19-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Saturday, June 27, 1914: Was going to town this afternoon, but then was detained at home to help with the work.
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Oh dear, Grandma, I’m so sorry. You’ve worked so hard for the last two weeks or so—first picking strawberries for wages and then helping harvest hay. A 19-year-old deserves to get Saturday afternoon off so that she can spend a little time with friends in town.
—
I write this while knowing in my heart that wasn’t the way farms operated. I have very clear memories of working long days when we were making hay when I was a child. Saturday often was an especially busy day, and I’m sure that it was the same when Grandma was young.
The next day was Sunday. People didn’t work on Sunday’s back then— and there also weren’t accurate weather forecasts a hundred year ago. Grandma’s father was probably very worried that it would rain before Monday.
The old saying “make hay while the sun shines” is literally true for farmers. Farm work is very time and weather sensitive. Hay needs to be dried and brought in from the fields while the weather is good. A thunderstorm can nearly destroy a cut hay crop.
Oh dear, ‘detained’ gives the impression that being at home was like a prison sentence. 😦
I agree–It sounds like she was very unhappy that she was required to stay home.
I’m sure Grandma was disappointed.
She definitely sounds like she was disappointed.
The only good thing about haying season is that it doesn’t last forever! I hope Helena gets her trip to town soon . . . .
I agree. . . but there will be second and third cuttings later in the season.
Yes, the word ‘detained’ is very strong, by our standards anyway!
For Grandma’s sake, I hope that the meaning was more nuanced back then. 🙂
“going to town” makes me wonder what she was going to do there… Visit a friend? Go to the Mercantile? Have an ice cream soda? Whatever it was, it had to be more fun than working. …but maybe she got to go on another day?
“Going to town” does sound like something that Grandma was looking forward to doing..
My late grandmother grew up a Minnesota farm girl and her memories of “childhood” were not particularly happy ones. She said it was all hard work, all the time. She said that’s why women wore gloves back then – to cover their ruined hands. She was so happy to get off the farm as a young woman.
I never thought about the reason that gloves were in style back then, but it makes sense that women and girls wanted to hide their work-roughened hands
Aww poor Helena. I imagine even today farmers need their whole family to help where needed.
Diana xo
I think that there is wide variation across families in how involved various members are in helping with the farm operations
Her word detained says it all doesn’t it? I agree with the memories of long days of work on the farm.
Yes, the word detained does say it all. 😦
Bless her heart, I can just imagine how sad that must’ve made her.
It can be so hard for farm teens when agricultural labor needs take precedence over the normal adolescent desire to spend time with friends.
“Make hay…” is an apt phrase for a lot of things.
🙂
I never realized until I started blogging just how sensitive the timing is for hay. I have a new appreciation for those who make their living this way.
Farming is fun, but it is also hard work
Going to town would have been so much more fun…working in hay is a hard, tiring job especially in very hot weather. Hugs
My grandfather was very strict about not working on Sunday. He would kill a chicken the evening before and cook it … Always cold chicken for Sunday dinner! Jane
A lot of hard work being a farmer. I am better in front of a computer. 🙂