Canning Memories!

My Grandmother died when my Mother was only 10 years old.  Mother had to become the cook and housekeeper for my Grandfather and a younger brother.  There were a couple of neighbor ladies who helped her some, that is, with advice and what ever they could contribute as they both had large families to care for.  Mother never developed into a great cook, however, she did learn from those friends, to excel in one area. She loved to do the canning.

After we became homeowners, in California, around 1936, we had 5 acres of land with the house and barn.  The first thing Dad did was put in a garden.  Mother started canning again.  And one year she even won a blue ribbon for her green beans at the county fair.  One of my jobs was to clean and help sterilize the fruit jars. I doubt that I thought it was great fun to help with that chore, at the time! 

 

After I married, it happened, the man I married loved gardening. We almost always had a large garden and so we started canning.  Now, you may not think this would become a very special enterprise, but it did.  He always loved to help me and we would sit together and snap beans or what ever, and we would reminisce about when we were kids and helping the elders with their canning.  I would tell him about crawling under the house, where the jars were stored, and bringing them into the kitchen to clean.  He told me about neighbors gathering each year to can corn.  His job was to turn the crank on the apparatus that sealed the lids onto the tin cans, that they used.  

 

Hmmm, the word canning came, I am sure, from the fact that they used cans in those early days and the term did not change after we started using mostly jars.  You wouldn’t say “jarring” would you?

 

Any way, it was a very companionable pastime and I loved that.  Often my Mother would come and help and it was very pleasant. 

 

Later we bought a large food freezer and began freezing a lot of our produce, especially fruit.  We did not grow peaches, but every July we would go to Montague County and buy them.  One year, with the help of Mother and Dad and an Aunt and Uncle, and whoever else we could find, we put up 5 bushels of peaches. What a mess that was in our tiny little kitchen and what fun it was.  And, how my Husband loved peaches!  Often he would not even wait till they were thawed, before starting to eat them.  Good memories, often recalled now that I no longer have those dear people with me. 

Can you imagine, though, what a happy day it was, recently, when my Daughter called and asked if I would like to help her put up some peaches. What do you think my answer was?