FOLKLIFE FESTIVAL
Interview with: Betty McGuiness
Interviewer: Esther MacMillan
Date: August 1. 19BO
Place: Institute of Texan Cultures
CANDLEMAKING
BM: I'm from Cisco, Texas. I'm with the Cisco Civic League and we have
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our candle demonstration down here.
, '&
M: O.K. We want to talk about making candles. Now I know there more than
__ ~!!~ .. J'/ay. .. ()f.Jn~H~g ... candle.s. but you're doing yours in a very unusual kind of
a way.
BM: Yes mam. We have the rush lights here and they are really unique.
THe pion~er~ used them outside and also inside their homes as lights for
parties or to use all the time. The rush lights are cat-tails that are cover-
--.----_ ...
ed in tallow, purified tallow, and this was used for different lights
outside, before electricity.
M: How long do they burn?
BM: It . v~.~~ ..e ..: .. wi:~_~~~_.c_a!~t~i~ th~ .. size and diameter and ilhe length of
th-e -ca-t- --t-a-i-l and whe.t.b(lt:'. j J;'.s a dry. . cat~tan .. or a green cat-tail. The green .
on~~_d_~~t burn hardly at all. But it takes probably somewhere between 15
minutes to 2 hours some of 'em burn.
T
M: Really? You say tallow. Where do you get the tallow?
BM: That's what we're demonstrating .You go to the butcher shop and have
him save you some fat that's around the kidneys or beef hearts; preferably
- ---------_. -
beef fat.
M: That's the best?
BM: Yes. It does not smoke as much.' ------------------ - )
does not smell as much .... as the pork
._---- -_._--------
and some of the others. You have him save you some from these areas then you
fry it ... take it home, chop it uJ~ fry Jt.. .. You can use the crackl ings that
are left for dips .. I gues7it's an old time creole or something. The kids
really enjoy those. You save the fat; pour it off; and you boil it with
2.
Candle making
8M: water, you add water .. to it, and boil it for ]fl or 15 minutes .• somewhere - '" in that vicinity, depends on what quantity you have .. then pour it off into
- .-.
a jar and let it separate •.. one that you can usually get the fat out of.
Or pan ... but everybody can see it better if it's in a jar. The part that comes
-~.-- -- . -- ----- -----.
to the top is called the pure , high tallow. This part is what everybody likes
to make their candles f rom. They made all kinds of candles in the old days - - - --- . _. --
f-rom- t-_h._is . The rolled candles where you have it ... just a string .•• you roll .. -
the tallow out real, real fine and then roll it tightly around this string
and the tighter you get it, the better candle you have .
M: I can remember, years ago, I owned a tin candle mold. Did they pour that
' --
right in the mold?
8M: Right. And some pe-ople if they were lucky enough to have the bees wax, ) . . . --
they could add it with this and your candles would last longer.
M: That's supposed to be very fine if you've got bees wax, isn't it?
8M: Right. It's a shame, tho, so many of the bee keepers now, from what I
understand, are going to the plattic or synthetic type combs. You know the
bees don't have to do the work anymore. They can spend their time making the
honey, instead of making the combs. So
thing to find. Church candles are going
candles have to be bees wax.
thereforebeeswax is becoming a rare
0-<:;,e,,) /
up .. • you know quite of the churches
"
M: Now you've got a cat-tail . .. and you're keeping your tallow warm? Just
warm, not hot? just so it's workable. Then .•
8M: It's clear; it's like a liquid.
M: How many time do you have to dip that thing to get a decent candle? . ..
8M: With a lot of patience, you dip each 0!1. ~ of 'em at leas! 50 times. 0" • _ _ _. • _ _ .,.. • _ •••• _ - • __
You have to build up on the outside ... you start with a dry cat-tail ... and
~ ~ - - -. -----
you have to build up .. dipping it once and letting it cool .. to in this
temperature outside now , it has to cool for qui~a while. In fact, it never
gets quite the temperature you'd like it.
Candle making
8M: I have the feeling they must have slaughtered their beef in the fall
so it might have been a little bit cooler temperature for maknng the
candles at that time, too.
You dip it in quickly; pull it right back out. You let it cool; dip it
in again a few minutes later; pull it out and let it cool again. You keep
repeating this until you have about ~ of an inch build-up on your candles.
.. --
It makes it burn a lot better.
M: What's your wick?
BM. : The wick is your cat-tail ... that_'.s_- --w-h-a_t m. akes the wick, the whole "--- - .--
cat tail.
M: The whole cat-tail! Not the little thing that sticks up?
BM: When you start to 1 ight it, it's best if you Bcratch the top of it and
make it kind of fuzzy-like on the top. That WJY you get some fibers that
are dry and they'll start ..
M: Does it flare up ; what kind of flame do you get?
3 .
BM: Oh, just",real smooth, even flame unless the wind's blowing. Now if
the wind's blowing you have a few problems .If you have real dry cat-tails
you're fine , but if they're just a little bit green .. . we had some last night
we were having a bit of a problem with ..• with the winds that we had, they
didn't like to stay lit.
M: But you do light 'em at night so people can see them?
BM: Oh, they're pretty. That's the main time they use them.
~: Do they give enough light, for instance, to read a newspaper by?
BM: I would imagine that they do because in accordance with the old days
but not now. Not for standards for now days.
M: When you pick the cat-tails, you leave as much stem as possible?
BM: Yes. It depends on how you want to use them; I would say a good 3 to
4 feet. This height depends; if you were going to make 'em shorter, from
what I understand, the pioneers used them inside their homes, also
4.
CAndle making
8M: and if they di d thi s then they probably had some type of holder for them
- --- --- ---- - .
M: I was going to ask you .. I wonder what they put them in.
8M: It must have been something .•. they drip, the candles do drip .•. and they
- - ------_ .. ---.- .
smoke a lot and so I can imagine that the inside of the houses they used 'em
in were quite smokey if they used them inside.
- -Wh-at -I -un-d-e-r-sta-n--d,3Jso.., they kept -insects away if you used them outside.
_Pr_o_b_ab-1L2-ns~d~4 t~.0...:- .I.- -h~ye--a feeling it might have kept the people away, too!
Tallow doesn't smell very good •
.. - ---- -_.. ---
M: When you read old stories, English stories, they talk about the flares
as they went through the streets, they called them rush flares .00 you suppose
w~en_ they say rush, they meant cat-tails? actually?
8M: It might be.
M: YOu see pictures
London
of people going through the dark streets of
8M: We had something real interesting .•. someone come by yesterday from
'- --_ . --- ---
Norway and he was saying that their cat-tails are much bigger around and
- - -- .. .. . . _-_. ._ _ ..
much thicker. So it may be .•. the cat-tails from over there may be larger
around.
M: They look like big flares.
8M: There are pieces of wood, one of two, I don't know which one.
Really interesting; lots of comments. I love the children Some by and
they have no idea what they are. Some of them have never seen a cat­tail,
either.
M: I was going to say, I haven't seen many cat-tails lately. Do you have
trouble finding t.~~m? ___ .
8M: Since we're not fr0l11.. _her:e;._ we're a 1.i!:t.l.~U)it farther._ north, we have a
Cisco Lak-e -a-nd- -t-he-y --have - a-. -d--a-m- and-- right around the area of that dam, we don't - -- -- ---- -- ----- ---- - ._--- --.. -----
have any proqlem,We did pick some of ourSabout 3 weeks ago;t~s the ones
'we picked a little bit green, I think, because we were ~~t/ afraid with
5.
BM:the dry weather we've had, we were afraid they were all going to sha~er
on us and by the time we got rea~for
cat,tails . to being down here.
the Festival. We wouldn't have any
So we went out about 3 weeks ago ; we were planning ahead; we went out
they
and picked them and put one coat of wax on them so w~ wouldn't shatter_
some of them. And we picked some more fresh ones since they were still there.
M: You have to keep them kind of cool, don't you?
BM: I kept them inside the house, right in the middle of the den. My family
just ~¢t kind of walked around them.
M: How did you get started doing this?
BM: We are doing it through our Folklife Festival. Cisco has a Fc~klife
Festival in the spring. This will be our eighth one this coming spring.
One of our members, Joan Servin, has really ? Folklife Festival and
she's been down to your-alls several times. !He is really the person
behind us, keeps us going and finding new things. She really loves to
read aMd fend out about everything; about the cat-tails; history.
M: Then she's the one who discovered this business about the cat-tails?
8M: I don't know. Last year she brought a demonstration of folk medicines.
She was down here with it and Bhe talked quite a bit about it last year.
And I think through the folk medicines and all the different types -
her husband is a physician and she's a registered nurse and thereforein all
the folk medicines and things peopae used to use. I don't think her husband
practices with them~ All the things she was interested in: derivatives for
nowdays medicines; quite a lot of them come from old plants and old remedies
they used to use years ago ·,
M: Th~y're using them right now,You bet.
8M: So I think a lot of this area.
M: It's terribly interesting. Now you come down to this. The Institute
is interested to know why did you accept the invitation?
6.
Candle making
BM:We enjoy it. It was such fun last year; we had such a nice time and you all
ve~
treated us so~nice.
M:Do you feel that yoJre giving somethBng to somebody? I mean , do you feel
you're contributing?
BM:Oh yes, we did. We didn't have
hundred
I don't know how manY1miles it is
problem
any finding workers again this year.
down here but we didn't have, ~oblem
finding members to oome from our club because it is such fun and everybody
enjoys it and has such a nice time.
M: But people do show a great interest, don't they? Young, old, middle?
BM;All ages .•. Some of the elderly people have come by had said, "Oh, tell
my grandchild about how we used to have to do this stuff." This little lady
came by today was just so enthusiastic •.• She said, "Tell my grandson how
I had to go and do this and thow him how; he'd never believe me~
I went through it with the grandson and golly, he just didn't believe
it.
M: It's good for the kids. Somebody I've talked to today said ... he made
a point I hadn't thought of ... there's so much leisure time now ... more than
there used to be I that people need to get interested in these things and keep
them alive.
BM: Yes, that's also true. Sometimes when you have children, it's going to
baseball and going to dancing and going to piano le ssons like mine are that
1 J
they miss some of the old time ways of doing things. Lost arts, almost.
M: It doesn't do them any harm at all to know about this. I think it
givesthem an appreciation.
BM: My two thLt are 10 and 6 really have enjoyed the FeStival this year.
M: You bring them down with you.
BM: Oh yes, they eame last year and this year, both, and they've really
enjoyed it. NobJthey learn different things. I guess the difference in
ages , each one of them have grown that much more and learned that much more.
7.
8dndle Making
B,M: My daughter had my apron on today and she was dipping candles with the
rest of them.
M: YOu see, this is great; they're participating they're doing something.
BM: Oh they enjoyed it.
M: Have you lived up there? ARe you from there?
BM: NO, I'm from Richardson, which is right outside Dallas. We've just
been Cisco about 4 years now.
M: Do you like living up there?
BM: Oh yes, We moved out of the big town to get our, .• the city where our
friends, our parents all live and they don't understand why we took the
only two grandchildren away from them. One of the reasons we did is because
we wanted to get our children raised in a small town like we were raised
because then Richardson was a small town.
M: I think you're smart.We did the same thing.
BM: It's really terrific.
M: Our child is grown up now but she says she wouldn't change that for the
world. We did simple things and little town things.
someplace
BM: The parades, if your child does something and somebody sees him1' you'll
find out about it and I'd rather know about it than not know where he is.
M: That's one of the niee things about the Folklife Festival, it's kind of
friendly ; kind of familyish.
BM: Everybody shares so much and that's .•.
:;:t..~
M: 8ne of the men that's been down here talking to me ~,-j· ~a:rd, "What
do you think is the best pptt thing about this and he said," I think the
best part is for the children." What it does for the kids. Some of them just
want to drink Coke and slide down the berms and things like that but one out of
10 kids is going to remember somethnng about this. He's going to rememBer
those candles and just think when he turns on an electric light." One time
Candle making.
• M: they didn't have electricity . .. that sort of thing.
8M: I've told some of them some of the things they can do with cat-tails
from what I understand. I'm not a real authority on what all the INdians
8.
and the pioneers did with the cat-tails but I understand some parts of it,
They made flour from them. So there's a whole lot of uses that the cat-tails
has.
M: And also when it goes to seed , it is fluffy and they use it to stuff
cushions with them.I think there is something connected with the cat~tail
that is used for tea.
8M: The roots, I think. I'm not sure what part the roots do ·
M: Apparently, the dipping of the candles .• I wonder if that's typically
Texas? Or was that allover the country? Do you know?
8M: Any area, probably , that had cat-tails, I have the feeling.
M: They proaably looked at thit and thought this would make a good thing.
8M: We've also found that people have said, "Oh, we used to dip the cat-tails
in kerosene. But I don't think they lasted as long and they would flare up .
That may have been what the people in the streets did in England.
~l I wonder what they had to dip it in.
8M: Fat? It may have been just the fat without having •..•
M: Could be or they could have just wadded a lot of rushes together and
lit them to burn. It's interesting .•. ~ave I forgotten to ask you anything?
Is there anything that you're telling people up there that I haven't asked?
8M: Goodness, let's see. I thought of something a minute ago. Just the
different types of candles .WE've used the mold candles and the rolled type
type candles and there's a stearin candle, too .
~~ What's that?
8M: I.m not the authority on the candles .•• the stearin candles •• I·m not
sure. I would hate to gi ve a bad description of it
M: Have you yourself made those rolled ones?
Candle making
8M: Yes. It takes a lot of patience in rolling them out.
M: You've got the fat now; the tallow; do you lay it out in a sheet?
8M: You get a cooky sheet is the easiest thing, something real smooth.
9.
You flatten it out either with a rolling pin or something •.. get your tallow
so it's real pliable. Roll it out and you put your string, which will be your
wick, wown . Then start very carefully tucking it around that string as tight
as you can get it. And just keep rolling it. It's just like a snow ball,
it keeps gathering and going around the wick
M: In other words, when you roll it out you've got a fairly rectangle or
square shape and you know from experience exactly how big a candle you're
going to get.
Any special kind of string that you use for a wick?
8M: Just one that would ••. I believe cotton would be best .. that type.
You can dip it in wax and keep it straight . Last year we demonstrated some
candles that we just had the wick and you kept dipping it in the wax, also,
and you can hang them, they're drip candles, you keep coating the string and
coating the string. That's one of the most common ways, also, to make candles.
M: Do you ever do it with paraffin?
8M: Yes, as a matter of fact, I'll admit, we're kind of cheating a little
bit on the rush lights up there because we are doing it with paraffin
because the tallow is so hot and it wo~ separate enough out. You have to
have it cooled down to a certain point after you've boiled it and let it
sit. And the temperature is such outside that it will not separate. That's
why I said they must have killed their animals in the fall or in the spring
before it got so hot. Because the tallow won't separate right.
M: But it works all right with paraffin?
8M: It works fine with paraffin.
And the paraffin doesn't smoke or smell
as bad either. That's a little advantage of using it for the demonstration.
Candle making. 10.
M: Did you think what it was you were going to say? If you don't think
there is anything else you want to say.
BM: Well, just that we've enjoyed it and I hope some of the people have
gotten as much as we've enjoyed it •
M: I know they have. YOu're nice to do this. Thanks so very moch.
~,,~ o{.~ ~- h,.:t "'" ~~