It was chilly when the old man got out of bed at 5:45 this morning. It took me back to the same August morning in 1938, though it was then nearly an hour earlier and on a weekday, rather than on a Sunday. It was hop picking time in the Fraser Valley and I had clung to my bed covers too long. Mom finally roused me and shoved me out the back door. I ran down the path along the dewy back yard grass for my early morning meeting with last year’s Eaton’s catalogue in the outhouse. Though the sun had not yet appeared over the Cheam Range skyline in the east, the sheen of dawn indicated another hot and humid day in the hop field coming up.
There was no time to dilly or dally with the scantily clad Eaton’s models. Mom, my sister and me had to finish porridge, bread toasted on the oven top and hot cocoa, clean up, get ready and walk to the main road half a mile away to catch the hop yard truck by six! So I quickly washed up at the kitchen sink beside the pump and sat at the table. Dad, already finished with milking and other chores, was ready to eat and soon after prayers and porridge climbed on his bike, lunch box behind the seat, for the long ride along the mountain road to start his eight hour day at the cut-off saw in the sawmill.
We had no time to waste, so after cleaning up a bit we packed up lunches and any other gear we might need through the long day in the field, and hurried to the truck stop on the main road. A knot of villagers had already gathered at the corner and the social networking of the hop picking season began for the day. Someone saw the truck heading our way from its stop for pickers further west and after the usual jostling among both elders and kids to be first up the ladder, we climbed to the stake truck platform for the best seat on the benches, standing room, or floor seating still available.
The driver, also a musical director at the village church, made sure everyone was secure and followed that rough gravel road to the Vedder River crossing, there to follow the main road to Sardis for the remaining miles to the hop field. The field was only half harvested, so he bumped across the field of already stripped vines, where everyone climbed down and headed for the family row to pick as much of the still dew-heavy hop clusters as possible before the first weigh-up.
Our village contingent took up only a few limited rows of the many in the forty acre field that had to be picked while still at its optimum ripeness. Pickers came from all over. We were surrounded by as diverse a group of racial origins, languages, religions and colours as you can imagine. Many came from the big city and lived in the row cabins at the office yard for the season, as we had done earlier in the Depression years. We did it again in 1939, as I remember being in the main yard camp cabin when the war started. For the most part everyone got along, at least for hop picking season, though “the company” separated the Japanese contingent from the rest in a separate cabin camp.
I was an early teen in 1938, still inclined to goof off as I had earlier in the thirties if I could. Still, by then I knew if I wanted proper clothes and supplies for school in September I needed to join the competition to see how many pounds I could pick in a day. The penny a pound paid by the company added up to about the only cash families would have all year for such extras.
They were good times, those long, hot August days in the hop fields. And they are good memories for the old man! I remember the competition for the “best” row when an un-harvested field of clusters was started. I remember the jostling and shoving to get near the front of the weigh-up line, when it paid me to be a little pushy; the buzz of dozens of conversations to be listened to, the calls for straying children (W-i-l-l-e-e-e-e-e! in my case), and the sudden and surprising beauty of a Swiss melody yodelled by a picker at the far side of the field, followed by the haunting summons for Wire-Down! from another direction.
For the old man, that was the romance of the hop harvest in the thirties after the quiet beauty of a hop picking morning.
There was no time to dilly or dally with the scantily clad Eaton’s models. Mom, my sister and me had to finish porridge, bread toasted on the oven top and hot cocoa, clean up, get ready and walk to the main road half a mile away to catch the hop yard truck by six! So I quickly washed up at the kitchen sink beside the pump and sat at the table. Dad, already finished with milking and other chores, was ready to eat and soon after prayers and porridge climbed on his bike, lunch box behind the seat, for the long ride along the mountain road to start his eight hour day at the cut-off saw in the sawmill.
We had no time to waste, so after cleaning up a bit we packed up lunches and any other gear we might need through the long day in the field, and hurried to the truck stop on the main road. A knot of villagers had already gathered at the corner and the social networking of the hop picking season began for the day. Someone saw the truck heading our way from its stop for pickers further west and after the usual jostling among both elders and kids to be first up the ladder, we climbed to the stake truck platform for the best seat on the benches, standing room, or floor seating still available.
The driver, also a musical director at the village church, made sure everyone was secure and followed that rough gravel road to the Vedder River crossing, there to follow the main road to Sardis for the remaining miles to the hop field. The field was only half harvested, so he bumped across the field of already stripped vines, where everyone climbed down and headed for the family row to pick as much of the still dew-heavy hop clusters as possible before the first weigh-up.
Our village contingent took up only a few limited rows of the many in the forty acre field that had to be picked while still at its optimum ripeness. Pickers came from all over. We were surrounded by as diverse a group of racial origins, languages, religions and colours as you can imagine. Many came from the big city and lived in the row cabins at the office yard for the season, as we had done earlier in the Depression years. We did it again in 1939, as I remember being in the main yard camp cabin when the war started. For the most part everyone got along, at least for hop picking season, though “the company” separated the Japanese contingent from the rest in a separate cabin camp.
I was an early teen in 1938, still inclined to goof off as I had earlier in the thirties if I could. Still, by then I knew if I wanted proper clothes and supplies for school in September I needed to join the competition to see how many pounds I could pick in a day. The penny a pound paid by the company added up to about the only cash families would have all year for such extras.
They were good times, those long, hot August days in the hop fields. And they are good memories for the old man! I remember the competition for the “best” row when an un-harvested field of clusters was started. I remember the jostling and shoving to get near the front of the weigh-up line, when it paid me to be a little pushy; the buzz of dozens of conversations to be listened to, the calls for straying children (W-i-l-l-e-e-e-e-e! in my case), and the sudden and surprising beauty of a Swiss melody yodelled by a picker at the far side of the field, followed by the haunting summons for Wire-Down! from another direction.
For the old man, that was the romance of the hop harvest in the thirties after the quiet beauty of a hop picking morning.
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Loved your hop picking story Bill! Reminded me of our strawberry picking days, the teens in my family picked berries for school clothes in the mid 50's for three seasons. It was a lot of work, but I have fond memories of all our adventures.
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