Hwy 34 Volunteer Fire Department

The Hwy. 34 Volunteer Fire Department just outside of Ninety Six, South Carolina, cooks hash for neighborhood citizens using a hash recipe made popular by a local hashmaster. The department raises money to buy needed equipment by cooking hash. Hash-making crews work in 4-hour shifts led by the more experienced members of the department. Customers read in the newspaper that the VFD is making hash and quickly place their order in for the number of quarts desired. Members of the Hwy. 34 VFD know their community well and deliver the hash to people who cannot get by to pick it up (or who sleep in, as is the case with one neighbor.) Hashmaster Melvin Fouchee learned the recipe from Ike Berry and acknowledges that while making hash is labor-intensive, it is well worth the effort.