Tennessee Fall Homecoming Photos (Oak Ridge, Norris: food, health, parking)

[alleycat]

Originally Posted by LauraC

Anyone ever drink non-alcoholic muscadine juice? What does it taste like?

I don't think I ever had muscadine juice, but I've eaten the grapes. They're sweet with what I might call a "woodsy" flavor. I'd guess the juice is sweet and somewhat "heavier" in taste than Concord grape juice.

[gemkeeper]

Originally Posted by LauraC

Oh, the food smells (barbecue) and grass smells and homemade soap/candle smells were great but I don't usually try new food or drink at a festival...just in case.

There were people ladling sassafras tea and you see that yellow sign for muscadine juice. I had never heard of muscadine so when I came home I looked it up and read that it's a good source of antioxidants, way more so than red wine. Anyone ever drink non-alcoholic muscadine juice? What does it taste like?

Cannot wait to experience the Tennessee Fall Homecoming next year.

Ahhh, sassafras tea! I haven't had any since I was a kid growing up in the mts. of PA. My dad was a great outdoorsman and our Sunday afternoon fun was a drive out into the country or up in the mts. He would find sassafras and teaberry leaves, which both make yummy teas on a chilly fall evening.

Also, sliding wood whistles, made from Ash trees, I think. (Anybody know what tree would be slippery like that under the bark? Almost like it was greased.) He would cut off about a 8 inch long finger thick branch for each of us 3 kids. The pith would slide easily out of the tough bark. Dad would notch the bark in several places and let the pithy center slide up and down under the openings in the bark. Mountain music!! What fun.

[alleycat]

Originally Posted by gemthornton

Also, sliding wood whistles, made from Ash trees, I think. (Anybody know what tree would be slippery like that under the bark? Almost like it was greased.) He would cut off about a 8 inch long finger thick branch for each of us 3 kids. The pith would slide easily out of the tough bark. Dad would notch the bark in several places and let the pithy center slide up and down under the openings in the bark. Mountain music!! What fun.

There are several trees like that. One is dogwood. When I was a kid we'd made slide whistles out of cane (which grew along the low creekbeds) and a dogwood plunger. We also made a popgun out of the same materials and used plump dogwood berries as the "bullets". We could actually shoot those things a fair distance.

[gemkeeper]

Originally Posted by alleycat

There are several trees like that. One is dogwood. When I was a kid we'd made slide whistles out of cane (which grew along the low creekbeds) and a dogwood plunger. We also made a popgun out of the same materials and used plump dogwood berries as the "bullets". We could actually shoot those things a fair distance.

Alleycat, I had forgotten the popguns! The whistles and popguns we had were probably dogwoods. Thanks for filling in the memory gaps. They lasted a couple of days until the bark dried out and started to split, but those "toys" and a stop at the apple farm for cider and a bushel or two of apples made for a great autumn day!

Sometimes I'd like to be 8 again.

[alleycat]

We also made our own bow and arrows (or at least the bow . . . I think we used store bought arrows). We always used elm for the bows since it was both strong and springy. I think they're still a few elms left on our place in Montgomery County, but the Dutch Elm Disease got most of the elms in Tennessee back in the sixties.

When I was a kid we didn't have to stop at the apple farm . . . we had our own. We had apples, pears, cherries (or what the catbirds left), grapes, plums, and a couple of peach trees that only produced little knotty peaches. We had so many apples that I would pick them and sell them when I was a kid . . . for the grand sum of $2 or $3 a bushel (yes, per bushel, not per pound). That is, if anyone had agreed to pay for me to pick them . . . otherwise they could pick all they wanted themselves for free. People shared where I lived, and still do to a certain extent. My mother is elderly now and people are always bringing her stuff, even though she can't return the favor anymore (she's had hip replacement surgery so gardening is out).

I'm not sure I'd want to be eight again. I think that was about the year I jumped off a barn roof with a parachute made from a sheet. I wasn't very bright back then and things haven't improved much since.

[TN Tin Man]

Originally Posted by gemthornton

Cannot wait to experience the Tennessee Fall Homecoming next year.

Ahhh, sassafras tea! I haven't had any since I was a kid growing up in the mts. of PA. My dad was a great outdoorsman and our Sunday afternoon fun was a drive out into the country or up in the mts. He would find sassafras and teaberry leaves, which both make yummy teas on a chilly fall evening.

Also, sliding wood whistles, made from Ash trees, I think. (Anybody know what tree would be slippery like that under the bark? Almost like it was greased.) He would cut off about a 8 inch long finger thick branch for each of us 3 kids. The pith would slide easily out of the tough bark. Dad would notch the bark in several places and let the pithy center slide up and down under the openings in the bark. Mountain music!! What fun.

Grand dad showed me a piece of weeping willow all so works by sliding the fresh bark foward and making a notch in the bark....

[gemkeeper]

Originally Posted by Tinman313

Grand dad showed me a piece of weeping willow all so works by sliding the fresh bark foward and making a notch in the bark....

Tinman, I can see how great a weeping willow would work for a whistle; they are good and moist. Maybe you, alleycat and I all had the same grandparents! He wasn't Pa. Dutch, was he?

Originally Posted by alleycat

We also made our own bow and arrows (or at least the bow . . . I think we used store bought arrows). We always used elm for the bows since it was both strong and springy. I think they're still a few elms left on our place in Montgomery County, but the Dutch Elm Disease got most of the elms in Tennessee back in the sixties.

When I was a kid we didn't have to stop at the apple farm . . . we had our own. We had apples, pears, cherries (or what the catbirds left), grapes, plums, and a couple of peach trees that only produced little knotty peaches. We had so many apples that I would pick them and sell them when I was a kid . . . for the grand sum of $2 or $3 a bushel (yes, per bushel, not per pound). That is, if anyone had agreed to pay for me to pick them . . . otherwise they could pick all they wanted themselves for free. People shared where I lived, and still do to a certain extent. My mother is elderly now and people are always bringing her stuff, even though she can't return the favor anymore (she's had hip replacement surgery so gardening is out).

I'm not sure I'd want to be eight again. I think that was about the year I jumped off a barn roof with a parachute made from a sheet. I wasn't very bright back then and things haven't improved much since.

We made our own bows using Mom's turkey roasting twine and just about any springy twig we could get our hands on. We made arrows using flint stones that we pounded the dickens out of with Dad's good hammers. Think we only tried that a few times before Dad got wise to what was messing up his hammers!

You were so lucky to have all the home-grown fruit. We had a couple of apples trees with the sourest, wormy apples you ever tasted. Pear trees that my dad covered with netting to keep the birds out of the fruit. And, of course, his beloved black walnut and chestnut trees that the squirrels thought came directly from God's hand to their mouth!

I NEVER jumped off the garage roof (although son#3 had a scary mishap doing the same, but with only a cape!), but I did ... oh, never mind. Better not get into that!!

[alleycat]

We had a lot of black walnut trees, but almost all the chestnuts were gone. The walnuts were another thing I sold. We would put them at the bottom of the driveway so cars would run over them and knock off the outer shell. And if someone got that juice from the outer shell on their hands, their hands were going to be black for several days.

If we had wanted to use flint arrowheads, we could have found them in the "back forty". The Cherokee or Creek must have used the place for a hunting grounds; there were quite a few arrowheads found.

[TN Tin Man]

Tinman, I can see how great a weeping willow would work for a whistle; they are good and moist. Maybe you, alleycat and I all had the same grandparents! He wasn't Pa. Dutch, was he?....[Irish-Germany] May be we can get a Jug Band going for the get together, we need a kazoo player-(gemthornton) wash board-the spoons-and a XXX clay jug. And a whistle,alleycat will you play wash board?...

[TN Tin Man]

Originally Posted by alleycat

We had a lot of black walnut trees, but almost all the chestnuts were gone. The walnuts were another thing I sold. We would put them at the bottom of the driveway so cars would run over them and knock off the outer shell. And if someone got that juice from the outer shell on their hands, their hands were going to be black for several days.

If we had wanted to use flint arrowheads, we could have found them in the "back forty". The Cherokee or Creek must have used the place for a hunting grounds; there were quite a few arrowheads found.

Furniture makers still today use walnuts for a stain.......