Though tobacco farming is much less common in South Georgia than it once was, manual methods of weeding the rows called topping and suckering, are often still employed. It’s very labor intensive.
Traditional Tobacco Farming, Ben Hill County
Vanishing Georgia: Photographs by Brian Brown
Since 2008. A visual survey of Georgia's historic architecture and culture. 9,000 locations. 30,000 images.
I grew up in Berrien County and remember going with my grandmother to dust the seedling beds (usually for some kind of pest or fungus) with fruit jars over the sticks holding up the shade cloth so as not to poke holes through the sheer white cotton fabric, planting the seedlings, weeding the seedlings, topping the blossoms, suckering, cropping, stringing it on the sticks, racking the barn, taking it down from the racks and off the tobacco stick, then bailing it. It all started as soon as the ground was dry enough to plow without bogging and ended about with the auction…just about when school started again. Everyone made $5.00/day, from sunup when the farmer came by for us, until the last stick was racked in the barn that day. We were fed dinner on the farm we worked and it was good and plenty, then a midmorning break at the nearest country store for an RC and moonpie, if we had a quarter. Afternoon breaks depended on how long we worked after
the noon meal. In the mid-fifties mules and sledges were retired in favor of mechanized two-level harvesters (four croppers below, stringers above with one driver). Tobacco in planted four rows and skip two to facilitate harvesting, whether by machine or mule(s) and sledge. The front single wheel of the harvester ran in the two rows; by mule and sledge they took the two rows and the croppers afoot went down the center of the adjacent two rows. At the end of the row the mule turned (a good mule didn’t need a handler) and started back up the field in the next empty lane.
When the sledge was full the croppers sent the mule to the tobacco barn for the stringers and an empty sledge was hitched to the mule which was led to the correct row. It was efficient if it was a good mule. My grandfather’s mule, Kit, always chewed up her collar after tobacco season if she could possibly get her teeth on it. Every year Kit had a new collar! We had a lot of laughs and fun when we could which made the work go easier and we had money in our pockets on Saturday!
Brian,
Those are great pictures of tobacco rows. When I was a kid, tobacco used to be “king” in South Georgia. That is how we made our living in Jeff Davis County in the Snipesville/Denton community. Successful tobacco farming was a challenging business and relied heavily upon hand labor. Removing weeds was done by using a plow, hoe, and hands. “Topping” and “suckering” had nothing to do with “weeding”. They were different tasks.
When the tobacco plant bloomed with pretty white and pink blossoms, these flowers, or tops were broken off of the plant. This was necessary to make the plant grow more robust, and to spread its leaves while gaining body and structure. It should be thought of as a pruning process. That practice was called “Topping Tobacco.” After the plant was topped and began to grow stouter, it produced suckers at the junction of leaves and the stalk. To prevent the plant nutrients and energy from going into the suckers, these sprouts had to be removed. Pulling these suckers by hand was a terrible job. One got tobacco tar all over their hands, arm hairs, etc. This task was referred to as “Suckering Tobacco.”
Tobacco growing became more automated in the 1960s. A chemical was first introduced in the mid to late 1950’s called MH-30 that stunted the suckers without harming the leaves. That was a major step forward for the farmer. Who knows what the chemical did to smokers.
Sent from my LG Smartphone on Sprint
I saw your link on my friends facebook. It took me to many puctures of my past as a child living in Bulloch county. I remember having to pull weeds as a child, also as they called it top and sucker tobacco. I grew up in the area of some of your articles. But I was wondering if you could do an article on the old house on the fairgrounds. My father’s family grew up in that house as I was told. This would mean so much to me. Thank you Ann