The Song of the Cotton Picker

by Madeline Horres Hantske

Photographs by Carl Julien

Initially published in 1942

All true, musical, humorous, and philosophical experiences are recorded in these poems as spoken by the Gullah people of the early 1900s in the South Carolina Low Country. The poems are written phonetically and, therefore, easy to read and understand.

Madeline Horress Hantske was born on a plantation near Holly Hill, South Carolina at the turn of the twentieth century. At that time, cotton was picked by hand.  Not only were the "hands" (as they were known) cotton pickers, they did everything on the plantation; hence, the different episodes or experiences recorded in this book. 

Mrs. Hantske attended Ashley Hall in Charleston and graduated from Columbia College in Columbia with a bachelors degree in voice and speech.  A mother of three, she was a teacher, a writer, and real estate broker.  She was an understanding reader of Gullah and has delighted many audiences throughout the South with the validity and charm of the Low Country's African-Americans.  Mrs. Hantske died in 1996.