Throwback Thursday - Tin Foil

In a kitchen drawer under a white plastic rubbermaid silverware tray is a small folded piece of what my grandmother called "Tin Foil". It is the product most call "Aluminum Foil" or by some it is also known as Reynolds Wrap. 

The origins of these names are interesting. At one time it really was very thin sheet of tin, long since replaced by aluminum. Once the largest maker of Aluminum Foil, the Reynolds Metals Company which was founded in 1919 as U.S. Foil Company of Louisville Kentucky by the nephew of R. J. Reynolds a name most often associated with tobacco. Now privately owned by Pactiv Evergreen Reynolds Consumer Products of New Zealand. Oddly no one calls it just foil.

The reason for the folded tin foil is simple, it is a small reminder of my grandmother's frugalness. When I was young she would wash tin foil and fold it just so, and place it in a drawer for use again and again until it was no longer serviceable. Typically she would have maybe a dozen or so folded sheets in a drawer.

She was the ultimate saver, Jelly and peanut butter jars, became drinking glasses. Much of the food scraps went to the compost pile and newspapers were saved for some purpose I never discovered.

A small helping of green peas leftover from dinner would reappear the following night. When the peas dwindled to just a small spoonful she would threaten that if we didn't "eat em up" we'd see those same peas at breakfast.

And so it was that a child of the depression, who later in life became one of Rosie's Riveters during the Second World War would chart a life that was a course in fugruality. In other words growing up during the depression and raising a family during the war she knew how to stretch a dollar.

As a young boy a visit to grandma's house in the county was a joy, except when it came to showers.

Farm life called for a bath when you were dirty, showers were not offered to children and when I complained that the tub was only 1/3 full of water I was told it was enough for a bath. My complaints regarding that lack of a shower were met with "it costs money" to just run water down the drain. My plea that the water comes from a well and is free was countered with "it takes electricity to pump the water and propane to heat the water". And then in a moment of clarity I abandoned my negotiations when I realized that my younger brother was only offered my used bathwater with a hearty splash of hot water to rise the temperature to just slightly below bearable. 

Today as I have done for decades I'll let the shower run longer than necessary, just to hear her Alabama Southern voice admonish me with "Stop wasting the water or I'll snatch ya bald headed".