19-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Sunday, September 13, 1914: Went to Sunday School this morning. Was up at Tweet’s this afternoon, and went to church this evening.
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Tweet was the nickname of Helen Wesner. She was a friend of Grandma’s who was occasionally mentioned in the diary. Based on the diary, and other sources, here’s what I know about her:
Helen was three years older than Grandma. Helen never married—and worked on her family’s farm and in their small dairy processing plant that produced bottled milk. She died in 1976 at the age of 84.
Anyone with the nickname of Tweet had to have been a fun person. Here are two previous diary entries that mentioned Tweet or the Wesner’s.
On December 6, 1913 Grandma wrote:
The whole family was invited out for dinner today. We all went except Pa. It was up at Tweet’s place. We had something that I always had a curiosity to know what they tasted like. It was waffles.
And, on January 3, 1914, Grandma wrote:
Made a call this afternoon, so that the time wouldn’t be so tedious. I’m wishing and longing for a sleigh ride, now that there is sleighing.
Ruth and I went up to Wesner’s this evening. There were some other girls there too. Renewed my acquaintance with a former school mate whom I hadn’t seen for over three years I guess, until I saw her on Christmas eve. Had a good time.
Great pet name!
It’s such a fun name!
I wish I had a cool nickname like Tweet!
So do I. 🙂
How fascinating…wondering what a waffle tasted like!!!
In the 50s, we had cousins who would come from Paterson, NJ to visit us on the farm in IL. Mom would serve milk from our cows out of a pitcher. The NJ kids wouldn’t touch it.
Mom went to the dairy in town and bought a couple of milk bottles. The kids would then drink their milk poured from them with no hesitation.
What a wonderful story! I always really liked fresh farm milk.
Tweet would fit right in today in the Twitter community!
I agree. . . She had a nickname that was ahead of her time.
This is so cool. I love the waffles and the wishing for a long sleigh ride. Thank you for sharing.
I’m glad you enjoyed it.
Yes tweet would be popular today!!!
My parents and their family are from PA and it seems everyone has a nickname. Like Uncle Moon. I never knew his real name until I got older!!
There’s often a fun story behind the nicknames. . . I wonder what the story was behind Tweet’s nickname.
Yes, too bad we don’t know!
Strange that someone in those days never married….
Diana xo
I have a great aunt from the same time period who never married.
Yes, I think those young ladies had a lot more fun than was written in this diary. They did take a vacation to Niagara Falls 🙂
I agree! For some reason Grandma seemed to find it really difficult to record all of the fun things that she did with her friends in the diary. Sometime I think that she thought that her mother or sister might read it if she wrote it down.
And I looked to see the cream on the top of the bottle, like those from my Uncle’s dairy that used to be found in the little metal box outside the kitchen door in the morning. Oh, and I did get a sleigh ride once, even then a step into the past, on my uncle’s (different uncle) wagon.
The milk sounds delicious. . . It’s almost impossible to find milk now that has cream on top.