My First Job #BEDM

I didn't have a steady job until I was out of high school but during a few of my summer breaks from school, I walked beans and detasseled corn for Garst Seed Company.  See, along with factories, central IL is full of fields... lots and lots of fields... that are full of soybeans and corn.  Crews of people, many times young people earning summer money, spend all day in them walking up and down rows and doing the tasks they are assigned depending on what is growing there.

If it's soybeans in the fields, then we walked with a crazy looking hook that was sharp not only on the inside of the hook part but also at the end.  We used that to remove any stray corn and other weeds that might be growing there.

I still have a scar on one of my legs from slicing up through a
weed and then up through the front of my leg.  Ouch.

Detasseling corn and pollinating is a little more involved. I actually liked that much better than walking beans because with the corn towering over my head, I was in the shade a lot more and in the baking heat of summer that made a huge difference.  Sometimes we detasseled, which means exactly that... we pulled the tassels off the tops of certain rows of corn stalks. Sometimes we "pollinated" which meant we had to put tiny paper bags over the budding corn silks on certain rows of corn stalks. It all had to do with making sure that only certain rows of corn released their pollen and only certain rows with corn silks uncovered would receive the pollen.

It was hard work but I'm not afraid of hard work or getting dirty. I never have been.


Hard work is good for the body and soul.