It seemed my dad would select the coldest day of the year to butcher our hogs (Hog Killing Day).    Recall that we had no electricity.  The REA (Rural Electric Authority) had not yet reached our part of Oklahoma.  Therefore, we had no refrigeration.  This meant that meat had to be cured for storage. 

Several methods were used for curing pork.  The favorite was to “smoke” the meat in a smoke house over a low heat for several days.  Smoking required special skills and a specially built smokehouse, which my folks didn’t have.  The method most often used was called “Sugar Cure” of which there was very little sugar used.  It was mostly salt with a little brown sugar and some smoke flavor.  This method required rubbing this salty mixture over the meat and letting it sit in the "smoke" house.  Periodically the meat would be turned and have the other side rubbed with this salty concoction. 

This curing method worked as far as preserving the meat but seemed to me to make the meat totally inedible.  Without special preparation of soaking the meat for several hours with several exchanges of water to remove the salt, it was like eating salt.  Now I think I understand why so many people from that part of Oklahoma suffer from high blood pressure.  Come to think of it, I wonder if regular eating of this “cured” pork would train someone to be able to safely drink seawater.   As I reflect on the salted (“sugar cured”) pork, I recall that it was so inedible that we weren’t bothered with rodents getting into the “smokehouse” where the meat was stored.

Sausage was handled differently.  Cooking it and placing it in canning jars preserved the sausage.  Sausage was made from ground up meat scraps with a lot of spices added.  I recall watching the lard congeal on top of the canned sausage patties.  We didn’t know but heard about making sausage links.  We were told that some people rinsed out the intestines and stuffed them.  We didn’t care much for the intestine idea.  My mom used to tell me that there were people that didn’t waste anything from the pig except the squeal and then they figured out how to use that for static on the radio.

My favorite memories about hog killing time were the feasts we had.  The organ meats couldn’t be preserved so we ate them right away.  This included the liver, milt (I think that was the hog’s spleen), and often the eye of the loin was served right away.  Of course for breakfast the next day we had scrambled eggs and pork brains.

The method for slaughtering the hogs is interesting.  In preparation large kettles of water were heated outdoors with a wood fire.  The hog(s) would be shot with a 22-caliber rifle and then someone “stuck” the hog.  Sticking the hog was a special skill with a sharp knife and a special skilled person would be sought for the task.  As the hog was shot and lay in his dying throws, the “stick” man would rush up and slit the hog’s juggler veins and then plunge the knife through the slit throat into the hog’s heart.  This was to ensure the hog bled thoroughly.  Not exactly kosher, but the same idea.

After sticking/bleeding the hog, the next step was to remove the hair.  This was accomplished by pouring scalding hot water on the hog or pouring the hot water into 55 gallon barrels and dipping the hog into the hot water.  Then with a knife the hair was scrapped off the hog’s skin.  The trick was to “scald” the carcass enough to cause the hair to slip off easily but not too much to start cooking the carcass’s skin.  It was at this point that the very cold day hurt the most.  You couldn’t help but get your hands wet while scrapping the carcass.  Wet hands on a cold day were very uncomfortable to say the least.  I often saw men rub their hands into the snow to warm them.

The next step was to split the carcass’s rear legs to reveal the Achilles’ tendons.  A substantial stick sharpened at both ends was inserted under the Achilles tendons.  The carcass was then hoisted up with one end of a chain or rope tied to the stick and the other end to an overhead tree limb.  Now the scrapped carcass was hanging by its back feet, head down.  Now was the time to remove the intestines (gut’em).  A Number 2 galvanized washtub was placed under the carcass to catch the entrails.  Then a slit was made from the crotch to the head being careful not to nick an intestine.  The entrails would fall from gravity into the washtub.  The organ meats were then removed.  Fat was also trimmed to be included later with other fat to be “rendered”.  The chest cavity was then opened and the lungs (lights) and heart removed.  The heart was saved for later pickling along with the pig’s feet.  People in some parts of the country ate the “lights” as well as parts of the intestines, chittlens or tripe.  Our clan didn’t.  One myth that existed was that Indians would show up at the slaughter site to get the entrails.  We usually fed them to the dogs that also had a feast on Hog Killing Day.