As unlikely as it may seem today, back in the 1930s, ’40s and ’50s, the dominant agricultural crop in the Napa area was not wine grapes. It was prunes.

Granted, yesterday’s prunes may not sound as exotic as today’s French-named wine grapes, but Napa Valley’s prunes were top quality — maybe not world class — but very good and served a large market.

At that time, the city of Napa was surrounded by prune orchards. While there were other kinds of fruit, like apples, pears, apricots and peaches, and lots of walnuts, the vast majority of the orchards of the area were planted to prune trees and they had to be harvested.

During the depression years of the 1930s, labor for the harvests was readily available. People needed work and they would do whatever it took to survive — even pick prunes.

Itinerant American families traveled throughout the Western states following the various harvests.

Then, in the early ’40s, World War II came and most adults became involved in the war effort, either in the military or in the defense effort. So, harvesting was left to the young — adolescents mostly. Some years they even delayed the opening of school in September so the kids could be available to help harvest the local crops.

Many of us local seasoned citizens of today picked prunes when we were young. Now, for some strange reason, we love to brag about it. I’m not sure why we brag about it, but when a group of old Napans get together, the subject of picking prunes frequently comes up.

A few weeks ago the Napa Valley Register had an article about a group of 70-ish old-timers who meet for coffee every morning. What do they talk about? They talk about picking prunes when they were young.

I have to state here that picking prunes was not much fun, but we still did it. We were paid 25 cents a box and let me tell you, those boxes were big. I think my best day was four boxes, and that took all morning.

At the time of my prune-pickin’ days, my family lived on St. Helena Highway (Highway 29) just across from where Sierra Avenue now dead-ends at 29. Next to where we lived, a Mr. Elliott owned a prune orchard. It was located between what is now Redwood Middle School and the Hilton Garden Inn on Solano Avenue.

I don’t know how many prune trees Mr. Elliott had, but it seemed like thousands. It took us a long time to pick up the fruit of one tree, move on to the next one and then the next one. It seemed like it took us forever to work our way through the orchard.

Our prune-pickin’ day started at 8 a.m. when we reported for work. Prior to that, Mr. Elliott or one of his hired hands would have “shaken” the trees where we were to pick. Maybe I should explain that shaking involved a very long pole with a large hook on the end. Holding on to the end of the pole, the “shaker” would hook one of the branches and, by alternately pulling on the pole and then relaxing, he would cause the fruit to fall to the bare ground. Then we pickers would ply our trade.

By each tree would be empty “lug” boxes. As a picker, I would pull a box to the perimeter of the tree, get down on my knees and, one-by-one, I would pick the fruit up from the ground and put them in the box. I would clear a small area of fruit and then drag the box a few feet and continue to fill it. When the box was finally full, I put my assigned number on the end of the box with chalk. I would then go get another box and start over again, working from tree to tree.

Picking prunes was a dirty job. Before I finished the first box, I was a mess. The fingers on both hands were stuck together from the fruit juice, my back hurt, my knees were killing me from kneeling on the hard dirt clods, and my clothes were covered first with dried juice and then caked with dirt.

It was not fun. It was really hard work — especially for a 12-year-old — but, today, I am proud to say that I was a Napa Valley prune picker.

Someday I may write about my days of picking tomatoes where Bel Aire shopping center is now. That wasn’t fun, either.

Footnote: As I was writing this piece, it occurred to me that we, the citizens of this great valley, have been unknowingly misstating facts for a long time.

We say that we picked prunes but, in fact, we picked up plums. To explain: Until they are dried, prunes are actually plums. Further, in order to pick a fruit, you should pluck it from its tree or bush. We didn’t. We picked them up off of the ground. So, we picked up plums. But I’m not going to make an issue out of it.

Jim Ford’s “Napa As It Was” appears every other Monday, alternating in this space with Betty Rhodes’ Senior Corner.