Chinches — Bedbugs 2009
Should you be a regular reader you are aware that this subject has been covered in this article before and it’s highly possible that you’d rather read the telephone book than this column. According to the old Webster’s Dictionary, a bedbug is a wingless bloodsucking homopterous insect, sometimes infesting houses and especially beds. A call from a reader in a distant city suggested that I write about this subject – she had just read an article in their local paper which stated that the bedbug is making a come back. Many instances in the northern states were sited. When I wrote about bedbugs some years ago, my dignified aunt (now deceased) gave me a good scathing about writing about any such. Duh!!!! The caller told a story about how her mother would give her and her two brothers each a jar lid – back then they were zinc – with kerosene (back then it was fifteen cents a gallon) in it and they were assigned the job of finding the chinches on the beds and putting them in the jar lid. That was what we called “lookin’” the beds.
In my growing up years lots of people were plagued with bedbugs; however, I never remember us having them here. But I do remember how my mother used to “look” the bed to be sure. Back then cotton mattresses had a big roll around the edge which gave the little critters a good place to hide. They would also come home with you if you had visited a house where they lived – they could get in clothes or wherever for the free ride to another house. The bugs also would hide in the cracks of the wall – most houses then were ceiled with boards. Families that moved often encountered the biting bugs quite often. John’s family was one of those and he tells stories of how they used to boil water and pour scalding water on the walls and floor trying to get rid of the pesky little bugs. In those days ladies put the mattresses outside to sun and air – especially when they did spring cleaning and that was a good time to make a deep search.
Lots of people used wooden bedsteads in that day and they, too, had cracks making a good hiding place. One family in this neighborhood had wooden bedsteads and could not get rid of the pests, so one spring the man of the house said, “I know how we’ll get rid of bedbugs, we’ll burn the wooden bedsteads.” And that’s just what they did. Imagine what the value of those bedsteads would be today.
Another funny story I’ve told before is about a prominent Geraldine man, who went to Auburn and took a course in entomology, where they had to collect a large number of insects. His sister was a newly wed (she was the teller of this story) and when the student came to the mountain to visit he went to his sister and asked if she had bedbugs – he wanted such for his collection. She was furious, stating, “Indeed I do not have bedbugs, but if you go over to Mr. So and So’s you can get some.” He did go to visit So and So, got a number of bedbugs – took them back Auburn and sold them to other students who needed another a bug in their collection. As I remember it, the price was twenty-five cents a bug. Smart thinking, wouldn’t you say? He turned out to be a Geraldine millionaire, too.
John’s aunt and uncle were married in 1932 and pretty soon thereafter were invited to spend the night with friends. Aunt Myrtle used to tell this story over and over. After the lights were out – no electricity back then, lights were kerosene lamps– is when the bugs would come out and they actually bit the people in the bed. (Remember Webster said “bloodsucking”.) The bites leave little red, itching whelps. She said the bugs were so bad on their bed that they got in the floor to sleep.
In more recent years when I was teaching a quilting class in the suburbs of Atlanta, this subject came up and one lady in the group had just returned from a long trip on a Pullman (train). As I understand it, a Pullman car is equipped with more elaborate furnishings – a bunk type bed is included. She stated that these bugs were also on the train.
So, according to that article read by one of my readers, we have to be mindful of such pests making a come back – just as head lice are doing. If we stay in a motel, I guess we have to look for bedbugs there, too. Think I’ll just stay at The Windy Knoll and try to keep the chinches away with my simple style of country living.