories is of my grandmother (b. 1910s and d. 1980s) chasing my blue-dyed easter chick, now full grown with only blue tips left on a few feathers, around the yard, catching it, wringing its neck and chopping its head off before my very eyes.  She kept a special hatchet just for such purpose on the pumphouse for the well behind the house.  Unfortunately, all of the kids in my family, cousins, etc. had to go through this whole ordeal annually in alternating colors (red, green, blue, etc).  You could buy them from vendors on the side of the road or at grocery and some department stores.  While she would try to be subtle about it and do it when kids weren't watching, she was busted quite often and always dried the tears, making up for the killing by tabling the best chicken to ever pass a tonsil.  I've excavated a few axe and hatchet heads behind historic houses and thought of that murderous
hatchet::)  We chidren would not go near it.  Incidently, in the 1950s from her (and my other rural and older female relatives) point of view preparing store-butchered chicken was considered a luxury because it was considered expensive.  It was cheaper to raise them for meal-ready-eats and you had the benefit of fresh eggs.  We always kept some banty hens for little bitty eggs for the kids. Also interesting, her married surname was Hatchett:)

dan allen
cumberland research group, inc.
www.cumberlandresearch.org

----- Original Message -----
From: "David Parkhill" <[log in to unmask]>
To: <[log in to unmask]>
Sent: Thursday, August 30, 2007 10:16 AM
Subject: Re: poultry consumption


> Chicken was considered the" Sunday special meal" by many folks in the
> '30's. Those of us living on the farms in Texas always took fried
> chicken with us most of the time while working in the fields. Many
> times while working in the fields (ours and our neighbors) the wives
> and mothers would meet us in the field under a shade tree with fried
> chicken, biscuits, iced tea   et al for lunch.
> DTP
>
>
> At 08:25 AM 8/30/2007, you wrote:
> >Well, on the part of the planet I came from, we do talk to our
> >grandmothers, and they did not raise chickens, so clearly habits
> >differed - by region or cultural background, or setting.
> >Sorry, even though I come from a long-lived family, no
> >great-grandmothers available for interview.
> >If the families in my study were known to be buying eggs
> >(documentary info), do you think it likely they were ALSO raising
> >their own chickens?
> >The question of just how common chicken was in the diet c. 1900 is
> >exactly what I am trying to establish, preferably from documented,
> >quote-able sources.  When the people were promised "a chicken in
> >every pot" was that a common meal, or a specialty they dreamed of
> >tasting, maybe reserved for special occasions?
> >Meli Diamanti
> >
> >MORGAN A RIEDER wrote:
> >>Sometimes I think you all are on a different planet.  Historically,
> >>folks have always relied on eggs and fried or boiled chicken as a
> >>major part of their diet. Just ask your great-grandmother (if you
> >>were born before 1950) or consult Fanny Farmer.  And, yes, we did
> >>raise our chickens "on-site," as a number of families in our
> >>neighborhood still do.
> >>
> >>
> >>Morgan
> >>