Butchering Hogs

Information about this photo (from Tom Lacombe):

I believe this may be at the Deavers’ home here in Browntown. You will notice quite a crowd gathered, and they would all have their jobs to do. Most families would have a particular weekend set aside each year, usually sometime after Thanksgiving and before Christmas. I think the Deavers would butcher on the weekend closest to December 8th, and they would butcher about 8 hogs, which provided enough meat for all the family members.

A crew of women would be about tending to kettles and such. Children would generally be about, and had to be watched closely, as scalding kettles were only one source of danger among many. It is interesting that a barrel is in the foreground, as the barrel was most likely made at the C. T. Edmonds stave factory a few hundred yards up the creek. I’m guessing this is from about 1930s.

Local Memories of Butchering Hogs

Monica Poe Jones

“I remember as a little girl many of these butcherings. The men cut up the meat, women wrapped, crackling was in the kettle, the kids watched and played. My Grandma Poe was a Deavers. Her sisters (Bea, Lucy, Mary, Julia) would have a spread of food to feed an army. Those truly were the good old days”

Laura M Mangum

“This guy behind the Fence post on the right looks like my grandpa Bill Poe. He had pigs till I was 9 months old. My sister at 2 always had to go to the sty “to see the pigs.”