16-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today: 

Sunday, May 28, 1911: Ma and Pa went away to store all day. Tweet was here all night and staid till evening. Went to Sunday school this morning. Carrie was over this afternoon. Heard this evening of the arrival of a girl cousin born on May the 18th. 

Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:

From reading the diary—I now know that “Tweet”  was Helen Wesner–with a nickname like Tweet she must have been a blast as a teen.  I just knew her as an elderly woman who had never married.

Grandma and Helen would see each other on Sunday’s for much of their lives. After Grandma married, she attended Messiah Lutheran Church in McEwenville which was the church Helen attended.

When I was a child in the middle of the 20th century, the children’s Sunday School classes were in the basement, but the adult classes were spread out in various corners of the main church sanctuary. I remember that sometimes my Sunday School class would end before the adult classes, and I’d come up the stairs into the narthex and peek through the doors into the sanctuary.

There were four adult classes: the men’s class, the women’s class, and the old ladies’ class, and the old men’s class. (Maybe the classes had another name—but I always called them the old ladies’ and old men’s classes).

I can remember Grandma and Helen sitting in the old ladies’ class. It was a small class—maybe seven people on a good Sunday—most Sunday’s there probably were about 5 people. My memory is that all had gray hair, wore loose-fitting dresses that seemed to lack any sense of style, and were bent over in weariness.

After reading the diary—I now wonder what those elderly women talked about on those Sunday mornings.

What do people talk about who’ve known each other for most of their lives? The good old days? . . their families? . . . gardening? . . . their health? . . . their deepest secrets (which may not really be secrets to people who’ve know each other for 50, 60, or 70 years)?

16-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today: 

Friday, May 26, 1911: I’m through watching cows for the present time—at least. That was my duty for one wk.

Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:

Why is the duty of watching cows over? What did it involve? Weren’t there fences around the fields? (Somehow this entry brings back vague memories of  Johanna Spyri’s book about Heidi watching cows in the Alps.) Was the task rotated between the siblings in the family?

According to Wikipedia barbed wire was widely used by the last quarter of the 19th century. I would have thought that the Muffly family would have had sturdy barbed wire fences around their fields—but maybe they didn’t.

16-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today: 

Tuesday, May 23, 1911: It was most too hot today any work today, so I lingered around in cool shady nooks so that I might not become overheated.

Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:

It probably was hotter on May 23, 1911 in McEwensville than it is today. Weather Underground’s forecast for today (May 23, 2011) for McEwensville is for a high of 76 degrees with a 50% chance of thunderstorms.

The May 23, 1911 issue of the New York Times contained an article about the unseasonably hot weather in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania on the previous day. Since Pittsburgh is about 150 miles west of McEwensville—similar weather patterns were probably seen on the 23rd in central Pennsylvania.

The New York Times article said:

PITTSBURG, May 22.—The stretch of two weeks of torrid heat was broken in Pittsburg at 6 o’clock tonight, when an electrical storm brought relief after the official thermometer had registered 92 degrees late this afternoon for the third successive day.

The record of continuous maximum temperature for all months for five years was broken, and all records known, extending forty years back for May heat are shattered.

The thirtieth death from heat in four days was reported this afternoon when Gustave Yenney, a jeweler, dropped dead in the Criminal Court room, the third person to topple over in the same court since last Friday, though the other two courtroom victims are recovering. Following the fatality, two branches of court adjourned to await cooler weather. Business offices all over the city closed for the afternoon.

It’s interesting how offices closed due to hot weather before the advent of air conditioning. I guess that back in those slower times there were both “snow days” and “heat days”.

An aside—Note that prior to World War I Pittsburgh was spelled without an h at the end—i.e., Pittsburg. During the War the h was added to make the name look less German.

16-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today: 

Thursday, May 18, 1911:  Carrie Stout was over this afternoon. We went for lilacs and after she had a big bouquet, she became afraid of the bumble bees.

Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:

Sounds like two friends having fun on a pleasant spring day while doing simple things together—gathering lilacs while goofing around as they worried about bumble bees. Ah, the joys of being young and carefree.

16-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today: 

Wednesday, May 17, 1911: I am busy these days ripping tucks out of my skirts. They are inclined to be just a trifle too short. My right forefinger is getting so sore. Wonder if it will prove another runaround. 

Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:

I wonder why the skirts didn’t fit right. Had Grandma gained a little weight?—or maybe styles were a little longer than they’d been the previous spring? A hundred years ago clothes were worn until they wore out, yet they remained stylish because they were regularly remade.

Today we buy new clothes each season in the latest colors and styles. Our closets are stuffed to the gills with seldom worn clothes from last year and the year before.

I’m annoyed with myself when I buy a new brown pencil skirt because my navy pleated skirt is hopelessly out of style—yet I won’t be caught dead wearing the pleated skirt. Sometimes I long for the good old days when clothes were regularly remodeled (though I’m all thumbs when it comes to sewing).

A book published by the Butterick Company in 1911 called The Dressmaker: A Complete Book on All Matters Connected with Sewing and Dressmaking from the Simplest Stitches to the Cutting, Making, Altering, Mending and Caring for the Clothes has a chapter on remodeling clothes:

Nothing accumulates so fast in every household as half-worn clothing, and the dead capital that it represents is apt to make the thoughtful ones draw a deep breath.  . .

One ought, at the very beginning of each season, to set to work to take a critical survey of last year’s wardrobe. It is the easiest way to find out exactly what new clothes are needed and exactly how far one can go with the old ones. Coats, suits, and dresses that are still in sound physical condition, but which have grown out of style, should be remade. The remodeling of a pair of sleeves, the recutting of a skirt, will almost always give a new lease of life to a suit.

Decide first what clothes are worth remaking. When the materials are badly worn it is hardly worth while going to any amount of trouble in the way of renovations. But when the material is sound and whole it is little short of criminal not to take advantage of the possibilities. . . .

16-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today: 

Tuesday, May 16, 1911: Started to make a much needed apron. Mother and I had quite a squabble over it. She said I wasn’t making it right. Started to embroider a jabot. Don’t suppose I need it though. Just something to take up room.

Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:

A jabot is a decorative ruffle on the front of a shirt or dress. A hundred years ago they were considered a stylish accessory.  Currently female supreme court judges often wear them.

And, today I learned how to pronounce a new word. Jabot is pronounced zhab-oh or jab-oh  I was telling my son that I needed to write an entry about  jabots–and we ended up discussing how to pronounce it. I had pronounced it “ja-bot.” But according to the dictionary the “t”  is silent.

I wonder what Grandma was doing incorrectly when she was making the apron. Old-time apron directions are in a previous post.

16-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today: 

Monday, May 15, 1911:  I was so very busy this forenoon. Sometimes I can be very energetic, if I want to. Bessie was out this afternoon.

Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:

Grandma probably was unaware of a major event that occurred on this date a hundred years ago.  If you look in a history book, there generally are two events mentioned that occurred in 1911—one was the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire and the other was the U.S. Supreme Court decision that broke up Standard Oil.

The Court ruled a hundred years ago today that Standard Oil was a monopoly and that it must be broken up because it violated the Sherman Anti-trust Act.

John Rockefeller founded—and then led Standard Oil as it grew into one of the largest firms in the nation. According to Wikipedia, in 1904 Standard Oil controlled 91% of oil production and 85% of final sales in the US.

Investigative journalists called muckrakers highlighted the problems and inequities caused by monopolies, corporate greed, and the robber barons.

Rockefeller and his associates did not build the Standard Oil Co. in the board rooms of Wall Street banks. They fought their way to control by rebate and drawback, bribe and blackmail, espionage and price cutting.

Ida Turnball

The Supreme Court decision symbolized the end of the robber baron era in the US.