They would have to be up by 5a.m., and finish all their farm duties by 7:30a.m.Just in time to get ready to leave for school by 8:30 a.m. Indeed their home life was very structured and demanding, especially for Jessica who was only 10 years old and the youngest of four kids. Thankfully there was one duty she really enjoyed doing on the farm. When it came time for her to feed the baby calves, she flourished with a sense of responsibility and the feeling of being important. The way she described
Staying at home | |with her two small sons, she was the ultimate earth mother, gardening, canning fruits and vegetable, | |making her son’s clothes, stitching and knitting. “I macramed two hammocks,” she admits now. “I needed | |help.” | |That help came in the form of a blizzard in February 1979, which left her stranded at home for a week. | |In an age without four-wheel drive vehicles, getting down the hillside from where she lived was | |impossible. Morning kindergarten was canceled for a week.
We also raised chickens for eggs and chicken. My mother canned everything we grew so we could save it for the winter when we couldn’t
The females in the family both young and old were in charge of doing housework chores like cooking, cleaning, milking cows, and mending clothes. The males did everything else from skilled trades to making the laws. The fathers and sons in the family would also hunt for meat. In the springtime geese were plucked for making pillows and mattresses and men and women both butchered and smoked farm animals in autumn. During the winter months the women would spin wool for sewing clothes and linens.
Girls did chores like sweeping, feeding animals, milking cows, watering horses, running errands, picking berries from the forest, gathering vegetables and spices from the garden, taking eggs from the chickens, making candles and soap, helping make meals, cleaning, and caring for babies. Girls’ education was not very elaborate, they were taught to read the Bible (religion was very important to New Englanders). Boys, alternatively, helped their fathers hunt and harvest dinner and chop down trees for firewood. When the boys turned seven, they became apprentices to a cooper (worked with wood and fixed wooden furniture), a silversmith (worked with silver and made silverware), or any other common job. Boys schooling included math, Latin, and other subjects needed to get into college.
The Aztecs grew corn, tomatoes, beans, chili peppers, and squash. Also, on special occasions they ate turkey, rabbit, fish, shrimp, dog, duck, and sometimes humans. The cocoa bean was important to the Aztecs because it was used to flavor water for the wealthy families. With that they were able to grow a lot of food and feed all of Tenochtitlán. By the age of 15 kids were taught by their parents.
It’s as if the Ranch Girl has stepped outside her body and is narrating the story herself, but with a hint of unfamiliarity. It’s about a young white girl, not rich, but not poor either, but because she was raised on a ranch, she considers herself just a little lower class than most middleclass white kids she goes to school with and not once has a girl from school, come out to her house. Her dad is the foreman on Ted Haskell’s Running H ranch. Both her dad and Haskell’s wives have run off, to leave the two men raising teen daughters on their own. While the hired hands live and eat in the bunkhouse, their foreman has his own house and usually falls asleep sipping a can of beer while eating crackers and cheese.
My mom deserves to be called a modern day epic hero just as any other caring mother, or father, because they do whatever it is to care for their own no matter what. For example, Jorge Munoz came to America in the early 80’s and became a citizen in 1987; after witnessing the struggles such as poverty that many of the people living in his city were enduring, he decided to start cooking food to feed dozens of day laborers in Queens. An estimation of more than 70,000 people has been assisted by Munoz since 2004. His operation is financed from the $600 he receives weekly for driving a school bus and donations. On August 4, 2010, Munoz was awarded the Presidential Citizens Medal by President Barack Obama.
In California, the use of migrant workers and their children is a common practice for big companies. In 2012, NBC news went to a location were child had been working there since they were 8 years old and up, some of the kids go to night school after they work 10 hour shifts. North Carolina has children picking vegetables and tobacco on many of its farms, all being sold to big companies refusing to comment about the use of children. The farm owners pay lower wages to the adults, causing the children to be part of the work force involved. I personally think that is the plan that farmers use to get more workers, especially when they are migrant workers or illegals whatever you prefer.
One of the main reasons I have a lot of knowledge is because I go every day to muck them out and feed them. I have had my horses for nearly 2 years now, and I now know how to groom, ride and lunge them. I also get knowledge of my mum she teaches me basic life skills, like how to use the washer, or how to cook basic meals. It’s good that my mum teaches me these skills because when it comes to me wanting to move away to university or moving house I will know how to care for myself. Information about my career options: I am studying Health and social care level 3 because I want to progress onto university so I can get a nursing degree in midwifery.