In reality John should hardly had any time to relax

[jason88cubss]

We would see him eating breakfast in the morning then going to the mill with Grandpa (or Ben in later years)

 Then he'd be working at the mill when it was time for supper, then he'd relax

but in reality his relaxation time should hav ebeen hardly anything

He had to constantly hunt for food, Grandpa would fish yes, but john Boy DIDNT hunt and it seemed Jason and Ben didnt either

Then the wood chopping for wood for winter time. Thats not a easy job. That would have been probably a full 2 days of work getting all the wood they needed and stocking up

I understand its just a show, but if you really look into it, hardly anyone really helped John out. I recall John Boy chopping wood once, but never the other boys

[Easton]

The Waltons raised chickens and pigs. Ham would be cured or smoked into bacon. Fish could be smoked or salted. There wouldn't be constant hunting. One weekend of hunting could net enough meat to last for months. And then, of course, there was bartering with neighbours and friends.

As for wood, that would not necessarily have been John's responsibility. He had 4 able-bodied sons to do the chopping as they grew old enough to do it. There would have been plenty of off-cuts from the mill to supply firewood and kindling.

There were 5 boys in my family. (I was the youngest.) We had a gas furnace, but 2 wood stoves: one for heat and one for cooking until I was about 5 years old when my father moved the old kitchen away from the house and turned it into a shed and workshop. Dad built a new kitchen and bought a new propane stove and installed a new propane furnace. He put the old wood stove back into the kitchen mainly because it was a different kind of warm than furnace heat.

Still, it was up to the boys to keep the woodpile stocked. When I was too young to either saw or chop, I would straddle the log on the sawhorse to hold the log in place so my older brothers could saw it.

As long as the Walton sons were at home, John would not have had to chop wood unless he wanted to. (Chopping wood was (and still is) a great way to work off excess energy or anger.

[dayton3]

This reminds me of someone commenting on Star Trek: Deep Space Nine that the entire station crew seemed to have massive amounts of free time on their hands while de facto chief engineer Miles O'Brien (Colm Meaney) was so overworked that it was a wonder he was able to appear onscreen at all.

That said when I was a teenager,   my dad used to cut down the appropriate trees for firewood with his chainsaw and then into the right lengths for the fireplace.   We carried them home in his pickup and after unloading it was my job to split all the wood into quarters.   First with a sledgehammer and wedge to halve the piece and then with an axe to quarter them. 

Sure built but the arms for football...

[Deleted]

I thought they had pigs to eat all though we do not see them other than Rover. I think the hunting might have been something he did on Sundays. 

I have wondered just how big the mountain is if everyone is cutting their timber from it. 

[Brenda]

Rover was a peacock. I think Ben had a pig called Grover, and Elizabeth had a pig called Jabez.

In the episode where Chad came to the mountain, Erin fell into the pigpen. We see the pigs then.

There were plenty of trees for everyone who needed wood. The Blue Ridge Mountains are covered with thick forests.

[bucky]

I always wondered why the boys, especially John Boy, were not shown to be helping John and Grandpa more often. One man cutting enough firewood to heat a house that size would take months of work if he was only doing it in his spare time.

[Deleted]

Nov 18, 2020 20:23:22 GMT -5 Brenda said:

Rover was a peacock. I think Ben had a pig called Grover, and Elizabeth had a pig called Jabez.

In the episode where Chad came to the mountain, Erin fell into the pigpen. We see the pigs then.

There were plenty of trees for everyone who needed wood. The Blue Ridge Mountains are covered with thick forests.

I am pretty sure JimBob says he named Rover after the pig, Rover when he is naming the peacock. I understand that the person who did the website All about the Walton's says its Grover, but... unless that person asked someone from the show, they could have miss heard it. There is this thread. waltonswebpage.proboards.com/thread/9954/bens-pigs-name?page=1 

Jabez went back to live with the other boy so he wasn't there for very long. Most of the time they do not talk about pigs for slaughter. 

Walton's mountain is in the blue ridge, but they are not the Blue Ridge therefore the amount of trees would be less, or is it fewer. Do you know how big Walton's mountain was supposed to be? I do not think they say. 

[Brenda]

I just checked William Atkins’s website, and he agrees with you that Ben’s pig was called Rover. He’s my “go to” source when I have a question about The Waltons.

I have no idea how big Waltons Mountain is, because it’s a fictional place. Nelson County is actually to the east of the Blue Ridge Mountains. It is an area of mostly rolling hills, but it is sparsely populated, even today, and those hills are full of trees. So I think there was plenty of wood for everyone who needed it. Some people probably heated their homes with coal. The railroad went through Rockfish. It would have been easy to have coal delivered.

[Brenda]

You can buy 193 acres of timber land in Nelson County!

Edited to add: Sorry. It’s unavailable. 

[carol]

The boys didn't help much because they were in school all day except for the weekends.

I don't think anyone really relaxed back then as they do now. Men worked from sunup to sundown in the fields, tending the animals and in John's case add in the mill. Women worked all the time too, cleaning cooking, raising the kids and, doing the laundry and mending.

[Easton]

^ The boys undoubtedly were up with the sun and had chores to do in the morning before going to school and there would be more chores when school after school. And I'm sure the boys did more work in the garden and mill and the girls did more household chores than were shown. We just didn't get to see it.

[Deleted]

Nov 18, 2020 22:17:59 GMT -5 carol said:

The boys didn't help much because they were in school all day except for the weekends.

I don't think anyone really relaxed back then as they do now. Men worked from sunup to sundown in the fields, tending the animals and in John's case add in the mill. Women worked all the time too, cleaning cooking, raising the kids and, doing the laundry and mending.

This.

Didn't grandma and Livy have a conversation while sitting on the porch about how they should not be sitting on the porch during the day and they hope nobody from the church saw them? 

[goodnight]

The pigs were shown in the episode where Jason's army buddy Ted was visiting. He was helping Jason with the chores. And they were slopping the pigs. Ted says, "I don't mind feeding them, I just can't eat them".

[patriciaanne]

Hunting was one of the ways John did relax. Hunting is much more relaxing than it's a "chore." Earl has said his father would often get up early and go hunt quail and come back with a bunch of them for breakfast.

I just saw an episode where John did that and Livy chided him for hunting on a Sunday. Then Grandma said she'd clean them. I don't know about quail, but I do know with pheasant you need to breast them shortly after you shoot them or it's very difficult (like you usually do it while still hunting). I won't get into the details, but there's a technique where you can easily and quickly expose the breast meat without plucking. The breast meat is the only part of a pheasant worth eating -- same with wild turkeys. Wild birds are much leaner than domestic ones raised on corn.

[goodnight]

Nov 19, 2020 6:20:51 GMT -5 patriciaanne said:

Hunting was one of the ways John did relax. Hunting is much more relaxing than it's a "chore." Earl has said his father would often get up early and go hunt quail and come back with a bunch of them for breakfast.

I just saw an episode where John did that and Livy chided him for hunting on a Sunday. Then Grandma said she'd clean them. I don't know about quail, but I do know with pheasant you need to breast them shortly after you shoot them or it's very difficult (like you usually do it while still hunting). I won't get into the details, but there's a technique where you can easily and quickly expose the breast meat without plucking. The breast meat is the only part of a pheasant worth eating -- same with wild turkeys. Wild birds are much leaner than domestic ones raised on corn.

Did certain hunting seasons exist back then like they do now? Deer or turkey season for example? And did people have to have hunting a fishing permits?