Writings of Ruth Fontaine Scott
Written approximately 1965 at Irvington Kentucky.
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Dad liked quiet when his day's work was over and would slip out to smoke while I put the children to bed--and they seemed noisier and took longer to get them settled this night. When by nine o'clock Dad hadn't come in, I thought he'd gone to tenant house for a chat so I went to bed. Came 12 o'clock, then one and I let my imagination have full swing. I called my oldest daughter and told her no Dad. We were cowards so we wouldn't venture far from the house, though we did hear a noise at the barn and wondered if a mule had kicked him. Then a peculiar noise came from the chicken house and we thought he'd been shot by a chicken thief. We decided we'd get in our old car parked by the house and go for a neighbor. So I called the youngest daughter that she might look after things while we were gone. She wasn't afraid of anything so she got the lantern and commenced making a survey of the yard as by then we were hearing fearful sounds. The day before we had put a feather bed down in the yard for a good airing and as she approached this, the bed began to rise and a masculine voice - "What in hell are you doing out here with a lantern!" - It was 2:30. With that I fainted and the girls went upstairs giggling. But you may be sure the following day I got the thousand and one odd jobs I'd been trying to get done--prior to entertaining the Woman's Club--when he did begin to explain. Said he'd gone to sleep in the car and, evidently remembering the bed in yard, lay down, then under, when he got cold.
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We never did have a respectable way to go and to take all of our family. It's another
story about me persuading Dad to buy a car and going in debt. Fourth of July was an
occasion we looked forward to all year-- ("1924?" in margin) To go to a picnic
at Sulphur Well and see all our kin and friends. But Dad said he wasn't going--the corn
must be plowed. We couldn't drive the car, we would get a neighbor boy to, and this time
the children were all so enthused and I was busy fixing lunch. Boiled ham, fried chicken
and all that goes with it. As I packed the basket (I was fixing his lunch to leave at
home) and was shedding a good many tears. The woman from the tenant house dropped
in. She saw me and went to the yard to ask the girls what the trouble was. Oh, she's
crying because Daddy won't go to the picnic with us. Says she, "How ain"t
that just like old Blenef Still [he was her first husband and had divorced her when he
found another]". But she shouldn't worry--my second man is the best man that ever
lived." That struck my funny bone when the girls reported and to the youngest I
remarked--Mary, aged 7--run down in the field and tell your Dad what Mrs. Nall said. - In
a few minutes in stomped Dad - "So you're comparing me with old Blenef Still or Jake
Williams (an uncle who never took his family anywhere)." He wouldn't give me a chance
for explaining but rushed out, chewing tobacco as hard as he could. In a few minutes,
glancing toward the barn I saw him taking the harness off the team. Then to the house with
"Where are my clean clothes"? None of us dared crack a smile. But the picnic was
a success.
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This picnic was held by a creek, a lovely spot with an island, and it was more a county
reunion. So early in the spring, the children would try to devise ways to lay nickels up.
Fifteen cents was enough though sometimes they achieved a quarter and before the big day
they would discuss just what the 15 cents would buy. Whether to get a glass of lemonade, a
cone of ice cream, chewing gum, or candy bar, ice cream, and popcorn with surprise in it.
It never occurred to them to want more to spend than they had earned. Of course we'd have
an extra good lunch. Once, for the three or rather four youngest, I made bathing suits out
of gray salt sacks with red calico trim. They were so proud of them, though the youngest
tried not to get his wet!
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The woman in the tenant house, who had been Blenef Still's first wife, couldn't read and
always had a "misery in her side". She'd come down and ask me or the girls if
there "was any killins" in the paper - that she always aimed to keep up with all
the killins-. Though her father was a deaf mute and she was illiterate, her children
turned out well. Following her came "Miss Elsie". She was a native but had moved
to Louisville with her first husband by whom she had 12 children. She took in boarders and
one--an Italian by name of Tony-- she ran off with and went to Detroit following the lush
years of World War I. Tony was a good mechanic - and she says - they really lived. Why I
won all kinds of prizes at the movies and had more dishes than you could shake a stick at.
She said whenever she went in meat market she threw down money and said give me the best
you've got. After nine years of living together, she and Tony had a big wedding. She
bought a white satin wedding dress and picture hat. But after the wedding Tony wouldn't go
to his church - said "Farthens (foreigners) are funny that way. They didn't believe
in divorced people marrying. However, Tony had a cross of palms above his bed and, on
stormy nights, he sure did beseech the Virgin. When they had put $5,000 in gold
certificates in the bottom of the trunk, she wanted to come back to the land where she
grew up. It was springtime so in case she went to Pa's grave Memorial Day, she bought a
black dress (though she could wear the white satin to church). The black dress was crepe
alternating with panels of lace and a big red silk corsage on the shoulder. A black
picture hat went with this, too. They lived in our tenant house five years and she really
fixed it up, though she was a little critical of our ways. Once in housecleaning time when
the girls put the library table in the center of the room, she came by and my daughters
called out to me in the yard, "Miss Elsie says the table is wrong. In Detroit they
always put em cata-cornered and to one side". Miss Elsie's children visited her every
Sunday and her youngest developed a fondness for coming in week days. Very soon she
commenced telling how her house was being broken into and robbed. They always just took
one 20 gold certificate. They lost quite a bit but the robber was never apprehended. Dad
had a way with the tenants and they all worshipped him, so he helped them quite a bit
after so much flattery. One night he helped Miss Elsie grind sausage and I had me one of
my indigestion (later gallstone) "spells". The children wanted to go for Dad,
but I said I'd be like my old cousin Jack Stith whose wife moved to town to put the
children in the school and he stayed on the farm. He took sick one night and the neighbors
sent word to his wife. When she phoned should she come home, he said "Tell the madam
I've lived without her and I can die without her". Miss Elsie and Tony were very
jealous of each other. If he did have to go to town and didn't get back when she thought,
she'd just know "he'd seen some other woman" and once when she went to the
county picnic and wore her "memorial" dress and danced till 10 o'clock and kin
got her home at midnight, he just knew she had seen "that other man", her former
husband. Miss Elsie's attractive daughter called Dad "Pal" and did he fall for
it. In times of stress Miss Elsie did, too. One midnight she called out "Pal, come
quick Tony's dying". Pal hurried out and she said Tony had gathered mushrooms
and eaten them and she knowed if he died in the middle of the night, folks would say she'd
pizened him. Dad hurried up to see Tony who quickly told him he wanted to be buried in the
old cemetery on our hill. With this off his chest, he got better. One woman in the tenant
house in the early days came down to borrow money. I didn't tell her we had none, only
that Dad always carried the pocket book. Says she, Mis Scott, I can see you started off
wrong. Me and my man been married going on 17 months and I carry the pocket book and he
hasn't given me no back talk yet. Then there were the folks who moved in the tenant house
one first of January. The neighbors and I all told Dad the man was no account, but after
Dad had told him he could move in, he hadn't the heart to say no. He wasn't a yes and no
man anyway. But the first night they were there the chickens set up a big squawk. Dad
opened the kitchen door and in the blackness of night aimed his double barrel shotgun in
the direction of the path up the hill back of the hen house. By daylight the tenants were
borrowing the wagon and team to move elsewhere. Dad agreed. He asked no questions and we
learned later the man told his brother-in-law - Great gawd amighty if
Mr. Scott can kill a dog of mine in the dark what might he do to a feller in daylight -
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The depression didn't hurt us too much. As my oldest daughter said, - when you've
nothing in the bank you don't have to worry -. We'd paid for our old farm in our first
years. We were not in debt and every red cent went towards helping keep the children in
school. Though our oldest son worked his way through the state university and would send
us grass seed, baby chicks, flower bulbs, etc. The worst year the children were all at
home -- all seven, the two of us, and two colored boys from Mississippi who said if we'd
let 'em stay there they'd work for their board. So they fixed up a chicken house to live
in and their happiest moments were after hog killing time when they had a chitling feast
every night. Once they went to a colored festival in town and were so incensed the next
morning - as Bennie said after paying them ten cents all he got was a piece of
corn bread big as your hand and chitlings no bigger than your two fingers. - There
was no one in the tenant house so my oldest son bought 460 chicks--he slept with them--
raised 435 - chicks 7 cents a pound. So we tried to see how many we could eat.
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With 11 to cook for my oldest daughter and I worked a system. As was customary in the
country when we used a wood stove in hot summer we gathered and prepared vegetables late
the evening before. We kept vegetables and all perishable foodstuff at the spring some 200
yards from the house. We had all the milk and butter, meat and chicken and garden stuff
that we could use. As soon as breakfast was over we'd put in the meat for noon--the main
meal--a big skillet of corn bread, an immense pan of pudding (as my mother-in-law called
it) though really cake, to eat for supper with apple sauce, plenty of vegetables, clabber
cheese, we always baked enough biscuits for breakfast and have some left for supper. The
three meals ran pretty much the same: breakfast-biscuits, bacon, gravy, eggs, fried apples
in season or canned peaches in winter, plenty of butter, milk, preserves, and sorghum. For
noon: big pot of green beans or cabbage or greens, potatoes, (salad the favorite), lettuce
or slaw. other vegetables in season as asparagus, peas, beets, tomatoes, simlin (cymalin
(squash)), lima beans, sweet potatoes; dessert of apple dumplings, ginger cake with
"dip" sweetened milk with nutmeg or custard pie in spring, pumpkin pie in fall.
All winter plenty of back bone, spare ribs, canned tomatoes, peaches - and dried beans -
cabbage, parsnips, turnips. Oranges were what you got in your stocking for Christmas and
had for special times. Macaroni and cheese was a special dish, too. Cold, rainy days
always had a big pot of beans or vegetable soup, baked sweet potatoes, and cookies that
never got cold - too many to eat them - Sunday a real "Sunday Dinner"
Christmas during the Depression
Our Christmas were always frugal affairs except that we had plenty to eat. When the
depression came, two of the children were working away from home. There wasn't even the
wherewith to buy any fancy candy or oranges or oysters for the Christmas Eve soup.
However, we made the most of what we had. My oldest daughter made an apron for "Miss
Elsie" out of the back of an old white shirt and Christmas Eve she and the little
boys, taking apples for Tony, went and sang Christmas carols for them. An apple in place
of an orange was in the toe of each stocking, some homemade candy and a doll for the
smallest made of sock stuffed with cotton and we always had our Christmas tree trimmed in
popcorn and red crepe paper and topped with a gilded "angel" that has always
topped our tree. Also we made stars covered with tin foil and the children were as happy
over these things as they'd always been. Dad made a table for the youngest daughter and
whittled out guns for the boys. It was snowing Christmas morning and we were to spend the
day at our Uncle's. We went in the wagon and on the way met the two who were away from
home, trying to get home in the muddy roads. They had oranges and striped candy and the
youngest said, - we met Santa right in the middle of the road -. The next Christmas we
moved to town as Dad elected Deputy Sheriff. Money was no more plentiful. So the two
youngest boys said guess Santa wouldn't even know where we lived this year. However, on
the move in I traded some hens at the country store for a red wagon and I never saw boys
as happy over anything. Then there was the previous Christmas when a nine year old son
could see that Santa would have a hard time and what was his great delight and surprise to
find a BB gun on Christmas morning that the oldest brother had sent to him from the
University. The first year I was married was the most disappointing Christmas. My folks
had always gone in for the celebration in a big way and I was not prepared for my
husband's family's attitude. To begin with my husband, who was never one to give presents
(he hadn't been brought up that way), but he went to the country store and on Christmas
morning surprised me with a large picture in a gilded frame--perfectly atrocious--and it
was a job to be pleasantly surprised. Then we went up to his home and there they were
washing, ironing, churning, as if it were any week day. From that time on I never let
Christmas catch me off guard and my crowning achievement was when 12 of my husband's
family spent the night at my house. We had a big tree and about 7 a.m. Santa knocked on
the front door--said the fire place kept him from coming down the chimney. One of the
little boys did remark that Santa wore shoes like "Uncle Jesse", but otherwise
it was a wonderful occasion. Then another time with about the same crowd the weather was
so pretty that the men sat around a fire out doors and cooked the turkey, while Ab--of
color--slept on the floor with his head up next to the fireplace. Ab also always read the
paper with his feet toward the light.
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Finances were never particularly dwelt on at our house. We had paid for the farm--we owed
no man (except once). When tobacco was sold winter necessities were bought. When wool and
lambs were sold, winter necessities were bought. Between times chickens and eggs
supplied small items for the table. We never dwelt on the fact that we were poor. And the
children enjoyed every minute on the farm. I made over clothes sent to me for the girls.
Shoes were quite an item, but mainly because my children had big feet and then they made
no comfortable shoes for children with big feet. When we did visit in homes where there
was money and it was dwelt upon--and how this only cost that--and how a penny was saved
here--I always came home and cooked an extra extravagant meal--and felt rich. Also,
I could sew and fix my children up so that they looked rich. We were fanatics on
the subject of good reading and one fall I did without winter underwear in order to
subscribe to National Geographic magazine. One of my boys, Bill, wasn't the little angel
they're supposed to be (none were) but he was one of the "what will I do next"
variety. At the age of 7 he began reading stories in the Saturday Evening Post. At 9 he
loved to read history and no more was he the "pesky brat". When night time came
every one quieted down with something to read--that is when they got old enough to stay up
until 8 o'clock.
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Busy times
My fourth child, a daughter, Mary, was born in July. That Spring we had a sawmill to come
and saw lumber for a new barn. The third child, Jessie, contracted pneumonia. At the same
time I cooked for, besides the family, three sawmill hands. I would be up with her every
two hours all night for medicine. The sick child, who was 3 1/2, just couldn't seem to be
get better. And I kept her on a pillow in a red wagon to keep me with her when I worked. -
One day when a county candidate stopped by for a noon meal - Dad was holding
the child and she had such a coughing spell. She finally threw up about a pint of
corruption. Later on doctors knew how to put a tube in for drainage. She slowly improved
though nothing could tempt her appetite and she couldn't walk. We were afraid her knees
and hips would be stiff. About three weeks before the new one, an aunt died and I was very
close to the family, so I took care of the house while others went to the funeral and had
the sick child with me. And they needed me for the night so I stayed. Next morning after
someone could carry my child downstairs, I helped my cousin, Hattie Williams, with
breakfast. The she went to gather vegetables for dinner. When she came in about an hour
(later), I saw she was moving in a daze, so I rang the farm bell for her father to come
and he called in neighbors and the Doctor. It was necessary for me to go home. The cousin
remained unconscious several days. She had typhoid fever. I went ahead making plans for
the new one to arrive. We were expecting her in two weeks. So my Arkansas relatives were
visiting in town near by. I wrote them--8 in all--to come for Sunday dinner. Saturday
morning I boiled a ham, dressed a hen, baked light bread and cake. That afternoon Dad and
the hired hand, Ab, canned 19 half gallons of blackberries with me getting jars sterilized
and helping out. I even walked to the barn with Dad at milking time. At 8 o'clock with Dad
taking a bath, I bent over the cot to see how the sick child was, and when I raised up,
pains started. Dad wouldn't hurry, said I just studied that one up. But finally he walked
across the field to a neighbor and brought the wife back while the man went on to get my
aunt and to phone for a Doctor from their house. We had no phone. The man had taken his
buggy for my aunt and on the way back in the dark he drove over a stump, upsetting the
buggy and the aunt spilled out. But she wasn't hurt. As she came into my room, I remarked,
this is one time I'll have a baby without a doctor, but a voice, that of my Uncle Doctor,
said, "No you won't". It so happened he was in the neighborhood to see the
cousin with typhoid. So the little Miss Mary was there by 10 p.m. and the Doctor and
nurses had a good time eating ham, fresh light bread, and cake. Dad's mother had told us
that she would contribute new green beans already cooked for our Sunday company dinner.
Also, she would bring the ice cream freezer over. At 5 a.m. Sunday, Dad went over to his
mothers and she was amazed to see him so early. Hastily, she told him she hadn't put the
beans on, nor gotten out the ice cream freezer - Said Dad - Well, I don't think our
company particularly cares for green beans or ice cream.- and Granma was quite
astonished - said Dad - you see she got here last night - So we called off the other
company. Dad's sister, Maggie, came on Monday to stay with us and that afternoon got a
call to come home. Her brother-in-law was ploughing out a tobacco patch with one horse and
lightning struck and killed the man and horse. When the baby was four weeks old and the
invalid was recuperating slowly, Dad built the new barn. So I had five or six men to cook
dinner for every day, besides one of the carpenter's wives who was "lonesome".
Dad and Ab (of color) would bring in vegetables and I remember what feasts I'd put on the
table. The baby was good as gold. After her morning bath you wouldn't know she was in the
place and the carpenter's wife said "you don't mean you bathe her every day?"
When the baby was two months old I took her and the invalid on my regular every other year
trip to see my father in Arkansas. My mother-in-law would stay with Dad and the other
children. The little girl, Mary, was just past two when we began to expect a new one. It
was October and Dad's brother and wife were visiting from Iowa. They came to spend the
night and so did a single brother. They had the idea they'd love to sleep in the new hay
loft. But in about an hour they came to the house and tried a bed upstairs. I had felt
unusually well that day: cleaned out the pantry, got every shelf cleaned, ricked a pile of
wood, and the children's clothes were all in apple pie order (as this was after the flu
epidemic and I'd heard of a mother dying and leaving a baby and two others and the older
children's clothes were in such a state). We were up a little late on account of company,
but I was awakened about 12 and called Dad. Said he, "Now look here, Hen, you needn't
try to pull any stunt just because company is here". But finally he called the
company. My sister-in-law got busy with a fire and hot water and the men went after the
aunt and to telephone for the Doctor. The baby came about 15 minutes after the Doctor
arrived and was a boy, William Henry, after three girls and the oldest boy. So Dad was all
smiles. The brother-in-law watched the aunt bathe the new baby by the cookstove. They told
me they had never been so well entertained when spending a night. The two youngest
children, Jack and Jim, both boys arrived at dawn on lovely summer mornings. They were two
years and two weeks apart. When the sixth one came, I used a verse I had found. Dad said
he imagined folks nearly had a deck of my cards by now. But for the sixth I sent out this
(not original):
The cradle had been split in sticks
When in popped baby number six
And we are praying hard that Heaven
Will keep fast hold on number seven!
However number seven arrived and a good, quiet baby and how we all did spoil him. Number
six, Jack, was the thin, crying variety and his constant cry when number seven, Jim,
arrived was "Mamma, put the baby down and take me". Our friend (of color),
Lizzie, was with me and number six loved her. She'd take him to the garden and keep him
with her. One morning Lizzie was holding number seven and number six kept running around
her making derogatory remarks about the new baby: "Little brother is ugly",
"Little brother is not good", "Little brother is in my way", and,
finally, "Little brother looks just like a 'nigger' baby". Lizzie was shaking
with mirth by then and put little brother down and took him. She knew he was just thinking
up anything that he thought was ugly and had no idea what "nigger" meant. Before
leaving, Lizzie would put supper on the table on the porch and cover it all over. Once
when company left they found number six sitting in the table eating green beans with both
hands. Lizzie's mother got sick so she was there only a few days. Then Grandma came over.
Dad always was my nurse. A neighbor came in to bathe the baby and Grandma was supposed to
do the cooking. But that wasn't her line when it came to cooking enough for a big family.
One Saturday when number 7 was about 9 days old, Grandma had gone home and the children
kept telling me how hungry they were. Says I, "Take a rocker in the kitchen for me
and bring in whatever you want for dinner." With their help, we had fried chicken,
potatoes, tomatoes, corn, slaw, and apple dumplings. Dad got the Sunday dinner and when
Grandma came back on Monday, she told me she'd make a chicken stew--didn't think now it
would hurt me to eat that. The children didn't tell on me that I'd enjoyed the Saturday
dinner as much as they had.
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When the youngest daughter, Mary, was 5, Grandma and I went to the store one day and as we
came back, the plowing team was hitched to the carriage. So we knew something was amiss.
Grandma had brought over a little cousin's slippers with heels and the little daughter put
them on. She was playing with her new doll and they were all in the barn loft as Dad was
working in the barn. When she started down the steps, the heels caught and she plunged
down on top of the new doll. Her face was badly cut and pieces of the doll face were in
her cheek and near her eye. Dad had bathed all of this with carbolic acid drops in boiled
water and the oldest sister, Rena Lou, was dressing her to go the Doctor's. It was a
momentous occasion as Dad very rarely called upon a doctor. I went along, too. But Mary
sat in her Dad's lap without a whimper while the doctor pulled out the doll with tweezers
and Dad was the one who put a new bandage on her face every time. Dad hadn't thought he
knew too much about child raising until this fourth one came. After that he felt he was an
authority on such and took over you might say. Once when I left home, Number two daughter,
Jessie, turned to Number three daughter, Mary, and said, "Now Mary, you cry and Dad
will let us do whatever we want to do."
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In regard to schooling, one of our neighbors remarked he'd promised a new car to any of
his children who graduated from high school. When this was repeated at home, Dad said,
"I'll give anyone of mine a black eye if they don't!" When our oldest, Walter,
was 13 and through with the 8th grade, I said we would send him to high school. - No use
of that, - said Dad, - I didn't go and we can't afford it. But my Grandmother lived in a
small place where there was a two year high school. So we made arrangements for her to
keep Bud. He'd go Sunday afternoon on horseback and back on Friday. He'd be so woebegone
on Friday as he had difficulty making a go of it with Grandma all the week. She was hard
to please. I remember of him telling how the school professor had rigged up a head gear
with ear pieces to listen. And it was called a radio. The next year a two year high school
opened up 5 miles from home and he rode horseback to that and maybe it was then the next
child, Rena Lou, a daughter, was ready to go with him. And what times they'd have. If she
had treated him "right", then he'd saddle her horse, too, and open the four
gates--the near way to go. But if things were not so well, then she'd have to saddle her
own horse, open and close all the gates, and maybe be late for school. Then he was a
senior and they had to go to the county seat to high school. It was only 20 miles, but
then Dad had to take them seven miles to a train. They rode about 10 miles on the train
and three miles to town in a hack. I engaged two rooms for them in the home of a school
teacher. Bud's cot was in the kitchen and the daughter did the cooking. We supplied the
food and when they could come home would cook a good deal for them to take. As is natural
with old ladies, Bud was their favorite and the neighbors were always fixing him something
tasty, especially when he told them his sister wouldn't cook. Trouble was their tastes
were so different. He was always finicky about his eating and Sister ate any and
everything and weighed from 90 to 95 pounds. She was especially fond of dried beans which
he wouldn't begin to touch. I knew they had their ups and downs, but I was unprepared for
the letter from their landlady, the elderly schoolteacher. She wrote that she was unable
to cope with my daughter any longer, that she had a "steady" boyfriend. - that
she (Rena Lou) left every afternoon about 5 to go get the mail at the post office and
didn't get back until 8 and she knew she was seeing the boy. I was quite upset though I
trusted my daughter to look after herself. However, I waited to see her. Dad had gone to
the train to meet them this dark winter night. When Sister came in I was horrified. I
hadn't heard of the new style where dresses came only to one's knees and Sister had hemmed
hers up. She also had on rouge and lipstick. Then in the next breath, - I've been having
the best time. Alverda [who rented rooms, too and lived near] likes beans and we put a pot
of them on every night and by the time we go to the post office and fool around a while,
the beans are done!! -- Too often I've found young folks are only eating beans when old
folk suspect the worst. -- Then Sister taught and the two other daughters joined her in
housekeeping in town. And my troubles did begin, as neighbors had a time trying to find
out just what all they were up to. One night when they returned from a "pie
supper" at Sister's school, they invited the young folks in and at 2 a.m. scrambled
eggs, cooked bacon and made coffee. The neighbors were so concerned over the goings on
that I told them it would be best to get out and tell them of each event. By then they had
an old Ford roadster that they'd come home in Friday, through muddy roads and back on
Sunday afternoon. Saturday was one busy day. They'd cook up all they could think of for
the week's food and I'd sew as hard as I could--sometimes making each a dress.
Sister taught country school several years. One place in particular where she boarded, the folks were so kind to her. She had plenty to eat and a clean bed. But one night when she couldn't sleep, she struck a match and there in single file were bugs tracking along her pillow. We didn't think of them as travellers, but what was my dismay when looking over beds one day to see that the girls' bed was simply walking off. Dad was so provoked that he took the mattress to the sink hole and burned it up. And though I kept a sharp eye all along, we didn't have visitors anymore. One place Sister boarded the woman was so clean that she'd mop up her linoleum floor after every visitor. Her way to test the floor was to rub her hand along and, if there was any trace of dirt, it had to go glimmering. She kept so much food cooked, but never threw away any food, just left it on the table and added more. So it wouldn't be surprising to taste or smell spoilt food. One winter Sister taught the home school. Her friend from town boarded with us and rode horseback 4 1/2 miles to teach. The second daughter, Jessie, went to another country school to get a good 8th grade training and the three youngest went to the home school (Hall School) and one was still at home. I prepared lunch for the six. And would have a good hot meal by 5 in the afternoon. Our boarder wanted beans every night regardless of what else. She'd lived over a drug store all her life and had subsisted on knick knacks, so she was hungry for good old every day "grub".
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The oldest was in High School in town in his senior year and the night of his 18th
birthday our barn burned down. This was a real blow to him as had started with a pet lamb
and by then had 20 ewes and 20 lambs worth $400. We only carried $250 insurance on the
barn. That night one child, Bill, wasn't well and when I awakened to see about him, there
was such a glare in the room I thought the house was afire. But running quickly to the
window I saw the whole barn was ablaze. In the meantime, I called Dad and the girls
upstairs heard me. Dad and the second daughter, Jessie, ran to save the corn crib. The
spring branch was near and she'd hand him buckets of water. I rang the alarm on the phone,
but when the neighbors got there the barn was falling in. We lost, besides the sheep, our
good old team of mares, brood sows, cow and calf, chickens, wagon, buggy, hay, feed, and a
car I'd persuaded Dad to buy (very much against his judgment). Dad had never ridden in the
car because it wasn?t paid for. We had only made 6 trips in it. We'd paid $250 down and
owed $250 and the insurance paid that. I could hardly stand the thought of a car after
that. It was a total loss. One small lamb had rolled out of the fire all scorched. No one
knew how it [the barn] caught fire. A gentle rain on an April night. Our good neighbors
were wonderful. One man came in the next afternoon with $175 that folks had contributed
and several wagon loads of feed were brought in. The oldest, Walter, taught school the
next year and bought a Ford roadster for $160 which we really did get over the country in.
Dad never learned to drive, but he would go.