NPR News, Classical and Music of the Delta

Wash Pots: Undesirable Necessities

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K. Ouchley

In retirement they seem innocent enough, often sitting quietly in the side-yard holding bouquets of pansies.  Back in their day though, they were instruments of hard manual labor, especially for Louisiana women who dreaded their weekly encounters.  For them, cast iron wash pots were undesirable necessities.

    

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Kelby was a biologist and manager of National Wildlife Refuges for the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for more than 30 years. He has worked with alligators in gulf coast marshes and Canada geese on Hudson Bay tundra. His most recent project was working with his brother Keith of the Louisiana Nature Conservancy on the largest floodplain restoration project in the Mississippi River Basin at the Mollicy Unit of the Upper Ouachita National Wildlife Refuge, reconnecting twenty-five square miles of former floodplain forest back to the Ouachita River.