Charlie Fritz, who learned how to make sauerkraut with his Aunt May starting in the Great Depression, knows that sauerkraut is more than some cabbage in a crock.

There's salt and time added too. All together, it is more than the sum of its parts, as a good life is more than the sum of its days.Many different salts have been added to the life of Charlie. He learned his way around a hammer with the guidance of his father Willard who was a fine cabinet maker. And he got a taste of farm life from his mother's sister May Beaver and her brother Clayton, who ran the family's small truck patch farm in East Weissport.Charlie's early life was also filled with the lore of the hazards and pride of men who worked for the railroad. His grandfather Warren Beaver was a steam train engineer on the Lehigh Valley Railroad.He never drove a car as all his years guiding his engine along steel rails made him unwilling to learn how to steer the vehicle. He retired before having to change over from steam to diesel engines.Growing up, Charlie helped manage a small apple orchard, pruning limbs and sending the harvest to the cider press. One tree that still remains there today was planted in 1909 and he has the paperwork on it. It was as hollow as any partisan politician, but was twice as fruitful.He remembers his uncle Clayton telling him, "Prune it hard enough so that birds could fly through them."This true advice he never forgot.Among the many things handed down to him is a special ball of twine. Aunt May saved lengths of butcher twine for some unforeseen future use.Like the sauerkraut he was making this October day, the knowledge of it reaches back to generations before us, along a long string of time. And when it is ready six weeks from now, others will enjoy the fruits of these labors.Charlie and his wife Melba have been making the sauerkraut for their Weissport church for over 30 years.Melba prepares the 200 pounds of cabbage by removing the outer leaves and cutting out the "cabbage hearts," the hard inner stem. Charlie is inside his old family cistern that he converted to a ground cellar which is perfect for fermenting sauerkraut: it keeps the crocks at a steady cool temperature away from light. It also keeps the noxious fermenting cabbage gases outside the house.Collecting andfiltering waterThe cistern held water that ran off the roof. It was their only water supply until the 1940s. With the sooty steam engines of the Jersey Central still making their runs along the Lehigh below, as well as other routine roof debris, it was important to let the first part of each rain shower clean off the roof before diverting the water into the tank.The cistern had a large and a small section. The main part, about 7' by 7' by 7', is where the water entered. It was separated from the smaller 3' by 7' by 7' section by a double, red-brick wall, which by their porous nature served as a filtering system for the water. The drinking water was drawn from this smaller section.In the dry summer months, they hauled water from the Barry family spring in Long Run. These yearly dry spells allowed them to climb inside the cistern to scrub it out. They got down inside with a discarded wrought iron caboose ladder.Today, five crocks sit inside the old cistern waiting for cabbage. Like the brick, the crocks must not have a heavy glaze on them or the fermenting process won't quite work. It makes one wonder who first discovered these food-making and water-filtering techniques?The 10-gallon crock is the first to be filled. Using a three-blade, wooden framed shredder from the 1930s, Charlie shreds about two cabbage heads - a half a head at a time - before adding two tablespoons of non-iodized canning salt. It is then gently tamped down with a wooden stomper until firmly packed together.Once, about 30 years ago, while making sauerkraut with Aunt May, Charlie was frustrated with the older, warped shredder they had been using for years. Aunt May told him he could get the brand-new one she had up in the attic. To his surprise, it was a still in its original 1938 package. It's the one he's been using ever since.The process is repeated until 100 pounds of tamped cabbage, with two pounds of salt, fills the crock. The six-gallon crock is next to be filled. He uses his Aunt May's ever-present, but soon-to-be-diminished ball of saved twine to seal the cloth over the top to keep the dirt out while allowing it to breathe.Charlie served in the Army Security Agency during the Korean Conflict, intercepting Chinese Morse code. He and his cohorts got so accustomed to listening in on the transmissions, they could discern the sender by their idiosyncratic style of tapping. Being in North Korea, he had nothing to spend his money on so he sent it home. On his direction, his parents bought a 1954 Chevy for him.Once home, he was re-assigned to Two Rock Ranch Station in California. With a love of travel, he loaded his Chevy with his father and Aunt Sula. They drove across country, stopping at the Badlands, Sequoia, and Yosemite National Parks. Then his father and aunt flew all the way home by propeller plane, with all the stops that day of flying entailed.When his enlistment expired, his father flew out alone. This time, father and son drove back across the southern range, visiting the Grand Canyon and Zion National Park.The most memorable was seeing Bryce Canyon with its bright rock covered in snow. It would be the final salt of his father's life. He died of a heart condition at the age of 43 that October in 1955.Keeping familytraditions aliveThis batch of sauerkraut will be ready in about six weeks but it won't be served until Jacob's United Church of Christ's Feb. 5, 2012 Pork and Sauerkraut dinner. All the work and aging will make it just right. (Jacob's is also having a dinner Nov. 5, 2011, equally tasty, but without homemade sauerkraut.)Besides the fellowship that always comes with the sharing of a meal, these dinners provide a chance to appreciate both the sauer of the kraut and the sweetness of the many deserts. But most of all it gives us time to reflect upon all the things that go into a long and happy life.But Charlie remembers making it as young as eight or 10 years of age, near the end of the Great Depression. Aunt May was his mother's sister, and she lived on her 2-acre family truck patch farm in East Weissport her whole life. She lived there with her brother Clayton, neither of them ever marrying. Though they are gone and the patch sold, the small apple orchard they planted there still grows.Charlie remembers one tree planted in 1908, he knows this because he still has the paperwork on it. And though the tree today is as hollow as any partisan politician, it is near twice as fruitful. The time in the fall was full of pressing those sweet apples into cider and tampering cabbage into crocks for sauerkraut, all raised on the small farm.Charlie was a trained cabinet maker who worked days in John Snyder's grocery store in Weissport. Charlie and Melba live in the house of his parents along Long Run Road in East Weissport.The 10-gallon, 6-gallon and smaller crocks were lined up in the former cistern used to supply all the family's water needs until a well was drilled in the 1940s. The water was directed from the rainspouts in the underground 7'x7'x7' holding tank that had a double red brick wall separating it from another 3'x7'x7' tank.The water came into the larger tank and filtered through the brick wall into the smaller tank. The drinking water was taken from the smaller tank.With the New Jersey Central Railroad line running along the Lehigh River below, the roof top had plenty of soot and other debris. After the initial rains washed it away, the roof water was then diverted into the cistern.Over the years, the sauerkraut making shifted from Aunt May's home to Charlie's cistern, which he opened at one end and built cement steps leading down into it.The 10-gallon crock holds 100 pounds of cabbage. Like the bricks in the cistern, the crocks must be porous enough to allow the mixture to breathe for the six weeks it ferments. Pieces of slate are used to top off the six-gallon crock, while Charlie has recently begun using two gallon Ziploc bags to press down on the fermenting sauerkraut. A cloth cover is placed and tied with the ball of packing twine saved from his Aunt May.The crocks need to be kept in a cool dark place, which is why Charlie converted his cistern into a cold cellar. The noxious smell of fermenting cabbage is enough to prevent the most diehard Dutchman to swear off the stuff, which is why a separate cold cellar is a must.Charles will check in on it from time to time. When it is finished, the top layer of black, spoiled cabbage is removed from the fermented sauerkraut.Charlie's Aunt May sold many things from her truck patch, including rhubarb, apples, cider, as well as the sauerkraut. She sold it by the pound from the crock each time someone came calling for it. Each time, she'd have to scrape the top layer off and throw it away.A retiree of Bethlehem Steel, Charlie still enjoys seeing the country as much as he enjoys keeping his family traditions alive. He also keeps bee hives in two locations in Franklin Township.You could say he knows how to take both the sweet and the sour that comes along in life. You don't have to know Charlie and Melba very long to know that.