DID YOU KNOW?  : In October the cranberry harvest is in full swing, and harvesting methods have developed over time to the highly mechanized process of today. Did you know that some of the earliest cranberry bogs were hand-harvested by family members, neighbors, and townspeople?  But soon, bog production grew, and growers needed to find itinerant laborers during harvest time. Between 1870 and 1900, growers counted on laborers who were Irish, Italian, Syrian and Slavs from Boston, Worcester and Brockton. From New Bedford, Providence and Fall River came the Portuguese and French-Canadians. But eventually, the two most common field workers were the Finns and the Cape Verdeans.  Using the six-quart measure pails, these workers picked as soon as the dew dried until sun down, bent over scooping berries and then returning to their “bog houses” to rest for the next day’s work.  It wasn’t until 1947 that the “walk behind” mechanical dry harvesters replaced hand scooping.  Some of these laborers eventually owned their own bogs and became successful cranberry growers while others moved on to harvest other crops and business ventures. In 1930, Ocean Spray, Inc., was established as a grower cooperative to market the crops, and its corporate headquarters was located in Wareham for many years.