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Diamond, Mo. —
As visitors attended Prairie Day at George Washington Carver National Monument on Saturday, they were transported back in time to how Carver and others lived in the 1860s and 1870s.
An estimated 1,900 people came to the event.
At one of the various stations was Elisha Burchfield, who was doing log hewing.
“Log hewing here where we are taking a round log, knocking off the corners and making it a square log where people would use for traditional barn construction, for traditional cabin construction,” he said. “I am displaying some of the different joints that go along with cabin building, as far as floor joint structuring and the corner joints that shed water and the importance of water being shed where the wood could dry. We are also displaying some traditional tools, answering questions that people have about traditional carpentry methods and tools and wood, anything to do with traditional building construction.”
Burchfield stated that even Moses Carver – who raised George – would have used the same technique for the cabin.
Burchfield said it would usually take three months to make a cabin.
“Normally, a 14 to 16 foot, is as big of a structure that you could get, where a man could use an ox and still move the lumber and actually physically make it,” he said. “You could get larger trees than that, then you couldn’t build the structure out of it. So 16 foot would be as big of a room that you could make – 16 by 16 square – and if you had a team of oxen and you had the right tools, you could probably put something up head high in three months, depending on the availability of the wood. If you had more help, you could possibly do it quicker. Most of the time, they didn’t ever get the roof structure on before the first winter, lots of the time, they just used the canvas from the covered wagon and waited until the next year to put the roof on.”
Other living history stations on Saturday included butter churning, lye soap making, cooking over an open fire, spinning, period toys and even laundry station.
With washtubs, washboards and lye soap, Amy Juhala, a seasonal park ranger, told visitors how to wash laundry by hand.
“This was a skill that George learned from Susan Carver, and then he later used to help pay for his food, board when he was going to school and trying to get an education,” she said. “We are teaching kids how to do it. They didn’t have electric washing machines back then, so it’s kind of fun for them to get an idea how much work it was to keep your clothes clean.”
As visitors attended Prairie Day at George Washington Carver National Monument on Saturday, they were transported back in time to how Carver and others lived in the 1860s and 1870s.
An estimated 1,900 people came to the event.
At one of the various stations was Elisha Burchfield, who was doing log hewing.
“Log hewing here where we are taking a round log, knocking off the corners and making it a square log where people would use for traditional barn construction, for traditional cabin construction,” he said. “I am displaying some of the different joints that go along with cabin building, as far as floor joint structuring and the corner joints that shed water and the importance of water being shed where the wood could dry. We are also displaying some traditional tools, answering questions that people have about traditional carpentry methods and tools and wood, anything to do with traditional building construction.”
Burchfield stated that even Moses Carver – who raised George – would have used the same technique for the cabin.
Burchfield said it would usually take three months to make a cabin.
“Normally, a 14 to 16 foot, is as big of a structure that you could get, where a man could use an ox and still move the lumber and actually physically make it,” he said. “You could get larger trees than that, then you couldn’t build the structure out of it. So 16 foot would be as big of a room that you could make – 16 by 16 square – and if you had a team of oxen and you had the right tools, you could probably put something up head high in three months, depending on the availability of the wood. If you had more help, you could possibly do it quicker. Most of the time, they didn’t ever get the roof structure on before the first winter, lots of the time, they just used the canvas from the covered wagon and waited until the next year to put the roof on.”
Other living history stations on Saturday included butter churning, lye soap making, cooking over an open fire, spinning, period toys and even laundry station.
With washtubs, washboards and lye soap, Amy Juhala, a seasonal park ranger, told visitors how to wash laundry by hand.
“This was a skill that George learned from Susan Carver, and then he later used to help pay for his food, board when he was going to school and trying to get an education,” she said. “We are teaching kids how to do it. They didn’t have electric washing machines back then, so it’s kind of fun for them to get an idea how much work it was to keep your clothes clean.”
Normally, Juhala said, the women would do the laundry, unless the man lived by himself.
“We use the lye soap, you are going to rub that on your clothes, you use that wash board dip your clothes down in the water, and rub it on that board, you have got to use a lot of muscle if you are going to get all of those stains out,” she said. “Then you rinse it off, dip it into the bluing. Bluing reflects light, makes your clothes a little bit brighter, hang it up on the clothes line with clothes pegs, because we are not going to use electricity, we are going to use wind to dry our clothes and then the next day, you have to iron all of those clothes. So it was a big job.”
George Washington Carver National Monument preserves the birthplace and childhood home of George Washington Carver, scientist, educator, and humanitarian. The monument is located two miles west of Diamond on Route V, then south a half mile on Carver Road.
For more information, please call the park at 325-4151.
