How do you crack corn?

Answer 1

The phrase "crack corn" is found in the tune Jimmy Crack Corn. It is extensively discussed at the appended link. The outcome is that the phrase likely means either "engage in idle chatter" (waste time by gossiping) or open a bottle (crack) of corn liquor - both activities that rich southerners would think their slaves would participate in once the owner's back was turned.

Alternately, dried corn is a hard grain and must have the hard shell cracked to make it easier for poultry to eat (see Link). The task of cracking corn may have been one of the easier and less demeaning tasks for a slave to do on a farm.

Answer 2

Corn is a grain much like wheat or rice and you can make flour out of it (called corn meal) too. HOWEVER corn has a very hard kernel and if you were to put the whole grain into a grind-stone it would wear grooves into it. (Not a good thing to happen to a grind-stone). So before you can mill corn you have to crack the kernels open. This is done by another grind-stone, one that is not so expensive as the real one, not expected to do such a fine job, doesn't have to be perfectly smooth, if you know what I mean. I've seen people do this by hand using a grooved tray and a rolling pin type grind-stone.

Cracking and grinding can be done with the same stone, it is a matter of raising or lower the top stone to make the gap the corn in ground in narrower or wider, making the corn fine or coarse.

Answer 3

Um ... it is corn that has been cracked into pieces.