Latah County Oral History Collection

Sam Schrager: I'm a huge Platts came to the police area with her parents from Missouri in 1900 and cooked for a number of years in the harvest fields. Here she describes cutting shocking and thrashing grain and the art involved and also cooking for the Harvest crew.

Ima Hodge Platz: Was done in the crew and everything they. We had 32 men to cook for three meals a day.

Sam Schrager: When you were talking about how from the beginning, when the grain is first is first cut, know and you describe it to me again.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, when it's first cut is cut with the with the binder. You know what a binder.

Sam Schrager: I've seen pictures of them.

Ima Hodge Platz: you never did see or not. Well, they have to. They have to cut. Sometimes they had grain and then when they do that, that's a different set up to when they hit it.

Sam Schrager: But with the binder they have as.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well as the binder while they go around the field. And then they cut the grain, cut it off this to signal it, cut it, and then your body and your bones are made. So they'll be the same size, you see. And then the binder takes those notes out in to go around and go up. They're pulled up, elevated up, and they keep that'll go around.

Ima Hodge Platz: And you're sick. Of course, cross your grain. But then that takes it up. And then when you can shed your butt so your bones will be the certain size, you know that you want their own.

Sam Schrager: Only foot wide.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, they're the height of the grain is high. Your grain is. But those the twine at times, the bundles or it goes through the center of the bone and that's cut off. And you've got the heads on one end and you're step on the other. We're just getting the grain.

Sam Schrager: And it's tied with twine at the same.

Ima Hodge Platz: Time. Is tied with the twine, Is it bind or cut it off and it get to a certain amount or then is adjusted so that it'll kick that out? Yes. I don't know. I guess the trick there is whenever it gets so far always made that they kick it out, you know, and then your bowl around the ground.

Sam Schrager: Okay, then what happens?

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, and then over who? You have to get someone to shut the bed up and make it. There's about seven or eight of those. Bernards put in the shark. Would you know how to shuck one?

Sam Schrager: I would know.

Ima Hodge Platz: Both of those bones. You know the bones or the height of the grain. That's good. And that would that twine tied around the middle. And that binder takes it out and then cut more now out of going you might come round to your binder and ties that grain up, you know.

Sam Schrager: So then.

Ima Hodge Platz: You know certain size bone.

Sam Schrager: Then. Then so many bundles make a shock.

Ima Hodge Platz: Yes. But so many. It all depends on how many bundles they put into the shark. It depends on the condition, the grains in it which needs to be aired out a little more or something. Maybe they won't make such big chunks. Sometimes the grain is just shot two bundles, one bundle, crisscross, you know, just like that, only two in a place that a shark or grain had to have.

Ima Hodge Platz: she that's six months in a shark. And that shacked up and they'll stand up on the field and, you know, send up mare and that makes it dry.

Sam Schrager: And one man does that job goes around shocking.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well they have different shark or you know. Yes it's only one But then he's not following that binder. Maybe it's already been bound, you see. And he's going on the one that wrote the binder and he's going on to another piece of ground or something maybe.

Sam Schrager: Or how long disagreeing stand there and dry in the shop.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, they just it all depends on if it soon is drying up or they like to sell his cured, they like to brush it, you know. And that all depends on how quick you get a thresher. You see the machine duration machine is all of its own image, but only remain with the binder.

Sam Schrager: So it could stand there for a week or more.

Ima Hodge Platz: it stands over that cow's got to jack season. Like if it's too wet, see? And you stack all round together and then chapter mode. And it all depends on the condition of the weather and things that makes a difference. Sometimes it rains on those bones when they're in shock and they have to turn those gnats. So job for the farmers.

Ima Hodge Platz: I have to do a lot of rain or so that it won't spoil the grain. See if they were left, why they'd start to grow and sprout.

Sam Schrager: Is it hard to shock? Is that. Is that it? Is there any trick to do piling you bundle so they stand.

Ima Hodge Platz: With each.

Sam Schrager: Other?

Ima Hodge Platz: Yes, I guess. Or is that our ninja? But they always put two together. I know. Start shock and then you stick around those two. And I think the condition the grain is in depends on how many, how many they put in the shot. You see, it'll dry quicker if you don't have too many and depends on the weather that comes in.

Ima Hodge Platz: A lot of times if it rains, why they've got to take and turn those ones. If it rains a whole lot to get dry enough in order for not to sprout.

Sam Schrager: Well, the the threshing crew, the crew that you work with that that didn't include the binder then it was just.

Ima Hodge Platz: No, it didn't just.

Sam Schrager: Yeah.

Ima Hodge Platz: It was just after it was in the shelf and that didn't include the.

Sam Schrager: So then your harvest crew came along right.

Ima Hodge Platz: After.

Sam Schrager: That.

Ima Hodge Platz: Met when the thresher come. It was separate. True. Does what.

Sam Schrager: Right.

Ima Hodge Platz: What is it. What the cut the grain. You know, that's altogether separate.

Sam Schrager: And what did the threshing crew do then. Well how did that work?

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, that's the one that takes care of it. After each cut and and dried, getting the conditions to be right. You can't just cut and dry right away. It's got seasonal.

Sam Schrager: Well, when you when you're crew started in when the harvest crew then started with with that, how did they go about picking up the sharks.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well I had the sharks were already out they stand up those fowl do and you just put your fork in them and let them where you want them. They'd have to hold on to the machine. Sylvana The barn haulers have to haul pick up those sharks and load it on this way and that they haul it to the machine in and they have to drive it to where the trash machine sit.

Ima Hodge Platz: They just put it in a spot, you know, and they don't move it around with. They want to have to move to a different field or something. It's interesting to see that done and see what they have to They don't know what they have to do. They get it. That's all A lot of people don't know what it means to to harvest.

Ima Hodge Platz: They don't know. They think it's just done right now. Well, it's not. It's a long time. You wait a long time for those crops. So in the fall or sometime in the spring, and then you don't have to just cut even. You've got to wait till it's matured. If you just try as soon as cut, your grain would be damp and it might fall on you.

Ima Hodge Platz: So it's not just a lot of people don't know what it means.

Sam Schrager: You say when you the pitching of the the bundles is not easy. It takes. It takes.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well good.

Sam Schrager: Neck.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well is the neck it. Yes, it's the size of the bundle is it. You got to pick up off the ground there and load it up on a runway and just pitch it over there. You all you have to do is get it in the bed, in the wagon, the read the runway. And that's what the driver that that has the team does is to place that bundle after the pitcher pitches it up on the wagon.

Ima Hodge Platz: You see, if you put it up there, you're done with it. There's the fellow that drives the team to move it for. He's the one in the first place around on his head or better on the bed that they hold in.

Sam Schrager: Some guys could pitch bundles better than other guys.

Ima Hodge Platz: yes. Goodness. Yes. So some of them just easiest could be for another. See, there's an art and and then the the film the film drives the team. He'll place it around and on the bed where you want it. See the one where the bed is. Where you've seen the bed. Well, the, the picture just pictures it in there and one that's in there drawing the team.

Ima Hodge Platz: When he's gone, the place is bundled around on his lawn. Some families and the nights just looking even loads when they come in with their bundles or even you know, and others, they just sold their.

Sam Schrager: They just what.

Ima Hodge Platz: Just throw down. not didn't care, you know or didn't know or what. I don't know with some of the loads that when they were loaded Don nice bundles, they look nice and then sitting up there dry men sitting up there driving the horses. No good to see it. But then when they're just haphazardly. And why you told them if they didn't know nothing about or didn't care.

Sam Schrager: And that was up to the man that ran the bundle wagon, how the load looked.

Ima Hodge Platz: He well, the unit that pitched it was the one that loaded the bundles after they were pitched under the wagon. You see, there's a way to place those around in there and you can get more. That's an art. And a lot of them don't know what it means to that's just like sewing sacks or anything. There's an art in it.

Ima Hodge Platz: You can tell when the beans come into the machine. The cookhouse wasn't generally very far from the machine and you could tell anybody an endeavor loading bundles on the wagon because their bones were even in nice outside and you were in one sticking here and one little and one over way over here. And you could tell one was used for doing that.

Ima Hodge Platz: There's an art and.

Sam Schrager: So well, what happened then when they got when they brought it into the machine and how did they get it off the wagon?

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, look at the picture of the fellas at Hauling Machine where they picked it over in the feeder on the separator machine. And it generally be and sometimes a man, they said, Do you ever see a man feed one? Well, it's an art the the feeder, the pictures, bolts of the wagon on the table, the side of the machine, you know, up high and the feeder.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, he each arm would just go in like that usually you know and that he pulled well on this side and then over here and that feeds it into the separator.

Sam Schrager: What what did he used to feed it with. He use it because his hands.

Ima Hodge Platz: He just put pull it into that feeder. You see it was just a hole in the top and the separator and all this work in here underneath which you want to green took the kernels from, from the straw They just take a hold the grain, they pitch it usually one from each side they generally and then the feeder well he was working his arms just like that, just pulling it.

Ima Hodge Platz: Then.

Sam Schrager: Did he cut the string around the bundle. No.

Ima Hodge Platz: No. You didn't have to go to the machine take. So.

Sam Schrager: So he just pushed the whole bundle in.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, no, he didn't. If is too big, he did, because in filling up the machine, you see, he could only take so much. Is it just made a revolution, you know, and just they just treat it like that.

Sam Schrager: So he push it from it, push it from all sides.

Ima Hodge Platz: Little table what the what they what they would unloaded on with the table there you know and that bundle would lay there until that was pushed off that table down here in the machine and they they just go like that with their arms.

Sam Schrager: From side to side of the table.

Ima Hodge Platz: No, just that just like this was the whole. Yeah. And all the machinery part was down right here and this and your table was here at the side, your arm. Just like that. Just like this. And. And then push it in there and push in here. And there's an art in feeding those things too.

Sam Schrager: What's the art in that? How fast you feed it.

Ima Hodge Platz: Yes. How fast and watch. Sure. I don't need to think it's no art and I'm not in one of those separate things A lot of people don't know. They don't think it means anything. But you can see their arms are going like this. They take a bundle from one side and put in gear and then they take the other one.

Ima Hodge Platz: But they didn't put it all in there. It went, you see.

Sam Schrager: They wait till till there was room in the separator.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, yes, but they didn't wait long. It just about the time they get this one off or they bringing it to another scene just kept their arms going like this.

Sam Schrager: Did they have to work real fast? man.

Ima Hodge Platz: no, not just steady. You do that all day. Why? But you get used to it. It's. And then down here we see out and rolled grain it be six down the weight on the separator and they be the day is six is placing sacks and and then they have jig that jigs down that grain after it gets in the sack so much when they started digging it you know bouncing it up and down so as to take or give it all the space is in there that the grain can get into.

Sam Schrager: So there's one man that does that. He's he's the jigger.

Ima Hodge Platz: Yeah. Yeah. There's one jig and then the sack or you see he's there with his needle. Do you ever see a sack then. Well, they're interesting. They're about the strong and to crooked.

Sam Schrager: The needles are about as long as.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well.

Sam Schrager: As your finger. Yeah. About longer than your second finger.

Ima Hodge Platz: About like that. And there's a hole in the end of them and, and they're curved.

Sam Schrager: Curved on the end.

Ima Hodge Platz: Yeah. Well they're just kind of like that and you've a needle and it's X or you just put that in your sack. They have usually a jigger on the sack so they fill up all the space. You know a lot of those sacks cause money too. And there's a tell you just break it down and then they would set it out for the sex or two.

Ima Hodge Platz: So, you know.

Sam Schrager: And how many stitches that he put a lot of stitches in the top or

Ima Hodge Platz: What about that far apart.

Sam Schrager: Every inch or two.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, out like that, I wouldn't say just how many, but went across the top of this sack. You see, and you had good sex or you had something. So I they could just put that needle in, just like they're pulling up.

Sam Schrager: Could they keep up with the sacks coming out? Could they keep up with the grain.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well it was.

Sam Schrager: Usually.

Ima Hodge Platz: Usually two on the side, usually to short on the side. Chief, I once or was the Shawnee sack by the end. And was there a fill in a sack hanging up or say see one man can't show it and hang it on to. But it's interesting to see how they managed.

Sam Schrager: The sacks Or was the sacks or usually a man.

Ima Hodge Platz: yes. Well, he was a man really old enough to handle the sack.

Sam Schrager: He'd have to carry it after he fell, after it was filled.

Ima Hodge Platz: As a rule that he had, he'd show that the jigger you see jinx it down the grain. So you type in your yourself and that says no sacks. You see, you get down and it's a good sack. Sure. And made good money.

Sam Schrager: SACKS Or was a good paying job.

Ima Hodge Platz: He's good with a lack of knowledge. So what did you do for part of the needle and do far apart And then when was read up, I sometimes leak out that the top we had a good texture and make good money.

Sam Schrager: It was Well then how did how did the sack the sacks get piled after bad?

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, I mean have to care my way. You see, they get them sold. Why They came to the sack, they piled up close. Well, not too close I guess was the estimate on that how the grain and go and they carrying the first ones we carry out you have to carry farther and pile them, build them up. It's not far to carry them.

Ima Hodge Platz: Then you've got to lift them up from higher. You see, get them up on the pile.

Sam Schrager: One of those sacks would be pretty heavy.

Ima Hodge Platz: They threw you way over £275. Yeah. They were heavy. They earned your money, but it's really hard to see them. So you wouldn't just take the needle and just take it in their hand.

Sam Schrager: Or you think they'd run it in their hand?

Ima Hodge Platz: I say. You think they would know? They don't right there. They didn't know. But there's an art in sewing and a good sex or general got good wages.

Sam Schrager: What about the the other men who were on the crew? There was a separator. Tender was

Ima Hodge Platz: Yes. Separator tender and indicator.

Sam Schrager: What did they what did those men do.

Ima Hodge Platz: well he just tended to the separator, you know, they were really do. But then if anything went wrong, you know you got to watch because sometimes you things it kind of plug up. You know they don't get the feeders that feed the grain into the machine, see the picture run or they have those shelves up here, I told you, But it's part of it, the part of the separator.

Ima Hodge Platz: And they throw it just for the bundles and lied to the wagon and they they just go like that all the time. You know, they load a well or a wagon on each side of the separator, see, just to work. And they're all the same time and they just pitch knowingness.

Sam Schrager: that's.

Ima Hodge Platz: Me on this side would come with bundle. Yeah. And over here, you know that's the way to feed.

Sam Schrager: But then the separator tender he'd look after something went wrong.

Ima Hodge Platz: yes. If anything went wrong, it's just like that. Your feet. They were just working their arm like that with a bundle of grain underneath each arm. She had pulled it in this feeder.

Sam Schrager: Yeah, the engineer did. What did he do? What was his job?

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, his job was to take care of the engine. And they had their jobs. Right. And you never know. Something can go wrong or something. You presume maybe everything going wrong and then holler. And it all depend on what went into the the feeder spot. You know, sometimes it'd be something maybe in the grain, in the shock of grain, or when the grain was something, you know, that the feeder wouldn't take.

Ima Hodge Platz: And you had to watch anything you to your ground and know where they was or they had a lot of times it would break to some the cylinders I suppose, or something. I mean.

Sam Schrager: What did they do? They shut the machine down.

Ima Hodge Platz: yes, they'd shut it down as quick as possible when they hear a noise. You know, when something wasn't right, they often learned enough that, you know, it's really interesting to see them.

Sam Schrager: Did you ever see fires in the in the field when you were working there? Did you.

Ima Hodge Platz: Know? I never did. But then they had fire. But we never did. Not that I ever saw this girl. I went seven years for one man, Navis 17. Harvey.

Sam Schrager: What was his name again?

Ima Hodge Platz: They had Parker.

Sam Schrager: And this was near Viola?

Ima Hodge Platz: Yes. Maybe. You know Jimmy Park. He lived in blues.

Sam Schrager: I don't think. I don't believe I do.

Ima Hodge Platz: I went to school with him and were his brother, but he was an older person. But it's really interesting. You just wonder how they ever get it to go and how they could ever figure it out. I don't know.

Sam Schrager: Figured out how to do all that and did it.

Ima Hodge Platz: So everything I mean, you know, Lucy Peters, the men that fed there was just like a table up here and they were chair in between and they were well or within their bundle of their way onto this table. And that was one on each side. You see. And the feeder just go like that all the time.

Sam Schrager: I want to ask you again about the cooking that you had to do there in the in the in the Cook house and how that worked. And you said there were only two of you that did all that cooking?

Ima Hodge Platz: Yes, there was only two of us that did all the cook.

Sam Schrager: And when did you start? In the.

Ima Hodge Platz: Morning. Do 30. Got up at 230. Well, we had breakfast at 4:00.

Sam Schrager: What did it take for you to get the breakfast ready from when you got up? What did you have to do to get it on the table?

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, we had to cooking, cook potatoes and make biscuits and make gravy fried pan of beefsteak. And we didn't have bacon. We usually had beefsteak.

Sam Schrager: And you And she divided it up, and each of you took about half the work. Is that.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, when I was, I made the bread and she took care of the meat. Each one. We had her own job. She took care of the meat and the rest of it by whoever needed to do, or they'd done so We went seven years together, seven halves, and we hired from the time we pulled in. And when you're going to make for the next we had the job already finished.

Sam Schrager: Now what it was the trouble. When you say the wagon, would they move the wagon from place to place the cook house?

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, I'd move the group out to different fields, you know, think there were different people. The grain, wherever the grain was, the cook was there too. And they moved. They got house in there. You had to pack your stuff in the house and maybe you'd be well, baked bread on the road different times. Maybe just get it new and for me think it never be fit and you'd wonder what they you.

Sam Schrager: What would you, what would you have to do while they were moving it? You would stay.

Ima Hodge Platz: Rigidly in the schoolhouse, right? Maybe Asperger's.

Sam Schrager: No bread in the oven.

Ima Hodge Platz: Yeah. We stand hold the oven door shut over a frown because we didn't want in the door and come down in bread, slide out and.

Sam Schrager: You didn't want up getting sick to your stomach. By the time that no moved. No.

Ima Hodge Platz: I didn't want to. You know, better. Couldn't do nothing good. You got sick and you were No hammer. Hammer. All that beefsteak burned to for breakfast.

Sam Schrager: Did did you. Did you decide what the menu was going to be yourselves.

Ima Hodge Platz: yeah.

Sam Schrager: You ordered the food you wanted.

Ima Hodge Platz: yes, we have. What we decided on that.

Sam Schrager: Did do you think that the food was real good on those crews? I mean, we did the many real well.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, I thought I died from any anymore. Yeah, it was. It was good. We didn't seem to be satisfied. The boss must been satisfied. We went seven years in succession each harvest.

Sam Schrager: What did you think? The work. What was the work and what was the conditions like for you to work under? I mean, were they real hard on a person to. Was it hard, tough for a person to cook in that kind of a setting where you didn't have much but a little?

Ima Hodge Platz: Well, it wasn't like it was where you're at home or something. But then we had plenty to cook with and plenty needed, so I guess they liked it.

Sam Schrager: It was very hot.

Ima Hodge Platz: Not too bad cause we raised the size of the cook house, the curtain on the side. We could reason and make a draft through and there was a door and a chain. So it would be bad. Sometimes you can see it and then after you got used to it.

Sam Schrager: What was the big meal of the day?

Ima Hodge Platz: All? It was much different. We usually had pie for dinner. Sometimes we just get bread now than or cake or something. And they came over the hill with the team had to move and that was something smaller. They didn't Food dough.

Sam Schrager: What about the dust? Was the dust bad and the while they were working in the field?

Ima Hodge Platz: no, not bad. No, it wasn't. She is in civil war, too, so that make a difference was something like they could expected the good soil and.

Sam Schrager: But what time did would you think you got to bed at night. Got to go to sleep? When would you be finished with all this work?

Ima Hodge Platz: well, we'd have breakfast. We had to prepare for breakfast the night before, you know, so we wouldn't have as much due next morning. I don't know. We get to bed about after ten or something like that.

Sam Schrager: So you only got about 4 hours sleep?

Ima Hodge Platz: Not very long. You get used to it.

Sam Schrager: Was like when you went to sleep, you woke, you made yourself getting up late.

Ima Hodge Platz: Did not eating. We had plenty to cook and everything.

Sam Schrager: Did you think it was Would you say that it was hard work for the men in the field? That it was it it was hard working? Well, Well.

Ima Hodge Platz: If you're pitching a lot of a man to handle the load, the man, the wagons, why you just pitching on when they'd come? Or you'd have to load up to the drivers. It's, you know, you've been working, but a lot of times I can do it easier than other. I don't want to go out in the harvest field and think they won't go to work.

Ima Hodge Platz: So no, because it.

Sam Schrager: Enjoyed meaning in this moment in how much it made. You said it was was it a day, Two and a half. Two and a half. It's not bad wages, was it? Well, no.

Ima Hodge Platz: Because he paid us more than some of the others were giving. You know, we had we worked seven years for that one man.

Sam Schrager: Was that about what the men were getting in the fields a day, something like that. Two and a.

Unknown Speaker: Half? Yeah. Yeah.

Ima Hodge Platz: Wasn't we like the greatest are now, but that was higher than most others got. We worked seven years for him, was hard to tire and pull in the fall for the next year. So he met and says Find me.

Sam Schrager: He hired you as soon as you got there for the, the year that was going to be the next one.

Ima Hodge Platz: Well when pulled in that year I spoke for it for the next year so.

Sam Schrager: The following brief section is Alvin Olson of Dairy, Idaho, Remembering old Joe Wells. Yeah.

Alvin Olson: He used to say under all a white man here. The rest is Swede. Yeah, he was a good friend of my dad. We used to go and do your work and whether we'd come by these places, it was just a great way to go by U.S. Place. But we had to try. And he. He coming. He'd come on average to come in and and have to come in there and give us if he'd if they go where he was bad.

Alvin Olson: Hello around. Yeah he was there but he said he was real good and he had two boys and kept them right. And the daughter Mary, the dog all now you know, let me see who lives on that place.

Unknown Speaker: No, I don't know.