When I complained to my father that the gin crew and I should not have to work through Christmas, he said, “Son, we finished ginning last year’s cotton crop early, and you duck hunted all winter,” he answered. “Be thankful for that. Fall weather hasn’t cooperated this season. The gin must run nonstop; this dry spell won’t last long.”
Back then, picking two rows of cotton at once was harvesting’s latest technology. It was a time when storing cotton in modules was unheard of. The threat of rainy weather put unrelenting pressure on gin crews. Empty trailers had to be available, meaning we had to work can-to-can’t, sleeping in snatches.
