Discovering Our Heritage Brings Cooleemee’s Past to Life for First Graders
“Discovering Our Heritage,” sponsored by the Cooleemee Historical Association, invited first-graders from Cooleemee Elementary School to experience a day in the life of Cooleemee during the 1930s.
Teresa Bivins and Rebecca Hursey gave students the opportunity to try their hand at churning milk into butter. Later, the students sampled the freshly made butter on saltine crackers. Dressed in long dresses and aprons, Bivins and Hursey provided a wonderful example of what everyday life looked like during the 1930s.
Josh Snider, owner of Snider’s Dairy Farm, and Mackenzie Hall, who works with NC State Cooperative Extension as Davie County’s Livestock Agent, taught students about dairy farming. The students fed hay to a dairy cow, and an educational display showed how a dairy cow processes its food. Both Snider and Hall enjoyed answering questions and interacting with the students.
Learning how to hold a hoe and plant corn in a garden was a new experience for many students. They planted corn in straight rows and watered their plantings using a large metal watering can. Volunteers Joey Shore and John Chandler also displayed a jar of canned green beans and green beans that had been strung for drying. The students thought it was funny to learn that the dried beans were called “leather britches.”
Jeff Ferrell was eager to teach the students where meat came from and explain that most families in Cooleemee once owned a pig. On display were bacon from the grocery store, a cured ham shoulder, and a jar of canned meat. Each year, Ferrell brings a pig so the children can pet it and feed it slop they help prepare. Milk and pieces of bread are tossed into a bucket as “food scraps,” and the children place the mixture in the pig’s trough. While a few students were reluctant to get close to the pig, everyone had a great time.
Lynn Vogler taught the students how clothes were washed before washing machines were common in homes. Using a washboard, a metal tub of water, and a bar of soap representing homemade lye soap, students learned how clothing was scrubbed clean by hand. Afterward, they practiced wringing out the water and hanging the clothes on a clothesline. Handmade clothespins, carved by Vogler’s father, were used for the demonstration. The students also learned that using a heavy cast-iron iron was hard work.
Collecting eggs and feeding chickens was a little scary for some students and a lot of fun for others. The egg basket featured two compartments to keep eggs from knocking together and cracking. Cathy Marchbanks gently helped students feel at ease around the chickens, while Sandra Ferrell amused them by asking the age-old question, “Which came first, the chicken or the egg?”
Discovering Our Heritage is a program created by the late Jim and Lynn Rumley, founders of the Cooleemee Historical Association, to teach Cooleemee Elementary students about their heritage. The program has become a cherished tradition and a highlight for students in every grade level, offering age-appropriate lessons throughout the school year.
Thank you to all volunteers who know and practice these valuable lessons still today. Most students still talk about their experience in their adult years. “Cooleemee, a town that refuses to die.”
For more information about the Cooleemee Historical Association, visit their Facebook page.
Feel free to contact me at www.cooleemeenews@gmail.com. I’d love to hear from you!
