History & Nostalgia
Wisdom and Ways: Spring Tonics
By Jim Casada
Other than a note on calendars indicating the date is the first day of spring, there’s no national holiday or special observance connected with the arrival of greening-up time. But rest assured the coming of spring has been both welcome and anxiously awaited in the High Country. Another round of cabin fever has come and gone. Longer days and earth’s reawakening put pep in an old man’s step and lift the spirits of the young. Mollygrubs and miseries magically vanish. Yet this welcome time of transition, at least in yesteryear, was never complete until everyone had been “dosed” with one or more spring tonics.
When it comes to this traditional rite of mountain springs, it’s tempting to claim, decades after the fact, that I was the victim of child abuse. If so though, child abuse was once near universal in the highlands. This particular tradition involved an annual “tonic,” with the underlying premise being that after a long, hard winter everyone’s plumbing needed a thorough cleansing—a sort of internal “pick me up.” The restorative came in numerous forms including sassafras tea, various types of wild greens, and the noxious remedy which reigned supreme in my family, sulfur and sorghum molasses.
Every year, as frogs began to peep on warm afternoons, buds on maples swelled and showed red, and early spring wildflowers burst into bloom the subject of spring tonics entered adult conversation. Although my mother was a firm believer in cleansing the inner body at that season, the leading voice in the call to action when it came to the administration of spring tonics was that of Grandma Minnie. As moderating weather brought the first hints of escaping winter’s doldrums, she became increasingly fixated on the subject. For my part, the whole process was completely repugnant.
At some juncture Grandpa Joe would add his pithy commentary to the spring tonic groundswell, although as a rule he sagely did so out of earshot of Grandma Minnie. I didn’t really mind his opining, since he staunchly maintained the finest of spring tonics came in either the form of sassafras tea, or perhaps better still, the purgative effect of wild vegetables such as poke sallet. “Eat a big bait,” he reckoned, “and it will set you free.” He knew that edible mountain greens had salutary effects. They also tasted good. Since I was quite fond of the various wild greens popular in the Smokies and regularly consumed by mountain folks, I was all for spring tonics as Grandpa defined them, never mind aftershocks as predictable as preparation for a colonoscopy.
On the other hand, the female side of the family’s perspective on spring tonics troubled me to no end. It involved nostrums sternly administered and carefully observed for proper after-effects, and discussions preceding the actual event were at least as troubling as the terrible taste. It was sort of like anticipating a visit to the dentist or being told by your mother, after some particularly egregious misbehavior, “I’m going to let you wait until your father gets home so he can give you a real whipping.” To my way of thinking everything Grandma and Momma had in mind when it came to spring tonics wasn’t merely unpleasant; it was diabolical. The tonics smelled bad, tasted worse, and were administered under considerable mental duress.
I would have already had far more than one boy’s fill of cod liver oil during winter, because throughout my early childhood you took a government-supplied capsule of it daily at school whether you wanted to or not. Yet the foul taste of fish oil was mere child’s play in comparison to foulness of the key ingredient in Grandma’s favorite spring tonic—flowers of sulfur. Since I dearly loved sorghum syrup, a nectar-like gift from the culinary gods, the first time I was about to be on the receiving end of a hefty two-tablespoon treatment of sulfur and sorghum molasses I anticipated a treat. Talk about disillusionment!
Once the first spoonful of the mixture was in my mouth, realization immediately dawned I’d been hoodwinked, hornswoggled, bamboozled, and in general led down a fool’s path by two determined, scheming females whom heretofore I thought had loved me dearly. From that point forward until I “outgrew” the dictates of wily female family members, I dreaded the annual administration of spring tonic with mortal fear.
Although such was decidedly not the case in my family, there were those who thought the ideal way to render spring tonics innocuous or even downright pleasant was to accompany them with a solid slug of peartin’ juice. Not too long prior to his final arrest and subsequent suicide, I had the opportunity to discuss such matters with the late Popcorn Sutton. Popcorn was a genuine mountain character and lifelong producer, purveyor, and hearty partaker of corn squeezin’s. His studied opinion was that “a body needs some properly made likker, along with a mess of trout and bait of ramps and branch lettuce, to get into spring in fittin’ fashion.” I’m not about to defend his musings or lifestyle, but there’s no denying his prescription is one that has long enjoyed a considerable following.
Bitter draughts and illicit tanglefoot aside, the story underlying spring tonics is one typifying the practicality of hardy mountain folks. Before the winds of yesterday once more brought ever returning spring, a High Country diet during winter months was long on starches, salted meat, pickled items, and dried foods. Even the winter squashes and root crops lacked essential vitamins, especially Vitamins C and K, along with fiber, calcium, and iron, found in green-leafed vegetables. It was a time when a balanced diet was pretty much impossible.
Mountain folks didn’t talk about eating a balanced diet, but they did discuss blood thinners, purging the body after winter, and come spring had an understandably strong craving for fresh victuals. That’s why the first greens of spring were so prized, and they were indeed a tonic to the body as well as a dietary approach that uplifted the spirits. After all, how can anyone resist the beauty of a warm spring day, the loveliness of a world gradually turning green once more, and the appeal of mountains aglow with flowers as the good earth reawakens? To me, that’s the ultimate spring tonic. To use the words former politician Zell Miller chose for the title of a fine book, these practices are now Purt Nigh Gone. Yet to recall them is to relish, even revere, such traditions.