Up at 6 am to find Angie and Jayde loading sheep into their air conditioned trailer while T Jon and the guys unloaded the watermelons they picked yesterday. The days start early and end late at The Newman’s. Right now the watermelon business is hot being July 4th. Because of this years heavy rains most of the watermelon crop was lost. The fact that T Jon planted his watermelons on a hillside while most others growers planted in lower fields means the Newman’s melons are in high demand, but T Jon’s prices remain the same.

I’ve been invited to go to the watermelon fields this morning. They have a six acre field behind Mrs. Harper’s House about 30 minutes away. So far they figure they have picked about 5,000 melons since early June and maybe have another 3,000 sitten on the ground. I have heard some stories about Mrs. Harper, her 16 gauge shotgun and her prolific use of this particular weapon from her back door. Watermelon picken and a 91 year old woman with a shotgun, sounds like a good time to us and off we go.

By 9 am; T Jon, his nephew Jake, the other Jake, and Dakota are out in the field. There is an orderly plan to watermelon picken- T Jon walks the field checking the melons, cutting the vines on the ripe ones and points to them. The two Jakes pick ‘em up and load the trailer behind the tractor driven by Dakota. It’s hard work in the hot humid sun and not many breaks. Once in a while a melon accidentally breaks open and out come the knives … They will load over 400 melons today.

Under a large open sided metal roof sits two flatbeds full of past picked melons resting on beds of straw. As the day progresses, peddlers come to buy melons and the activity in the field slows down as the melons are sold and loaded onto pickups.
It is under this roof we first meet Sister Reiddie Harper, Grandma to the folks around the Newman Household……

The Boogah Camp

Boogah Signs

Dakota on Tractor

DMK and the Watermelon Men

Watermelon Toss

Jake

The other Jake