How Not to Bake a Cake by Grandpa Tigner

"I was about four years old. I had seen my mother and sister make cakes and I decided I would make one to pass the time. I got everything I had seen them use, like flour and lard, and lots of vanilla to give it a good flavor. When I went to get the sugar, I did not get the right dish; I got a bowl of salt instead. I like my cake sweet, so I put in plenty of this so-called sugar.

When my sister came home from school, my cake was in the oven, just about done. She saw the mess I had made, pulled out my cake, and went outside and scattered it all over for the chickens to eat.

My mother had purchased several Plymouth Rock chickens, which are grey chickens about the size of a Rhode Island Red. These chickens were always hungry. So here came these purebred Plymouth Rock hens which my mother was going to use for a big start in the chicken business, and they gobbled up that salty cake.

Then you know what happened. There was not any water around, and that salt killed the chickens. When my mother came home, her old hens and little chickens were upside down in the yard stone dead! I heard about that in no uncertain terms.