Pigs are an excellent source of meat protein. They were feed slops. They were the garbage men of our past. Pork lends itself to storage by salting and smoking. Nothing was wasted from that rubbery snout to the tip of the tail. Excess fat rendered to lard, entrails for sausage casings, hair saved for brushes, large cuts of meat salted and smoked, other bits of meat chopped and turned into sausage, some parts pickled.
Butchering usually took place in the fall with the onset of cool weather. After a good scalding in a huge vat, the hair was removed using this or other scraping tools.
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