Today’s guest post was written by Brenda Smith.
I saw this golden grass while walking along the Little Tennessee River this late November morning, and my memory went on a journey back to the early 1950s to a time when we would harvest broom straw.
I’m not sure that is the right name, but that is what we called it. We were sent out into a field that had not been plowed in a year or so to gather arm loads. We would store it in the smoke house loft to dry out. Most of the white fuzzy seeds had already been blown away by the fall winds, but there was always a few left, and by the time we had brought in a year’s worth of straw we would be covered in fuzz.
The first time I saw a store bought broom was when I started to school and saw the janitor, Mr. Elliot, sweeping the hallway with one. I thought that must be what rich folks used, and instantly I had a case of broom-on-a-stick envy. But we didn’t buy anything that could be had free, so we pulled broom straw.
There was no cutting. We would grab a hand full at the base and twist it off. Briers liked to grow in these fields too, so a few stickers were expected.
Mama would bind enough straw together to make a broom that would fit the hand. She would wind long strips of rags tightly from the stubby end downwards and leave half the straw loose for sweeping. The swishing end would be trimmed neatly, and a brand spanking new, one handed broom was ready to use. As it was worn down, a little stooping was required, but if enough straw had been put up to dry, a new broom was as close as the smoke house loft…free.
I hope you enjoyed Brenda’s memories. We call it broom sage. Pap always said a field of broom sage blowing in the wind was one of the prettiest things he ever saw. I think’s its awful pretty too especially when there’s a sparkling blue sky behind it.
Last night’s video: My Life in Appalachia 27 – Granny’s Birthday & the First Planting of the Year!
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I enjoyed this story. My great grandmother was half Cherokee and was the only woman my daddy remembers seeing that had pierced ears. She only wore earrings on special occasions so, she kept a small piece of broom straw stuck in the piercings to keep them from closing up.
I have made and used boom straw brooms. They were easy to make and easy to replace. I also think a field of broom straw is pretty to look at.
I grew up in town with no fields of broom straw close enough to gather and hall home for broom making; so we had store-bought brooms for use inside and on the porch.
We also had what I always called brush brooms that we used in lieu of rakes on leaves in the yard. Branches pruned from trees and bushes where pared down leaving branches near the ends. Multiple branches were then bound together in 3 or 4 places with strips of cloth saved from old dresses, sheets, towels or whatever from the rag bag.
Was this known in the mountains? I’m speaking of Wake County – Raleigh.
Loved today’s post. We always called it broom straw. I have memories of my Grandmama making brooms and my husband’s Grandpa made them also. He can remember his Granny sweeping their dirt yard. I’ve seen that done a few times myself when I was very young. We both agreed that we would give anything to have one of those brooms now to keep. Thank you, Brenda and Tipper, for bring back some fond memories. Last night’s video was wonderful! The best part was Granny’s birthday party. How sweet and thoughtful of Katie to make the Mother’s ring for her. What a blessing you have her still. Looking forward to the reading tonight. Have a great day everyone!!
We called it broomsage to, though I never knew of anybody actually making brooms with it in my time. My Grandma made a tea for me once when I was sick and broomsage root was an ingredient. I also love the color of it and sure would like a sunny room painted with that tawny buffbrown redgold color and set off by a rich redbrown wood floor. I wonder what would happen if I took a handful to Lowe’s and asked, “Can you match this?” But I know they can’t match the shifting color in the wind or how it changes from dry to wet and back again. To me, broomsage instantly says, “Country!” as much so as a weathered gray barn or a rusty wire fence.
I never saw my Grandma sweep with anything but a home made broom made from broomsage or broomstraw. I count myself incredible blessed that even though I’m not yet 60 years old, I had grandparent who were old enough that I was exposed to so many of the old ways. Like seeing brooms made from staw, and wringer washing machines, and the old timey corn shellers. Some of my fondest memories are riding on Grandma’s knee as she she was sewing on an old foot peddled Singer sewing machine. Great memories.
Really enjoyed this post Miss Tipper! I remember my grandparents on my moms side of the family having a broom sage homemade broom and they shared stories of their parents having them as well.
Again, anything old or that’s got anything to do with history, count me in.
The picture of the broom sage waving in the wind reminds me of the golden wheat fields blowing in the breeze. Our little town was surrounded by them in the summer. Not nearly as much wheat is being grown in our area at this time. Love the picture!
I don’t remember about the broom but I sure remember Mom and Dad making do with what we had but didn’t realize it at the time, we thought we were very well off and actually we were.
I enjoyed Brenda’s post, especially the words “broom-on-a-stick envy”. I’ve heard of and seen handmade brooms with broom sage, broom straw and whittled wood scrub brooms but never a complete description of how her family made theirs. It was a make-do world before recycling was thought about. Thanks for another good read.
Brenda has wonderful memories of the broom straw. I liked her details so I could imagine it as I read. She gave me a chuckle with her “rich people broom” and “broom-on-the-stick envy”. I remember swiping the floors with a straw broom on a stick, but we weren’t rich. It also reminded me of the first time I saw the a vacuum and had vacuum envy. What’s funny is as an adult I searched everywhere for an old fashion straw broom to use on my porches because the straw seemed to sweep dust and dirt off better than the synthetic fiber type brooms. Now days it’s hard to find a well made straw broom that won’t fall apart after the first couple of uses. Thank you for sharing Brenda’s story with us.
Oh my gosh, so many memories this brought back. I used to help my Grandma gather broom straw and make her brooms. We would wind it (shake it) to get the fuzzies off and take handfuls and trim the stem ends level. She would take old inner tubes from tires and cut long strips about 1.5 to 2 inches wide and wrap around the stem end to make the handle. We would use it til it got really short and stiff and then we would make another one. I still have the very last straw broom we made hanging in my house. I tied a beautiful blue ribbon around it and hung it up in her honor. So many memories, thank you again Tipper for reminding me. If I can remember it, I will take a picture of her last broom and send to you.
Where along the Little Tennessee? That’s where I grew up.
I call it broom sedge “broom sage”. I’ve seen it tied in a bundle like the author describes and bound to a handle for sweeping without stooping.
Broom sage/sedge/straw grows best in worn out farmland. It loves the poorest of soils. The higher the “acidity” the better it grows. One of the best ways to kill it is to fertilize it. Regular applications of lime and phosphate will eventually kill it.
I use broom sedge as an anemometer. All I have to do is look out the kitchen window to see how hard and in which direction the wind is blowing,
We didn’t have enough open fields for broom sage to grow in my hometown. The flat land was used for planting vegetable gardens and it was not unusual to see a hillside cleared for corn leaving no room for sage. Mom had homemade brooms that were made by someone else. I think her uncle Wilson made them to hand out when he came home to visit from another town.
These are the simple yet wonderful memories of times gone by. All it takes to bring them back as clear as the day you committed them to memory is a smell, a gold field, just something to spark up the WAY BACK MACHINE and throw you right on in there for a moment of joy filled memories that time or loss can never take away. I’d love to gather my own broom sage makings and put one together myself! I’d be proud of my work and the fact I don’t have to rely on a store. We are heading back to this time I do believe out of necessity.
When I was a boy, a short walk from our house was a large unused pasture that was almost entirely broom sage. On nice days I would lay down in that wonderful broom sage and be hidden from everything except a few birds. Just watching the clouds and letting the world go by.
Growing up we had three kinds of brooms, broom straw brooms used inside the house for sweeping, corn shuck brooms for scrubing the floors in the house and the porch and yard brooms made from small saplings for sweeping the leaves from around the house.
Great memories.
That’s an interesting memory, at least to me. But from what I have read, broomsedge grows in the east & I was raised in the Midwest during the 50s. And we always had store bought brooms for the kitchen & the porch stoops and a vacuum cleaner for the rest of the house.
My late sister was born in 1950 and as eldest it was my job to do floors since I was closest to them, according to my less than 5 foot mother.
Enjoyable post and wonderful example of “make do with what you’ve got.” When I think of broom sedge two recollections of pure delight come to mind.
One is an early morning setting with a good bird dog on point, holding a covey of quail in the midst of a field of broom sedge sparkling as the sun touches a billion transitory diamonds set in place by overnight frost.
The second is the pure joy of “sledding” in a sloping field of broom sedge on a sunny afternoon in late November or early December. Our sled was a big piece of cardboard. There was no steering and no brakes, but my could you fly over that slick sedge. We had a perfect field next to the house, although the slope ended in a tangle of floribunda roses and blackberry briars, so the end of each ride was a bit problematic. A 12-year-old boy simply didn’t care. There was fun to be had.
Thanks for resurrection of a couple of grand memories, and I’m betting there are others with similar ones. Alas, quail are purt nigh gone and those sledding days seem to belong to a world we have lost.
I love your comment about a bird dog on point. Bird hunting was one of the joys of my life, not so much about the shooting as it was watching a good pair of bird dogs working especially on a beautiful Indian summer day in a field of broom straw. To me nothing much prettier. Remember Havilah Babcock writing in one of his stories if faced with going to bird dogs on point or a pretty woman in a nightgown, he thought he would go to the bird dogs, but he was not sure, he had never been faced with that temptation. Me neither!
Your sledding days bring back memories of sledding down Sharp’s Ridge in the Winter, but our problem at the bottom wasn’t rose bushes or briars, but rather the hawg farmer’s barb (bob) wire fence. Bailing out at the right time could certainly be problematic, timing was everything, ha ha. Yes, those days are long gone, and belong to a different world.
Your picture is gorgeous! Once when driving the Blue Ridge Parkway, we stopped at the museum and I bought a spider broom. I’m so scared of spiders and Florida has it’s full share. I admired the handmade broom, tall (from the crooked branch handle), very skinny (from tightly woven and braided attachment to handle) and perfect for swatting those large spiders off the ceiling and also wiping away the webs that grow in high the ceiling lights and corners. That was over 56 years ago and it still in great shape, hanging off a hook in my kitchen – useful and beautifully made. I’m so glad to read of Brenda’s memories so that my friend ‘the spider broom’ has even more history and story with it.
Good post! I remember going to Old Brasstown Church as a small child and watching the men clear the broom sage off the cemetery before Decoration Day. I can remember my Granddad Nick Byers and his brother Uncle Lawrence tying their horses to trees beside the cemetery. They rode over from Ivy Log as neither ever learned to drive.
Anytime I see golden fields such as this, I am taken back to my childhood days and the area in which I grew up. I romped around woods and fields such as this for hours on end with nothing but my Red Ryder BB gun, my dog Babe, and perhaps a pack of Saltine crackers. Babe loved to run ahead, tracking and sniffing in these golden fields. Just for kicks, and to see her reaction, I would duck down and hide amongst the thick stalks of gold, and eventually call her name to watch her try to find me. She would dart to and fro, stop, look around over the tops of the grass, and then run around some more. Eventually she would find me, panting, excitedly crawling and licking on me, and looking a little sheepish as if she were embarrassed that she had lost me. Babe was a mix between a German Shepherd and a Black Lab, had a little brown spot over each eye. I picked her up from a litter one day walking home from school, and had her from the 3rd grade all the way to my last final in college.
A different time and a different life! Happy Birthday Grannie!
I have always heard it called broom straw. My maternal grandparents used the short stubby brooms made from this grass, made exactly like mentioned above. I don’t remember them ever having a store bought broom even on up into the 60’s. The older farmers in my area like to plant their watermelons and cantaloupes in a plowed up broom straw field. They say there will not be as much grass in their fields of watermelons if you do this. My neighbor does this each year, he plants several acres of watermelons to sell each year and owns enough land to do be able to rotate his fields. The broom straw will come right back up if the field is it left unworked for a year or so. This is unheard of today, but the grandaddy I mentioned above would used a broom straw broom and mix up arsenic in a bucket made from an old 5gal lard tub and brush the tops of his Irish potatoes and maybe some other things in his garden with it to kill the bugs. This and a lot of other things he did, now considered unhealthy killed him. He was only 83 years old when he died.
Beautiful to watch as it waves in the breeze… As a teenager, my husband worked in fields of broom ‘corn’ (broom straw, sage) in hot, muggy Oklahoma summers. Oh, my – the stories of itchy seeds and fuzz down the back of his wet shirt as he’d twist, break and stack it. Sure makes one appreciate the store-bought brooms of today.
Loved the video from yesterday, but Granny’s Birthday was the highlight for me. She is such a gem. Looking forward to today’s read. God Bless…ps, sure wish I had some of that dirt/compost you guys had delivered.