17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Tuesday, December 17, 1912: Carrie went with me to Watsontown this afternoon. I did my Christmas shopping. I didn’t take as much money as I thought I would. Jimmie wants to know what I got him. He wants a gun so awful bad. Got him one.
Jimmie Muffly
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Carrie Stout was a friend of Grandma’s and Jimmie was Grandma’s 7-year-old brother. Given the recent very tragic event in Connecticut, it’s hard to know what to write today. My thoughts and prayers go out those affected by the tragedy in Newtown.
17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Monday, December 16, 1912: Our dearest Ruth left for Sunbury this morning and my heart is rather sad. We killed some pigs and I took a slice off the end of my thumb. Oh sad the day, for I don’t care anything about having a sore thumb.
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Butchering hogs is a lot of work. A hundred years ago today, the yard between the house and barn on the Muffly farm was probably filled with scalding troughs and large wooden tripods with hog carcasses hanging from them.
I wonder how bad Grandma’s cut was. A “slice off the end” of her thumb doesn’t sound good. (Click here to read a previous post on how they treated cuts and wounds a hundred years ago.)
Did Grandma miss her sister Ruth or was she being sarcastic? (Personally I might be annoyed if I had a sister who didn’t have to help with the butchering.)
I think that Ruth went to a teachers’ institute. She was a teacher at a one-room school-house near McEwensville. Winter break for the schools began the previous Friday, and I think that teacher institutes were held over the breaks to provide professional development and training for the rural school teachers.
Sunbury is the county seat of Northumberland County and is about twenty miles from McEwensville.
17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Sunday, December 15, 1912: Went to Sunday School this afternoon. Jimmie also has the pink eye and says I gave it to him. He was real mad for a time.
Recent photo of the Muffly’s house.
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Poor Jimmie—pink eye is no fun.
Of course, Grandma’s seven-year-old brother is right—he probably caught the pink eye from Grandma . She wrote that she had pink eye on December 10—and that it was getting better on December 12.
Did the Muffly’s try to prevent the spread of pink eye?
Here’s what I found in a hundred-year-old book called Personal Hygiene and Physical Training for Women about how to avoid infections (though it focuses on influenza rather than pink eye).
We have already seen that bacilli are not only the cause of acute infections, but also of chronic bronchitis, and that this was especially true of the bacillus of influenza and the pneumococcus of pneumonia.
It is well know that influenza is an infectious disease, which rapidly spreads through the family and the community., but it is not so well-known that the so-called “common colds,” ordinary sore throat, and tonsillitis are also highly contagious. The infection is carried from one person to another by direct contagion; the air is being constantly sprayed with the germs of disease in talking, laughing, sneezing, and coughing. In coughing and sneezing it is not sufficient to hold the hand before the moth—a handkerchief must be used for this purpose.
17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Saturday, December 14, 1912: Made some handkerchiefs this afternoon. Of course they weren’t very fancy ones, but good enough for me.
Source: Ladies Home Journal (December, 1912)
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Was Grandma making the handkerchiefs for herself –she might have needed them since she’s had colds for much of the Fall—or as gifts for someone else?
In the old days people made lovely handkerchiefs. Some had tatted or crocheted borders . . others beautiful embroidery.
(An aside—Does anyone know how to tat anymore? It is so delicate and beautiful.)
Grandma said the handkerchiefs weren’t very fancy. Were they actually plain or did she just think that she wasn’t very talented at making handkerchiefs.
From one yard of handkerchief linen six squares may be cut and trimmed.
17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Friday, December 13, 1912: Our Literary Society met today. I didn’t take part this time. The kids got their parts off pretty good. Don’t have to go back to school again for two weeks. I’m so glad.
Building that once housed McEwensville School.
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Wow, they had a long school break for the holidays a hundred years ago.
Grandma really enjoyed being a member of the Literary Society at her school. Across the last few months I’ve struggled to figure out exactly what the Literary Society did. At first I thought it was a book club—but more recent diary entries, including this one, suggest that they put on some sort of program.
I think that maybe I’ve figured it out. I found an article in the December 1912 issue of Ladies Home Journal called “The Rural School at Christmas.” It discusses how the rural school is often the center of social activities during the holiday and contained several suggestions.
One suggestion described activities a girl’s club could do. I think that the girl’s club described in the magazine sounds very similar to the Literary Society at McEwensville High School.
A Club for Girls
During the Christmas month this club looks up all of the literature and music bearing on Christmas. Christmas stories are told and Christmas songs and hymns practiced.
17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Thursday, December 12, 1912: My eyes are getting better, but everything looks misty to me now. Expect tomorrow to be a busy day for me.
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Grandma—I’m glad that you’re finally getting over the pink eye. Stay healthy!!
—
As many ailments as the Muffly’s have had, I hope that they had a well-stock medicine cabinet.
I found a hundred –year-old list of what should be in a family medicine cabinet (or as they called them back then “medicine closet.”) The list was in the appendix of a book called The Care of the Baby.
List of Articles for Medicine Closet
Those liquids marked with an * are for external use or are dangerous. They should be in poison bottles.
Glass graduate marked with fluidrachms and fluid-ounces
Minium glass
Accurate dropper
Hard-rubber syringe
Small druggist’s hand scales for weighing medicines
Camel’s-hair brushes
Small straight dressing forceps
A pair of scissors
Absorbent cotton
Several one-inch and two-inch roller bandages, one to three yards long
Patent lint
Old linen
A spool of rubber adhesive plaster
Court plaster
Paraffin paper or oil silk
*Alcohol
Whiskey
Olive Oil
Ammonia-water
*Turpentine
Glycerin
Distilled fluid extract of hamamelis (witch-hazel) for bruises
*Soap liniment for sprains
*Tincture of iodine
*Solution of boric acid for washing cuts
*Solution permanganate of potash, 4 grains to the dram
Flaxseed meal
Mustard
Magnesia
Vaseline
Castor oil
Zinc ointment
Soda-mint
Baking soda
Sweet spirit of nitre
Aromatic spirits of ammonia
Bromide of potash in 2o-grain powders to be divided according to the age
*Tincture of digitalis
Syrup of ipecacuauha
Tannic acid for use in poisoning
Epsom salts for poisoning
Vinegar for poisoning
Jeaunel’s antidote for poisoning
What the heck are most of these items? . . and how do you use them to treat illnesses and wounds?
17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Wednesday, December 11, 1912: Miss Wesner was down to stay overnight, and go home tomorrow morning.
Source: Ladies Home Journal (December, 1912)
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Helen (Tweet) Wesner was a friend of Grandma and her sister Ruth. Was it really a good idea for Tweet to visit? The previous day , Grandma wrote in her diary that she had pink eye.
Setting health issues aside—
What did the girls do? Maybe they were hoping for a holiday romance and made a mistletoe and candy kiss decoration to hang in a doorway. It was featured in the December, 1912 issue of Ladies Home Journal.
Mistletoe is the classic symbol of Christmas romances—and anyone who stands under the mistletoe is supposed to get kissed.
Here are the directions in the magazine:
Candy kisses for all under the mistletoe bough. Wrap the kisses separately in paraffin and tissue paper, and then tie them in clusters with ribbon.
A hundred years ago candy kisses could refer to any small candy–though .Hershey’s kisses have been around since 1907.
Paraffin and tissue paper is an old term for waxed paper. Based on the picture, it looks like it night have been available in several colors back then.
