Cane grindings of Georgia’s rural past

BY FRANK NeSMITH

Frank NeSmith

Growing up as a boy in the mid-20th century in Evans County, late autumn was the best season of the year. The trees would dress up in their most colorful finery and proclaim to the rural folk that, with the passage of another long, stifling summer, it was finally the season for making cane syrup.

Cane grindings of that era not only produced a sweet food staple, they were also big social events for the farming communities. They provided us with an opportunity to chew sugar cane and sample the fresh and plentiful cane juice.

Almost everyone in the community dropped in to visit, coming and going continually through the whole process—from early morning until late at night. People enjoyed sitting around under the steamy boiler shelter to visit and catch up on all the local news, since most farm homes had no telephones.

The slowly turning mule or tractor-powered cane mill started the process by squashing long, flat ribbons from the cane stalks as they were hand-fed into it. This procedure would extract the juice, which was then reduced down into syrup in the open boiler. Watching the sweet juice being transformed from a cold, green nectar into a hot, golden morass that simmered with hushed plops provided a large part of the enjoyment of cane grindings.

Frank NeSmith poses with his parents, sister Linda and their 1948 pear harvest. The dog, "G.I.," was left with them by World War II soldiers on maneuvers.

Although making syrup was hard work, for all the kids like me, it was simply a time of great joy and delight. Syrup making always carried on into the nighttime, which provided a rare and magical playground for us. While grownups visited around the boiler, we played games of hide-and-seek.

For us, gone was any worry about teachers or tests. In their place, every shadow held spooks; every corner of the moonlit-dappled yard concealed the dreaded seeker. And if you were found first and failed to beat the seeker to home base, you were “it” for the next game.

Too soon, the final night of syrup making on our farm would come to an end. Then, it would be all over until it was another family’s turn to have a cane grinding on some other enchanted night.

Never did I think this favorite activity would disappear with the winds of time and change. But now it is a part of Georgia’s rich history of rural life that can only be found in rare, preserved exhibitions or enterprises—and in the fond recollections of those who experienced it.

Frank NeSmith of Reidsville spent 38 years in the U.S. Air Force enforcement branch and then in wildlife enforcement in Kansas and Idaho. In 1998, he retired and returned to Georgia with his wife, Judy. He is presently writing a novel on growing up in rural Georgia in the late 1950s.