WESTSIDE — Each night I crawl between pink floral polyester sheets and stretch my body out on a hard mattress with its 20-year warranty. On cold nights I pull a cotton blanket under my chin and set the thermostat to a comfortable room temperature. This week’s column is a story told to me by my husband Jerry, about the feather beds of his boyhood.

Keeping cozy in a feather bed

By Jerry Putman

I helped my mother make feather mattresses. She sewed the ticking. My job was to catch the geese so mother couldpluck those soft down feathers from them until they looked naked. It took a long time and a lot of geese to fill mattresses so my five brothers and I could each have one for our beds.

But, oh, how good it felt on a cold night in my unheated attic room to climb into the middle of that rounded mound and sink down until it surrounded me with its warm softness. Kids today have no idea what a wonderful experience that was. I’d pull up layers of heavy quilts my mother and grandmother had pieced together and quilted and I’d go right to sleep.

In the morning, mother would call me and I’d jump on the cold floor in my bare feet and hurriedly fluff that mattress till it looked like a ball in the middle of the bed. I’d quickly toss the colorful quilts on top, then gather my clothes and hurry downstairs to dress by the warmth of the pot-bellied wood-burning stove.

In the spring, I’d help mother gather up all those feather beds. I’d carry them outside and throw them over the clothesline where they would air all day in the warm, clean air. Then I’d beat them with a long wire beater until they were soft and fluffy, before carrying each one back to its room. We stored them until the next fall by slipping them beneath a cotton mattress. We’d sleep on the cool, firm, cotton mattress during the hot summer months.

I remember a time before World War II when the government bought up cotton from the impoverished South to give away to people who wanted to make mattresses. My family ran a canning factory in Pea Ridge, where we canned tomatoes in the summer. Our factory was selected to serve as the mattress distribution factory. We made mattresses for all our beds right there in our canning factory, along with all those for other people. No one had any money. All they had to do was come in, claim their free cotton and supplies, then sew their mattresses by hand.

Today everyone tells us we need hard mattresses for our backs. But they sure don’t feel as comfortable or keep you as warm as mama’s old feather beds.

Marie Wiggin Putman, one-time Gravette resident, shares her thoughts with our readers once each month.

Opinion, Pages 6 on 03/09/2011