Swingers for Pennies

We begged our parents to buy us a swing-set.  You know, the one with the glider, and slide.  We told them that some of the other kids in town had one.  Being very frugal, as many depression era parents are, Mom told us we would have to save our own money.  We rode our bikes, which were purchased second hand from my cousin's bicycle shop in Coffeyville, all around town to pick up old pop bottles.  We couldn't believe that people would toss out a perfectly good pop bottle on the side of the road.  Back in those days, a pop bottle was built to last, and recycle.  When tossed from a moving vehicle, they could land intact, unless they hit a bridge or a road sign.  We would pick up the bottles, and turn them in at the local grocery store for 3 cents.  We were making a killing.

Mom told us that if we would dig "Snake Root", also know as Black Sampson, we could sell it in Coffeyville.  Just in case you don't know, Snake Root in the Native American equivalent of Novocaine.  If you chew on a piece of the root, your mouth will go numb, and you will drool like a rabid dog.  We dug all of the snake root in our pasture, moved on to Uncle Elmer's pasture, and got permission from a couple of local farmers to dig in their hay meadows.  We would lay the roots on top of our chicken house to dry.  When it was dry, we would load it all into burlap sacks, which we called gunny sacks (aka burlap sacks).  Mom hauled our diggings to Coffeyville, and sold it for 90 cents per pound.  When we were digging, we could see the dollar signs, but little did we realize that a dried snake root weighs about 100th of an ounce.  A gunny sack full only weighs around 5-6 pounds.  It's a lot of work for a little reward, but it just kept adding up.

We would turn in our earnings, and Mom would put it in a jar.  If memory serves me well, it was a gallon jar.  When the jar was full, we all jumped in the old Dodge station wagon, and headed to Dewey.  We walked in to the Western Auto store and the look on the owner's face was priceless.  We bought our first and only swingset with a jar full of pennies.