Report from the Ozarks
(Page 2 of 3)
November/December 1974
By Mary Jo Frolick
Electricity? Yep, we do have that. I even cook with it. When I get a place built to put one, though, I'll buy a wood cookstove to use in the fall, winter and spring. Most of the people on the mountain (especially those who were raised here) have wood ranges to fix meals on, side by side with all sorts of electrical appliances. I don't think they trust the pow er company, and maybe I shouldn't either. Meanwhile, that's our only utility bill.
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Advice for those considering homesteading in the hills of southern Missouri and Arkansas....
We have several good wells on our place, but they aren't being used. We take cool, clear, soft, deliciously sweet water from a spring situated on the mountain above us. . . and have all the conveniences of town at no cost, because our gravity flow system gives us pressure equivalent to or better than that in the city.
When a woman is on the shady side of 40, happiness is the day an automatic washing machine and a flush pot are installed in the house. At my age I get no thrill from swatting at crawling, flying and jumping insects in an outside johnnie (I'd forgotten how plentiful the critters were). And I'm too old and slow to wash clothes with lye soap on a scrubboard. (Don't worry about the halfcup of detergent I use for each load of laundry . . . it runs outside in the yard and makes the grass tall and happy.)
Now a word to people who are moving to the Ozarks to live: Please, have enough money on hand to house and feed yourselves for two years. It takes that long for folks to accept you and for you to adjust to their customs and their ways of thinking (they are different). Even then, you'll probably have to create your own job if you want to be paid more than a bare living wage.
Two dollars hourly is almost top pay in this section of the Ozarks (as of one year ago.—MOTHER). I know a man who owns a chain saw and cuts firewood for $1.50 an hour, which is also the rate for picking tomatoes, squash and other vegetables. Another acquaintance of mine, who works for a gas company, got a raise to $3.00 an hour and was very happy about it . . . even though he'd been employed by that same outfit for 20 years.
You should also know that education is virtually no help in obtaining a job . . . in fact, it may be a handicap. The tradespeople in this area can't or won't pay the higher wages advanced schooling is supposed to bring. Those college-trained men who still live here either teach school or own their businesses. Most local young men go elsewhere to make a living and come home to retire. So it goes . . . .
About buying property: When we moved here in August 1971, the land on the mountain was selling for $55.00 an acre. Since then the tract has changed hands and now sells for $200 an acre, cut into 10-acre blocks. ( Again, that's as of one year ago. —MOTHER.)
