Foxfire books

[theresehirko]

I got all eleven of them from the library this week after one of my professors mentioned them to me. Although I don't know when I would butcher a hog or set up a still to make moonshine, I am planning on reading them and buying them at a used book store. One never knows when I may have to help my ailing neighbors butcher their hog (no one has any around us) or make moonshine (for medicinal purposes only since we live in a dry county). At this point in our lives, our little "homestead" is only one acre and I have not had success in growing our own food, except for herbs. We are being as sustainable and self-reliant as we can be. One big problem with our garden failing is that both of us are at the hospital for long days and the weekends were the only days the garden got any attention. Thank goodness for the farmers market.

I heartily recommend this collection of books for any of you who haven't read them yet.

[msta999]

Thanks, I have heard the books mentioned before, but didn't know what kind of books they were. I'll have to look them up on ebay. Is that the name of the set? Foxfire?

[theresehirko]

That's the name. You'll see Foxfire: The book is the first one, then Foxfire 2, Foxfire 3, etc.

[denham]

That's interesting, I just saw Foxfire 1 and 2 and my local half price books. I had heard of them vaguely but then saw the moonshine still thing and 'faith healing' advertised on the cover and I thought they weren't really what I was looking for. I guess I should have looked closer.

I did however find 4 gems in the clearance section: Breads, Basic Plumbing, The Book of Country Living, and Successful Small Game Hunting. All 4 for $5 and some change. :)

[theresehirko]

Once I'm through with school, i might give the moonshine thing an experimental try. Not to sell it, of course, but to just see if it can be done. What does one use? Wheat, potatoes, etc? I've never made moonshine before.

[denham]

Seems like corn would be a possibility, what with 'corn liquor' and all. I'd imagine you could use just about anything that had some starch to it though.

[bookwormom]

worth reading. Not only a how to do but a sort of documentary of Appalachian culture. Foxfire is the spooky light that can be formed on a decaying stump that used to scare the weary traveler (on foot, at night) of yesteryear. I read them all when they first came out , I guess about 30 years ago used to talk with my mother in law about that stuff, she knew (and forgot) a lot.

[theresehirko]

My dad, who is a lawyer, says not call him when the feds burst through my front door to arrest me for bootlegging. People make wine and beer at home. Heck they sell kits to do that. Why would making moonshine be any different? I'm not going to sell it or anything.

[tufhelp]

It is against the law for one reason - TAXES, the revenuers want their pound (and a half) of flesh - no taxy no whiskey simple as that. They make it real nasty for those that want to make it, regardless of the intent to sell or not, to keep all of us sheeple in line.

[theresehirko]

Bob said if I wanted to distill something, I could distill water and see the experiment in a lawful way. Oh well, I thought it would be a good chemistry experiment.

[Faye]

I have the whole set and love reading them and learning how the people of appalachia lived. I was raised in rural Alabama and a lot of things in those books are a lot like some of the things I remember and that my grandparents told me about.

[kawalekm]

I'm shamelessly frugal and want to buy the entire set for only 1$ each. So far I've found Foxfire 1, 2, 3, 4, and 9; paying 1$ for each. Well, half way there!
Michael

[Faye]

Actually, you're not quite half way yet. I have volumes 1 through 12. I will keep a look our for them. The flea market in Mobile has a huge used book place and a couple smaller ones also.

[MooseToo]

interesting books - a lot of nostalgia and some really good info - however, as a homesteading "guide", they don't compare to carla emery's works -

[msta999]

I found this on Craigslist. There is a foxfire book and some other, what look like, good books. Take a look, this guy is selling them online.....atleast is looks like he his.

http://seattle.craigslist.org/tac/clt/637587722.html

[LeatherneckPA]

What does one use? *Wheat, potatoes, etc?

Wheat, barley, corn, and rye can all be used to make various forms of whiskey. Obviously, grapes and berries, and dandelions make wines. Potatoes make vodka. Brandies are made by distilling wines made from fruits. Ouzo is made by distilling pour grain alcohol (white lightening) with spice flavorings including anise, cinnamon, and coriander. Saki is made from rice. You can even ferment milk to create an alcoholic beverage or sorts.

In the OLD Marine Corps we would save the tins of fruit and fruitcake for our platoon brewmaster, who would brew us up some "pruno" when we were on long floats aborad Navy ships.

And I have seen inmates make alcohol out of grapefruit, tomato sauce, soft drink syrup, and pretty much anything else they can get their hands on. Two fellas I knew in the Lewisburg penitentiary once made their booze in their toilet, just mixing their morning fruit and Frosted Flakes cereal into the water and letting it sit covered for about a week in mid-summer. It was a couple of weeks before we figured out how they were doing it.

[remington]

Great books. Some good stories. Since I have roots in Arkansas I have a little connection to them. I like reading about the old time farm methods especially.

[hillsidedigger]

The information contained in the first and maybe all of the Foxfire Books was gathered and compiled by the students under the direction of one particular professor about 30 to 40 years ago at the Rabun Gap-Nacoochee School, then a private junior college in Northen Rabun County, Georgia located only about 1/4 of a mile from the Georgia-North Carolina state line.

That school is located directly across US Highway 441 from the Dillard House, a family style restaurant where in 1971 the closing scenes for the movie 'Deliverance' were filmed. The school is now a 4 year college or university I think. The Dillard House now has become a 'touron-trap' and with a large campus itself can only be called a home-style food-factory.

The owners of the Dillard House rent a Bed-n-Breakfast old farm house across the creek (headwaters of the Little Tennessee River) from the Dillard House campus.

That old farm house was located on a 70 acre farm and was built by my grandfather about 1910 and is where my father grew up. My father attended the Rabun-Gap Nacoochee school for his final year of high-school (it was a boarding high-school as well as junior college then, but he lived only a 5 minute walk away) and 2 years of junior college about 1931-1934.

He often said back while he was alive in his later years that the Foxfire Books were kind of 'hippyfied'.

Note - While there is still an element of rural living in parts of Rabun County, GA and the adjoining Macon County, NC, both are now dominated by pricey second-home and retirement home subdivisions (including most of my grandfather's former 70 acres) with shopping centers, motels and the likes.

[annabella1]

All the foxfire books are available in the backwoods home magazine on line bookstore here's a link:
http://www.backwoodshome.com/store/files/ssfoxfire.html

[drillkjh]

my mom had a few of thes books when i was a kid i loved them. i could not remember the name i knew it was fox something. well now i know what to look fore.

[msta999]

OOPS! Sorry, I didn't even think to look.

"I was on a quest, don't ya know!" ;D

[theresehirko]

I'm home today with nothing to do buy study. I put a big pot of oak leaves on the stove with water and I'm trying to make a green dye from a recipe in Foxfire 3. Supposedly it will make a green dye. So far it's an olive green color. We'll see how it turns out.

[Dawgus]

I love the Foxfire books. I started reading them some 20 odd years ago, and now we have the entire set, minus one. (forget which one) One of these days I'll get the last one when we visit Lehmans again. We're only 45 minutes away from them but we always end up getting something else there, and forget the book every time we go lol (we can spend all day in that place ;D )
Be careful when ordering them online, as there was a Foxfire magazine too and they were numbered as well.I ordered from an online used book place a while back, and I thought I was getting one of the books, but recieved a magazine by that number instead, oooops. Ah well, it was only $2 and still made for interesting reading.

[msta999]

Dawgus,
thanks for the info on firefox magazines. I almost ordered them, thinking they were the books. They even said magazines, just didn't know there was a difference. Glad I waited.

[kawalekm]

Visited the bookseller again today and got Foxfire 6, again for 1$. Anyone here in Southern California? You've all got to check out the Saturday morning market held at Golden West College in Orange county. Intersection of Edinger and Golden West.
Michael

[denham]

I'm home today with nothing to do buy study. I put a big pot of oak leaves on the stove with water and I'm trying to make a green dye from a recipe in Foxfire 3. Supposedly it will make a green dye. So far it's an olive green color. We'll see how it turns out.

So how did it turn out...inquiring minds want to know!

[theresehirko]

You must have to use a ton of oak leaves to make a good green dye. I let the cotton sit in over night and it barely turned green.

[theresehirko]

BTW, I am home all day today, so I'm going to try boiling yellow onion skins to make a yellow dye. I'll report back.

[denham]

I was just re-reading one of the little house books the other day. Ma used grated carrot to dye her cheese yellow.

[msta999]

I drive by this book store 3 times a week to take my son to soccer and today was the first time I noticed it. I went in and they have used and new books. I asked if they had any of the foxfire books and I was able to pick up 1 & 2 for 6 bucks each. They are the hard cover, so I guess I'll have to work on getting the other ten. It was kind of cool, the young lady (maybe 20-21) new just where they were.

[theresehirko]

I boiled a pot full of yellow onion skins and the water turned a deep yellow. I put some cotton string in it and it let it soak for about an hour. The string turned a really nice shade of yellow.

[sbemt456]

On the Foxfire subject, I had my son check some of the half price book stores in Lexington Kentucky and they all told him the same thing, " We only get one occasionally and we have a waiting list for them a mile long." The clerks have told him they dont know why all of a sudden so many people want those particular books. Well go figure. He may be just 26 yrs old but he can tell them it is to prepare for when the SHTF and his hippy mom wants them.
;D
stella