Atchafalaya Basin People: Chapter 36

DATE:                        January 4, 1996 

 INTERVIEWER:      Jim Delahoussaye

 LOCATIONS:           At Ida Daigle’s house at Oxford Loop, Oxford, St. Mary Parish, Louisiana

 COOPERATORS:   Ida Sauce Daigle

 JD:      Well Ida, that’s one of the things I wanted to talk to you about, was…in the old days that you can remember, when you were a girl, a young girl…which course wasn’t that long ago…

 Ida:     Naw…it uh…it pretty long.  [laughs]  You know I’m 77 years old yeah.

JD:      I want to talk to you about…when you first got started being interested in fishing.  How did that happen?  What do you remember about…

 Ida:     What I remember?  I been fishing since the age of eight years old.  I started in a pirogue.  In the woods.

 JD:      It was your daddy’s pirogue?

 Ida:     No, no.  that was my own pirogue.  My grandpa made my own.  Umhm, and uh, made my own paddle, and I bought my own lines…because he gave me the money.

 JD:      I was about to say how’d you get the money to start off?  Did he give you the money?

 Ida:     My grandpa did. 

 JD:      Your grandpa who?

 Ida:     Grandpa Claiborne.  His name…

 JD:      Mayon.

 Ida:     He…he gave me the start.  I started just at the edge of the woods, where they could see me. 

 JD:      Where were y’all living then?

 Ida:     We were living at Blue Point Canal [Blaise's Canal].  The one they call Blaise's Canal?  That’s where we was living.  And uh, we was living there alone, just the family.  And uh, we was bored, you see, all the time.

 JD:      Oh yeah?

 Ida:     Because we didn’t have nothing to do.   My daddy say “Well”, he say “I’m gone put y’all to work, then”.  Then, I say “What you gone put us to do?”.  He say, “You gone fish, you.  You a fisherman”.  My daddy made a good livin, fishin.  He was a good fisherman. 

 JD:      That was Blaise Sauce?

 Ida:     Umhm.  So then, uh, my granpa who was livin with us at the time, and my granma…

 JD:      Claiborne and Fanny?

 Ida:     Umhm.  Well, uh, he say “You gone put her fishing?”, he say “I’m gone build her a pirogue”.   He build a wide pirogue, high borders.

 JD:      High sides?

 Ida:     High sides.  And he built me a paddle.   And he say “Well, you need some line, now”.  So…So, he got me some lines.  He showed me how to fish em. 

 JD:      Your daddy did?

 Ida:     No, Claiborne.  My grandpa showed me how to fish.  And, when the water start comin up, he say “Well, you on you own now”.

 JD:      That was in the spring probly, huh?

 Ida:     Yeah, in the spring, when the water was comin.  So, OK.  I started at the edge of the woods.  Daddy say “Don’t go too far back, stay at the edge of the woods so we can see you”.  And I started there, and I seen, man, the further I’d go back the more fish I’d catch [laughs].  And then I took the whole woods, and I fished.  And I’d come back with that pirogue that full [gestures].   So, my daddy put my brothers to fish too, you see, Monug and Tootsay.  Neg was too young, him.   But then he say, “Y’all got a…y’all can make a livin on y’all own”, he say.  So, that’s what we did.   They started fishin too.  Monug was older than me [and] Tootsie was older than me.  And I’d catch more fish than they do.  Pappa say “Y’all not fishermen like Ida” [laughs]. 

 JD:      Ida [Eye-DAH] he called you, Eye-DAH?

 Ida:     Ida, he say, “Ida can do anything better than y’all” he say “Why? And y’all older than her”.

 JD:      Oh, and bigger too, probably.

 Ida:     Bigger, yeah.  My oldest brother was big and fat.  Big and fat.  Neg got a picture, I don’t have none, me.

 JD:      That was Preston? 

 Ida:     Preston, yeah.  We used to call him Monug.  And uh, so, I kept on fishing, and when the water went down, I said “Now, what we gonna do?”.   He say, my daddy say “I show y’all what to do”.

 JD:      So, he took over from Claiborne to show you?

 Ida:     Yeah, he took over from Claiborne to show me what else to do.  He say “We gone go pick moss”.

 JD:      Umhm, and you were just eight years old?

 Ida:     Yeah.  I climbed the trees.   I’d go get that moss up there.   I was light, I was like a squirrel.  In other words, Jim, I wasn’t meant to be a girl.  My daddy said it was a…it was meant to be a boy.  And I turned out to be a girl.  [laughs].  My daddy would give me...he say, he built a scaffold on a…on a barge, a big barge.  As big as this house here.  And you know for [?], me and my two brothers we had that barge full, stacked with mud…with moss.  And, then he’d come get us.  We’d push the barge from tree to tree, and just before dawn [dusk?] he’d come and get us. 

 JD:      You’d pushpole, y’all would pushpole? 

 Ida:     Yah, we had poles on the barge, you know? to push the barge.  And then, we, we quit picking moss when it was time to fish again. 

 JD:      And when…you went from…you fished in the wintertime, well, when the water came up, in the woods.

 Ida:     Yah. When the water came, and then pick moss.

 JD:      And then you picked moss…what time of year, if you started fishing when the water came up in the spring, was it in the summer you picked moss? 

 Ida:     Yeah, after the water would go down. Because my daddy say it was too hot for us, you know.  [this is confusing, it’s hottest when the water is low]  After it started coolin off then…because he say it’s too hot to pick moss, he say, y’all gone smother up there.  So, after, we pick moss, and I picked moss until I got married.  My daddy would get sheds full and sell that. 

 JD:      But you would fish too? 

 Ida:     Well…yeah…would fish in between.  In the evening when he come get us early we’d go run our lines in the lake.  But my daddy didn’t like for me to go in the lake too much.  He said they had too many people that would go and come.  I was a young girl you see?  In them days, they was particular.  So, ok, when, I picked moss for my daddy and them until just before I got married, and fished.  Then when I got married I got…Jesse didn’t want me to fish “You don’t have to do dat” [he said].  It was killin me Jim!  I say “I want a skiff and push oars”.   And I say “I’m gone fish too”.  I say “You can say whatever you want, you not satisfied, pack you clothes and go”.  But I say “I’m gone fish”.  Ok, and I started fishing.  I got pregnant for Russell [her oldest son], I fished until almost the time he was born.  And then after he was born I used to have one of them big [number] 3 washtubs ?  I’d put a blanket filled in there, I’d put him down in there and I’d take off.

 JD:      Well, no wonder Russell turned out to be a fisherman!

 Ida:     His bottle, I’d bring his bottle, his milk, and all, and I’d leave him sleep in that tub, and all. 

 JD:      Where did you get the push…the push skiff, who made that for you?

 Ida:     That was my grandpa. 

 JD:      Your grandpa made that for you?  He was good at building boats?

 Ida:     He had…oh, yeah, any kind of boat…any kind of campboat.  Anything.  He was a good carpenter.

 JD:      Did he fish Ida?  Claiborne?

 Ida:     Oh yeah.  He used to fish for a living.   Yeah.  And uh, I’d make more money than Jesse did.  He say “I guess I’m gone have to leave you fish”.  I say “You might as well”.  I say “You might as well go” [if you don’t?].  And that’s why when we moved back here I was so…I was so upset.

 JD:      When you moved back here? Uh, over the land…over the levee?  When y’all moved over the levee? 

 Ida:     Yeah.  I was all…I was all messed up, you see, because I couldn’t fish. 

 JD:      You couldn’t…you didn’t have a truck, or something to pick the boat…?

 Ida:     I didn’t know how to drive.  If I’d a knew how to drive I’d a bought me a truck and a boat trailer.  But I didn’t know how to drive.  I fished all my life.  Lena Mae?...Me and Lena Mae?  Used to get both in the pirogue, before I got married, she was little.

 JD:      They lived close to y’all?

 Ida:     I used to bring her with me.   Lena Mae…me and Lena Mae…Lena Mae worked for a living, well, from the time she was old enough until she got married.  And she’s still working. 

 JD:      The old, uh…when you first started fishin, you said that you worked…you, you fished in the woods.  That was…that was uh, bushlines? 

 Ida:     Umhm.  In fact, uh…

 JD:      Tell me how you would fix em.

 Ida:     Well, [for tightlines] we’d tie our lines tight, tight.  And you hang your hooks.  From tree to tree. 

 JD:      About how far apart?

 Ida:     Three feet.  Oh, in the woods, about that far.

 JD:      So, three feet, three, four feet apart in the woods. 

 Ida:     Yah.  And you’d take the…the, the, the bushlines, whatever you find a straight limb…big enough limb ?...you tie them bushline and leave it drop.  You’d bait it and keep on… trees to trees.

 JD:      And how…how uh…?

 Ida:     And I caught some big fish in there!   Ummm, the goujons!  And I was in a pirogue, but I had a hatchet.  I’d thump em on the head [laughs] .I..’d make em come up [laughs]…I’d thump em on the head, and when they was stunded, then I’d pull em in.

 JD:      You didn’t use a landing net for the big fish?

 Ida:     No, I couldn’t use it.  [and] My daddy didn’t want me to use no gaff because he say “It’s still alive and it’s gone pull you out”.  And I didn’t know how to swim. 

 JD:      You didn’t know how to swim?

 Ida:     Uhuh.  I didn’t know how to swim.  But, I made…I made my livin. 

 JD:      So, what you had to…what you had…what you had to fish with was the fuel [??], and…

 Ida:     Yah, uh…[when] the water was clear, we’d fish with lil live perches.   And if the water was drugy [muddy], we’d fish with shrimp.

 JD:      Umhm, how did you catch the perch?

 Ida:     Fishin.

 JD:      Fishin with a hook?

 Ida:     Umhm.  And Russell was a lil bitty thing, and he used to have his lil line and every now and then he’d catch one.  I’d bring him with me, he’d follow me all over.  He was…he was something else when he was little.  One day he…we had run out of bait and he didn’t want to go home .  He was I guess…about like that…

 JD:      About two feet tall.

 Ida:     Yah.  “Momma they still bitin!”, yeah, but I say “We ain’t got no bait”.  He put a piece of water lily on his hook, and throwed overboard, and catch a perch!.  So, that’s the way I got started, Jim.  And I raised my kids.  Jesse workted, now, don’t get me wrong.   He workted, as long as he could.  But he was only 36 years old when he had the first stroke.

 JD:      Is that right?!  Thirty six was all he was? 

 Ida:     Thirty six years old, and I couldn’t get no help. 

 JD:      When he had the first stroke, what did it do to him?

 Ida:     Oh, he couldn’t walk.  Couldn’t walk, couldn’t talk. 

 JD:      Couldn’t talk either?  Could he use his hands and his arms?

 Ida:     No, not his hands, one hand, his right.  This’n here was like this [gestures a crippled hand].  Couldn’t hold nothin.

 JD:      Thirty six!

 Ida:     That’s all Jesse was, and I had four kids.  Lil bitty ones.

 JD:      And how old were they?  How old were they when Jesse had his stroke.  How old were the kids?

 Ida:     My kids, the oldest one, it was Russell, was 14.  Russell was 14 and all the rest of em was lil bitty things.  That’s why…Russell knows the situation him, you know, he was old enough to remember the situation. But the others don’t.  Now, after they grew older they seen how much I had to work, because EJ was gone take the footballs, you know, game, and it costed around $50 a month to play football.  To be…to be a football player, you know?

 JD:      This was at the school in Franklin?

 Ida:     Yeah.  And he was in…he was living with Russell.  And every week I’d send him…every month I’d send him $50 so he could pay, you know,…

 JD:      He was living with Russell in town, or something?

 Ida:     He was…yah…because we didn’t have no car, and he was with Russell and them.  Cause they lived in town.

 JD:      And he could go to school that way?

 Ida:     And he’d go to school, and then go play ball in the evening.  He stayed out there, and then uh, his daddy got mean.  That’s when Jesse started getting mean.  So, he quit football.  Then he come and fished.  He didn’t have but, uh, 11 weeks to finish school, he’d a graduated, you see.  And it hurted me Jim, because I had worked to send him that far!  And Jesse started…and he [EJ], he quit.  EJ quit.  I say “Why you didn’t leave that kid finish school!?”  But he quit completely. 

 JD:      He got fed up?  He got just…tired?

 Ida:     He got fed up with his daddy telling him “You big enough now to be on your own, you big enough now to do this”, but a child go to school ain’t got time to do that.  And uh, I had Leroy, I had Leroy in school, I had EJ, and I had,, Wayne.  All three of em in school.  And then we had to pay for the lunches, you see.

 JD:      You had to pay for lunches?

 Ida:     Yah.  We had to pay for lunches.  That was each a 35 cents, I had to give em each, every morning.  To pay for the lunches.  And I couldn’t get no help, no kind of way, I tried my best.  Howard Thibodeaux tried.

 JD:      Help in what way?

 Ida:     In a…a…welfare, or food stamp, or anything would have been a help, you see?  The only people that helped me…it was the Lion Club…one Christmas, for the clothes.  You know, they gave me clothes for my kids.  But that’s all, Jim.  That’s all I ever got. 

 JD:      Did Leroy and Wand Wayne finish school? 

 Ida:     Leroy finished school…they all finished school, but finish after they grow up, so they could…Wayne finish school in Lafayette, him, and EJ finish school right here at the courthouse. EJ had straight A’s, Jim.  I mean straight A’s in everything!  He had as high as 26 and 30 A’s on one report...card.  And I…I fussed at Gayle, she threw em away.  I say “I wanted that, so show”.  Leroy had A’s too, I mean, you know, Wayne had A’s, but not that many, him.  But believe me, that …if Jesse wouldn’t a…wouldn’t a been fussin, at EJ, I could a sent him…you know, where he wouldn’t have to work today.  But Jesse started fussin.  It’s not me…

 JD:      You think he got mean because of his stroke? 

 Ida:     I don’t think so, not too many of em that I heard [of].  Because it wasn’t a lot of woman that was working, you see?  Woman didn’t work in those days, they always, you know, take care of the kids.  The man would work.  But me, I had to work.  You take me, I…I was born, I guess, to work.  And I couldn’t [?], I did my housework, I took care of my kids, but I…I…I worked, I worked to make money. Because me, I wanted to make my own money, I didn’t want to go to Jesse and hang my hand [to him].  Me, I didn’t think that was right.  He was working for the money.  He’d buy the groceries when he’d make money and I didn’t need to be…[talking to the dog].  And uh, so, I was a working person.  I still feel like that too.  I want something to be done, I do it myself. The only thing, the kids don’t want me to climb no more, so…

 JD:      To climb?

 Ida:     Yah, [laughs] they scared that bones…if I fall and break a bone, old like I am, I’m gone stay crippled.   I am crippled in this arm.  So, that’s why.

 JD:      Could I…do you mind telling me what your birthday is?

 Ida:     My birthday is December the first, 1918.

 JD:      OK, so you’re uh…you’re older than Neg.

 Ida:     Oh yeah, I’m 5 years older than Neg.

 JD:      But you’re younger than Agnes. 

 Ida:     I’m younger than Agnes.

 JD:      Agnes is six older than you.

 Ida:     Yeah, I know.

 JD:      …I’m just…I’m just keeping track of what I have on this sheet.  I got everybody…I got everybody on this sheet that I can.  As I talk to em I get their birthdays and everything.

 Ida:     Umhm.  When… I’m born December the 1^st…and, uh, I’m born in 1918. 

 [question from young girl at the table about why I’m doing these interviews]

 JD:      You know, we found your…we find your grandfather Claiborne’s grave.

 Ida:     That’s what EJ told me. 

 JD:      We found his grave.  That was fun.  That was good, yeah.  It was exciting.  [laughs]

 Ida:     Yeah, it is exciting because that’s a long time ago. 

 JD:      And Fanny, your grandmother…

 Ida:     That was my grandmother.

 JD:      Fanny.  She’s buried right next to him.  Same place.  And your grandmother and grandfather on the other side, we found them both in Pierre Part.

 Ida:     Yeah, in Pierre Part, yeah.  That’s where they buried. 

 JD:      We found both of them in Pierre Part. 

 Ida:     They got a lot of their relatives there…that’s there too.  

 JD:      Your daddy died early, didn’t he? 

 Ida:     My daddy…they tell me…Agnes got the papers, Jim.  If Agnes would show me them papers…they tell me he was 44 years old when he died.  But my daddy…I was real young when my daddy died.  Neg was real young.  Neg, I believe was 5 years old when daddy died.  And, Agnes has got the papers.  Agnes will show you and you could mark it down.  And if we’d need it, then we’d know, you know?  Agnes has got the paper.  She got the paper on Preston Sauce too. 

 JD:      Preston also, Monug? 

 Ida:     Yah.  And… I don’t know if she got the papers on Tootsie.  I don’t believe, his wife must have that – that’s Robert. 

 JD:      Gertrude?

 Ida:     Gertrude.  His wife, must have that.

 JD:      Jesse.  Jesse was Myon’s half brother?

 Ida:     Yah, Jesse was a Daigle, and Myon was a Bailey.

 JD:      So, Jesse’s daddy was Homer Daigle.

 Ida:     Yeah. 

 JD:      I’m beginning to tie all these people together, you know?  Back in the old days, when you got started, just…if you can remember what it was like when you were a lil girl.  When you were…

 Ida:     Oh, I can. 

 JD:      You know, nobody knows what it was like to live on those campboats.  And everybody had different…different memories about what they found, and how it was…

 Ida:     In the campboat was fine, it was a nice livin in a campboat because wherever, you see, you…let’s say you living in Big Pigeon.  The fish would quit bitin and they was bitin in the Catfish [bayou].  Well then, they’d untie the camp and they’d go over there where they could fish, you know, right close.   Just like us, we was livin in Lil Pigeon.  And the fish wasn’t doing anything.  So, my daddy moved from Lil Pigeon to Big Pigeon.  And he wasn’t satisfied; momma didn’t like to live there.  No.  He say “Well” he say “We gone go ride and see”.

 JD:      Why didn’t your mother like to live there, you think?

 Ida:     I don’t know.  I really don’t know why.  She didn’t liked Big Pigeon for some reason.  I believe it’s because her sister was livin there and her husband…her husband was mean to her. 

 JD:      You talking about Rosalie, was…

 Ida:     Rosalie, that was my momma.

 JD:      And she had a sister Lydia. 

 Ida:     Yeah…no, uhuh.  Elaine.  That was my momma’s sister, that was my godmother. 

 JD:      You have any idea who she was married to?

 Ida:     Yeah, she was married to Artie [Henry?] Domingue. 

 JD:      OK, so you see that’s…that’s four of them.  I only had three…I only had three people that were…that were brothers and sisters to your mother, but there was four, at least.  There was more than that?

 Ida:     There was some more.  They had…they had Olivia.  She died when we was young.  Olivia.  Now, they had Lydia.  And they had…they used to call her Dod, leaving her name [?]…put Dod anyway.  That was another one of Momma’s sisters.  And Emma.   Emma was another one of Momma’s sisters.  And she was married to a Duval.  And she was married to Solivan Duval.  But Dod, I don’t remember her husband’s name. 

 JD:      Well…that’s seven so far, we got.  Do you remember her brothers?  Alvin and Ivy.

 Ida:     Yeah, Alvin Mayon, and Ivy, they used to call him Boy Mayon

 JD:      Ivy? 

 Ida:     Yeah, Ivy, that’s two brothers.  They had two brothers.

 JD:      Which one they called Boy? 

 Ida:     Uh, the oldest one.  Alvin, that’s Alvin.  [this is kind of confused]. So, they had two brothers.  And…and…and she has sisters, you see.

 JD:      Five…five sisters. 

 Ida:     Yeah, five sisters. 

 JD:      Lydia, Elaine, Olivia, Dod and Emma.

 Ida:     Yeah. 

 JD:      So, which one lived on…on Big Pigeon…on Lil Pigeon?  Oh, you said that was Elaine.

 Ida:     Elaine.

 JD:      She’s the one.  And it was Henry Domingue that was mean?

 Ida:     And Henry Domingue…he was mean.  And momma was tied right next to him.  And make em get up at two or three o’clock in the morning.  He had a crib, you know, floatin on the water.  And he’d beat her ass right in front of the kids, there, until she couldn’t move no more.  And momma didn’t like to see that.  Because she didn’t want to see her sister mistreated…I don’t blame her.   And so my daddy, we went ride.  I remember the big old skiff.  Had us all in there…

 JD:      Old Lockwood?

 Ida:     Old, old uh…six horse Lockwood.  And we went in that them canals and when we got to the end of this Blue Point Canal, you know? They had a pocket, like this, and they had a big hill on that side…

 JD:      A big hill?

 Ida:     Yeah.  And, when we got…we could see the lake, you see, but we was far from the lake but we could see it.    He said “This is the place, right here!”  He turned right back.  He went and  untied the campboat and brought it on Momma’s Hill.  That’s why we called it Momma’s Hill. 

 JD:      Momma’s Hill, yelled called it?  Rosalie?  Now, is that the canal that became called Blaise's Canal? 

 Ida:     Yah.  That’s the canal.  Now I went since then, and it don’t look like the same place.  Uhuh, there ain’t no more levee, and they had a high levee there Jim.  Where momma had the campboat tied, they had a great big old hill.  My daddy planted a fig tree right on top of the hill.  And that fig tree got so big on that hill!  Figs, the figs was that big around [two inches].  And then he started patching [planting] fruit trees.  Oh, he planted all kind of trees.  But it was a levee, it wasn’t nothing like they got now. 

 JD:      That hill is gone?

 Ida:     Oh yeah. 

 JD:      You can’t find the hill at all?

 Ida:     I can spot the place.  But the hill, no.

 JD:      How about that pocket where y’all tied the campboat? 

 Ida:     That pocket, you can see the pocket.  You know, it’s still there.  Now, I used to live, after I got married, Momma used to live…[gestures] this here was the pocket, Momma used to live on this corner and I had a house on the other corner.  And Agnes…Momma used to live like this, her, and they they’d have big old crib, you know, and Agnes was tied on the other end of the crib.  And that’s the way we lived for years. 

 [Yapping-dog problem]

 JD:      When your daddy found that spot on the canal, was anybody else with him in there?

 Ida:     No indeed.  Nobody before we got married and then, you know, Agnes was married, her, already.  But they was off trapping, and then she moved [into the canal] after we was in there. 

 JD:      Let me ask you this, you say Agnes was off trapping, she and Myon.  Now, where were they trapping?

 Ida:     On the…somewhere around Belle Isle, I believe, or somewhere. 

 JD:      Oh, so they went to the coast, then?

 Ida:     Yeah. 

 JD:      They went to the marsh, to trap.

 Ida:     Yeah.  Belle Isle, that’s where they were. 

 JD:      So, Myon trapped for a living sometimes?

 Ida:     Myon trapped every winter.

 JD:      Did they take the campboat…their campboat with em?

 Ida:     Yeah.  They was livin in a lil campboat not big like my kitchen here. 

 JD:      A small one, huh?

 Ida:     A small one.  It was only 18 foot long.  But it was 8 foot wide.  And, he would trap.

 JD:      Lena Mae…it looks like…she was uh…she was 11 years younger than you. 

 Ida:     Lena Mae…yeah…Lena Mae’…in other words, we worked a lots together after…after she got old enough

 JD:      You did?

 Ida:     I did.  And we stayed three months in Morgan City over there.  Before Milton was born.

 JD:      Three months? Yeah.  To get back to…to get back to what it was like when you were a little girl in the campboat.  Just start…if you could tell me…let’s say you would get up in the morning at, what time did y’all get up in the morning?

 Ida:     Oh, we get up early!  My daddy used to get up early, and I was the first one behind him.  Just before daylight, I guess. 

 JD:      And he would go off and fish, or whatever…

 Ida:     Yeah.  He would go off and fish, and we’d go and…and haul…me and Monug and Tootsie.  We’d go haul some pieces of cypress to make kindlings.

 JD:      To make kindling for the fire?

 Ida:     I got the mark [scar] just back of my ear, here.  My momma cut me with an ax…

 JD:      She cut you with an ax?

 Ida:     I was…went haul pieces of kindling, and, when I got back I guess I got too close, you know, when she swing the ax [the backswing]…

 JD:      Behind her, when she swung the ax behind her?

 Ida:     Yeah, I was behind her.

 JD:      Ah, she couldn’t see you.

 Ida:     When she did that [swung the ax back], well, she didn’t do [it] on purpose.   When she did that to chop the kindlin [she hit her in the head].  [and] I got a [another] mark over here where Agnes hit me with a iron skillet.

 JD:      A iron skillet.  Y’all were mad at each other?

 Ida:     She’d get mad.  She wanted me to do…like she’d do, you see?  And, ag I was young, I didn’t know how to do it.  …[?] to learn.  And she hit…she knock me out.   Knock me out, because, we was washing dishes.  I was washin em and Momma…for pots…you could see yourself in it, and that’s the way we had to do it.  And I was rubbin the pot, I mean I didn’t have the strength.  My poor lil hands, lil bitty hands, and…I couldn’t get it off, [from the pot], you see, burnt on the bottom of the pot?   And uh, I washed what I could and then I put it…after I rinsch it, and uh, she looked in the pot and she threw it back in the [dish] pan and then she caught the skillet and hit me on the head because the pot wasn’t clean.  You don’t know nothing [about these things].  I know…it makes her mad when I start tellin her

 JD:      But when y’all would get up, y’all would get up…y’all would eat breakfast, I guess.

 Ida:     Yeah, Momma would bake biscuits and we’d eat breakfast. 

 JD:      Is that what she had for breakfast a lot?

 Ida:     Yeah.  Chocolate milk with biscuits. 

 JD:      Chocolate milk.  Now, where did y’all get the chocolate? 

 Ida:     Uh…well…my momma used to make her own chocolate. 

 JD:      She did?  How?

 Ida:     Uh..uh, she had the seed, I don’t know where she got it.  And she used to grind it up.

 JD:      She’d grind it up…she’d grind the seeds and make chocolate?  And…mix that with milk or water or… 

Ida:     Yeah, with milk, water and milk.  But she’d use the sweet milk.

 JD:      Like Pet Milk, in a can?

 Ida:     No, not the Pet Milk, they didn’t have any Pet Milk.  The sweet milk, it’s a lil can about that high, about this high.

 JD:      Oh, condensed milk?

 Ida:     Condensed milk?  The Magnolia condensed milk.  That’s what I raised Russell on.

 JD:      So y’all would have chocolate that she would grind herself, and biscuits?  What other things did y’all eat for breakfast? 

 Ida:     And, well, almost every morning she make those fried biscuits, sometime you know?  But we always did have a good dinner [lunch].  My daddy was a hunter.  And my momma used to…sometime he’d come back with a boat full of ducks.  And, he’d uh, she’d clean all that, Jim.  Pretty and clean, you wouldn’t believe. 

 JD:      She’d pull the feathers, or she’d skin em?

 Ida:     No, no, she didn’t skin em!  She pull all the feathers.  Clean that… You know how you buy…bought your chicken how pretty it is?  Well, that’s the way she cleaned that.  She’d put that in a big pot with a lot of grease, throw em in there. 

 JD:      She’d cook em first?

 Ida:     Fry em.  She had cans about that high.

 JD:      About two feet tall…

 Ida:     About that big around.

 JD:      Big, big around, about a foot and a half.

 Ida:     And she’d put that all that in there and then she poured her hot grease in there.

 JD:      So, she’d cook em first, and put em down in that big can, and poured hot grease on top of em…

 Ida:     And poured hot grease on top of it, and she’d put that in the hull of the camp, where it would be cool.

 JD:      In the hull of the camp, down below the house?

 Ida:     Ice, we didn’t have no ice.  And she used to do that with rabbit.  She’d take rabbit, she’d debone em all.  She’d ground that meat.  Yah, ground that meat and make patties…big patties.  She’d fry good her patties and put em in that can, and then take a lot of grease and pour on em. 

 JD:      Where did y’all get the grease? 

 Ida:     Uh, hog grease. 

 JD:      Did they buy it?

 Ida:     No, my daddy used to raise hogs.  He used to melt that grease. 

 JD:      OK, so he used to melt the grease when y’all made a boucherie or what you call it?

 Ida:     Yeah, melt the grease and put in there.  She used to make boudins, she used to make sausage and all, and that’s the way she’d keep it, in that can.  [And then also] They had the big crocks [for salting] But then she used to salty her meat, and things in there.

 JD:      She didn’t salt the rabbit and stuff?  Just cooked that…

 Ida:     No, no, she salted turtle, and, and her meat.  Her…her hog meat.  Salted it and put it in there.

 JD:      Why do you think she salted the turtle and the hog meat and she didn’t salt the rabbits and the ducks and stuff?

 Ida:     Yeah, but my daddy used to smoke the rabbits, and he soaked em in grease, like I tell you.  

JD:      Oh, he smoked al that.

 Ida:     And, when…we always did have something to eat.  And cabbage?  He’d plant cabbage.  Well, he’d make that sauerkraut, and I used to love that stuff. 

 JD:      Make sauerkraut?

 Ida:     Oh yeah.  He’d make that but the big old crock, plumb full.  And we had something good to eat, all the time 

 JD:      Y’all would have something like one of those ducks, or some of those ducks…

 Ida:     Yah, momma used to go in her can when…now, if we could get it fresh, we’d get it fresh, but when we couldn’t get it fresh, she’d go in the can and get it.  And we’d cook it, you know, with onions and all?

 JD:      Recook it…recook it?

 Ida:     Yeah. 

 JD:      Was it…was it as good out of the can as it was fresh?

 Ida:     It is.  If…good down, you know [cover with grease]…make sure they don’t spoil.  But I don’t remember momma ever lost one of em.  Not a rabbit, no, nothing.  In other words, she’d put rabbit in there, she’d put ducks, poule d’eaus,   She’d put the uh, those white cranes? [ibises?].  My daddy used to kill that, too.  And bring that, and momma used to have cans full.  Now, she’d make spaghettis with that.  You talk about a good spaghetti! 

 JD:      Now, the white cranes you talking about, is that those, the bec crosse, the ones with the bill [curved down]?

 Ida:     No no, no no, the ones that stayed in the fields.   In them times they used to rob the nests.   And my daddy would come back sometime with a pirogue plumb full.  And the boys…the boys and momma, I was too little, me, I remember it, but I was too little to clean em, you see.  But after I got big enough, I took my job too. 

 JD:      That was the young ones, the young ones out of the nest, that couldn’t fly yet. Did y’all… how about grosbecs?

 Ida:     Grosbecs too.  Momma used to put that in the can too, when my daddy’d get…I used to love that grosbec season!  My daddy used to sat on the hill I’m talking about?  OK, used to sat on that hill, and he’d call “Now watch, now!” and he’d whistle, just like a grosbec with his finger in his mouth.  And he’d…they’d come…

 JD:      Circle.

 Ida:     And then, “Watch him, watch him now, he’s comin close”.  He shoot em, and boy I’d run, pick up that duck [grosbec] and I’d go find him…hurry up, I wanted to clean im, clean em as it go. 

JD:      Oh?  You’d clean em as it go? 

Ida:     Umhm.  After I got big enough.  And I’d bring it to momma.  Sometime, big old dish pan full.

JD:      Big old dishpan full, of grosbecs!

Ida:     Grosbecs.

JD:      Did y’all put those down in the can too?

Ida:     Momma’d put them down in the can too, if she…well, she’d cook some, you see, for the meal, and she’d put the rest of em down. 

JD:      And cabbage, y’all had a lot of cabbage?

Ida:     We had a lot of cabbage, we had a lot of turnips.  That’s something, turnips, you couldn’t keep.  Now, she used to pick corn.  She used to jar the corn, like the figs, the figs, the peaches and all.  She used to keep all that because she…she knew how to jar it.

Continued on Chapter 37