Old Albany Days – Part 2

Yesterday, I told you all about Old Albany Days, a yearly event showcasing old-time methods of doing day-to-day tasks around the farm. When I attended last weekend, there was so much to see that I couldn’t include it all in one post. So here’s more:

I was fascinated watching cider being made from apples. I’d heard about how it is done before, but never seen it in person.

First, apples are thrown into a hopper and chopped to pieces with a turn of the crank.

Here’s a close up of the chopped apples ready for pressing.

The apples are then pressed by turning a handle attached to a screw with a plate that mashes down the apples and squeezes out the cider.

When done pressing, the cider is poured through filtered cloth,

and then put into gallon containers for sale. I bought 1 gallon. Best cider I’ve ever had, and the freshest too!

In the days before combines, corn kernels were removed from the cob by hand using a corn sheller. Corn cobs are fed into the top, and then blades remove the kernels by turning the hand crank.

The kids loved this one. Who knew corn shelling could be so much fun?

Today a combine cuts the wheat stalk and separates the wheat kernels, or threshes, from the stalk. (Click here to see how wheat is harvested today) But years ago, wheat was cut by hand, and then threshed with a threshing machine.

Workers(yellow arrow) feed bundles of wheat into the thresher(green arrow), which separates the wheat kernels and shoots them out into a waiting cart, while the wheat chaff and stalks are shot out into a pile on the ground(red arrow).

Here’s a closer look of the workers as they feed the thresher.

And here you can see the wheat kernels being sent to the waiting cart.

Towards sunset, Noxie Ridge, a local bluegrass band, took the stage, er flatbed trailer, to perform.

John, besides playing a mean fiddle, also has beehives and sells honey.

Check out this young banjo player,

and guitar player. It’s neat to see Bluegrass being passed on to the next generation.

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——-> Up Next: Bear with me folks, I’ve got one more post about Old Albany Days. See a blacksmith at work, kettle corn fresh from the kettle, homemade rugs from a loom, and more old cars.

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