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

Sunday, August 9, 1914:  Went to Sunday school this afternoon. Our church is fixed up at last. It’s quite a satisfaction now to look around and admire the pretty walls and ceiling. It was pretty warm today. The seats had been varnished. Was afraid I might stick fast, but I didn’t. Came home and found Ruthie a lazying around in her room. Her excuse was, ‘twas too hot to go to church.”

I bet the pews in Grandma’s church were shinier than these . . . Hmm, now that I’m thinking about it, Grandma said “seat”, not “pews”. Did she mean pews, and was just using imprecise language?

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

The remodeling of the McEwensville Baptist Church took a month and a half. At the beginning of the process, on June 22, 1914, Grandma wrote:

Had quite a time at rubbing and washing today, and it wasn’t here at home either. We are going to have the church fixed over, and it was necessary to wash off the walls. One girl upset her bucket of water off a step ladder. Had to laugh. I was up near the ceiling, and my laughing made me dizzy. Came down off that ladder and staid down. Didn’t want a fate like the bucket.

The remodeled church sounds lovely with pretty walls and ceiling—and shiny varnished seats. Yet, I feel a twinge of sadness, because I know that the church will soon begin its final decline since, in 1939, in her History of McEwensville, Agnes Beard wrote:

 The Baptist Church, a brick edifice, has fallen into ruins, there being no members in or near the place to keep it in repair.

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

Friday, August 7, 1914:  Florence and I walked to Watsontown this afternoon. She couldn’t stay till train time. Ma wanted me to go to Milton to get her teeth. It was nice and breezy riding down on the car.

Hope Mother dear doesn’t see this. Something would happen if she did. I bought a brownie. It is a little over a week e’er we go to Niagara Falls, and well the temptation was too great. I didn’t want Ruthie to lay her eyes on that package. She has such a way of divining things. I left Mr. Package under a cherry tree, where I felt sure it would not been seen. After dark I smuggled it into the house and up to my room.

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

Wow, Grandma, there’s a lot in this diary entry. You’re getting downright wordy.

Niagara Falls! You’re going to Niagara Falls! Last spring you wrote that you went to Williamsport—which is only 20 miles away—for the first time in your life. And, now you’re going all the way to Niagara Falls! Awesome!. . . Tell us more.

Is the “brownie” a camera? Why would your mother have been angry if she’d known you’d purchased it? You have so much fun taking, and developing, photos. In my humble opinion, you definitely need to new camera to record the trip.

See any cherry trees?

—

Ruth (or Ruthie in this diary entry) was Grandma’s sister. I have no idea who Florence was. This is a new name in the diary.

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

Tuesday, August 4, 1914:  Forgot what I did today.

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

Since Grandma didn’t write much a hundred years ago today, I’ll share some ideas for stenciling and painting furniture that were in the June, 1914 issue of Ladies Home Journal.

Did Grandma ever paint or stencil a dresser or chair to beautify her bedroom? When I was young I used to enjoy “antiguing” furniture with paint to give it a new look. Maybe Grandma also enjoyed giving old furniture a new look.

The simple pattern on the slats is stenciled in white.

‘

When painted  yellow and stenciled with a leaf motif in green, a chiffonier makes an attractive piece of furniture.

The washstand can be treated in a like manner.

 

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

Sunday, August 2, 1914:  Went to Sunday school this morning. Besse and Curt came out towards evening. They brought ice and we made ice cream.

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

mmm. . . Ice cream and cake sound good.

It’s weird, but I have a vague sense of changing technology and transportation across the 3 1/2 years that I’ve been posting the diary entries.

Grandma’s family often made ice cream on Sundays when her married sister Besse and her husband Curt came to visit. However, I think this is the first time they had ice cream during the summer.

In the past they always made it during the winter when ice was readily available. I think that they got the ice out of animal watering troughs or from the creek. For example, on January 22, 1911 Grandma wrote:

Went to Sunday school and church this morning. Made ice cream. That is my sister made it and I assisted. I got the ice. Besse and Curt came out this evening. Just when Ruth and I were having a little spat all to ourselves.

(Grandma sometimes had ice cream during the summer at a festival—and once at a friend’s home— but never at home.)

Besse and Curt lived in nearby Watsontown. My take is that technology and transportation were changing—and that it was easier (or at least less expensive) to get ice during the summer months in 1914 than had been back in 1911.

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

Saturday, August 1, 1914:

The summertime is passing on,

To summers that have gone before.

Life is an ever-changing scene,

Which we would fair explore.

Am beginning to count the days until the 17th beams upon my horizon. Ruth and I went to a festival up in town given for the benefit of the church.

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

Grandma—

There are hints about so many things in this diary entry—but so little substance. What is going to happen on the 17th? What did you and your sister Ruth do at the festival? Did you see the person mentioned in yesterday’s diary entry?

. . . Went to a surprise party this evening. It was over at Carrie’s. Enjoyed myself as much as I usually do. I think no doubt remains as to the state of my feelings concerning somebody.

July 31, 1914

I assume you wrote the poem, but you’re only 19—and in some ways the monthly poem sounds like it was written by someone much older.

For more information about the monthly poems see this previous post:

Monthly Poem in Diary