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"Proof of the Puddin'"
Making Mountain Molasses Brings History Alive
by Carissa Rice
Peggy Harmon skimming molasses (click for interview & photos)
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The making of mountain molasses, or sorghum as some may call it, is an old tradition in Madison County. Recently, two local couples revived this practice. The younger couple, both in their thirties, followed the instruction of Peggy and Nathan Harmon, who were born a generation earlier and who still remember the ways of their parents.
Few know the customary ways - and people - of the mountains of Western North Carolina better than Peggy Harmon, special collections supervisor of the Mars Hill College library. Harmon's family roots grow deep in the mountain region, as one can detect from the special way she pronounces and uses certain words. For example, Harmon often refers to mountain molasses in a plural way, saying "'lasses are sweet," unlike people from beyond the mountains who might say "molasses is sweet." Her family's past and their tall tales bring the history and traditions of the region alive.
Harmon remembers many family and neighborhood gatherings when all would come together to grind cane and boil the thin green juice down into thick brown molasses. However, Harmon never really learned how to do it without her family, even though she had often watched her father and grandparents make the syrupy substance come harvest time in the early fall. After Harmon's father became disabled in 1976, she never again watched anyone make molasses in the old way using a horse-powered mill - until just a few months ago.
This past fall, Harmon once again found herself watching her father's old furnace fire up to boil molasses, thanks to Cathy and Andy Bennett, a young couple who settled on nearby Cargile Branch on land adjacent to property that Nathan Harmon owns. Cathy, originally from Kentucky, and Andy, who grew up in Tennessee, have started a farm there called the Double Tree Farm. They planted cane, or the sorghum plant, and harvested it, but had no way to grind it.
They asked if they could use the Harmons' old mill, furnace, and boiling pan to make the molasses. The Harmons agreed, and the two couples gathered together with several of their friends. Over the course of a few days, they produced molasses using the techniques that Peggy Harmon's grandfathers and father used - with the aid of a horse and the mill, an aged furnace and shed. Seeing her father's old equipment being used after so many years brought back memories to Peggy Harmon of family and childhood. The sweet taste of the fresh molasses also reminded the native North Carolinian of her family's history in the mountains. It gave her the true feeling of success and genuine happiness as she thought of her father.
"That's the proof of the puddin'," Harmon said, as she looked - smiling - at a photograph of a quart jar filled to brim with a fresh run of dark, thick molasses.
Peggy Harmon Interview by Carissa Rice
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