THURSDAY, MAY 21, 2026

Hello you all! I reckon from me you expect a nice, country sounding, "hello y'all!" I am more than happy to deliver it. "Hey y'all, how's ya mommer'nem?" My mommer'nem? Fine I reckon, I ain't heard any complaints from them in years! Some of y'all will not think it funny to make light of my dear "mither," et al, having passed on. It's a dirty job, but somebody has to do it. Lighten up, its okay, I am sure she is shaking her head and saying, "Wade hush that mess," like she did so many times before. Alright, if you have not resigned from GF&FL in the last minute or two over this, let's move right along. I ran across a photograph of an old Redi-Aid bottle online, and many of you will remember Redi-Aid as a very good fruit flavored drink mix, much like Kool-Aid, but it was a concentrated liquid in a bottle, not granules in an envelope.

Daddy said they liked Redi-Aid when he was a boy, but they never had it cold, as they had no electricity, no refrigerator nor icebox. Well water, sugar, and some Redi-Aid was a big deal to many kids then, even warm with no ice.

It was made in Vidalia, along with frozen pops with fruit flavors. Our Emanuel County where I live, made more moonshine whiskey than any county in Georgia. The city of Oak Park in Emanuel that was just inside our county near Toombs County, was always a hotbed of shine production.

These were mostly makers of liquor in volume with little care for quality. Those in the business used a lot of granulated sugar, and had to buy it in bulk. Grocery stores' as well as wholesale grocers' sales of sugar were monitored, and customers had to "sign for it."

If they made large purchases of sugar retail, it was recorded. It was bought in large brown bags, much like fertilizer was. Of course, like all such restrictions, those who needed it in bulk could usually find a way to get it, regulations be damned.

One source for sugar was from makers of products that required large quantities of it to make their products. They often had a sideline of selling sugar to bootleggers. It was unlawful, but it did happen. I recall that two farmers in the Oak Park area were bitter rivals in the production of shine.

Their farms were close by to the other. Men like them used their farm equipment for making whiskey, and both bought old stake-bodied farm trucks loaded with bagged sugar from a certain maker of such things in Vidalia.

One of those men's nephew told me of a day long ago when he had gone with his uncle to get a load of sugar in Vidalia with their ragged old farm truck. The uncle's bitter enemy was also at the place waiting to get a load right behind them.

They were headed back to their farm when the old truck gave up the ghost, died and rolled to a stop on the shoulder of US 1. You can imagine how nervous they were as they quickly got to seeing what the problem was and trying to fix it.

If the right lawmen came by, their goose was cooked. Not long after they had the hood up, their rival came upon them in his old truck, and seeing them there, came to a screeching halt, backed up and pulled in behind them.

He jumped out with a hip pocket filled with wrenches, and ran to join them under the hood. He squeezed in, saw the problem and fixed it for them in short order, all the while he was being pleasant and friendly, which surprised them greatly.

After he got it going, he hopped down from where he was standing on the bumper, joined them, stuffed his tools back in his pocket and then and only then, did he begin cussing, rip-roaring and raising hell. He told the uncle that his junkpile of a truck was going to ruin a good thing for them all!

He yelled for him to get his raggedy truck on home before the law saw them and locked them all up. Just a day in the life of a couple of Oak Park farmers trying to market their corn! Okay, I hope you enjoyed the story this morning.

If you tune in here tomorrow, I have an even better Redi-Aid related story that tops them all. This one involves a "murder," a fugitive from justice, and a manhunt. I hope that whets your appetite for more "Redi-Aid stories." Yep, right here, tomorrow.

Thanks for coming by, and I hope to see you again then.

Numbers 6: 24-26, KJV

we boyz three, babee conway, lil merle, & me