问答题 Brenda Farmer and Willie Blanscet have sat across from each other on the Butterball bagging line for 17 years, 102 cold, raw turkeys sliding by in front of them every minute. "Me and Willie look at each other and say. "How in the world can anybody eat this much turkey?""
The odds are good that yours may be one. 1. The women, along with workers at another Butterball plant a 90-minute drive away, help produce about a third of the 43 million turkeys the nation will eat today, according to the National Turkey Federation.
This corner of northwest Arkansas is not the land of free-running heritage birds that command $16 a pound. A leisurely morning browsing the farmers" market is not how most people spend a Saturday.
2. In this community of 3,000 on the Arkansas River, where everyone is cheering on the Hillbillies, the high school football team that made it to the state playoffs, turkey is an industry. And a job at the Butterball plant is one of the most reliable in town.
The median income in Franklin County is just over $30,000 a year. Unemployment is at 7.3 percent. Every week, a dozen or so people show up at the plant looking for work. Maybe two get hired, plant managers said.
It is not easy work. Turkeys need to be stunned and dispatched and gutted. Someone has to cut the oil gland out of the tail. Necks and gizzards and livers have to be cleaned and stuffed into a cavity. 3. During a six-week period that begins in October, the line runs seven days a week to process fresh turkey. It is a period people in town simply refer to as "fresh", and it is grueling.
"It"s a long battle when we"re working fresh, but I at least got some bills paid and Christmas money," Mrs. Farmer said. "I just sit there and hum and sing and talk to my friend Willie. We get through it together."