I remember when my folks and grandfolks still used the smokehouse all the time. Grandma had about twenty of those big glass pickle crocks in the root cellar. Some with picles and picleled fish and Hams in brine waiting to go to the smokehouse. We didn't have electricity in the rural Dakotas until I was about ten. We had a delco plant that charged batteries for some light but mostly we used fuel oil lanterns and lamps. I remember by folks crowded right up to the fuel oil lamp trying to read. I enjoyed those old days except the outhouse when it was twenty below zero. You learned to go fast and how to sit on your hands.