What is a truck patch??

[uncle Will in In.]

In days of old there were many people living on a little place in the country.. Non of them were called Homesteaders, but most of them had a garden. A pig or two, and a cow to milk. They also had a truck patch.
Have you ever heard of a Truck Patch??

[FarmboyBill]

Ive heard and read of them. mostly heard of it from people in Mos.

When I was young, I just thought it was a junkyard way back when of places filled with Hawkeyes, keystones, Marmons, Avery, International, and Twin City trucks, amongst others lol

[edcopp]

A market garden. Folks raised produce to sell. Once or twice a week they would load up the pick-up with home grown produce and go to town to sell what they had raised.

Tie the truck and the garden patch together and you will come up with a "truck patch"

[mnn2501]

Truck Patch means they sold produce from their farm.
Many times from a truck on the side of the highway.

[Sawmill Jim]

Tis a Southern term you had the kitchen garden and a truck patch much bigger if you had excess you would try selling some in town .

[rambler]

Heard of it as a 'truck garden' myself, yup.

Paul

[haypoint]

Around here, they had a truck patch, but no truck. A hundred years ago, few roads. So they loaded up the canoe and took their produce to the city dock. Everything was sold out on the dock. Sometimes, if they were lucky, a passing freighter would drop a rope and they could get pulled up near the dock.
There was also a place where the freighters took on firewood. They would sell wild black berries by the bushel and maple syrup by the barrel.

[danielsumner]

I've heard the term, but "Truck Farm" was used more often.

[empofuniv]

I heard of truck garden often in OK

[FarmboyBill]

I havnt. Maybe in S OK

As was said about selling in town, I remember in the mid early 50s, dad went to the market in St Joe Mo. It was a block square bldg with no walls, only roof. It was raised up off the street surrounding it by around 3ft. There were trolleys running around it, even tho they had replaced them uptown with busses. Some people sold out of there trucks, and some bought spaces and sold in the square. I imagine one had to pay something even if they sold out of there truck.
I also remember, after growing up and getting my 3rd job at a candy co in St joe that I walked up a street that had been the towns origional business district in the years between 1880 say and 1940. It also had dock areas, but the sidewalk was in some places built up, but that might have been as much to keep the Mo river out of the bldgs as helping to unload produce. Anyway, the stores had fresh ripe vegetables in them. in some places you could see vines, corn husks, leaves, ect trailing out the doorways. I have the idea now that grocery stores in and around St Joe came there to buy loads of fresh vegetables from the stores. There were railroad tracks either in front or in back of the stores, ive forgotten. The ones in front were more than likely trolley tracks. It was kind of a seedy, run down area. 2 and 3 story bldgs,. It was on 2ns st and around 2 blocks from the Mo River. There was another area like it. It ran for around 2 blocks N & S and only on one St. It had furniture stores, antique stores , a couple bars, and clothing stores,

[haypoint]

Detroit's Eastern Market has been in operation over a hundred years. Worth a visit. In a few weeks they'll have tens of thousands of bedding plants, flowers and vegetable starts. Small farmers from all over the state sell to individuals, retail stores and restaurants. Amazing!

[Sculkrusha]

Even a Dumb Aussie knows, thanks to the King.
Elvis and "Polk Salad Annie"


Down in Louisiana
Where the alligators grow so mean
Lived a girl that I swear to the world
Made the alligators look tame

Polk salad Annie
'Gators got your granny
Everybody said it was a shame
For the mama was working on the chain-gang
What a mean, vicious woman

Everyday before suppertime
She'd go down by the truck patch
And pick her a mess of Polk salad
And carry it home in a tote sack

Cheers.......Scul

[SteveD(TX)]

Originally Posted by Sculkrusha

Even a Dumb Aussie knows, thanks to the King.
Elvis and "Polk Salad Annie"


Down in Louisiana
Where the alligators grow so mean
Lived a girl that I swear to the world
Made the alligators look tame

Polk salad Annie
'Gators got your granny
Everybody said it was a shame
For the mama was working on the chain-gang
What a mean, vicious woman

Everyday before suppertime
She'd go down by the truck patch
And pick her a mess of Polk salad
And carry it home in a tote sack

Cheers.......Scul

Thought it was Poke Salat ??? Didn't Tony Joe White record that first?

My grandmother loved that stuff and she had her kids pick it whenever she saw it growing wild somewhere.

[DamnearaFarm]

Yep, it's poke salat (at least to say, if not to write) and blah on Elvis. Tony Joe White did it better.

[joebill]

Gramps had a truck patch and when he was a lad, my dad used to pick cucumbers and stuff and pack them to anywhere men were working. Lots of them left home without food in the morning and regretted it by afternoon. He get a few cents each and provided a salt shaker so they could enjoy their "lunch".

Many years later, my other grandad would get my sister and I to load up his ancient radio flyer red wagon and tow it around town full of roasting ears and watermellon, selling the stuff to neighbors, then split the money with us.....Joe

[uncle Will in In.]

We had a garden about 100 x 100. We raised most of our veggies and strawberries there. It had a grape vine across one end, plus an old winter pear tree.

We also had a truck patch out along the side of a farm field. They were bout plowed with horses, then diisced . We hitched old Bessie to a furring out plow and made rows for out winter potatoes. We planted our sweet corn out there. We planted all the vine type plants there because the garden was to small fro them. We cultivated the truck patch with the horses. Most of what grew there wound up in our basement either canned or in potato bins.. My stepdad never owned a truck in his life.. What we grew lasted us until the next year. We also had a cane patch out there that we stripped the frosted leaves off, cut it with a corn knife, then hauled it to the sorgum mill in an old two wheeled trailor behind our Model A Ford. Most years we got about 8 gallons of molasses. We ate all that before the year was up.. Maybe that was why I weighed 200 pounds before I was 12. Also made 6" 4" before I was 16. Never had to look for jobs throwing baled hay around the neighbor hood.. We ate 2 hogs and about 50 big roosters also..
All because of the dad gummed TRUCK PATCH

[Bret]

A good read. Thanks. I tried to stay away from the garden or truck patch as it was sometimes called, when possible. Dad had other ideas. Now dad is gone and I seem to plants things here and there. No a big truck patch.

[geo in mi]

A truck patch was/is a garden that supplied more than just for home use, so the man who worked it had extra to sell. Many times just Mama or Grandma kept a garden.........

For me, a truck patch is what I need for the door of my '98 GMC Sonoma pickup.........

geo

[Steve in PA]

My great grandfathers on both sides had truck patches. Like was mentioned above, it was essentially a market garden. They had other jobs, so it was probably the largest size one could have and still not be a fulltime farmer. They had plenty of land, I think labor/time was the limiting factor.

I know one tried using migrant labor, but since they were being paid by the pound to harvest tomatoes they were filling the baskets partway with rocks. They didn't finish the season and that was the last he used them.

[BobbyB]

I grew up hearing " truck farm ". It meant a small farm that raised vegetables of all sorts the year around. There were 2 not far from where I grew up.

Truck garden was smaller than a truck farm and a truck patch was smaller than a truck garden.