Family History
Hanging from the Rafters
The journey of a kid from the tobacco fields of Southern Kentucky to the mountains of North Carolina
“Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.” — Thomas Edison
Off in the distance, the waves of heat are visible as the sun beats down on the fields of various plants. A long winding dirt road leads to a lonely house out in the middle of nowhere. My dad’s shirt drenched in sweat and his blue jeans turned red by the clay. His chaveta knife slices through the thick tobacco leaves as he works his way down the row. To his right is his best friend who hasn’t seen his parents in weeks. On the left is his future brother, in-law. The workdays are long, and the pay is practically nothing, but around here, it is the way the world goes round.
When I was younger, I remember driving for what seemed like hours down roads that on either side were lined with thick leaves that drifted aimlessly with the wind. My dad in the front seat spitting what my mom told me was “dirt” at the time into an old water bottle. The way the fields of sprouting leaves were lined for miles served as something to look at as the time passed, but for my dad, they held a much more significant purpose. They brought back the best and worst memories that were buried deep in his mind — memories of what so easily could have been his entire life.
My dad’s go-to threat every time I got out of line was that he was going to send me to live with my mom’s dad and work the tobacco fields all summer. For my dad, this wasn’t just the threat of terribly hard work for hours a day. To him, this was a chance for me to grow up and learn life lessons that would stick with me for forever. He wanted me to learn how to do hard work even with no specific goal or end in sight. For him, his work ethic was a means of bettering his life and the lives of his future children, and he wanted me to have that same trait.
While my dad never sent me to live with my mom’s parents, I often wondered what it would’ve been like to spend my days working the various farms in Logan County, Kentucky — waking up early in the morning before the sun rises. Hearing the horn of an old 68' Bronco, driven by a best friend, waiting out-front to pick me up. Sure the days would be long and hot, but it would make the cool river water at the end of the day all the better. The lessons learned would carry you through the rest of your life, and the bonds you form will be for life.
My dad’s life has not been a straight line with a clear end in sight. His first job was with GE in a plant based out of Madisonville, Kentucky. He worked with heavy machinery for long hours and low pay. His experience working on farms all his life, showed to be useful. He proved himself to be a persevering worker, and as the years went by, he moved up through the chain of command. With almost every promotion, he was forced to move hundreds of miles away, something that no one in our family has had to do.
Throughout the years he has been forced to move to 5 different states, each farther away from his home than the last. For a father of an infant in a family that hasn’t lived outside Logan County for generations, this had to be one of the most daunting tasks imaginable. Through the process of this project I would like to learn more about his journey to where he is at now, and how his humble beginnings influenced his life.
“I wouldn’t change it for anything”
A conversation with Michael Meguiar
The drive down to Greensboro was one that didn’t include much talking. My dad and I were headed to a baseball tournament and in the back was my friend who happened to play on the same team and needed a ride. The small talk that occurred was awkward at times since my dad and my friend had never met, but as the pleasantries died down each of us grew silent. My dad and I don’t get a lot of alone time and weekends together on baseball trips like this one are perfect times for us to bond.
The cool air of an uncontrollable hotel room air conditions chills the room after a long day of baseball. I am sitting on the rock hard mattress doing homework when I suddenly remember I need to interview my dad about his experiences as a child to help me better understand his upbringing. He didn’t seem overly eager to turn off the T.V since his favorite team, Kentucky, had just taken the lead over rival Florida, but eventually, he agreed.
Interview Questions:
- Could you please state your full name and date of birth?
Michael Cole McGuire, December 11th, 1974.
2. What did you like about living in a small town Kentucky?
Well, I pretty much knew everyone in the entire school. My dad was, your grandfather, the principal, and everyone was kind of like a small family, so everyone went to church together, sports were huge, you know that’s where everyone got together it’s just like a little family.
3. What was it like working on a farm/tobacco farm?
It was the hardest work you could possibly imagine. It was at the end of the day completely exhausting, but we worked with our friends. Usually me and Timmy Tucker and John Martis and Ethan, my cousin, and Scott Reed and at the end of the day when we were done, it didn’t seem so hard. We were working together all day, so it didn’t make the work seem so hard because we had so much fun. We would tell jokes about things that happened on the farm all the time, and you know. We get to drive equipment, and we were with friends. Hard work can be fun when you’re with friends.
4. Why do you think small towns across America are dying?
I don’t know that small towns are dying. There are lots of small towns, where I think the economy gets hard, jobs are scarce, and people need to go to bigger towns. Used to be at the hardware store downtown, the restaurants, the small little mom-and-pop appliance stores all employed people. Now you know you can get everything you need from Amazon, so those small mom-and-pop shops close up, and that creates fewer jobs because people go to bigger cities to find work.
5. What specific memories do you have from working on farms?
So when you’re housing tobacco, you have to climb these tiers that go all the way up. There are these rungs that hang that you climb, then whoever is on the bottom has to handle every single stick of tobacco. So you grab it and hand it to the next guy, and that guy pulls it up and hands it to the next guy. So the guy on the bottom has to touch every single stick, and the guy at the top only has to touch every four or five, so it’s easier. So we used to get to the barn, and as soon as the tractor stopped, we would jump off, then jump up and grab the rafters. The first one to climb to the top got to be at the top and got the easiest job. There was one of our friends who was probably two stories, probably a story high and he fell one day. His brother was on the bottom, and when he fell, he fell flat on his back. We all thought he broke his back. His brother was just like get up you ain’t hurt, you know just real hard on him because it’s his older brother, but it was just like things like that. It was fun racing. When you’re housing tobacco, you have these wood-boring bees that put holes in all the posts, and we would get in there with sticks, 2-inch-wide sticks and we bang on the posts, and these bees would come flying out, and we would fight bumblebees. You got stung, but it was fun, it was an adrenaline rush. I could probably tell you a hundred of these stories.
6. Do you still keep in touch with your friends you made working?
Every day, I’ll talk to Ethan and Timmy probably every other day, I talk to John Martis probably less, but probably a few times a month. We’ve actually got a group chat and we were texting in it today about the Kentucky game.
7. What made you want to leave?
I wouldn’t say there’s anything that made me want to leave, but you know I got my degree, and I couldn’t make a living long-term in Russellville, so I had to move, but yeah nothing really made me leave. You know our family is there. It would have been nice to stay, but you know I don’t know what we would have done for money.
8. What were the steps you took to get to where you are now?
Man, so I got my degree in environmental and I didn’t do work in that field for like less than a year, but I worked really hard and I was pretty good with people and I had a mentor that kind of took me under his wing and said hey why don’t you try to be a supervisor. So when me and Gwen were married I went to third shift and I worked third shift as a supervisor in Madisonville and from there I just worked really hard and was loyal and tried to take care of people and made really good networks and all my entire career every role I’ve had to play the manager’s role. In Chicago and Las Vegas and now this much larger role that I’m in now. Just work hard, take care of people, perform, deliver results, and you do all those things and people find you rather than you finding them. I didn’t need to fight for jobs and compete for jobs. Nearly every job I’ve had people have tapped me on the shoulder and said hey can you come do this.
9. Do you ever have any desire to go back?
There’s a part of me that when you went to Western (Kentucky) a couple weeks ago, that thought how weird would it be if you are at Western and we went back. I don’t know if we would because the girls (my sisters) are already here ,but I would like to have a place there and spend a lot more time there.
10. Did you ever consider not moving away?
Well, so when I went to college, I was like 2 hours from home at Murray State, but then when I got my first job, I lived in Nashville. That was two, like two and a half hours away, but after I left for college, I never came back. Aunt Lori moved back and she loves it and she wouldn’t live anywhere else and she’s got a lot of things I’m envious of but there’s also things that we’ve been able to experience that she hasn’t so I don’t think I would change it.
11. How do you think your childhood influenced who you are now?
So your granddaddy was pretty awesome. He was hard on us, he was strict, but he set a good example and I think he had a lot to do with building my character and memaw as well. They both just were having a family together. They were always together and we didn’t have drama in the house. There wasn’t a split family; we were just together. We were always raised in the Christian faith. I don’t know, we just knew the right way to live I don’t know how to put it.
12. What was it like working for your future wife’s grandfather?
So you’re talking about Gwen’s grandfather. I worked for him before I knew who Gwen was. The first time I met him, Ethan and I were working across town at a farm and we’ve been working all day and it was hot. So we are driving back to Ethan’s house, and we looked over and he and Rose Catherine (Gwen’s grandmother) were in the field by themselves and he had turned the wagon over. And this huge stack of hay had fallen over and those two were in the field by themselves picking it up and Ethan pulled over and we help them and that’s the first time I met him. Then we started working for him probably a few months later and he was just always wide open like he was old but he could work circles around us. He always drove the tractor real fast, faster than we could keep up. You know he was a hard worker, he was tough, he was demanding, and he would get on to us if we were loafing or doing the wrong things. He was tough
13. Are you glad that this is where you grew up?
Absolutely, growing up in a small town, but I wouldn’t even just say growing up in a small town. Just having really close friends that had similar values, but honestly I could tell you working on a farm taught me everything about hard work because you couldn’t quit. You just have to work through it. I wouldn’t change it for anything. It’s a big part of who I am
14. Do you think that same lifestyle would work in today’s world?
I do if more people would do it. I think you know today there’s just not that many kids that want to do that manual physical hard work like there’s no time. Your school is ten times harder than mine ever was, your sports, I didn’t have. I was a great baseball player just like you are, but I didn’t have travel baseball. I played maybe 15–20 games a summer and that was in the afternoons after we worked all day so I think so the specialization, the social life there’s just so much for y’all today that you don’t have time to do it, like when would you possibly have time to go work 12 hours today. You can maybe do it one or two days in the summer and that’s it. You’re just too busy and that’s what prevents people now from doing it
15. What do you think the future of Logan County looks like?
I actually think it looks pretty good; the economy is actually doing pretty well. It’s right in-between Nashville Tennessee and Bowling Green and both of these towns are booming. It’s very expensive to live in those towns, so I think small towns like Russellville that are close to the bigger cities are more affordable. There’s been some larger jobs coming there, but the small farmers are all gone because what happens is these big farmers corporate Farmers come out and take all the land and they work it. Uncle Wesley, he works for a guy that owns tens of thousands of Acres. He owns probably all of Logan County, Todd County, Warren County. Like he’s a big corporate farmer, so the small guy that you know has a, like Papa, he’s got probably three or four hundred acres there’s very very few of them left
16. Do you recommend someone take the path that you took?
Yes, I mean it’s hard, you know. In order to do that though you’ve got to give up something that you’re passionate about, like baseball you know it’s like I do wish. Ethan and I talk about it all the time. Your cousin Braxton, who lives in Logan County, has never done anything like what we did and I think it would be really good. Even if it was just a couple weeks and just do what we did. I did it in college when I went to Murray State. I found a farmer in Murray and that’s how I made money I can make enough money in the summer of college to last me until Christmas. I could strip tobacco and make money at Christmas that would last me almost till summer
17. Did you ever question your decision to leave?
I mean yeah, it crosses my mind every once in a while to take the path like aunt Laurie, where she went to college and came back, but you know I think we would have been happy no matter where we are now. That’s where the lord took us and gave us the opportunity to go to Chicago, and you know work for GE for a couple of years and that’s just every move we’ve made you know we kind of put it in his hands
18. How has working on a farm made you a better dad?
I think it just showed me how to work hard and so I don’t do the physical labor that I did back then, but I’m setting an example of commitment and hard work and sticking with something and succeeding. I think that’s setting an example for y’all, but I think it also creates some, you know we have some conservative values. In means of being Thrifty being tight yeah we didn’t have a whole lot and so working and earning money earning your keep and having good values
19. Were there ever any times where you wanted to quit?
Oh yeah especially because you know when I was a kid there were so many things you could be doing instead, but I worked primarily for one main guy actually there were two, but there was really one-man guy most of the time, and it was me and Ethan and Timmy and a couple of others. He was depending on us, it wasn’t like they had ten other employees they could hire. They were counting on a bunch of high school kids on hand cutting tobacco and stacking straw so if we didn’t show up that day he couldn’t get his work done so I think that your being there on time and commitment was important
20. How well off was your family growing up?
So I never really knew that we didn’t have much. Mom and Daddy lived in the same house that they are still in. Daddy was a principal, and he didn’t make a lot of money and mom was a secretary, so she really didn’t make a lot of money so everything was really tight and you know. I really didn’t know at the time. The things that stick out to me you know after school when I was a kid I had to stick around after school because Daddy was a principal and every day I would ask for a Coke, and it was $0.50 at the Coke machine. Maybe once every couple of weeks he could give me the $0.50. I could remember thinking when he did; now today when we’re at a ballgame we have a case of Cokes a case of waters. That does worry me because do we take what our family has gotten in life for granted and do we you know are we spoiled a little bit now? You know Mom and Daddy lived in an era I can remember where our interest rates were crazy high, and you know they couldn’t afford their house and they couldn’t afford a lot of things. Going out to eat was a big deal, we did it like twice a month, and we would go to KFC or Pizza Hut. That was a night out, we would usually do it after church on Sundays
21. How financially stable were you after you got out of college?
I got a good job right out of college, I wouldn’t say I made a lot of money, but for someone with a four-year degree, I did okay. You know with the technical degree working for a company, Gwen was teaching. We probably together made as much money in the first few years after we got married then my parents did when they were in their 40s, so you know we’re able to buy a house really early. Wasn’t anything fancy but it was all right, but you know we did okay. We also didn’t need a whole lot since it’s just you and us and as all of you came along y’all are expensive, and y’all had hobbies, and we had Hobbies. It’s definitely changed
22. How involved with the church was your family growing up?
Every Sunday morning, we were in church. Sunday school at 9:30 church at 11 and then we went back Sunday night at six, and we were there every Wednesday. We had church service three times a week, Sunday morning Sunday night and Wednesday night and once a week after school we took the bus and we’d have youth group, so we’re in church at least four times a week and Daddy had a Sunday school class that he teaches. He’s been teaching that class since I was in high school. He’s had it for probably 30 something years i would guess
23. Where is your favorite place you have lived?
People ask me that all the time since we’ve lived in a lot of places, but it’s like saying what’s your favorite food because it depends. One day it might be a hamburger, one day maybe a steak, one day maybe a lobster. Each day is different. I’ve liked them all just depends. There’s different aspects. I’ll probably like Asheville the most because it’s where we’ve been the longest and it feels like the most home. We’ve had the most friends, and y’all are established. I’d probably say Asheville.
Oral History Reflection Questions:
How does your tradition-bearer’s story relate to your community in both the present and the past? How does it relate to you?
My dad’s story relates to my current community here at christ school because here we are in a small community where everyone knows each other. Each day we wake up, go to job, school, and sports and build bonds that will last a lifetime. Then one day we will all leave to take on bigger and better things. His story relates to me because when I go off to college and get a job one day, I too will have to leave my family behind.
How did your perception of community history change, from before the interview to now?
Before the interview, I was under the impression that Logan County was a place that at any moment, could collapse from economic instability. After the conversation with my dad I learned that everyone in the community counts on each other. My dad believes that as long as people keep supporting the community that it will never fade away.
How did this project inspire you to learn more about your family and community?
As I learned more about my dad and his childhood, it inspired me to learn more about the life and changing ways of small towns in rural Kentucky. I learned how interconnected each person in the community is and how each person counts on the other to do their job. For instance, when my dad worked farms when he was younger, the farmers relied on him and his friends to help with the work. Without them, the farmers would have no way of cultivating their crops.
What were some of the challenges you faced during this project? What could you do differently in your next oral history interview?
Some challenges I found during this project were that it was difficult to trace my family lineage since there are so few records about my family. It was challenging to find specific people, but based on stories told by my parents and grandparents; I could conclude that my family has stayed in/near Logan country for many many generations.
If the roles were reversed and you became the tradition-bearer, what stories would you like to tell?
If I were the tradition-bearer I would tell stories of how I moved states every two years and how it affected who I have become. I would also tell stories of my time at Christ School and the lessons I learn from being at a boarding school.
My research goals for this paper are to learn more about the farming industry in South-Western Kentucky and more specifically the tobacco industry. Through google books I have found a couple books that I believe will help me throughout this process as well as some online articles that talk about the issues with small town America today.
Sources
- Harris, Rachel L., and Lisa Tarchak. “Small-Town America Is Dying. How Can We Save It?” The New York Times, The New York Times, 22 Dec. 2018.
- Lowrey, Annie. “What’s the Matter With Eastern Kentucky?” The New York Times, The New York Times, 26 June 2014.
- Strupp, Alton. “Kentucky Tobacco: 10 Years after the Buyout.” Journal, LCJ, 13 Oct. 2014.
- Engle, Jeremy. “Do You Think the American Dream Is Real?” The New York Times, The New York Times, 12 Feb. 2019.
