The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1903-10-18
COLLECTION OF G0URDS.
The Many Uses to Which They Were
Put i'm Pioneer Days.

Nashville (Tenn.) American
Miss Susie Gentry, of Franklin. will fur
nish for the Tennessee State exhibit at the
st. Louis worlds fair one of the most in
teresting exhibits that will appear in the
Agricultural building. She has made a study
of the gourd family, the uses of gourds,
and the conditions of their growth. She
has made a collection of all the different
varieties grown in Tennessee. and she has
collected some fine specimens from foreign
countries.
In the earlier stages OF Tennessee ciyii-
zation, when cooperage vessels and glass
ware might have been classed as luxuries,
nature supplied the most essential from
the gOurd family. The Observation-Disclosures
of the present generation were familiar with
the pungah gourd, and they used ii for
many purposes. 1t was the receptacle for
keeping such things as lard, molasses.
sugar, coffee, fruit, eggs, preserves, salt.
and soap. 1t served the purposes of the
modern cans, boxes, jugs, bottles, buckets,
etc.
Legislators valued it so much that they
exempted it by law from sale by execution
for debt. The pungah gourd has no handle,
and the largest size is eight to twelve inches
in height and from fourteen TO eighteen
inches in diameter. large one will hold
one hundred dozen eggs. and one lady of the
early times says she packed her silk wed
ding dress in one of them The next size
a
gourd in the field, for carrying salt to the
stock, etc.
Then comes the gourds with long handles,
some about three feet in length. for dip
ping water from deep springs. and others
approximately in size and shape the britain
MIA or cocoanut dipper. Then follow the
SKINS smaller in size. the darning gourds,
the dancing gourds, which were the spin
ming tops of our forefathers, and the baby
rattlers, the smallest in size. These are
the whisky bottle gourds. in which the early
settlers carried their bottled lightning. al
most exactly the shape of the old-fash ioned
black bottles. There is the quill gourd. in
which the women weavers kept their quilts
by the loom. and gourds in the shape OF
squashes that were used to make Kitchen
utensils, and sometimes jewelry boxes.
There are funnel gourds and the gourds
that were hung poles in the poultry
yard 10 make homes for the martins. There
is the tobacco gourd for storing tobacco
seeds and for tobacco boxes
There are swimmers gourds, substitute
for modern life preservers; the Hercules
club" which looks like baseball bat and
snake gourds, which under the artistic
hand of Miss Gentry have been made to
look SO much like snakes that you can al
most hear them hiss.
There are eourds i'm the shape of goose.
turkey. duck guinea. and chicken eggs that
are colored so naturally that when one Il
placed in the nest as nest egg the fowl
maternity of the gourd Then there is the
orange gourd. just like an orange, and the
Turks cap. that makes beautiful pin
cushion There is the vegetable Lace or
..dishrag gourd." the inside OF which could
be used TO ornament a ladies' hat or 10
wash dishes, etc
Miss Gentry has in her collection a lady s
hat which is strictly an agricultural prod
uct The body OF the hat is vegetable
cream lace: the trimming is flowers made
of grass rope and corn husks, parti-colored,
and ribbons of cotton batting natural color
the whole orDamented with peacock feath.
ers. The sourd takes beautiful finish
and Miss Gentry has vanished and orna-
mented her collection so to make liz ex-
ceedingly attractive well as Instructive
She has banjo made out of gourd and
covered with buckskin, and on a large sugar
gourd is a bar Of music of the old negro
reel. Sugar In de Gourd" One who Is
familiar With the old-time negro would as
sociate with ii Rabbit in de Pea Patch =
and the old-time cotton picking and corr
shucklng and the dance at night in the
cabin on the puncheon floor. or the s1nme;
time negro dances In the moonlight son tn,
lawn