For your reading enjoyment, we continue to publish Rambling Vines by the late Marylea Vines as she recalls events and names of Corning folks from many years ago. We are currently in the year 1990

We are winding up for another great 4th of July celebration and it is going to be upon us before we hardly know it. I don’t know how many C.H.S. class reunions are going to be held, but I do know the class of 1940 is planning a get-together. Plan to be here on the 4th, there’s something for everyone of all ages, plus all the good food, music and meeting and greeting old friends.

Well, I’ve done it again. I’ve completed another year here at The Courier. It was quite some time ago that I started working here and I well remember that it was on a Friday and the boss asked, “Do you want me to pay you today, or do you want to let it be added to next week.” I didn’t stutter, I said “I’ll take it now” because as far as I was concerned there wasn’t going to be any next week. My family spent the whole weekend trying to talk me into going back to work on Monday and when Monday morning came, my mama literally made me come to work. After the first week things started getting better and before long Summer was over and I didn’t want to go back to school for my Senior year… so we had another weekend filled with arguments for and against going back to school. As usual, I lost.

The next day after graduation in the Spring, I was back at The Courier ready to work full time… and here I am! Something about this place causes it to get a hold on a person, sort of like taking a drink out of Black River.

Why does Corning just sit here and take what everyone else puts out? Other towns sure don’t, and they don’t have hog-wallows at the main intersection leading into town! I hate to complain all the time, but shucks, if people would just automatically do the things that needs to be done, I wouldn’t have anything to complain about. We’ve had a lot of people working hard to make Corning look better and low and behold, what do we have right out on the highway for everyone to see (and sometimes get into) a mud hole along the edge of the highway at the junction. And when it is not full of water, the place is littered with pieces of metal, glass, limbs… we should ask the Arkansas Highway Department to do whatever needs to be done out there.

Another Memorial Day has come and gone. I remember when we used to have a parade that formed at the courthouse and marched to the cemetery where a memorial ceremony was held. I can also remember when it used to be called Decoration Day and folks went to the cemetery either on that day or the Sunday before to clean their family graves… that was back in the days before cemetery associations were formed to insure better care of all our area cemeteries. (We owe all that to the late Charles R. Black who got the associations organized). We used to meet my Aunt Pearlie’s family at Richwood Cemetery each year and it took us all day to clean all the Vines, Hays, and Blaton graves. We took food and at noon we stopped work and went up around the schoolhouse for a picnic lunch under the shade of the big trees. We always took empty fruit jars and water along and when the graves were cleared (scraped clean) of briars, tall grass and limbs, a bouquet was placed at the head of each grave. We don’t have to do that anymore, someone does it for us, whether we pay them or not and that’s not right. Folks who have loved ones buried in cemeteries should help with the cost of upkeep. Only those of us who have seen our cemeteries (including the Corning cemetery) grown up in weeds, tree sprouts and berry briars, can fully appreciate the dedication of members of our cemetery associations.

People have been asking about Putter. He’s just fine, got a big Summer lined up with his first 4th of July Celebration in Corning. He’s also got a birth anniversary coming up in August and I have to start thinking about something special for that.

Can you remember your first café-bought hamburger? I can and I well remember I didn’t like it. We didn’t have hamburgers too often at our house but when we did, they were better than anything that can be bought in this day and time. They way mama made them was to cube a couple Irish potatoes and mix in with the meat. She was doing it to stretch the meat, but we didn’t know that, we just knew that hamburgers away from home weren’t half as good as what mama made. We would take a bun that had been kept warm in the oven, smear mustard and pickle relish on it, and top the meat with a thick slice of onion. A restaurant hamburger was where I got my first taste of dill pickles and let me tell you that was a shock! Up until then I had never heard of anything but sweet pickles because that was the kind mama liked and that was the kind she made.

Store-bought cottage cheese is something else that I can hardly eat… it takes a lot of pepper to get it down. Mama made our cottage cheese by putting some milk on the stove and doing something to it, then she would pour it into a small cloth bag and let it hang on the clothes line and drip for about a half day… the chickens would gather and peck around where the drip hit the ground. Once the cottage cheese was firm, she would slice it and put it on a plate. Nothing better than walking around eating a thick slice of cottage cheese with lots of salt and pepper sprinkled on it. I’m not kidding, I couldn’t believe the sight of the fist store-bought cottage cheese I ever saw… all broken up into little pieces and mushy!

That was almost as bad as the first margarine that they came out with. It was white and looked just like pure lard and people didn’t like it. Right quickly the manufactures came up with the idea of adding a package of coloring with each container of margarine. The whole idea was to let the margarine soften, add the coloring, and stir. Consequently, folks had “stripped” margarine because there would be streaks ranging all the way from dark red to pale yellow in color which was another drawback to buying margarine. Before long, all the companies came out with margarine that really and truly looked like pure butter and you know what? I can hardly stand to eat pure butter anymore. It’s all in what a person gets used to.