In the News - June 2009
Homespun advice from a veteran county agent
Working up through the ranks
BENTONVILLE, Ark. - I suppose that summer jobs for kids follow similar
patterns, whether in town or country. Back home in cotton country, jobs that
resulted in income might begin with odd tasks like picking strawberries, moving
geese or fencing, but invariably ended with chopping cotton and weeding soybean
fields.
It was as essential then, as now, for kids to have opportunities to elevate
themselves, physically, mentally and economically. In our location, the next pay
scale up from being a hoe-hand was to be a tractor driver. After learning those
basic skills you could be promoted to the task of cultivating soybeans. If
really skilled, you could find yourself cultivating cotton, the money crop!
During this particular summer, I had just made the soybean cultivating rung
of the ladder and still under the watchful eye of Uncle Homer, the master
tractor driver in our neck of the woods. Only after he gave the nod to the boss
would you be assigned to cultivate a field on your own.
After a week of running tandem with Uncle Homer, I received the nod and
proudly steered my rig down the county road to the next field, hoping to pass
enough folks so the grapevine would send word of my promotion. Of such things
will youth dwell on during the early years of maturity and well beyond.
It was approaching noon when, noticing the new pickup ease along the field
road, I realized the boss was checking my work. Totally comfortable, I made the
turn at the end rows and drove on, knowing that completing Uncle Homer's course
was equivalent to passing the bar exam.
Apparently pleased, the boss timed his walk to stop me in mid-field and began
passing the time of day in idle conversation. In the middle of a sentence, he
removed a BC Powder envelope from his shirt pocket, emptied the contents in his
mouth and reached for my water jug. It occurred to me then, and soon to him,
that my water jug was empty!
Nothing is as bitter as a BC Powder, made more so when placed in a dry mouth
with no prospect of washing it down. Fortunately for me, he was too dry to say
what came to mind and all I heard was, "You little - - - !" as he quickly walked
back across the field to his pickup. Dad's advice when performing any job was,
"Always be irreplaceable!" Til' next week!
June 5, 2009
By: Robert Seay
Benton County Extension Agent Staff Chair
Media Contact: Elizabeth Fortune
Extension Communications Specialist
U of A Division of Agriculture
Cooperative Extension Service
(501) 671-2120
efortune@uaex.edu
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