17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Tuesday, July 10, 1912:Went to Milton this morning to have my teeth filled, and was so fortunate as to only have three cavities. Also did some shopping besides. Got a pair of white silk gloves.
Source of photos: Ladies Home Journal (March, 1912)
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Why did Grandma need white silk gloves? She may have worn gloves to Sunday School, but it seems like a somewhat unusual purchase in the middle of the summer. Maybe there was an upcoming special event where she needed to wear gloves.
A Trip to the Dentist
Three cavities!—but Grandma seemed pleased to only have three. Grandma had gotten some teeth filled almost exactly a year prior to this date—on July 6, 1911 she wrote that she’d gotten several teeth filled. People must have had more cavities in the days before fluoride.
17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Sunday, July 7, 1912:Went to Sunday School this morning. Received my Bible after having been learning verses for about a year and a half.
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Whew, Grandma finally received her Bible. She learned 700+ verses to get it—and some weeks she learned more than 20 verses. For example, on December 23, 1911 she wrote that she was trying to learn 27 verses that week.
She sure was persistent—I never would have stuck with it.
Grandma completed memorizing the verses on May 26–and received the Bible the previous week (June 30), but they kept the Bible to put her name on the cover .
17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Saturday, July 6, 1912: Ruth and I hunted our cows for a change this afternoon, and found them at last after hours search safe in a neighbor’s barnyard.
Recent photo of a neighbor’s farm
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Whew, how in the world did the cows wonder so far afield (no pun intended) that they were lost for several hours?
I bet that Grandma and her sister Ruth were really relieved when they found them. I wonder which sister was supposed to be watching them. (See previous posts about the need to watch the cows to ensure that they stayed in the pasture and didn’t wonder off—see, for example, June 22 and May 18).
It sounds like the Muffly’s had nice neighbors (or at least neighbors who didn’t want stray cows wondering around their corn and wheat fields destroying their crops).
17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Thursday, July 4, 1912: Such a magic sound it has to some, but to me it is about the same as other days. We got a glorious rain this afternoon. I can’t help but rejoice over the very thought of it. It’s cooler now for one thing.
I bet that people a hundred years ago would never have expected that “ancient” traditions like fireworks would still exist in 2012.
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Poor Grandma–It sounds like an incredibly boring 4th. Some places were livelier.
About 125 miles northeast of McEwenville, New York City was holding a modern 4th of July celebration.
Here are some excerpts from the July 4, 1912 issue of the New York Times:
CITY TO CELEBRATE ITS SANEST FOURTH
Music, Parading, Speeches, and Electric Light to Banish Firecracker Riot
Over the Old Fort Block House at 5:30 o’clock this morning the new forty-eight-starred flag of this country will be raised and its raising will be the start of this city’s celebration of Independence Day. This celebration will be the 136th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration of Independence in Philadelphia.
It will represent weeks of effort put forth by the Mayor’s Committee and by countless societies and organizations, all joined in a determined campaign to free the marking of this day from the ancient rites of fire and powder and its ancient toll of death and wounds.
Instead of the steady popping of firecrackers and deafening crash of the cannon cracker, there will be parading, music, dancing, and speechmaking.
The prediction last evening, as the final touches were put on the innumerable arrangements, pointed to the safest and sanest Fourth in a city where the Nation’s big day has been growing safer and saner every passing years.
For safety Acting Chief Guerin of the Fire Prevention Bureau reported that for the last week he and his men had been on the lookout for fireworks stored away for sale. Confiscation is the rule and some $3,000 worth of explosives have been so put out of harm’s way.
The weather man, after scanning the heavens and weighing the evidence with unusual care last evening announced his gloomy fear that this city and the surrounding country would experience thunderstorms this afternoon or evening.
Quite as much as any other part of the celebration, the elaborate illumination depends on the holding off of the rain. If all goes well many parts of the city will be radiant with fantastic light, for nearly a hundred thousand Japanese lanterns have been strung to the trees in the parks and these were supplied with current last evening to try them out. As the dim trees in each park, loaded with festoons and strung ropes of these lanterns would spring into radiance with the turning of the switch, a shrill chorus of delightful approval would go from hundreds of children. The current is the gift of the New York Edison Company for the celebration and besides this, it has given the lanterns.
City Hall and its square is to be more brilliantly lighted than any, 6,000 electric light bulbs being devoted to this purpose.
17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Tuesday, July 2, 1912: Ruth tried to deceive me this morning about the quantity and richness of Mollie’s milk. I had saved some last evening to see how rich it was, and Rufus dumped nearly all of it out and filled it up with cream. Wasn’t she mean?
Photo source: The Farm Dairy (1908) by H. B. Gurler
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Hmm—I grew up on a dairy farm and I barely understand this diary entry, but I’ll give a whirl at trying to explain it.
Milk that has not been homogenized separates after sitting for awhile. The cream floats on top of the skim milk.
Cream is worth more than skim milk because it can be used to make butter.
Cows vary in the ratio of cream to milk that they produce. And, cows that produce lots of cream were considered more valuable.
Here’s a quote from a 1908 book about the importance of having cows that produce a lot of cream (butter-fat).
A cow that produces less than 200 lbs. of butter per year should not be kept in the herd, and the 200-lb. cow should only be retained in such a time as is necessary to secure a better one. No one will become rich milking 200-lb. cows.
You can afford to pay $130 for a cow that will make 250 lbs. of butter yearly as to pay $30 for a cow that will only produce butter-fat to make 200 lbs. of butter.
The Farm Dairy by H.B. Gurler
Grandma probably wanted to know if her cow Mollie was a profitable cow. Her sister Ruth (also called Rufus in this entry) apparently decided to tease her—by making it look as if Mollie was an exceptional cow who produced almost all cream.
17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Monday, July 1, 1912:
In the shadow of a shade tree,
There the weary often be,
After they have been well roasted,
In the hot sun of July.
Stopped picking strawberries today. All my earnings, about $4.00 in all, I still have and expect to keep until I spend them.
Strawberry Plants (Source: Wikimedia Commons)
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Grandma apparently has—at least occasionally– been picking strawberries for money since June 10. I assume that a neighboring farmer paid her to pick them.
$4.00 would have been worth a lot more a hundred years ago than it is worth today. I wonder how Grandma eventually spent the money.
