The Black Market

In looking back at our years in Salfordville, I am always reminded of the war years and their shortages, ration stamps, regulated prices and black markets. The price for most farm products was regulated by the government. My only experience with the black market was in the summer of 1945. In that year I bought and raised three hundred baby chickens of the White Rock breed and intended to sell them in the fall as roasting chickens or capons. I had the male ones caponized and the whole flock was doing very well until they were about two and a half pounds each. At that time, a man came around and offered me about two and a half times the legal price for them. I took it and made a nice profit. That was the only experience that I had in the black market. I did save ten of the capons and in the fall they weighed ten pounds each. We had them killed, dressed, and frozen at a commercial freezer place in Harleysville, where we kept them and used them one by one in the following months. They were very good and the whole project was profitable.