"Memories: Grave and Gay"

Chapter 1

A few years ago, when recounting some incidents to my Daughter, she said I ought to write such things down. So, since then I have done so, on loose papers, as I thought of them. And now I have arranged them, as far as possible, in the order in which occurred the facts of which they treated, those things coming first which my mother told me happened before I was born.

Ebenezer Bugbee, born April 6, 1773, in Massachusetts married December 20, 1799, Lucy Lovejoy, born February, 1775, in Massachusetts. Their daughter, Lucy Bugbee, my mother, was born in Burke, Vermont on February 25, 1810. Her mother, Lucy Lovejoy Bugbee, died in Dunnerston, Vermont, when Mother was between seven and eight years old.

Mother remembered having a party on her seventh birthday. She had a present of a new doll. The “party” went to play by the side of the mill-pond. Presently one of the little girls said she was hungry and asked Lucy to go in the house and get her something to eat, and offered to hold the doll while she was gone. Lucy handed the doll to her, and when she returned with some bread and butter, found the girl had thrown her precious doll into the mill-pond.

Mother said when she was a young girl in Vermont, there were many uncles and cousins living near, and they often gathered at each others houses for frolics, such as maple sugar parties, making maple wax on snow, etc. At one house there was no mother, and a very stingy old maid was housekeeper. She would always say “Neaow, children, you need’nt eat any more’n you want, ‘cause any of us can eat it." It seemed to us, Mother mimicked perfectly, her funny drawl when telling us of it, for we always laughed.

She remembered her mother’s mother, who had married a man named McClenathan after Mr. Lovejoy’s death, coming to visit, and finding them very poor, had cried with her mother (Lucy) because Lucy’s three brothers had taken possession of their father’s farm after his death and sold it and would not give her any of her share of the proceeds, because they were angry with her for marrying Mr. Bugbee. Lucy and her mother said that Mr. Bugbee was such a good Christian he would not permit his wife to go to law with her brothers to get her share of the property, and they cried because, if Lucy had had her share, she need not have been so poor. The farm was “down by the bay in Boston." (When I first heard about it, about 1870, those who knew how Boston had spread and grown, said my part was worth at least a quarter of a million dollars, which I might recover, on account of the cloud on the title, as Lucy Lovejoy never signed the deed). Although so young it made such a deep impression on Mother that she remembered it as if it were only yesterday, when she told of it after so many years.

Mother married October 25, 1827, at Butler, Wayne County, New York, to Austin Crane Munsell, who was born July 3, 1805 at East Windsor, Connecticut.

One evening, when Mother had only one baby and Father was at work outdoor in the moonlight, a strange man came to the door. I forget what excuse she said he made, but he came in and Mother gave him a seat at one side of the fireplace. She sat at the other side, with the baby in the cradle between them. Presently the man began to move the cradle, so he could get nearer to her. She seized a huge iron poker, used to lift logs around in the fireplace, and threatened him with it. Thereupon he went away. As soon as he was safely gone, she snatched the baby from the cradle and ran like the wind to Father.

She said when she had three little ones, one day she took pony and buggy and went away somewhere. When she returned it was night, raining hard, as dark as pitch. She snuggled the children down by her feet and let the pony take his own way, as it was too dark to guide him. When she arrived home they asked her which way she came. When she told them, they said it was impossible, as all the flooring planks had been removed from the bridge that day. Upon her insisting that was the way she came, they took lanterns and followed the pony and wheel tracks back to the bridge, and found that the pony had walked on one stringer and the wheels had run on another on either side, above the raging waters twenty feet below!

Mother said there was a religious sect called “Millerites," the members of which lived near her in “York State,” who thought the world was coming to an end on a certain day. They prepared for it by giving away all their earthly possessions, all except one woman, who would not give away her white silk shawl which some of her sea-faring ancestors had brought from the Orient.

On the morning of the day on which they expected to be translated to Paradise, they assembled on the top of a nearby little hill, and there waited, praying and singing all the day through.

When evening came and none of them had been taken bodily into Heaven, they came down the hill, a sad company, their faith in their leader completely shattered. The kindness of their former neighbors somewhat abated their disappointment and chagrin.

While they still lived in “York State” Mother said she used to spin flax and wool, and weave cloth for their own clothes, and spin yarn for their stockings. The flax for linen was grown there, retted in the edge of a pond or river, and hetchelled with teasels. Flax was spun on a small wheel, and wool on a large one. After moving to Michigan, Mother had neither, but once when I was a child she borrowed a large wheel and spun yarn from wool grown on our own sheep, from which to knit our stockings. I had to knit eight times around on my stocking each day, for a “stent." She had no carding machine but took the wool to a mill to be carded into rolls, ready to spin.

Chapter 2

In 1842 Father [Austin Crane Munsell] came to Michigan and built stone culverts for the new railroad, the Michigan Central.

In 1843, Mother with six children, Jarvis, the oldest son, the twins, Wallace and Willis; Mary, Elvira and John, started to Michigan too. They traveled by boat across Lake Erie to Detroit and then west by train from there; stopping off in Oakland County, not far from Plymouth, Wayne County, to visit Mother’s cousin Greens. Willis was left there as the Greens had no son and Mother had so many.

I remember seeing a letter Mother wrote to Father before they started from Honeyoe Falls, N. Y., beginning: “Honored Husband” and saying not to write oftener than necessary, because she “had to pay twenty-five cents postage on each letter.”

In reply to my letter of 1923 to Brother John (Wesley), eight years older than I, asking what he remembered as to the move to Michigan, he wrote as follows:

“Uncle Clark, Mother's only brother, had come to Michigan some years before Father did. Uncle had a farm a few miles north of Marshall, at that time, the end of the Michigan Central Railroad. When Mother and we six children arrived from Honeyoe Falls, Uncle Clark met us at Marshall (all except Willis) and took us to his home in the woods. When we got about half-way there, one of the horses got off the cause-way and mired in the swamp. It took so long to get him out that the mosquitoes bit me badly and I crawled under Mother's long skirts to get away from them. Where they had bitten me swelled up and made me quite sick. We did not stay at Uncle's farm long and came back to Marshall, where we lived about a year, and then moved in 1844 to Kalamazoo as Father's work was at different places west of there.

“Father bought a house and one acre of land in Kalamazoo. Our house was near the depot and Uncle Clark Bugbee soon came to Kalamazoo and lived just across from the depot. Later Uncle Clark had the contract to bore holes in logs which were to bring water to Kalamazoo from a nice large spring on Prospect Hill, west of town. I was helping him with the boring when my little finger was caught in the machinery, which crippled it for life.

“Once Sister Elvira and I went across the Commons (Bronson Park) to visit Uncle Clark's wife. We stayed a little too long after dark, during which time the first snow fell about two inches deep. It was quite dark when we crossed the Commons and part way across we saw an object coming towards us. Sister let go of my hand, ran home and left me. I was not afraid, so stopped and looked at the object, which got down on hands and knees, came a little way and then rose up. When I saw those large eyes, like two balls of fire, I also ran home. If it had run after me it would have had to run faster than a horse to get me. When I got home I told my Father a big black bear had crossed the Commons but he did not believe me. The next morning neighbor Sweet, a gunsmith, came early and told Father about the bear and they started out to look for it. It had crossed the Kalamazoo River and got into a large Tamarack Swamp, where they killed it, and brought it home. It weighed 280 pounds.

“You perhaps recollect I was a runaway boy. Once I ran away with P. T. Barnum’s Circus. He liked me and used to call me his little temperance boy, because I was always talking it to the men. One day they were all drunk and were going to pour liquor down my throat, while I fought them as best I could. One of them was a big burly fellow and was drunk also, but he took my part and knocked them right and left and told them to let me alone, and was always a friend to me.

“When we reached Cleveland I left the show, as Aunt Ruth Adams lived there, and had a boy about my age named Fregola. Mrs. Adams husband was a lawyer of great note at that time. He took me to a clothing store and fitted me out with a new suit of clothes, and then took me to the proprietor of the American Hotel and introduced me to William Milford, who hired me. He liked me and said I was the best bell-boy in the hotel and the smartest to wait on people. And I got lots of tips.”

(Photo: Brother John at ninety, Brother John's grand-daughter, about 1907)

I well remember playing with borings from those logs Brother John mentioned, as they were bored out in front of our house. Also I remember when John came home, Father whipped him so severely for running away, that Mother’s dressmaker, Ellen Haskins, fainted.

Mother said, as soon as they arrived in Marshall, she went to housekeeping at once, by cooking out of doors on a little round charcoal furnace. I remember seeing the furnace as late as 1857.

I was born in 1846 in what was called the Tucker house, presumably the one John said Father bought. When I was ten months old I walked, but was delicate, and the doctor said Mother must take me away somewhere, or I would not live. So Mother took me to Cleveland, to her half-sister Ruth, who was the wife of Samuel E. Adams, a great criminal lawyer. When we arrived at their house on Euclid Avenue, then the finest residence part of Cleveland, Aunt Ruth was visiting a neighbor. Mr. Adams went to get her and said “Come home, your sister Lucy has come, and has a little doll with her, running all around."

Once Aunt Ruth visited us, bringing her son, Fregola, then about twelve years old. It must have been a short visit as I remember nothing of it except seeing them. She was probably then on her way to visit her sister Sarah, in Illinois.

(A telegram to a Chicago paper, no year given) “Cleveland, O. Jan 23. The death of Samuel E. Adams occurred yesterday at his home, 453 Bolton Avenue. He was the oldest member of the Cuyahoga County Bar and one of the most eloquent men in Cleveland. His career as an attorney was one of unusual success, and in the time of his greater activity, and closer application to his profession, he probably had no superior and indeed few peers among the criminal lawyers of Northern Ohio. He was 73 years old.”

Chapter 3

My Father built the first brick buildings in Kalamazoo; houses, stores, and a hotel. The following list was furnished by Brother John in 1920, as near as he could remember, and thinks he probably forgot many, as he was then so old. He died June 20, 1928, aged ninety years and three days.

Banker T. P. Sheldon’s house

Ben. Austin’s house on Prospect Hill

Baptist College

William B. Clark’s store

McNair’s store

Israel’s store

Lawyer Arad Balche’s house

The Burdick House, a hotel, Main Street

The “Tucker” house, where I was born, 1846, was white, with green blinds, no front porch but two steps up to the front door. At the side of the steps I remember a jasmine vine, with light lavender flowers, on a frame about one and one-half feet square.

When I was so small I had to stand on a chair for Sister Mary to braid my hair, long and thick, she said to me, she must hurry and get me dressed up, as Father was coming home from Dexter.

(Photo: Sister Mary)

Sister Mary married George T. Barney, a mason, January 15, 1852. I remember the wedding, especially the orange-color shirred satin bonnet she wore. After the wedding they dashed off in a cutter, accompanied by other sleigh-loads of young people.

(Photo: George T. Barney)

Before Mary and George were married, they took me to a ball. We went in an omnibus which had a lamp fixed in the front end to light the inside of the bus. The glass front of the lamp had a small hole in it. This made the lantern smoke dreadfully and I was deeply interested in watching it.

About that time I was left alone sitting on a chair in the evening, with a candle at the other end of the room. As I watched the flame, rays of light shot out from it about a foot, then receded, and again lengthened. After watching this for some time, I became frightened, jumped down from the chair and tore upstairs where the others were.

Sister Mary’s son, George Elbert, was born at our house. I remember Mother letting me take a baked apple to her while she was ill. Mary and George afterward lived at Schoolcraft, Michigan, ten or fifteen miles from Kalamazoo. Once there was a ball there, and Elvira and Willis went to attend it, taking me with them. They forgot until part way there, the satchel with my extra clothing, and had to go back for it. Mary lived in a house with a large yard, in which were some very tall trees. Georgie was in the cradle, and when Mary saw some ladies coming to call, she said I must call her “Mrs. Barney” while they were there.

Willis and Sister Elvira took me to the ball, where the dancers amused themselves by having me join hands with them when they “circled round." Between times I looked at pictures in a magazine, (Harper’s, I think), one of which picture was of Kossuth. Then there was the grand supper, laid on long tables the full length of the dining room. Every little way on the table was butter molded in the shape of full sized pineapples.

One Sunday when brother Frank was about two years old, he and I were left at home while the family went to church. When they returned and came in the door, he said, “How do you do?," and then ran bashfully into another room. It was his first spoken word, and nothing could persuade him to speak again, for a long time.

One night Mother awakened us children to see the railroad depot burning, a fire afterward said to have been set by a drunken man taking a lighted candle into a clothes closet. The fire communicated to the nearby depot and when we saw it, the tall wooden pillars were a solid mass of flameless fire, the picture of which beautiful sight still remains in my memory. The next day, some blackened bones lying on a board put across two barrels, showed what intemperance may do to a man.

In 1850, the day when Brother Eben was born, Mother was sorting clothes, for the washerwoman in the morning. I remember she was wearing a very pretty white dimity wrapper (of which I now have a piece), with little bows of the same down the front from neck to hem. Then I was let to go play with the little girl next door. We played a long time with little dishes made of codfish-spine bones for cups. Finally growing tired of play, we went in search of her mother, especially looking in a room we were sure we saw her go in, and not come out of. The mystery was too much for me, and soon I went home. The little girl’s mother was there, and my mother was in bed with a little new baby, Ebb, my youngest brother.

About that time a caravan came to town. Caravans afterward developed into the circus. This caravan seemed to be a show of wild animals, but I remember only an elephant, on which was a sort of platform with a low railing around it, covered with a glittering cloth. There was a ladder or steps up to the platform and children were invited to ride the elephant. Quite a number did, but not I who was afraid. The elephant was led or driven around the inside of the tent. There was a cluster of three large oak trees near the entrance to the tent, which was on the commons near our house.

Around 1851-52 there was a Fourth of July celebration in Kalamazoo. A bower of small trees was made in the courthouse yard and under it were placed long tables loaded with good things to eat provided by the citizens. As it was quite near our house, I was permitted to look at the tables, leading Brother Frank. When returning home, we passed by a candy stand and Frank began to cry. The man asked what ailed him and I said he was crying for some candy. As I had no penny the man gave him a half a stick, which stopped the crying. Stick candy was the only kind in those days. When we arrived home Mother was picking strawberries and had a pan nearly full of the loveliest sweet white strawberries. I have never seen any white ones since.

I remember being in the new cemetery on the hill west of town and picking wild flowers there. Also, about that time, Aunt Fannie, wife of Uncle Clark Bugbee, Mother’s only brother, died, and I went with others of the family to the funeral. We rode in an omnibus, the only public conveyance for hire in the little new town. She was buried right near some bur oak trees in the northwest corner of the old cemetery, near and opposite where the large Union School was later built. This cemetery was many years later made into a park. [South Westnedge Avenue Park].

Cousin Marian, Uncle Clark’s only child, came to live with us after her mother's death until Uncle married again. One day, Mother hearing the child was ill, went to see her, then about seven or eight years old and found her sitting up in bed, hemming towels, which her stepmother, Cordelia, had set her to do, even if she was ill. Mother was very indignant and took Marian again. Mother loved Marian very much and was very good to her, who was with us most of the time until she grew up. I remember Marian and Brother John taking me with them to pick flowers in the woods beside the Plank Road.

I often heard my family mention "2.40 on the plank" as to races on Plank Road north of town. After a crash, in which "Luke Whitcomb broke his leg so that bones protruded through the skin," I heard no more of the races for some years. Later a driving association was formed, and the races held at the Kalamazoo Horse Fairgrounds became quite celebrated.

Chapter 4

Grandpa Bugbee and Grandma (his second wife, Ruth Brooks) lived with us when I was about five years old.

(Photo: Grandpa)

At that time, 1851, daguerreotypes were taken of Grandpa, Grandma, Frank, Eben and me, and of Wallace, Sister Elvira, and Willis taken together, which picture was framed and always hung in our parlor, until a few years before Mother’s death Mary begged it of her. Mary died in 1921 and the priceless picture was lost.

Mother always said Grandma was a splendid stepmother, that an own mother could not have been better. Mother said the summer before Sister Elvira was born (at Buffalo, N.Y. October 1836) Grandma took her four children, Jarvis, the twin boys, and Mary, and kept them all summer.

(Photo: Grandpa, Grandma) (Photo: Me)

Mother loved her father very much and said he was the best man in the world. I remember seeing her comb Grandpa’s white hair, bringing it up from the sides of his head and braid it in a little braid over his bald spot to keep the top of his head warm. Christmas morning I stood by Grandpa’s knee and looked up the fireplace chimney, to see where Santa Claus came down and put in my stocking a little pie, made in a patty pan just like the one I liked best of those in which Mother used to make little pies for me. I thought it queer but nice.

One cold, rainy November day, I saw a carriage arrive, and Grandpa got into it and was taken to the polls to vote, as “they” were anxious, then as now, to have everyone vote.

Not long afterward, Grandma fell downstairs and broke her hip, and when later she left our house was carried in a chair to the train, when she and Grandpa were going to Uncle Clark’s home in Chicago, and soon after that they went to Aunt Sarah, Mother’s half-sister, wife of Dayton Boies, living on a farm near Belvidere, Illinois. Later, they both died and were buried there. Aunt Sarah told me long after, that her Mother (Grandma) sighed to return to “Lucy’s house," because Mother had more of the comforts and luxuries of life than were found at their farm.

(Photo: From daguerreotype, 1851, Martha Munsell)

About that time or a little later, Sister Elvira took me with her to call at the Woodward’s, walking the railroad track, which was a short distance from our house. I remember I wore a two-strand coral necklace and a little gold ring she had given me. On the way home from Woodward’s I picked joint grass, which is something like bamboo. I have never learned its name, nor seen any since.

A few doors west of the new house Father had built and recently had moved into, there was a Catholic church built. As soon as the church was roofed and the floor laid, a school was started in it with boards for seats. I attended this school for a day or two, but cannot remember being taught anything. The Catholic Priest was a Frenchman [who took charge in Feb. 1856] called Father [Isidore A.] Lebel who used to call on the neighbors near our house. One, a Mrs. Turner, told Mother when she reproached him for keeping his flock (nearly all Irish) so ignorant, replied “We have to keep them in ignorance or we couldn’t keep them in our power." This must have been before the church was built or the school started.

Mrs. Turner was the wife of a baker, whose crackers were celebrated all over Michigan. They were round, thin and crisp, about two and one-half inches in diameter. One day one of Mrs. Turner’s children fell sick, and the doctor ordered him to eat simple things, such as crackers. But Mrs. Turner said “No, indeed, the crackers are made with rancid lard."

I also attended, for a few times, a school in the basement of the Methodist Church, and I remember standing at the teacher's knee as she tried to teach me the A.B.C.'s. At one of the schools I attended about this time, the big children played, "A pin, a pin, a poppy show.” The owner held a picture of some small thing in his hand and demanded a pin as payment for a peep at the object. Pins were scarce and expensive in those days.

Once Mother took me to a meeting in a small white church, which had been moved to its then location when the new Congregational Church was built. It was afterward sold to a Dutch (Holland) Society. The day was very warm and Mother gave me two roses to hold to keep me awake, one a red single rose, and the other, same size but variegated.

About that time many Hollanders settled in Kalamazoo [after 1850], and some on the shores of a bay of Lake Michigan, northwest of Kalamazoo, and named their town “Holland." Once I heard Father say: “All those Hollanders have a chest full of gold pieces.” One of our neighboring Hollanders one day carried me in his arms to visit some girls older than I, named Jane and Mary Green. I did not stay long, for I did not like the name “Jane," and I saw some rolls of lint under the bed where we played. I thought, “Mother does not have dirt under her beds."

Another time I heard Mother say: “Hollanders are very neat. They scour everything until it shines, but they will take a milkpan to wash their hands in.”

Chapter 5

About that time, Willis came home from Cousin Green’s, where he had been helping on the farm, and had taught school one winter. This was near Plymouth, where Cousin Marian afterward lived. She attended Normal School at Ypsilanti, making her home while there at Cousin Greens. She taught school, married Bert Tillottson, and lives there in Plymouth now, 1931, a widow of ninety. She used to visit us once in two or three years. The last time, was to take her father home with her from a hospital in Chicago. He had been run over and legs broken. He had been doing business in Chicago for some years, coming occasionally to take me to ride behind his fast young horse. He was very fond of horses, and I used to hear Mother talk about a fine stallion, Red Lion, that he used to have when he first came to Kalamazoo.

Willis arrived home in the evening. Wallace had gone out after supper. Those in the room began talking to him as if he were Wallace, and he replied as if he were. Mother was in an adjoining room, getting us little ones ready for bed. She knew his voice, and whispered to me to go out and say “How do you do, Willis?” I did so, and it created much fun to discover the mistake. They always enjoyed making people think each was the other.

Once I was allowed to go to my eldest brother's [Jarvis] to visit his wife and little baby, Ella. His house was on South Street, facing the park. This park is just south of Main Street and the land for it was given many years earlier by Mr. [Titus] Bronson, first permanent settler in Kalamazoo. Also the land for four churches, Methodist, Baptist, Congregational, and St. Luke’s Episcopal, and I believe for the court house and jail.

(Map of Bronson Park)

At that time the park was not named, but was later given the name of its donor, Bronson Park. It was only an unmowed field of native grasses and fenced with six-inch boards, with steps, called stiles, going over the fence at the center of each side and at the corners, except at the north-east corner, where there was a school house facing the corner diagonally. This school was called "The Branch," and was taught by Mrs. [Lucinda Hinsdale] Stone, wife of the Reverend James A. B. Stone, a Baptist. It was a branch of the Michigan State University at Ann Arbor, opened in 1835 and used until 1850, then being absorbed by the Kalamazoo College. Sister Elvira attended there and I remember going with her to visit the school when I was so small that I stood on the seats while the girls talked to her "little sister." Many years later a chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution was named for Mrs. Stone, the “Lucinda Hinsdale Stone Chapter of Kalamazoo," as she lived there many years and was a very influential leader in all educational work. In fact, I think Kalamazoo would never have been the educational center it became, if it had not been for her influence and it was a well deserved tribute. After the Branch School, she had one for a while in the basement of the new Baptist Church. And then she had a boarding school on West Main Street on the top of the hill, which was burned later, and I went to the spectacular fire. Later, about 1873, she had a class of women, to which she read history.

In the southwest corner of the park there is a large grassy Indian mound, about ten or fifteen feet high. The fall before Lincoln was elected, William H. Seward and others, standing on this mound, electioneered for Lincoln, and addressed the crowds in the park. While listening to the speeches, my brother's pocket was cut open and his money stolen. In the evening there were torchlight processions on Main Street, zigzagging to imitate a rail fence. These looked very pretty from second story windows. In the daytime there was a long procession of Republican clubs from all over the county, some floats of stalwart men splitting rails, etc.

(Photo: Seward here)

At an early date, cows were allowed to run on the Commons. Once when Sister Elvira and another girl were coming home from an entertainment in the evening, each with an arm through that of their escort and all three keeping step, they suddenly put their feet on a cow, which immediately rose, nearly upsetting them! About this time our three cows were found dead in the morning from eating a mash thrown out by a brewery.

Mother must have had her hands full when Willis, Frank and I came down with the measles, some time in 1852. Willis, being a young man, suffered the most. Frank, on the other hand, being youngest, was the least affected. In those days it was supposed that if the ears were pierced for ear rings, the after effects of the disease would settle in the lobes of the ears instead of in the eyes. I remember that when sufficiently recovered to sit in a high chair, Sister Mary pierced my ears. She held a ball of yarn behind each ear as a pad for the needle, threaded with silk, to go into after passing through my ear. The silk thread, probably oiled with some healing ointment, after passing through the ear, was tied so a ring of it remained in my ear, which was turned often while healing, to keep the hole open. I can not remember wearing ear rings before I was fourteen or so. Mother always wore some gold ones until I was grown up. Those rings she sent me with other keepsakes the last Christmas before she passed away. These ear rings I have now given to my granddaughter Eleanor.

(Photo: My Mother's earrings) (Photo: Grand-daughter Eleanor)

The measles did not seem to affect my eyes, but did those of Brother Willis. I cannot say whether he was more ill than I or whether he would not have his ears pierced, or if he did not take enough care of his eyes by shading them from the light, but he had red eyelids all his life.

In the early part of the winter of 1853, Father and Mother sold the house they had built a few years before and bought a farm of eighty acres. It was five miles east of Kalamazoo and a little over a mile northeast of Comstock. It was an old farm and had a long row of maple trees in front, some large honey locusts, and one large Red Oak tree. How lovely the grass looked when the sun shone on it! In the back yard was a very tall hickory tree, on which grew many nuts.

The house was of logs, with three rooms below: a large living room, one bedroom, large kitchen with fireplace, two pantries, a cellarway, and a stairway. Upstairs there were two rooms, one of which later was mine. After moving there, Brother Frank slept the first night in one of Mother's two big chests. There was a smaller chest, which later was given to me to keep my treasures in. Inside the cover was written in pencil, the words of a song which my brothers frequently sang, the tune and words of which I learned long before I could read the words, which were as follows:

THREE ROGUES

In good old Colony times

When we lived under the King,

Three roguish chaps fell into mishaps

Because they could not sing.

The first he was a miller

The second he was a weaver,

And the third he was a little tailor boy

With the broadcloth under his arm.

The miller he stole corn,

The weaver he stole yarn,

And the little tailor boy he stole broadcloth

To keep these three rogues warm.

But, the miller got drowned in his dam,

And the weaver got hung in his yarn,

And the devil clapt his claws on the little tailor boy.

With the broadcloth under his arm.

The farm consisted of eighty acres, forty on each side of the road. The house was on the east forty, facing north. There was a very large barn across the road, facing it. On the west forty was a lake, or rather the greater part of a lake, as the northwest corner of the farm was in the lake. In the summer the boys, Willis and John, and sometimes some of the neighbor boys used to go to spear fish at night. They had an iron rod fastened to one end of the boat, which held up about three or four feet above the water, a sort of cradle with fingers to hold a fire of kindling wood, the light of which attracted the fish, and when they came near they were speared. In the winter, holes were cut in the ice, about a foot in diameter, and hook and line let down to catch the fish.

[This illustration of the boat with the cradle of fire was drawn in the manuscript by Martha.]

The lake was surrounded by a very wet marsh which was full of rattlesnakes in the summer. Father and the boys, when mowing the hay used to kill the snakes and bring home the rattles. Years later the marsh was drained and planted to celery, Michigan’s famous celery. Wintergreen berries grew along the edge of the marsh and sometimes on Sunday afternoons Mother would take us walking there and we would all pick wintergreen berries. In the spring we picked the tender young leaves. The leaves of wintergreens are used to make wintergreen extract or oil.

Some tall blueberry bushes grew in one portion of the marsh where it was very wet. Blueberries were then called huckleberries but real huckleberries grew up the hill on dry land, on bushes two or three feet high, and the berries were dry, with large seeds. Blueberries are large, sweet and luscious, and grow on bushes seven or eight feet tall in the edge of the water.

Lots of frogs lived in the marsh, which our neighbor, Ben Depue said the big bullfrogs sung (in bass) “Uncle Ben Depue,” and the little tenor frogs sang, “John Keen, John Keen." One day one of our little colts got mired in the marsh and I was sent on the run for help to rescue it.

The marsh extended across the road to the east part of the farm and there was no way to get across it when we went there to live. Father was soon elected Roadmaster and with the aid of the neighbors drew logs across the swamp on the ice. They placed them side by side, later covering them with dirt, thus making a corduroy road across that bit of marsh. On our end of the corduroy there was a high steep hill to go up and down. On the farther end, the hills were small for half a mile or so, then some more corduroy, then a creek that flowed out of our lake, which stream had to be bridged, then a bed of marl which my Father said, if burned would make lime, then a big sand hill to go up, and then it was quite level all the rest of the way to Kalamazoo, on what was called “the upper road."

The east forty was bounded on the west by this “upper road," and on the north by one which soon led diagonally southeast through woods and brush and by a millpond to Comstock, and thence to Kalamazoo by the “lower road." This lower road was the old “Territorial Road” which, there by Comstock, followed to the Kalamazoo River, and which road began in Detroit as Michigan Avenue and ended in Chicago as Michigan Avenue. The Michigan Central Railroad paralleled the highway and the river for some miles east of Kalamazoo.

One summer we had no school in our district and we had to attend school in Comstock. The schoolhouse there stood on the top of a high steep hill. Sometimes evening singing schools and spelling schools were held there, often evening revivals and Sunday meetings, and always funerals. Brother Willis’s first wife, Carrie Depue, was later buried there by the side of five of her eleven brothers and sisters, in that cemetery by the schoolhouse. We school children amused ourselves wandering around in the cemetery and reading the inscriptions on the headstones, especially those of the five little Depues.

The Postmaster in the little hamlet of Comstock was a Mr. Loveland, who had two daughters older than myself. Once when my family attended a revival at the Comstock schoolhouse, I was left during the services with Cleora and Flora Loveland. The Post Office was in their house. The room we were in was the front room with an outside door. There was another door which apparently led upstairs, for when closed the first step was in the room. This step the girls used for a stage, and they did some play-acting on it. I had never seen anything of the kind and did not understand what it was all about. They seemed to enjoy doing it, apparently thinking it a good way to entertain me.

On the way to the Comstock school we picked wild strawberries, for which I made baskets of large leaves pinned together with thorns from the thorn apple trees, in which trees or bushes we could see birds on their nests. We also passed near the saw mill and mill-pond, and by a flour mill after we had crossed the creek. I don’t remember how we got across the creek, as there was no bridge then, and teams forded the stream. After the ford, by the edge of which much spearmint grew, the road turned east by the flour mill, and went down by the second mill-pond across the Michigan Railroad and turned south onto the Territorial Road.

Opposite the mill-pond and the railroad, was the mansion of General Comstock. This was a large square white house, with a broad two-story porch across the front with tall pillars. The town of Comstock was named for the General, who was not living there then, and I do not know whether he was then still living. The house was occupied by a family, which had a piano, and Mother let me go on horseback later to practice on that piano. The side saddle I used was the one Mother herself used when she was a girl, and used all her life until she was seventy.

Just there, west of the railroad and the highway, is the town of Comstock. The water after being used over the waterwheel of the flour mill, falls over quite a dam on its way to the Kalamazoo River near, and looked quite picturesque. I learned a few years ago that the dam, falls, and mill-pond have been improved and made beautiful.

Chapter 6

When we moved to the farm there was neither well nor cistern there. All water had to be brought from a spring by a big maple tree at the foot of the hill across the road. The men had a yoke to put over their shoulders, by which two pails of water could be carried at once. Other times they put a barrel on a sled drawn by a team and brought it as full as they could, barring slopping over. One windy day in March the roof of the kitchen took fire from a spark from the low fireplace chimney. It happened to be wash day, and the waste water and a full barrel of spring water on hand were used to extinguish the blaze. Mother made us children sit on a log of the wood pile until the fire was out.

That perennial wood pile always had a large quantity of chips around it, which we children had to pick up and bring in, especially on baking day. The large hickory tree grew there, and in the fall in rainy weather we would see the nuts fall on the wood and bound off. When the rain stopped it was fun to search for the nuts.

Father soon dug a well fifty-seven feet deep. There was a little roof over it, from which a wheel was suspended. A rope ran over the wheel and a bucket was fastened on each end. When one bucket went down empty the other would come up full. I discovered that with a piece of looking-glass I could throw the sun's rays down the well and see the bottom plainly. After a while one of the buckets was lost in the well, and Brother Frank was sent down in the other to recover it. Then I remembered my piece of mirror and brought it out. It proved to be a very useful plaything as the little boy could be seen all the way down and up again and he could see just how to get hold of the bucket to bring it up.

Mother had a pounding barrel in which she used to wash large, heavy pieces. I think the barrel was bought, but Father made the pounder (which I now have) and inserted in it a long handle. When the hot suds were poured into the barrel and the soiled articles were well pounded, it was very easy to finish washing them. How fine they smelled from ozone, after being out in a high wind!

As I looked out the window one day I saw a small snake trying to swallow a tree toad. I ran out and hit the snake with a stick and made him let go of the toad, which hopped away, and the little garter snake also disappeared. This was quite near our well. I don't know if tree toads lived in the well. They were quite small, and occasionally when drawing a bucket of water, my hand would be placed on a cold damp toad clinging to the rope and the start it would give me would almost make me let go of the rope; but it never did, as I realized in time that it was only a little toad on the rope.

Mother had a tin "baker" in the kitchen which she placed in front of the fireplace. In this she baked bread, cake, pies, and other things for us to eat.

We had many pieces of pewter ware which Mother said were part of the "setting out" of one of her ancestors as a bride in the early seventeen hundreds. I remember a large round platter, several plates, a small pan, cup and saucer, and a tumbler. In course of time they were all scattered. I have one of the plates.

Chapter 7

Father and Mother were very public spirited. Before they moved on the farm and for a while after, they attended the Congregational Church and took us to Sunday School. I remember the names of two books which I had from the library, "Hadassah," and "Ministering Children." Sunday afternoon Mother used to read to me the stories in the big Bible.

About a year before we moved to the farm, Mother with two other ladies, Mrs. Kedzie, wife of the Congregational minister, and Mrs. Samuel Ransom, wife of Dr. Ransom, founded the Ladies Library Association, from which she could draw books; but after moving out of town she had to pay a dollar a year for the privilege. At that time we had books by Sir Walter Scott, Bulwer-Litton and others of that era. Cooper's works were had as they came out. I have a copy of Cooper's "Bee Hunter," the scene of which is laid in Kalamazoo and on the Kalamazoo River. It may be the first edition.

I have a reaping sickle with small, sharp, backward and turning teeth, which belonged to my Father and his ancestors, (or, I had, until I gave it to the museum in Santa Rosa). Sickles were used in Bible times to reap grain, and I don't know how long it had been used in his family. After we moved on the farm he used a grain "cradle" to harvest grain.

Soon after we were on the farm, my parents started a Sunday School in the schoolhouse. The next spring in June, there was to be a celebration of all the Sunday Schools in the County. Wagons were trimmed with branches of trees and made to look like bowers, and with seats along the sides were very gay when filled with children, the girls in white dresses and gay sashes. When we reached the place of assembly, each school with a teacher at the head of each class, all marched up Prospect Hill, in front of the speakers stand, where we heard addresses from ministers and others. After the speaking, we broke ranks and went to the tables, loaded with good things to eat. We arrived home about sunset, tired but happy, as it was the first such celebration at which we had ever assisted.

When we moved to the farm, Sister Elvira remained in Kalamazoo, where, for some years she taught music and boarded with friends. She had her own piano, the one which was bequeathed her by the first Mrs. Tomlinson, together with a beautiful Scotch plaid shawl, which had taken the premium at the London World's Fair in the Crystal Palace in 1851.

Once I visited Sister while she was at the Woodward's. I went down on the train, alone, and stopped awhile with Delilah Harris, who lived near us before we moved away. I had a few pennies to spend, and we went to a drug store, where I bought a small vial of cinnamon extract, which we took turns in tasting until I left her, to go to the Woodward's. Sister promptly confiscated the vial and put it in Mrs. Woodward's china closet, and I never saw it again. Now, I fancy that Delilah was much older than I was then, and suggested the purchase.

Mrs. Woodward showed us her hyacinths, all lavender in color. She told us that when they were not removed from the ground after blooming, they would all revert to their original color.

Mrs. Woodward's mother was with her then, and also a small boy called Cliffy, who slept with his grandmother. Cliffy was not well, and the doctor being called, said that what ailed the child was sleeping with the old lady, who took all his vitality.

I never heard of that form of trouble until about twenty-five years later, when my daughter's French teacher told me that the wife of the late Russian Emperor used to sleep between two young Russian girls in order to absorb their vitality.

Once I visited Sister while she was at the Cameron's. One evening she and Nettie Cameron, a young lady, arranged some tableaux. One of them was a Turkish scene, with a girl in full white trousers coming to the shoe tops and showing five or six inches below the dress skirt. There was quite a party, and I heard one lady ask another, who is the Turkish lady? She seemed horrified at the costume, and said she was "thankful it wasn't her daughter."

Nettie Cameron had a beau, who remained after the others were gone, and I fell asleep on the sofa in the parlor where they were, while Sister helped Mrs. Cameron clear up.

Another time I visited her at the Norris's. They had a bookcase full of books. While there I read "A History of My Pets," by Grace Greenwood, and also some of the "Rollo" books, in which I learned much of the ways of Nature. Later I had a "Peterson's Familliar Science," in which I was deeply interested.

Mrs. Norris warmed our beds with a long-handled warming pan. One day she brought upstairs to her daughter Sarah, Sister and me, oranges sliced very thin and sugar placed between, the first I had ever seen served that way. Father often brought home oranges, which he peeled and separated into sections without letting a drop of juice escape. I have all my life tried to separate oranges as he did, without once succeeding. These visits to Sister were great events to me.

Chapter 8

Sister was engaged to Charles Huntington, before he went to California in 1851 with a number of other young men. When coming home in 1856, one of the party brought a section of the bark, as a curiosity, ten or twelve inches thick of the big trees they found there to exhibit. Charles on the way home bought for Sister at Jamaica, a writing desk for the table, covered in patterns with tiny sea shells, all beautiful, especially those of a lovely rose color. He had sent to Sister while in San Francisco, a lovely large Valentine, which had attached to the lace-work, two tiny gold coins, one a fifty-cent coin, and the other a very thin octagon gold coin of twenty-five cents, very few of which were ever minted.

A brother of Charles went into the mountains to hunt gold and gold mines, and was never seen again. It was never known whether he was a victim of accident, Indians, or wild animals.

When Charles arrived home, Sister was at the Tomlinson's, and she came with him in a cutter to get me, to attend the Christmas tree there, (dug up out of the garden and replanted later). This was the first Christmas tree I ever saw, and it was a glorious sight. On the very tiptop was a fairy doll dressed in lace and silver, which I was curious to know who would get, as there was another little girl there about my size, Amelia Austin, daughter of Mr. Tomlinson's partner, Ben Austin. I was surprised enough when the doll was taken the last thing off of the tree and handed to me. This doll I kept in one of Mother's bureau drawers, as it was too precious to play with, and only to be looked at occasionally. Sister made for the tree, a row of darkies of black sealing wax and wishbones, standing on pasteboard, to imitate the Presbyterian choir, in which she sung, and also Mr. Tomlinson and Mr. Woodward. This made a good deal of fun. Lily Tomlinson was a baby then, about a year old. Then there was also a girl several years older than myself, that Sister said was a nurse-girl to take care of the baby, whom I must not try to play with, as Mrs. Tomlinson would not like it. There was also another child a little older than baby Lily, named Georgia Russell. Her mother, a relative of Mrs. Tomlinson, had been staying there while her young husband went to Chicago. During the epidemic of cholera there, he died. Georgia's mother died a few hours after she was born, and after she was dead tears were seen in her eyes. It was thought she had not strength to ask, and no one had thought, to bring her the baby that she might see it! The Tomlinson's kept and reared the baby, Georgia. When she was about four I was sent there on an errand, and saw her seated on a footstool hemming a fine handkerchief. I said to Mrs. Tomlinson "she is learning to sew," and the smiling reply was, "She thinks she has already learned." Many years later I learned that Georgia was a teacher in the public schools of Kalamazoo. Lily Tomlinson, when grown, married, and took a "honeymoon" trip to New York. One day while walking in Central Park she challenged her husband to race down a hill with her. At the end of the race, Lily fell dead of heart trouble.

Austin and Tomlinson for many years had a contract for the prison labor at the Michigan State Prison at Jackson to make boots and shoes. The Tomlinson's once invited Sister to take a trip with them to the prison, and she was there given a work basket, beautifully carved by a prisoner. This Mrs. Tomlinson was a third wife, and the mother of a son long desired in the family.

(Photo of the basket)

Chapter 9

Soon after moving to Comstock, Father bought a farm a mile east of ours, making a first payment on it of $200 in gold, for a birthday gift to the twins, Wallace and Willis. They were to make the future payments. The gold was in a roll I had often seen in the back of Father's drawer in the secretary when he unlocked it to use. It must have been made up of $20 gold coins from the size I remember, and three or four hundred dollars by the length. I used to stand by him as he used the drawer. It seems that Mother did not approve of this purchase, as I remember her saying, "It is good-for-nothing, sour land, all covered with red sorrel." I don't know whether the twins liked it or not. Willis taught school winters in districts roundabout, and Wallace made and painted carriages in Kalamazoo, and afterward, in Skaneatelas, N.Y., Watertown, Wis., Janesville, Wis., and Des Moines, Iowa, and I suppose helped make the payments. In summer, Willis helped Father and also worked on his own farm. I remember once when going there he took me along and let me visit a young couple with a little baby on the next farm, Harry Adams and wife, the latter having an affected way of speaking, so that the neighbors called her "stuck up."

After a while, a fine bed of clay was discovered on the farm and Father said he could build a house of it for the twins and proceeded to do so. He put a framework of boards inside and out to make a form, exactly as is done to make concrete houses, and filled it with clay. I remember seeing the house when about halfway up, with door and window frames in place. When it was finished, I went up to the second story and looked around. Soon after it was completed Willis married Carrie Depue and lived there nine or ten years, until it was sold in 1863 or 1864.

When I was about seven or eight [1853-54] Mother went visiting a friend whose husband kept the County Poorhouse and took me with her. At that time, insane persons were kept in the Poorhouse. The lady took us through the house to see it and the inmates. I do not know if there were few or many, as the only one I remember was a woman who was said to be insane, and who gave me a little looking glass with which she seemed to be amusing herself. I do not remember if Mother let me keep it, though I think not, as I can not remember seeing it afterward. But I remember, after more than seventy years, just how the woman looked, not her face, but her figure, as she sat on a stool or chair in the middle of the room. A few years later at a school exhibition, a big girl recited a poem, "I am not mad, I am not mad," while tied to the chair she was sitting in. I have often wondered if that insane woman was tied to her chair. She did not look to me any different from any other woman.

When I was young, my hair was long and thick. At eleven or so I began to "do up" my hair myself. No doubt Mother was glad to have me do so as she had plenty of other duties. Soon I noticed the other girls had puff combs, and of course I had to have some too. These were "side combs" with tops widened a little and bent back, so that when placed behind a portion of the front hair, they made it stand out over the combs as if puffed. Then I felt as big as any of the girls.

When I was ten or eleven Willis and I drove to town, and found the Kalamazoo River flowing over both bridges, so Willis tied the team and said we would walk over the railroad bridge, which was out of the water. He took hold of my hand and we walked safely over, as no train came along. Years since, we both said we would never try such a dangerous thing again.

The river at this place, after flowing along in a straight line for miles, took a sudden turn to the east and curved and flowed south, then west and then almost straight north, leaving quite a peninsula south of the two bridges, which were only a short distance apart, about a hundred feet or so, as I remember. There was sufficient fall in the river between the two bridges for the water to turn the wheel of a flour mill there.

East of the bridges and south of the highway, which turned there, was quite a bit of ground, probably several acres, which was overflowed in the spring when the water was high. When this ground was dry, Indians used to camp there. When going to town we sometimes met them returning to their camp, walking in Indian file, wrapped in their red and blue blankets.

On our farm we had an orchard, mostly apples: Greenings, Northern Spy, Harvest, Rhode Island Greenings, Sweet Bough, Pound Sweet and Jonathan. One year Father took about twenty bushels of Pound Sweet apples to the cider mill. He had the juice boiled down in the sugar pan to make boiled cider. When it was supposed to be boiled enough, it was turned into a twenty-gallon keg. When Mother tasted it, she found it was the nicest, sweetest jelly we ever had.

Mother had long flower beds, extending from the house to the street, with many roses: Queen of the Prairie, Sweet Briar, Blush, Yellow, Cinnamon, Black, Button, Eglantine, Scotch Pink and Red, Hundred Leaf, and Red Moss roses. There were lilacs in the center of the beds with such smaller flowers as English Sweet Violets, tulips, pinks, narcissus, jonquils, myrtle, etc., in rows on each side. There was a May Duke cherry tree in one bed and two dwarf pear trees in another. Father was very fond of all of these. He planted six evergreen trees between the beds just in front of the house. There were two Mountain Ash trees in another flower bed, which bore beautiful scarlet berries. A pair of partridges came every winter and ate the berries, until an enterprising neighbor shot them. I thought it an outrage to kill the pretty harmless birds, for we enjoyed seeing them feasting on the berries.

(Photo of Father)

There was a Roxalena Rose which grew all over the front of the house, up to the roof, and an Isabella Grape all over the west side of the house.

Once in the fall we had a "paring bee." All the young folks roundabout came and pared apples, bushels of them, which next day it was my job to string them with a darning needle and piece of twine about six feet long, tie the ends together and hang them up to dry. That was the way then in vogue to make dried apples. When dry they were put in sacks for winter use, or sold if all were not needed. After the paring was finished, games were played, and melons, cake, etc. were enjoyed.

Wallace lived in New York City some years and was a member of the famous N.Y. 7th Regiment, which then used to go to Staten Island to practice sharp shooting. While in New York he sent for Sister Elvira to visit him, and took her to hear Jenny Lind sing, and to the Opera. Later I had the Book of the Opera, but it was all in Italian. On the way home they visited friends in Skaneatelas, who sent me a canary bird in a cage, which, when it later died, I enclosed in a little box and buried under a rose bush in a small flower bed Mother had given me.

Also, they visited Aunt Ruth Adams in Cleveland, and Cousin Georgianan came home with them. But she had only been with us a few days when her father happened to come over to Detroit, telegraphed her to meet him there, which cut her visit short, much to my disappointment, as I liked her very much.

Wallace brought home with him a large handsome mahogany bookcase and many books. There were eleven bound volumes of Harper's Magazines, from the first number issued, which I delighted to pore over. Among the other books, I read "The Autobiography of an Actress, Anna Cora Mowatt," and a bound book labeled "Drama," containing three plays, one of which was "The Lady of Lyons"; but I have forgotten the others. Although much of these two books was too old for me to understand, I enjoyed them, and in later years, remembering them, understood. The books and bookcase remained with us several years, until Wallace married in 1861. This date I remember well, as a cousin, Father's nephew, visited us on his way home in the east. He had been in Chicago some months helping his uncle, James Ward, his mother's brother, make saddles, harness, etc. for the Army, to earn money to finish preparing for the Congregational ministry. He told us he had seen the names of "O. W. Munsell and Lady" among hotel arrivals. That was the fashionable way of registering then, instead of "and wife." Not knowing whether "Lady" meant wife or not, Cousin did not call on them. He did not know it was our favorite brother on his wedding trip until we told him, too late, to his regret.

Sister was very gay, and often brought her young friends out to the farm. Once a party of them came out on horseback and feasted on fruit and melons. Sometimes it was quite embarrassing to Mother to be taken by surprise, -- no telephones in those days. Once when Sister's company was there in the evening, she made silhouettes of them. I remember hearing her say, "I can not be a poet, any more than a sheep can be a goet."

A short time after we moved to the farm, Father built a frame addition on the east side of the house, a parlor, sitting room, large pantry, and stairway to the two rooms above, the front chamber being mostly used to store apples and nuts in winter. Also the back chamber was a sort of storeroom too, where there was a book cupboard which had two little drawers in it, in one of which was a seal with an eagle's head on it, and some blue sealing wax, with which I later sealed a little vial of maple sugar made from our shade trees, which I have now. In one of those little drawers was a set of type which Father had used to print the records in the Family Bible. Mother gave the Bible to Frank after Father's death. Also in that cupboard I found letters from Sister's friends, written on fine thin paper. One day Mary Depue came down, and we had a fine time cutting off blank pages and making envelopes, and sheets of paper two or three inches square, cutting the little star-shaped ornaments from the stamps (U.S. 1851), for stamps for our little letters.

I had a playhouse in one end of the empty corn crib. My furniture consisted chiefly of bits of broken dishes. I had a swing in the barn, and once we got Mother to swing in it and we thought it great fun. It was fun to hunt for eggs in the nests under the mangers, in the haymow, and over the horse stalls and granary.

In the back of the big barn were some deep gullies, where blackberries grew up and down the sides. Once when we had threshers I picked enough berries for pies for dinner, and my arms and hands got finely scratched with the thorns.

Mary Depue had a pet lamb, which once strayed by our house, so I went out in the road to play with it; but no sooner than I put my hand toward it, than it lowered its head to butt me. I made one spring to the fence, climbed over, and never again made advances to a strange so-called pet lamb.

When the new part of the house was built and had just been plastered, Father and Mother went to town and left me at home. The doors were left open so the plastering would dry. Seeing bits of mortar on the floor, I thought it would be fine to clean it for Mother while she was gone, and so got mop and pail of water and gave it a good scrubbing, thinking to surprise her, when I showed her the result of my labor. She showed me the result, in the many digs I had given the new soft plastering with the long handle of the mop, but said never a word about the mischief I had unintentionally done.

Chapter 10

The second winter after we moved to the farm Mother was taken suddenly ill. Sister was there and as the doctor had said Mother would not live through another congestive chill, having had two before, Sister was frightened and told me to run and get some hot water out of the tea kettle on the stove, which I did, but did not put the kettle back far enough on the stove and it fell off and the boiling water splashed on my bare arm, (I wore short sleeved and low-necked dresses until I was thirteen). I screamed and wiped my arm with my apron and the skin rolled off on the floor. The scar, without skin, remains yet. My screams made Mother forget all about the congestive chill, and she jumped up and did all she could to ease my pain. She filled a pan with snow, as it melted, let me pour the ice cold water over the burn. This relieved the pain as long as I poured the water. Proud flesh appeared, and it was a long time healing. Once some young ladies living near, invited me to bring my doll and said they would make some clothes for it. I went and had such a good time watching my doll's new clothes being fitted and made, that I almost forgot my pain.

One summer Wallace helped some on their farm. He was harrowing with an old-fashioned heavy drag, when the colts he was driving ran away and injured his foot badly. Mother ransacked the town to find some cranberries to make a poultice for it, to keep out inflammation. It must have done the work, as I heard no more about the injury.

Days when we were not going to town, we depended for fresh meat in summer on a fat old butcher, who came with it out our way with horse and cart. In winter Father killed a sheep, and hogs just before Christmas. How gladly I helped Mother make sausage and headcheese, and waited on Father when he smoked the hams and salted the side meat!

About 1850 there was a potato famine in Ireland and thereafter, for many years, Irish emigrants poured into this country. One, in telling what was given him to eat, said, "They guv me pays on a stick to ate, bedad," meaning green corn.

When I first began to attend school in our little white schoolhouse in the spring, there had been some rain, which settled in some grassy pools two or three feet across and two or three inches deep. The submerged clover leaves looked as if made of ground glass, and I was much mystified. Finally I dared to walk through a pool, and found each step turned the clover leaves back to their natural green. The magic must have been tiny bubbles of air on the leaves.

I used to find clusters of blue hepatica growing by the trees, and once I picked some white flowers from a field, all I could carry, and when I reached home Mother carefully put them in a large pitcher in which she used to set yeast for bread. I can see her yet, as she arranged them for me, treasures to me then, but the commonest weeds I later learned.

Our school had two large red oak trees in the front yard and the larger children played from one to the other crying, “Pom, pom, pull away. Come away or I’ll fetch you away.” Also, they played "ante over," with half of the children on one side of the schoolhouse and the rest on the other. One child threw the ball over the house and cried "ante over." Those on the other side tried to catch it and return it the same way.

The smaller girls made playhouses among the bushes across the road, kept house, and visited each other.

On Fridays we generally had recitations and other exercises. I remember one of the large boys speaking or shouting, “I am Monarch of all I survey," and one of the large girls reciting:

"O, I'll tell you of a fellow,

A fellow I have seen.

He is neither black nor yellow

But he's altogether green."

Once I recited:

"Don't call this world a wicked world,

What e'er you call the people,

And e'en of them some good are found

In sight of every steeple.

This world is not so bad a world

As some would like to make it.

Though whether good or whether bad,

Depends on how you take it."

One winter a young man came with many maps and in the evenings held a geography school in our schoolhouse. The maps had the rivers and towns marked on each state, but no names attached to them. He put a long pointer on a dot saying, "Say, Maine, Augusta; Maine, Augusta," which we did, chanting in a singsong way, as he did. In that manner we learned the capitals of the states of our country, and foreign ones too. Even now, if I want to remember the capital of a certain state, I have only to begin to singsong the name of the state and the name of the capital will follow.

We had spelling schools in the evenings, too. Captains were chosen and these chose alternately one speller for each side. Of course, each captain tried to get the best speller. When all were chosen, they stood in rows on opposite sides of the room. Then the teacher gave out the words. When one spelled a word wrong, he had to sit down. It was very exciting to see which side would stand up the longest. When only two or three were left, the teacher would give out the hardest words he could find and we waited breathlessly for the last one to be spelled down.

Every family took one or more candles to light the schoolhouse for these evening meetings, for many parents came with the children and often stood up to spell. Father and Mother enjoyed these meetings as much as we did.

I well remember helping Mother arrange the candle-wicking in the candle molds to make candles. The wicking was doubled, the whole ends being strung on two rods. The other ends were twisted to a point, so they would go through the holes at the bottom of the tubes which shaped the candles. When all the wicks were through, the mold was turned over and a strip of wicking laid across each row, and the protruding ends pulled hard and tied tightly in big knots over the strip, so the melted tallow would not escape when turned in. The next morning when the candles were cold and firm, the ends of the wicks on the bottom were cut off, and the two rods drawn up, each bringing six candles out. They looked so white and perfect, it was a pleasure to see them.

Afterward for a while we had camphene lamps. These were glass, with brass screw tops which had two tubes protruding upward about two inches. The tubes were about half an inch apart at the bottom and one and a half inches apart at the top. Each tapered and had candle wicking running through them for wicks. The flame was extinguished by a little brass cap which was fastened to the lamp top by a short brass chain. Blowing would not extinguish them.

Candlesticks also had extinguishers on a cone on the candle-stick, the use of which extinguished the candle flame without smoke. When kerosene lamps came into use, most of the candlesticks, snuffers and trays and candle molds were thrown away so that very few are now found, even in museums.

Chapter 11

When I was about thirteen the brother of my chum, Mary Depue, invited her and me one Fourth-of-July to take a ride up to Galesburg, about five miles east, to see the celebration. While there he treated us to a lemon and a stick of candy. He cut a hole in one end of the lemon and inserted the stick of candy, and we were to suck the lemon juice through the candy. That was the only time in my life I ever heard of that kind of a treat.

For a while I attended the Presbyterian Sunday School in town. Once they had a Christmas tree in the church. In the center of the tree was an engraving of a much-loved deceased pastor. After everything else had been taken from the tree, this was handed to me, as a gift from my teacher. I had put on the tree for her a china candle stick, which Sister said would be useful, as at that time she was being courted by a young man.

Another time the Sunday School had their Christmas entertainment in the Firemen's Hall, which consisted of an amateur performance of "Mrs. Jarley's Wax Works." In a semi-circle at the back of the stage were twenty-five or thirty persons standing on small boxes, each person turning around on his pedestal, while the showman (Sister), pointing with a long stick to each as she described the wax statue, gave a short history, such as: "This is the Maid of Honor, who died because she pricked her finger while sewing on Sunday," "This is the old lady who lived to the age of 103." I forget why she had the honor of being perpetuated in a "wax figger." I remember well how convulsed with laughter the audience was by the comic descriptions given by the "Showman."

On the road which led south-southeast from our farm to Comstock before we reached the mill-pond, in a little valley called "over in the hollow," after some years was built a little house or cabin. We saw there a family which seemed to consist of a man and wife, some little children, and a very old man. We later learned the old man was over ninety years old, and had been a soldier of the Revolution. Since I have been a member of the D.A.R. I often wonder if his grave has been marked as those of Revolutionary soldiers are now marked. If he drew a pension, through the Pension Office in Washington, his grave could yet be found and marked by the Sons of the American Revolution, or by the D.A.R. in Kalamazoo.

One summer I saved some seeds of columbine and made little packets of them, which Father took to a drugist friend in town to sell for me. In time I received forty cents for them and felt rich. In those days drug stores were the only places where one could buy flower seeds. No florists in those early days!

Brother Willis was a great user of similes, some of which were: "Came down like a thousand of brick. Sticks up like a sore thumb. Not by a jug full. Like a bump on a log." I wonder, had he ever heard of a Redwood Burl?

Many years ago there used to be in the middle states of this country, pigeon roosts, where passenger pigeons gathered to rest at night or a few days. They came in such numbers that those who saw them said they darkened the sky, they flew so close together and in so many layers, that it was like a dense cloud. I do not know when nor where those flights began. Where they roosted their weight broke large limbs from great forest trees. They were so thick it was not necessary to shoot them. Men clubbed them and loaded their wagons with them. When I was a little girl I heard talk about a pigeon roost being not far from us, but I do not remember any of the family going there. In 1880 when I was visiting my parents, who then lived on a farm near Traverse City, Michigan, one day a load of men and boys went by, who said they were going to a pigeon roost. When they returned, Mother bought from them, enough pigeons to roast for a meal for us. That was the last pigeon roost of which I ever heard. Even before then it was stated in the papers that the pigeons were nearly extinct. For many years they were thought to be wholly so. But in May, 1931, the cherry farmers of Northern California were complaining that wild pigeons were destroying their cherry crops. Can these be the passenger pigeons that for so many years have been thought extinct?

Many buffalo used to roam the western plains, and they were slaughtered by the hundreds to obtain their skins to sell. We had one of these "buffalo robes," to keep us warm when we rode to town or elsewhere in cold weather. In summer it was laid on our settee.

I read such magazine and library books as came in my way, from the "Ladies Library" and other sources. I soon thought I would write a book myself, and everything I did or imagined, was phrased in my mind in the third person, ready to use in a book. But first I tried a short story, as I have one now I wrote at about the age of ten, but never tried to get published.

[This two-page short story, entitled "Blanch Clayton" was not included in this retyped manuscript].

Chapter 12

In 1857 our parents bought the lease for six months of a hotel in Dowagiac, some fifty miles west on the railroad. There was a barroom in the hotel, but Mother was a strong temperance woman and cleared it out completely. We had transient guests mostly, such as concert companies, circuses, etc., and some regular boarders.

A Dr. Clark lived near, a brother of Grace Greenwood. I attended a private school, one of whose teachers was a Miss Stocking, a very funny name I thought. A girl named Littie Williams invited me to her party, but I was such a stranger to nearly all the children, I did not enjoy the party very much.

A little later Father bought a barrel of maple sugar in large cakes. Mother thereupon let me have a party with maple sugar, both cold, and in warm syrup, for refreshment and entertainment. We did not have maple wax because it was summer and there was no snow to make it on, but we had all we could eat, with no stingy old maid to spoil our fun.

We had dancing parties at the hotel that summer. Mostly the dances were square, cotillions, with the schottische for in-between. The Lancers was danced some too. "Money Musk" and "Pop Goes the Weasel" were the favorite dance tunes. What fun when we could persuade Mother to "trip the light fantastic toe!"

There was a panorama of "Pilgrim's Progress" came to town, which had a large audience. As the panorama unrolled on one side it wound up on the other side, and a man explained it all. I can see it now, the stage, panorama, and audience.

One day, Mother's cousin, Dr. Israel Bugbee of Edwardsburg, a few miles from Dowagiac, visited us and Mother let me go home with him for a little visit. There I found Cousin Laura, a year or two younger than myself, and the twins, Cora and Charlie, creeping around. I remember Laura and I picking and eating strawberries in the garden. I went home in the stage, the only passenger.

It seems when Sister Elvira was about twelve she also visited Cousin Bugbee, for many years later I found a letter from her, written to several members of the family, a page or so to each. To Brother John she wrote: "I supposed you are having fine times drawing little Martha around in the little wagon. Me thinks I see you now." To Father she wrote: "Father, I put upon you the responsibility of telling Willis to come out here." How we laughed over that letter!

When we moved to Dowagiac, Sister and her piano went with us and she taught music there. I remember she gave a little recital of her pupils, when I sang:

"Hard times, hard times,

Come again no more.

Many days you have lingered

Around my cabin door.

Hard times, hard times,

Come again no more."

After a while, Sister Elvira did not like living at the hotel and so went to board with her friends, the McClellan's. She was married there, [September 23, 1857] Charles [Huntington] bringing the Presbyterian minister from Kalamazoo, with him. The wedding was in the evening. It was supposed that there might be a charivari party concealed in the schoolhouse nearly opposite, so when the first carriage drove off, we shouted "Goodbye, Goodbye" and a crowd of men and boys poured out of the schoolhouse with horns, etc., and followed the carriage, while the bride and bridegroom took the next carriage in quiet. There was such a crowd at the station that it was hard for them to get in the train. One fellow stuck his three-foot horn in the car window, and some man grabbed it and held it fast, and the man finally had to let go or be killed as the train moved off. I was permitted to carry Elvira's precious reticule (hand bag), a gift, and took the opportunity to put in it a poem, which I had written and called, "On Her Wedding Day." but she never mentioned it to me, and probably threw it away, never giving it a thought, though it expressed my love which I was too shy to say.

We left Dowagiac in the fall of 1857 and returned to the farm. Sister and Charles boarded that winter, 1857-58, with the family of Allen Potter, banker, living in an octagon house, copied from the celebrated one in Washington they had seen on their wedding trip some years before. In the spring, Sister and Charles went housekeeping. His mother having died the previous winter, his father came to live with them. They had many things his mother had made, fine needlework and embroidery, finely quilted bedspreads, woven coverlets, etc. Also there were several braided rugs, one of which was so very fine Sister took it to several Michigan State Fairs and it was always awarded the first prize.

I was let to stay with Sister for some time after she went housekeeping, to help her, run errands, and make the old gentleman's bed. Once I forgot to make it and she scolded me well for forgetting. But he said he preferred to make it himself, and always did after that, unless sick, as long as he lived.

In the summer of 1858 a man and his wife came to Kalamazoo and started a singing class for girls of all ages. The girls were taught certain songs and choruses which were practiced for three or four weeks. Then a concert was given, the proceeds of which repaid the couple for their efforts. There was very little such entertainment in those days in a small place and the concert was well patronized.

The smallest girls were violets, singing in units of three. The first group sang the "Purple Violet" song , then all three groups joined hands and danced around. Then the second group sang "Blue Violets"; all joined hands and danced; the third group sang, "White Violets," danced and then all sang:

"Purple and blue, and white ones too

Peep, peep at the sun and welcome you."

Then one little tot sang:

"My Grandma lives on yonder little green

Fine old lady as ever was seen.

She often cautioned me with care

Of all false young men to beware," etc.

The next older girls were Zephyrs, singing:

"Happy little Zephyrs are we,

Swiftly through the air we bound.

Kissing every leafy tree,

Throwing blossoms on the ground," etc.

They joined hands and danced in circles at the end of each stanza. Then the little Swiss flower girl with a basket of roses in one hand and a bunch of roses in the other, came forward and sang:

"Come buy my sweet roses, ye fair ladies all.

My sweet roses come buy.

Sweet roses, fresh roses,

Come buy my sweet roses, come buy," etc.

Then little Gypsy Jane, her tambourine aflutter with ribbons came bounding forward and sang:

"In the very early morn

Gypsy Jane skips by.

With the milkmaid neath the thorn

Stealthy am I.

For her I've tales of house and land,

And husband rich to gain.

You've only just to cross the hand

Of little Gypsy Jane.

Tra la la, Tra la la la," etc.

Then came larger girls, dressed in Scottish Highland costumes, singing, and dancing. Last of all were the largest girls dressed to represent the states. I was Florida, with many flowers on my dress. I was tall for my age, though not as old as the rest of the states.

We sat on seats arranged like stairs, the smallest girls on the lowest step and the largest on the highest. As each group performed its part they came down, sang, danced, and returned. We, the states, standing in our places sang "The Star-Spangled Banner" and waved flags. The tallest girl in the center, dressed as Columbia, waved a large flag. That was the finale.

In the summer of 1859 a man got up a concert, “The Coronation of the Rose.” I cannot remember the arrangement of the cantata, but different girls represented different groups of flowers. I was Mignonette, and sang in a duet, the other girl being Heliotrope. The first stanza began as follows:

"Sister flowerets, we are here.

At your call we now appear," etc.

Several years later there was formed "The Kalamazoo Musical Union." I did not sing in it, not being a member; but often went with Sister to the rehearsals, and learned many of the songs and choruses, and made her costume. Sister's part was lovely:

"Though wilk keep him in perfect peace

Whose mind is stayed on Thee.

Whoso trusteth in Thee

Thou wilk keep in perfect peace."

Captain Burrows was the "King." The concert was such a success that it had to be repeated.

The only place in town at the time for holding such entertainment was the Firemen's Hall, over the engine house. The glass blowers held forth there, variety shows, church strawberry festivals in summer, and oyster suppers in winter.

Sister's first child was born in July, 1858. The new father came to the farm to get Mother, and said to me: "Well, Mattie, we have a little daughter at our house." Presently he came again, to get me, as he had bought a quantity of blueberries, and I was needed to wait on Sister while Mother canned the berries.

I cannot remember whether it was immediately after Mother came home, or whether the coming of brother-in-law, Geo. T. Barney, made her come home sooner than she intended. He was then Sheriff, as well as U.S. Marshall, at Marquette, Michigan. He had come "down below" to bring prisoners to the State Prison at Jackson. He asked Mother to let me go home with him and spend the winter with Sister Mary. She finally consented to let me go. We stayed in Detroit three days, at the Michigan Exchange Hotel. Mother had told me that, in the morning when ready to have my dress hooked in the back, to pull the bellrope, and when it was answered to ask to have the chambermaid come, and then get her to hook my dress, which I did. When we went to the dining room, George said I should ask for whatever I wanted, and so at breakfast I asked for sausage. When the waiter asked me next what I wanted, I said again "sausage." George laughed, but I had my sausage. Once one of the waiters dropped a tray of silver and it made a terrible clatter. The other waiters rushed to help him pick it up but George said; "He will get a good kicking from the manager when he gets in the kitchen." There was a screen in front of the kitchen door, so we did not see the operation.

George was busy through the day but he took me out toward evening, once to see the market, but it was too late and the farmers were all gone home. One evening he took me out to see the torch light parade in celebration of the first cable message across the ocean, between our President and Queen Victoria, August, 1858. Another time he took me out in the afternoon to see the shipping in the Detroit River, big steamboats; some side wheel steamers, but mostly propellers, with a big wheel at the stern.

Other times it was pretty dull, staying in the hotel alone. When not in my room, I could look out a window in the hall and see the passing in the street. Once one of the Negro waiters took pity on me and took me up on the roof, where I could see all over the city and the river. But I could not enjoy the view very much because I was so afraid of the Negro, having seen none before coming to the hotel, and soon went down. I presume he thought me very unappreciative of his kindness.

Then we went on board the Northern Light, one of the propellers. George asked me if I would have a stateroom by myself or one with a young lady. He said I could choose either way. After considering a moment, I said I preferred a room by myself--I was shy of strangers. However, I soon became acquainted with some little girls about my age. The boat stopped at a landing on the Canadian side of the river for wood to burn under the steam boilers. While the wood was being loaded, the girls and I went off the boat and walked up and down, so that we could say we had been in Canada. It was interesting to watch the shores of the Detroit River, and the stakes in the St. Clair Flats and Lake, which showed where the water was deep enough for the boat to go.

It was also very pleasant to go through the Locks on the Soo Canal. We did not go out of sight of land on the south shore going through Lake Superior, and saw the Pictured Rocks in the distance. There are some sculptured pictures on the rocks there and in the caves, made by pre-historic peoples.

Then we passed into Marquette Bay, where the water was quieter, the bay being about five miles across. Marquette in 1858, was a small place with a Methodist, an Episcopal, and a Catholic church. The last was attended mostly by the French. Their little girls wore orange-colored pantalets which showed about five inches below their dresses.

George and Mary lived on the second floor of the jail, the Sheriff's Office and cells being on the first floor. There was only one prisoner in the jail at that time, to whom Mary took food on an oblong pie tin.

George was building a new house to move into when presently he would cease to be Sheriff. The new house backed on the edge of the cut of one of the two railroads which came down from Iron Mountain, about six miles away, on the tracks of which came cars loaded with iron ore. Each railroad ran out on long piers in the bay, where the ore was loaded into steamers tied alongside the pier.

Mary often went over to the new house to help get it ready to move into. One day she left me ironing while she was gone. I had heard her say that when the iron was too hot she put it into the water barrel to cool it. There was a great fire in the stove and I soon thought the iron too hot and took it to the barrel. Of course the steam came up and scalded my hand badly. I do not remember if I dropped the iron into the barrel, but when Mary returned I had my hand in the bowl of alum water she kept for burns. Then she explained that she tied a string to the iron before she put it in the water!

George had quite a large garden, but his cucumbers he had planted in barrels sunk halfway into the ground. He watered them with manure water to make them grow fast, because the summers were so short there.

Mary and I went with some neighbor women to pick wild red raspberries, which grew among the bushes near town. There were red currents too, and it seemed strange to see them growing wild. Mary made sweet pickled blueberries, as large as cherries, and also pickled wintergreen berries almost as large.

Soon after we moved into the new house, school began. We heard that there was to be a seminary opened, but I began attending the district school. When I reported at home that the pupils were all boys except for a very small group of little girls, I was sent to the seminary. Here I found twenty-five or thirty girls, some younger, some older than myself. Mrs. Laura Newton was the Principal, assisted by her sister, Miss Nellie Smith. Mrs. Newton had attended a college some place in central New York, where Rosa Cadman, a young lady of Kalamazoo had attended, and was acquainted with her.

I soon began to attend the nearby Methodist Sunday School and became acquainted with Addie Remington, who lived near us, but she was a year or two older than myself. At the Sunday School, prizes were offered to those bringing in new pupils. I won second prize for eleven pupils, the prize being a book entitled “Contentment Is Better Than Wealth." Two of the pupils I secured were Mr. and Mrs. Charles Earl from Kalamazoo, friends of Mary and George. They attended just to help me get a prize, but became converted and joined the church. During the winter their baby, their only child, died. George being a friend, dug the little grave through the frozen ground.

A little later Mrs. Earl called, and I heard her say she "knew the baby would die, because she had dreamed of fire rolling under the house, and when she dreamed of fire there was always a death in the family."

The Newtons lived just across the street from us. During the winter I begged a lock of hair from each of the girls attending the seminary, and sewed it on paper in a curl and had each one write her name beside her curl, an early collection of autographs, though I did not know it then. For many years this was one of my dearest treasurers.

I have forgotten now nearly all the names of the girls. Ella Harlow, a beautiful girl with dark curls, was my first acquaintance in the school. After I returned home to the farm, I wrote a letter to the girls collectively, and Ella answered it, and we corresponded for some time. She wrote a beautiful hand which I liked and imitated, consciously and unconsciously. I felt I must write as well as she did, and so my handwriting improved. Some years afterward I heard Ella Harlow married the Rev. Mr. Stevens, a widower with a seven year old boy. He was a Presbyterian, and preached in the new court house, until a church was built.

Pem (Emily) Watson lived in a nice white house near the bay, and had a piano, the only one in Marquette, I was told. About 1912, Mr. and Mrs. F. O. Brown lived by us at our Fulton Ranch. They came from Marquette and knew Emily Watson, who by that time was Mrs. Cooper. Not long after, Mrs. Brown on a visit home learned that Mrs. Cooper had lost her mind, and soon after died, a sad end for so joyous a girl.

Ora Edwards, about fourteen, a pretty blond, lived across the street from us, a few doors from the Newton's.

Hattie Gravaraet was about sixteen, a beautiful girl with rich dark coloring. Her father was French and her mother was said to be Indian.

Mary Johnson was a little girl about ten, very small, the daughter of Captain Johnson, who lived on Main Street, near the bay. She married a man named Scoville, and lived in Chicago, North Side, when my daughter was with McClurg's Publishing House, and their daughter clerked there for a while. Daughter became acquainted with her, and later we were invited to Sunday dinner at their house. The other daughter was a student at the Art Institute, little Mary Johnson was still "Little Mary," and her husband was a very big tall man. His business was principally looking after the late Captain Johnson's gold mine in Colorado.

Jennie Jackson was a sister of the proprietor of the Marquette House, and was spending the winter with his family.

Eunice (I forget her last name) was a relative of the baker, who lived over the new bakery. Her home was up at the Iron Mountain mines, but she was with the baker's family to attend The Seminary. She invited me to go home with her for a weekend, which I gladly accepted. We went in a sleigh, and the principal thing I remember about the visit was the deep snow, which curled over the eaves just as it did in Lower Michigan, and as I had read in Harper's it did in Franconia Notch, New Hampshire.

One day toward spring, when the snow had melted in spots on the south side of hills, Addie Remington and I went to find wintergreen berries, of which we found plenty in those spots. On the way, on the road that followed the bay shore south, we picked white cedar cones, and crossed Whetstone Creek, that emptied into the bay just there. There had once been a mill there to cut whetstones, and many sawed pieces lay scattered around and I took home one for a souvenir. It was of such a fine grain that my eldest brother begged to cut a piece from it. The remainder I have still. Addie and I picked wintergreen berries until we heard a noise, which we thought might be made by a bear, and so we went home.

There were few horses in Marquette, as all hay and grain for them had to be brought up from "down below" by boat in the fall, before boats stopped running on account of the ice. After that, mail was brought in once in two weeks by a man with a dog sled. Some ladies had fine sleighs just large enough to hold one, drawn by a dog. That was very swell.

That winter there was a large comet, extending across about one-fourth of the sky, which we watched many nights for a long time. I have never seen one since half as large.

Moonlight evenings, parties of people, young and old, rode on bobsleds from in front of the Episcopal Church on top of the hill, down Main Street, which was part of the way parallel to the bay shore, and across the two bridges over the two railroads, to where the road turned onto the last pier, half a mile long, and we went nearly the whole length of the pier. It was a lovely ride, but such a long walk back to the top of the hill that we did not take many rides on one evening. The weather continually cold and dry, and many people came there purposely to spend the winter, the dry cold then being considered good for consumptives. Yet some did die there.

In the spring the Northern Light plowed through forty miles of ice and opened a path for a string of boats, and then the North Star raced ahead to the end of the lake and back again, and got most of the passengers "going below." George thought it unfair, and partly for that reason and partly because there were seven coffins taken on the North Star, he would not let Mary and me go on it, and we came down on the Northern Light.

Soon after school opened at the seminary, Mrs. Newton formed the pupils into a club called the Concordia, which she said meant band in Concord. We held meetings once a week and after awhile began to get ready for an entertainment at the close of the term. It was held in the large ballroom of the Marquette House. We sat in a semicircle at one end of the room, and as it came our turn, each arose and did her part. I recited "The Little Pilgrim," which Mrs. Newton said that her teacher, had written for her. [This twelve page poem was not included in the retyped manuscript].

Once in the spring, Sister Mary, Addie, and I took a walk down by the bay shore. There we saw two brothers named Charles and Francis Bishop, who were just going out in their boat, and they invited us to go with them. Mary refused, but let Addie and me to go with them.

We went out near the entrance of the bay and there it began to get rough. When we begged them to return, they complied. There was a big rock not far from the shore of the town, about as large as a house. Quite near that rock, their crank flew off and stove a hole in the bottom of the boat. A stream of water an inch or more in diameter gushed in. We girls landed on that rock, while the boys plugged the hole, so we could get home, which we did without further mishap. One of the brothers afterward gave me a book, "The Biography of all Nations" which I have had rebound once, and treasure yet, being very instructive and entertaining, published in 1850 or '52.

A winter or two before I was there, Cousin Marian spent the winter with Mary and George. Mary said, once the three, with George's brother Richard, went on snowshoes over the ice and snow to Presque Isle, an island about six miles away. Marian was not used to walking on snowshoes and became so tired that the two men had to carry her about one-fourth the way. Coming back, after resting, she did not get so tired.

New Years morning Mary was very busy setting the table in the back parlor with all sorts of goodies, as she was "keeping open house" that day, as all the other ladies did, to receive callers, of which she had plenty. She was known to be a famous cook.

Just at dusk I remembered that Mary had said one must "Bring in something on New Years Day," so one would bring in something all the year. So I looked around for something to bring in, and found only ice and snow, except a sliver of wood, which I brought in the house. How Mary laughed, when in answer to her query, I told what the sliver was for!

After passing the ore docks, the shore of the bay rose in a cliff on the north, the rocks of which were of slate, smooth like the slates I had used at school. This cliff ran around the bay a quarter of a mile or so, where it was crowned by a government lighthouse.

As George was the United States Marshall, in the winter he had to enumerate the Indians in that section. He wore snowshoes, with a woolen cloth about eighteen inches square wrapped around his feet over his wool socks, the whole inside his boot packs to keep his feet warm. He took provisions and camped out while gone. I remember Mary said that he made with snow, the very nicest hot biscuit.

When we were coming down below on the boat, Sister Mary was invited to sing, to help entertain her fellow travelers. The gentlemen who asked her, then stated that she would sing, but forgot to give the name of the song until after he sat down, and then jumped up and said "She's black; but that's no matter," but did not state that that was the name of the song. It was a Negro melody, such songs being popular at that time.

When we started, the snow was yet three feet deep in the woods around Marquette, but coming on the train from Detroit we saw peach trees in blossom.

When we arrived at the Comstock farm, we found that Brother John was just married, having left for that purpose the Gull Prairie Seminary which he had been attending through the winter.

Chapter 13

Soon after I came home, Sister Elvira was at the farm, and cut off my hair. Afterwards, she said I looked like a "crazy Jane." I never found out why, nor who was a "crazy Jane."

In the fall of that year, 1859, Mother had me attend a term at the Gull Prairie Seminary, about eight miles or so from our home. There were rooms on the second floor for the Principal, Professor Walbridge, and his wife, and for Professor Andrus, and his brother, who was about eighteen years old. The other rooms on that floor were rented unfurnished to girl students who lived too far away to walk. I had one of the rooms. The day Mother brought me there, some of the older boy students came out and helped take the table, chairs, stove, etc. upstairs. Later a neighbor induced Mother to let her daughter, four or five years older than myself, to room with me. There was a rule that no man or boy should enter a student's room. One Saturday, thinking that the rule did not apply to the teacher, we invited Professor Andrus to dine with us, and thinking it not polite to leave his brother out, invited him also. But we found out our mistake on Monday morning, when Professor Walbridge reprimanded us before the school.

While there, Frankie Peck, daughter of a rich farmer living nearby, invited me to a party at her house, where I saw for the first time "Stage Coach" played which made lots of fun.

Frankie Peck later married Captain Burrows, who was Congressman-at-large from Michigan for many years, and after that, Senator for many more years. Mrs. Burrows was one of the Charter Members of the National Society of the Daughters of the American Revolution. She graduated at Rockford College, Rockford, Ill. In 1895, Daughter and I visited her between trains, and she took us driving all about Kalamazoo and I saw the new Ladies Library Building, and Mt. Holyoke College, of which she was one of the trustees. As it was summer and school not in session, we went all through the building and saw, among other things, the immense griddles where the students baked their cakes. We drove by the Union School, which had been replaced by a larger and finer one. It was diagonally across the street from where the oldest cemetery used to be, but which had been later turned into a park.

At the Gull Prairie Seminary there was a very high swing in the yard, in which two large boys swung other boys, and also girls, very high, by "running under." One day I was swung so high that the rope slackened and my hoop skirt flew up. I let go of the rope with one hand to put my skirt down and then came tumbling down, clinging to the rope with one hand, and the two young men caught me just in time to save my life. Cured of wanting to swing.

During that term at the seminary, a new school in Kalamazoo was opened, called the Union School because the first floor had rooms for little ones, the second floor was occupied by grammar grades, and the third floor was the high school. Brother Wallace went with me and entered me in the high school of which Professor [Daniel] Putman was principal and Professors [Horace] Halbert and Mrs. [Lucy D.] Lyman, the faculty. After examination, Professor Putman thought I need not take Arithmetic, but Algebra instead. I had Natural History, but do not remember what other studies. Algebra proving like so much Greek to me, I explained this to Professor Putman, who kindly excused me. The next term, I began Algebra again, and went through it rapidly.

After the Civil War came on, one of the girls, Eliza Barney, always began her essay's "On board Fort Union." One day at noon, we all stood around when some slight noise caused me to look around and I saw Eliza stooping over and running like a rabbit, and she had only gotten away when a large section of plastering fell from the fifteen-foot-high ceiling, and landed on the exact spot where she had been standing.

The high school had a library, which had a closet where Professors Putman and Halbert hung their hats, and changed boots for slippers. In the library hung a skeleton, in whose bony jaws we sometimes hung those hats, or a slice of watermelon. I took my first drawing lessons in that room, and have now the first three things I drew there. In the library was a book about the derivation of names, in which I learned that my name, Munsell, came from a Province of France. Since then, our "Munsell Family" book says our first English ancestor came with William, the Conqueror. Walter Scott mentions one of them in "The Fortunes of Nigel." Anthony Trollop, in "Framley Parsonage," says the "parson married a Miss Munsell."

In this country our ancestral line runs as follows:

Thomas (1) arrived here 1680

Jacob (2) born 1690

Jacob (3) " 1732

Silas (4) " 1758

Elnathan (5) " 1785

Austin (6) " 1805

Martha (7) " 1846

One winter I went skating at Loring's Lake, with a party, mostly young folks, my sister one of them. One lady had a fall and was hurt quite badly, but a doctor was in the party and attended her. One of the men skaters invited me to skate with him. He was a fine skater, large and powerful. We went to the end of the lake, about two miles, and back. He complimented me highly on my skating, but I did not feel very elated, because he was so strong and such a good skater that he carried me along with almost no effort on my part, and I had enjoyed it very much.

During the Civil War there was a recruiting station in Kalamazoo, with several Lieutenants from the Regular Army there. Their presence made the winter quite gay, as many parties and balls were given while they were there. One of them, when asked "How do you do?" always answered "Gay and Festive." The girls grew tired of it after a while, and when one night at a ball he flung his feet higher than usual, he fell flat on his back with heels in the air. How we girls did shout!

One of the recruiting officers came to our house one evening. I went to answer the knock at the door and just as he entered the hall, the lamp in my hand blew out. I had to leave him in the dark while I got another light and brought in my sister. He proved to be a Lieutenant Mitchell, son of a Mr. and Mrs. Mitchell who had visited George and Mary at Lake Superior and had promised them that they would call on Sister Elvira if they ever came to Kalamazoo. So, when their only son was sent there, as recruiting officer, they wrote to him to make the call for them. He proved to be an exceptionally fine young man whom we all liked very much. But, alas, he was killed at the Battle of Pittsburgh Landing, afterwards called "Shiloh." Many years later Sister and her daughters visited his parents at their home in Flushing, Long Island.

During the Civil War, a large bazaar was held in the Fireman's Hall and I was asked to dress a large doll as Columbia which I did, making shield, flag, liberty cap, etc., Columbia standing on a pedestal of three steps, left hand on a large shield; liberty cap on head, and right hand holding the flag. The doll brought ten dollars into the bazaar treasury.

We also had a Sanitary Fair at the Horse Fair Grounds, for which I made a log cabin 12 x 15 inches, on a platform about 3 x 4 feet, with a little woman churning on the porch, midget furniture showing through the windows and open doors, and other little figures roundabout. Moss was used for grass and shrubs with little rabbits peeping out, and a stream (looking glass) meandered along, with tiny ducks at the edge. This brought twenty dollars into the Sanitary Fair treasury.

At this fair Sister sold chances on a piano at five dollars a chance, the piano being donated by the Chickering Agency of Chicago, if it brought five hundred dollars, which it did, and the daughter of an express-wagon driver won it.

When the Regiment, which had been camping and drilling at the Horse Fair Grounds, entrained at Kalamazoo to start for Washington, nearly the whole county was at the station to see the soldiers depart. While the train stood there filling up, Ben Butler (afterward General), a lawyer from Boston, climbed on the top of the train and made a speech. I was not near enough to hear what he said, but bursts of laughter gave evidence that it pleased those near enough to hear.

From among my Father's papers after his death, (1881), was a clipping from "Harper's Weekly." "(From the diary of a young Southerner, killed at Bull Run, July 21st)."

"May 13th, - The long looked for letter comes at last, and Oh how much joy it gives us...All well at home and want to see us; but not worse than we want to see them..." We both cried over it.

"Sunday, May 19th - A good old fashioned sermon from our pastor, Chadwick. Oh how I love to listen to him...Do, Oh Lord deliver me from sin and temptation.

"July 4 - The memorable day of all days for the American people, we could hear the sound of the enemy's guns, I suppose in celebration of the day. We did not celebrate it; I don't know why; I think we ought to have done so...would like to know how the home folks spent it.

"July 21 - Got up a little after sunrise, broiled my meat, and ate it with old crackers full of bugs...expecting orders to march every moment."

Brother Frank enlisted at Janesville, Wisconsin in the Eau Clair Rangers, which was afterward taken into the 2nd Cavalry. At the end of the three years he re-enlisted as a Veteran, Captain J. J. LeRoy, General Washburn. The Regiment, at the end of the war was mustered out at Austin, Texas.

(Photo of Brother Frank returning from war)

Chapter 14

I was invited with Sister and her husband to attend the great Sanitary Fair at Chicago, which was held in Bryan Hall (afterward the Grand Opera House). Some of the exhibits were shown in a room of the Court House, on the opposite side of the street, among which exhibits was the stuffed eagle, Old Abe, which, when alive, was the mascot of the Wisconsin 5th Cavalry.

(Photo of Old Abe)

The bazaar part was held in Bryan Hall, where all sorts of things were for sale. "Long John" Wentworth was Mayor then, and when he came in the Hall, it was fun to see the girls, from each booth he passed, flock around him, with hands full of fancy work, clamoring for him to buy.

We made Autograph Quilts (and others) in the sewing circles at Kalamazoo to send to the soldier camps and hospitals, and "scraped lint" for the wounded, medical supplies not containing any in those days.

At the fair in Chicago, there were concerts and plays at the theatres for the benefit of the Sanitary Fair. The concert I attended was in Metropolitan Hall. The play I saw was "Our American Cousin," the same one that Lincoln was seeing in Washington when he was shot. One of the large restaurants gave all the money taken in, in one day, at fifty cents a plate, to the Sanitary Fair Fund.

One day a cousin invited me to go to the top of the Tower on the Court House. On the way up he entertained me by telling me that murderers were hung in the "well" formed by the stairs circling around!"

[Martha wrote an eight-page story (about 1886) entitled "The Autograph Quilt" which was not included in this retyped manuscript].

The summer when Sister's eldest girl was two years old, Sister took her up to the farm at Comstock to stay a few days, and left me to keep house for Charles and his Father. It was pretty lonely for me, and I amused myself composing some verses, setting them to music, and singing and playing them for Charles. I remember one stanza as follows:

"Our darling is our pet

And our angel-child,

With her fairy-like form

And her blue eyes so mild."

One night there was a terrific thunder storm, and I was so frightened I got up and stood by Grandpa Hunt's door until the storm was over. The next morning, neighbors who were watching it, said that at the worst part of the storm a big ball of fire came down and divided into three parts, the three going in three different directions and striking three different houses at the same instant. I was so frightened I could not stay there any longer, and went home the next day, walking the whole five miles to the farm. When I arrived, the baby was going from flower to flower and touching each with her tiny finger, saying "pitty fower." When she was about three, one day when she was desired to stand off the oilcloth which was being washed, she said, "I tant, my rippy's sore," rippy being her word for wrist, which had a bandage around it. About the same time, she was reaching up to put her lips on the hot stove. Being snatched away just in time, and asked "Why," she said she was going to kiss the lady in the lily, an ornament on the front of the heater. One day, when old enough to attend Sunday School, Sister exclaimed about something, "Oh, I am so discouraged," the child said to her, "Oh, Mama, you mustn't be discouraged, for you know, "Jesus is your friend!"

A few years after we moved on the farm, the farm across the road to the east was bought by Orlando Clark and his wife, whose sister, Abbie Barber, lived with them. They had moved from central New York to Minnesota; but the Indians there were so troublesome and dangerous, they came back east again as far as Kalamazoo, where they had relatives. Soon after coming to live by us, their daughter Kittie was born. And they soon built a pretty new house by the corner nearest us, and planted the whole forty acres to apple trees. They all lived and died there, Kittie the last one, in 1922. I had kept up a correspondence with them ever since I was married in 1868 until Kittie died, and then her cousin, Mary Remington, wrote me about her death.

Once Mother went away to Houghton, on Lake Superior, as Sister Mary was sick and sent for her. George and Mary did not go back to Marquette in 1859, but to Houghton, where the copper mines were. I was about fifteen then and tried to do the work while Mother was gone.

(Photo of copper spoon)

When we had threshers, Father helped me some about the dinner. I took great pride in having everything just the way Mother always did. I prepared mashed potatoes, cold boiled pork, hot fried pork and thickened gravy, and vegetables, sides being on a side table, coffee, a big dish of sliced cucumbers, and apple pie on plates ready to serve. When the men were called to dinner, we found all those who lived nearby had gone home, as their womenfolks had told them to do, knowing Mother was gone. (In those days, farmers "changed works" with neighbors at threshing times). I was terribly disappointed as I had prepared a good dinner. One of the threshers was a young man who had been in my grammar class when I was nine and he about sixteen. When Father asked which kind of pork he would have, hot or cold, he replied, “I won't have none of neither." His bad grammar shocked me.

At the farm we had a good dog, Turk by name. At some time he must have been shot, for when he heard a shot he would rush into the house and crawl under a bureau, and no coaxing would bring him out for a long time. Afterward we had another dog, smaller and with quite short legs. He used to follow me down to the lake when I went skating, and run after me and bark at me, but when I turned and skated toward him, he could not run as fast as I skated, and cried until I skated away from him again, and then he would run after me and bark joyously. This little dog followed Father and me one day when we went sleighing to Augusta, about twenty miles away. The dog was lost in the town, and Father said he was glad of it, as he was worthless, but the next day he was home again!

One cold winter evening when Sister and baby were at the farm, Willis and his brother-in-law called. Very soon after they departed we heard hoarse cries of "fire, fire" and on coming out we saw it was our house on fire, which they had discovered and were running back and shouting. Mother and Sister immediately began to think of taking the baby up to the Clarks, a short distance away. While they were arguing, the men wanted pails and water to put out the fire, which was the chimney burning out. They found two pails, and because I could not find another, I took Mother's big brass kettle, holding two pails full or more, and with the cistern hook drew water from the cistern. One of the men carried a pailfull in his teeth while he climbed the icy roof on his hands and knees. The cistern was quite near the open door and I could hear them talk as it was dark outside they could not see me. After a while they missed me, and said I must be scared and was hiding. Then they looked for me and when they discovered me trying to draw water from the cistern in the big kettle, Mother made me stop. When the water was thrown in the chimney it followed the stove-pipe to the turn at the corner, and then gushed out and deluged Sister, who happened to be standing under the corner at the moment. That was the only damage done by a fire which at first sight looked as if the whole roof was afire, because the wind flattened the flames down over the roof.

After I was about sixteen I spent quite as much time at Sister's as at home. Once some of the girls invited me to "assist" at a surprise party on Augusta Arms, one of the number. I invited Abbie Barber to go with me, so she came down in the afternoon, staying overnight with me at Sister's afterward. I had never attended a surprise party, and asked Sister if I should take some refreshments. She said yes, but some popped corn would do, and prepared a large quantity, which I carried in a covered basket, and left with our wraps. Not seeing signs of any other refreshment brought, and being too shy to take the initiative and bring out my pop corn, it stayed right there all the evening, while games and cards were played, and came home again in the basket just as it went, except that a young man, our escort home, carried the basket!

Sister was very gay in disposition, loving young company, frequently entertaining both single, and young married people. Music, whist, euchre, and refreshments were the usual order. In the summer the same group used to go camping and fishing at the Gun Lake Club, some twenty or more miles from town. Those who were very fond of fishing arose at four o'clock and started before sunup, as they said the fish bit better then, a hired oarsman in each boat. The lake was about seven miles long, with some islands and indented shores, so that boats soon lost sight of each other, and remained as long as the fish bit well, or the long-drawn "wah-hoo" summoned them to breakfast. A man cook was brought with the party. Once one of the gentlemen invited me to go with him the next morning. When I was getting ready, his wife called to me to "hurry, as Samuel don't like to be kept waiting." I was soon seated in the stern, with a rope in each hand to guide the boat, the oarsman in the center of the boat. We were well out of sight of the clubhouse with two lines out, when I descried a small stick protruding three or four inches above the water just ahead of us. I had just time to cry out and pull on a rope when the stick grazed the side of the boat as we went by, but without upsetting us. We found the stick was the end of a large limb of a tree which had evidently blown on the lake when it was frozen, sinking in the spring thaw. We had scarcely gotten our breaths after passing it, when we "got a bite" and pulled in two lovely fish. So we went back and forth and around that tree top, getting one or two fish each time, until we had about a dozen large ones. Then we thought it time to return for breakfast. When in sight of the landing we saw the whole party gathered there, greatly excited about something. A little fish about six inches long, hung up, comprised the entire "catch" of the other half dozen boats out, and caused much laughter. When they saw ours and heard where we caught them, they said I must be a mascot, and one gentleman who prided himself on being an expert fisherman and thought he knew every foot of that lake, immediately invited me to go with him the next morning and show him that tree top. I went, but in that great expanse of water a small stick three or four inches high could not be seen unless almost upon it. We caught no fish, and my mascot-ship ended right then.

Eating in the clubhouse, reading under the trees in the shade, telling stories, and visiting, comprised the most of the diversions through the day. Once Mr. Hoyt made a speech, mimicking Ben Butler, bum eye and all, which was very amusing. Sometimes the men would all go in the boats to some secluded cove and swim. They told us of the sport they had trying to teach one of the number how to swim.

(Photo of Martha Munsell, 1864)

Chapter 15

When the insane asylum was built in Kalamazoo, as soon as a part of it was finished, the part soon filled up. It was the largest and finest building at the time in the town, or in fact in that part of the state. So, like everyone else, when we had visitors from out of town, we took them to see it. Once a cousin from Edwardsburg, Marian, eldest daughter of Dr. Bugbee, came. Mother drove a young horse of which she was very fond, taking Cousin and me to see the asylum. It stood quite a way back from the entrance gate, which we had to open and shut. Mother tied the horse to a post, which seemed to be a hitching post, quite near the wall of a new part on which we could see men working three or four stories up. After we had been shown through the building and came out, all we found of the horse and buggy was a small piece of the halter strap still tied to the post. We thought one of the men must have dropped a brick and scared the horse, which we found had jumped the gate and ran into scrubby woods opposite. Later, when the horse was caught, and Father went over the tracks she made trying to turn to get back into the road the way she came, he found she had reached the sandy dry bed of a creek, and was going so fast that the buggy had jumped and only touched the sand every twenty feet.

There was an excursion train to Coldwater, Michigan, starting early one morning, to see the art gallery of a man there who had copies made of many of the world's finest paintings, and I went with Sister and the others. This collection, I understand, has since been given to the Michigan State University at Ann Arbor.

(Photo of Brother Wallace)

In the spring of 1862 Brother Wallace, then living in Janesville, Wisconsin, invited me to visit him and his wife, Abbie, and I gladly accepted the invitation. They had just moved into the pretty two-story house they had built. The house was at the top of a hill on the Main Street of the town, and when I was there Main Street crossed Rock River near the center of business. About half a mile from the bridge the river turned sharply, and on the bluffs following it along, a row of Lombardy poplars grew, which looked like a row of sentinels there.

Once they took me on a long drive through the Dells of Wisconsin. These seemed to be an old river bed cut through solid rock, which some convulsion of nature had emptied of water. Flowers and vines clambered up the sides, and at the top we could see the projecting roots of large trees, whose verdure made a twilight for us to drive through. Also, on the way across the prairie, we saw ditches of water, with the earth which had been dug out, piled on one side, the primitive way of fencing along the roads, where there was no timber. Now probably the ditches are replaced with wire fence.

Once they took me to a strawberry festival, in the parlors of the church they attended, the pastor of which had married them. But most of the my time was spent singing and playing for and with Brother. He was just as fond of music then as when he sent for Sister to come to New York to hear Jenny Lind sing. Also, I spent much time pouring over the articles on Music and Art in the New York Evening Post, of which William Cullen Bryant was then editor.

After the Civil War had begun, I was in correspondence with a former schoolmate named Dunbar, and while in Janesville, in one of his letters he wrote that a comrade in his Regiment, named Hosmer, had seen the Janesville postmark and superscription on one of my letters, and who declared it was the writing of a girl he knew in Janesville. Dunbar asked me to write in my next letter something he could joke Hosmer about. I did so, but the very next letter from Dunbar said Hosmer, before my letter came, had been killed at the Battle of Stone River. That saddened me, and I never wrote Dunbar again, who was not even wounded. And when the war was over his father and he, set up a feed store in Kalamazoo.

After a while Sister Mary wished me to visit her in Ligonier, Indiana, and so I went from Janesville to her house, and remained a month or so, when Sister Elvira coming over for a few days, I went home with her, after being gone six or seven months.

Once I visited my uncle in Auburn, New York. On the way there I carried my best bonnet in a handbox, which had my name and address very large and plain, kindly prepared by my brother-in-law. On leaving Niagara Falls in the evening it was cold, and I joined a group gathered around the stove in one end of the coach. One of the men who had evidently seen my name on the handbox which I had placed on my seat, began talking to me, asked me if I knew the so-and-sos in Kalamazoo, was so glad to meet someone from there, etc. I answered coldly, but as it did not stop his talk, I took my seat. Then another man, evidently one of the same lot of crooks, came and sat down beside me. He wanted me to put my head on his shoulder so I could sleep and rest. Then he said he had to get off at a station and said he was so lonesome, wouldn't I get off with him and keep him company?, etc. Presently the conductor came in and after collecting the tickets stood at the farther door of the car. Immediately I went to him and told him about these men. He said there were some ladies he knew in the next car, and he would take me to them, which he did. Then he went back for my handbox, and said he was sorry there was no way of keeping such men from coming on the train, but I at once tore my name and address from my handbox.

In Auburn I had a pleasant visit of some weeks. My cousin took me one Sunday to attend the services at the State Prison. The whole six hundred prisoners were in their seats when we came in. The only noticeable thing, was the absence of Negroes among them, there being very few. I suppose there are a larger number now.

One season at the races at the Kalamazoo Horse Fair Grounds was the time and place when Flora Temple made her extraordinary speed, though it has been bettered since, by later horses.

A cousin of Charles, living at Albion, was hurt when the second floor of her father's store collapsed when she happened to be there. She was a long time ill, and when sufficiently recovered, she visited at Sister's. I had to sleep with the cousin, so as to rub her back when it pained her so she could not sleep. I did not enjoy the experience overly much.

Sister's youngest daughter, "Sunshine," was born 1861. When old enough to attend Sunday school, one frosty morning she called to her Mother to come out, and said, "They tell us as Sunday School that we are made of dust, and so we are. Just see," and exhaled a good breath which immediately froze to visible vapor, which she had thought to be dust.

One day she threw herself on my lap and said, "Oh, Aunt Mattie, what do the angels put their footies on?"

At the time of [General Robert E.] Lee's surrender there were great rejoicings in all northern towns because the war was over. In our town there were fireworks to be shot off on top of a store. Great crowds gathered in the streets around, while we were fortunate enough to be on the top of a store diagonally opposite. Soon after the fireworks began to be shown, something went wrong and they all began to go off together. Our little girl began to cry hysterically. When she was quieted enough to tell why, she said she was crying because she "was afraid they were going to set God afire!"

The rejoicing was quickly turned into mourning by the murder of our beloved President Lincoln. I have a copy of the New York Herald, announcing the assassination.

(Photo of Herald)

One day not long after Sunshine began attending school, we heard a great boo-hooing as the two girls went out the gate. Sister said to me, "run and see what is the matter and make her stop crying." I hurried out and found little Sunshine was crying because her sister had spilt some water on her clean apron. I knew there was a hot flatiron in the kitchen, so took her there and ironed the apron dry and nice as before the accident. Then our little Sunshine went dancing away to school, a smiling, happy child. When I reported the accident and its remedy, Sister said, "How easy to turn tears into smiles."

Soon Sunshine began to learn songs at school, which she sung when at home. One I liked very much, but can only recall the words of the refrain:

"All the birds to the cold water army belong,

Cold water, cold water

All the birds to the cold water army belong!"

She had a gift of a good sized doll cradle. One afternoon when exercises were to be held at school, she took doll, cradle, and her little chair to school, and while rocking the doll, sang a little song:

"Sleep, baby, sleep.

Thy father is watching the sheep.

Thy mother is shaking the dreamland tree

And down falls a little dream on thee.

Sleep, baby, sleep." etc.

Chapter 16

October 28th, 1868, I married R. E. Granger, the Reverend Oliver. S. Dean performing the ceremony, in the presence of about twenty guests. We were married in the afternoon, and after partaking of refreshments and seeing the many gifts, took the train for Chicago, where we arrived about seven in the evening. We were to board with the Cochrane's, friends of Mr. Granger, at 307 West Washington Street. They had a little reception for us, some guests for supper, friends of theirs, and also Mr. Granger's mother and his aunt, Mrs. Fenton.

Our rooms consisted of the second floor front room and small dressing room off. Mr. Granger had furnished the rooms before he came to the wedding, all but the stove-pipe. October twenty-eighth is generally pretty cold in Chicago. Next morning I had to stay downstairs with Mrs. Cochrane while a hardware man helped get the stove-pipe in place through another room to reach the chimney. Then when a fire was lighted and the room a little warm, I could see how my present home looked.

In addition to the usual furniture, the walls were lined with pictures, three very large steel engravings, four small ones which were photos of caribou hunting scenes; and some others, all however photographs or engravings, in black and white, in dark walnut frames. The large ones were, an artist's proof of Marshall's 'Lincoln." Mr. Granger had bought, one of three exhibited at Crosby's Opera House Gallery. The other two were Daniel Huntington's "Mercy's Dream"; and "The Village Blacksmith," of which I have forgotten the artist. The last two pictures were given with tickets he had bought for the raffle of Crosby's Opera House. Mr. Crosby had found the Opera House cost more than he had expected, and took this way to get out of debt for it. When the drawing took place, he held the winning ticket!

Besides these pictures, our room held an "etagere," commonly called a "what-not," with some bric-a-brac; also an album, with photographs of Lincoln and his funeral in Chicago, and of some other men connected with him.

(Photos: 1-8)

No. 1 - Lincoln, photographer unknown, though it must have been taken in Chicago. I visited the St. Louis Fair, 1904, and in the Illinois State building there was a framed group of Lincoln pictures, at least a hundred, not one like this, or nearly so good.

No. 2 - The engine, draped, which drew the funeral train from Washington to Springfield, Ill.

No. 3 - The draped and guarded coach. This photo was taken at Chicago, bearing his body on the way to Springfield. The car was the principal Officer's Car of the Government from 1863 to 1866, and was kept in the military car shops in Alexandria, Va., for the special use of President Lincoln. After the funeral it was kept in the Chicago and Alton yards at Joliet, Illinois, F. B. Snow, Custodian.

No. 4 - Catafalque, Officer's horses, Regiment of soldiers, and throngs of people in front of the Chicago Court House, during the funeral services. This picture also shows the front of the Court House (destroyed in the Fire of 1871) with fountains playing in the yard, the first Chamber of Commerce Building, etc.

No. 5 - The Chicago Court House, draped to the flag staff on the dome.

No. 6 - Lincoln's Springfield home, draped.

No. 7 - William H. Seward, Lincoln's Secretary of State, who was wounded by the conspirators at the same time Lincoln was killed.

No. 8 - The assassin, John Wilkes Booth, (brother of Edwin Booth who would never after set in Washington).

All these photographs were gathered in 1865 or before, by R. E. Granger, who was then in charge of the photograph section of a large bookstore in Chicago, and he considered this photo of Lincoln the very best one, as he had met and shaken hands with Lincoln when he was in

Chicago before he went to Washington. All the negatives of these photographs (except that of Booth) were destroyed in the Great Fire of 1871 and also all photos, except those in families in the extreme south and west sides of the city. We lived on the west side, several blocks from the fire. For more than sixty years these eight Carte de Visites have been my greatest treasures. The Marshall's 'Lincoln', Mr. Granger bought before we were married, and was sold in 1889 to the late Mr. Chas. L. Hutchinson, President of the Corn Exchange Bank, through the Art Institute, which had it on exhibition.

Not long after we were married, some friends of the Cochrane's, where we boarded, invited us, with them and some others, to dine and spend the evening. After a delightful dinner, our hosts brought out a game board they had brought from England. The card game played with the board was called Pope Joan, and could be played by any number from five or six to ten or twelve, and was very jolly. Afterward Mr. Granger had a similar board made for us, and we used it when we had company who liked to play cards, and they always found it very amusing. I have the Pope Joan board now.

While we were with the Cochrane's, Belle Buell, a young lady employed at the Post Office, also boarded there, and when at breakfast, Mr. G. would ask to be excused to go to business, she would always say, "With the greatest of pleasure!"

Mrs. Lincoln at that time lived in the next block west, and R. T. Crane, afterward I believe our Ambassador to Russia, lived across the street, and the Badgers, Southerners, lived near on the west. The Cathedral of St. Peter and St. Paul was a little east. Dr. and Mrs. M. Robert visited us there, and we took them to see the Water Works on the north side, the most showy thing in the city at that time. There was a very high water tower, but none of us ever climbed it, except Mother some years later.

When we were married Mr. Granger had a book and news store at 210 West Madison Street; but in December sold it.

In April, Mother was taken ill and sent for me, and I went home. When I returned I found Mr. Granger had rented a furnished house, 174 South Sangamon Street. Our eldest daughter was born there, October, 1869. We lived there until February 1870, and then moved to a cottage, 665 West Adams Street, and lived there four years.

Late in the fall of 1870, one evening about ten o'clock, a rap at the door proved to be that of the young lady who had for a short time roomed with me at the Gull Prairie Seminary. She had come to Chicago to attend a three day "Music Institute," and was in search of a place to stay over the three nights. As we had a spare bedroom off the parlor I consented to receive her, and then she dismissed her companions, who had already found places to stay. The following nights we left the front door unlocked and left a light in the parlor. The last night she was so full of the "Institute" she had to come to our bedroom door and talk about it for about fifteen minutes. My husband was getting ready for bed when we heard her enter. He hurried as fast as he could, and had just gotten into his night clothes when she appeared at the door. He had just time to skip behind the door when she began to talk, gazing at both, I was convulsed with laughter, as she droned on with her story. When she finally reached the end, and Mr. Granger could come to bed, he was nearly frozen!

Saturday evening, October 7th, 1871, there was a large fire which we could see from our house, although some miles away. For a few hours the water in our faucets did not run, but as soon as the fire was subdued it began to run again, that is Sunday morning. On Monday morning when our milkman came, I told him I would like extra milk, as the water was not running. He said "No, and it won't run again, for the Water Works burned at three o'clock last night, and the Post Office and the Court House." Then I ran to tell Mr. G., who was not well and meant to stay in bed all day. But at the news he jumped up, ate a little, and went away, and did not return till night. Brother Frank, who was with us, ate a little, grabbed his lunch box and hurried off. We did not see him again till after dark, when he came, with a piece of veiling in a string around his neck, and the reddest eyes. The veil had been used to keep the smoke out of his eyes, he said. He had run the engine for the elevator to take carriages down from the upper floor of his place of business, Coan & Tenbroeck's on Adams Street between State and Dearborn Streets. The carriages were run into the lake to keep them from burning. He helped until the fire drove them all away. The first carriage he helped down, he had thrown his lunch box into, and it was resurrected about three weeks later when that carriage was drawn from the lake. Some of the carriages were stolen, and he was sent to towns roundabout to recover them whenever any were heard of.

On Wednesday, Mr. Granger nearly burned his shoes off his feet, helping get the safe out of the hot coals.

On the Monday morning at nine o'clock, several men stood on the corner of State and Madison Street, watching Crosby's Opera House on Washington Street burning, and wondered if the fire would work back and take Bookseller's Row, three large bookstores standing side by side on that corner. A few hours later nothing remained there or within miles, but ashes, bricks, etc. There were large coal yards on Madison Street beside the river, with coal heaped up on the docks, and as soon as it was dark, for weeks we could see the light of the coal still burning.

Many people came from far and near to see the ruins. My brother Ebb and Charles came, bringing from Mother, a large suitcase full of food and water. We had no water except what we brought from a duck pond in Union Park, about three blocks away. After a few days carts began to come around with water to sell. The city fathers had the fire engines pump water from the river into the water pipes for laundry purposes, but some used it for cooking, etc. The river at that time carried all the sewage of the city to the lake, so that typhoid fever began to appear, before the Water Works were repaired and in use again.

On the Monday afternoon of the fire, we saw a small express wagon from the fire district with a few things from a State Street bird store, a cage hanging on the back, containing a forlorn parrot. A young lady, my brother's fiancée, dragged her trunk to the LaSalle Street Tunnel, to escape the flames. A friend of ours on State Street hired a man to take a load of furniture away. A sewing machine, and a trunk belonging to a sister just returning from a honeymoon trip were loaded in, and then the man became frightened at the near approach of the fire and drove off at a run, and that was all they saved.

It was said the court house cat, after the fire, was found in a pail of water, alive. The court house bell, which always had been used to tell the districts in which a fire was located, was afterward melted and made into little bells for souvenirs. My little girl had one, which was on a chain around her neck, but both was afterward lost.

(Photo of my little girl with the bell)

From all over the United States, money and carloads of food were sent. I was proud that the first carload to arrive came from my native town, Kalamazoo. Things were taken to the west side churches to be distributed, the fire having been confined by a very strong wind to the south side business district and the north side, both of which were wholly wiped out, except one house on the north side in the center of a whole block for grounds. One day I went to our church to see the distribution. One of the Elders who knew me, begged me to let a barrel of flour, a ham, etc. be sent to us, but on my refusal he said there was plenty of things, and most of them were going to those who did not need them. It was just a month before the firm Mr. Granger was with got in shape to pay salaries again.

(First printing done in Chicago after the 1871 fire)

Wholesalers in the east, New York, etc., showed their faith in Chicago business ability and enterprise, by sending to their former customers before the fire stopped smoking, all things to make a new start, before they knew whether it was possible to make such start. With tears in their eyes and trembling voices, retailers told of these numerous instances. Time has shown the faith fully justified.

In England, not knowing Chicago as yet had no public library, Thomas Hughes, author of "Tom Brown's Schooldays," etc., thought our greatest loss by the fire, was the loss of our public library, and made an appeal to authors, publishers, scientific and other societies, of Great Britain, which resulted in obtaining about 7,000 books. When the donation was received in Chicago, it was placed in temporary locations, until November, 1897, when it was removed to its permanent home in the new building, which occupies the site formerly called Dearborn Park, owned by the U.S. Government. Many requests for the site were made by different organizations, but it was finally given to the Library Board, with the stipulation that the "Grand Army of the Republic" should have its home there for fifty years, it being thought the last of that great army by that time would have passed away, when their rooms would revert to the library.

In 1927 telegraphic news came as follows: "Chicago, October 22nd, -- A Committee named by Mayor Thompson to make a search of the Public Library for traces of the British Lion reposing in the far recesses of its forest of stacks, today learned with considerable surprise that Queen Victoria helped to found the Library after the Fire of 1871."

(Photo of the Library)

Geo. P. Upton, of the Chicago Tribune, wrote a history of the Fire, entitled "The Great Conflagration," which is one of our treasured books.

The brick and other fire debris were carted to the lake shore and dumped where now is Grant Park. The Michigan Central railroad came into the city over piles quite a distance from the shore, leaving quite a space to be filled in, which eventually was named Grant Park.

In 1873 early in the evening there was quite a fire a few blocks south of where the great one began. One of my neighbors and I said we would go to it, as we had not seen the other fire except at a distance of many blocks. We went on the street cars until they were stopped by the police, and then walked the rest of the way, to a cross street where we had a good view. Soon, there came a cow running from the fire, and we climbed up on a ten foot pile of those bricks to get out of her way. Now, the Art Institute stands on that very spot, with her two lions guarding the entrance.

(Photo of Art Institute)

Directly after the Great Fire wild rumors flew about, of robbers helping themselves to loot. All men were called out to guard the city. Mr. Granger and our neighbors patrolled our vicinity, until General Sheridan arrived with soldiers and took charge, when things quieted down, and we heard no more of "thugs being strung up to lamp posts."

General Sheridan had a fine span of bay mules, which he drove hitched to an ambulance for a carriage, thinking well of Washington's plan of raising many mules, with the intention of driving them entirely to his carriage. Sheridan could often be seen driving down the avenue with his "spanking team," until he married and gave his bride, as a wedding present, a carriage and fine span of horses.

Chapter 17

In 1872 my parents sold the Comstock farm and moved to Kalamazoo, where I visited them several times from Chicago, once when the Michigan State Fair was held there. In 1874, all their nine children having located elsewhere, they sold the Kalamazoo property and bought a farm near Traverse City, in the north part of the lower peninsula of Michigan.

(Photo of Traverse Bay)

In 1875 we moved to Calumet Avenue, where we lived six years. Our youngest child, Gertrude, was born there, November 10th, 1875. "Wednesday's child is merry and glad."

Our elder daughter heard someone ask if the baby had red hair, and exclaimed indignantly, "It isn't red, it is golden yellow!"

(Photo of the baby)

When Gertrude had learned to stand alone, she would creep to a hassock, climb on it, take hold of the window sill, straighten up, and look out of the window a long time. When tired, she would carefully let herself down on the hassock and then regain the floor without falling.

When she was about two, we had a kitten which would hide on one side of the open folding doors and when Gertrude would run by, it would jump out at her, and then go on the other side of the doors and then jump out at her again when she returned, and they would keep up this game for a great while.

In 1876 I went to New York, taking the two children. Sister and her daughters were planning to attend the Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia, the first World's Fair in the United States, so we joined their party. We stopped at a hotel built and run by a man from Baltimore for use during the Exposition, as he thought his furniture business would be nil while the fair lasted. His nice wife was with him, and they brought their colored servants, one of whom took care of my baby while we visited the Fair.

We attended the Fair several days and enjoyed it very much, especially the art building, which was made for permanence, as a memorial of the exposition. I have a silk-woven picture of the art building, and other mementos.

(Art Building in silk, 1876)

After we returned to New York, Sister took us to see several noted places, among them, Greenwood Cemetery, to see the Italian marble mausoleum there. Returning from that trip, we saw numerous yachts in the harbor all draped with mourning, on account of the overturning of a yacht in a windstorm, with the drowning of all the occupants.

When we returned to Chicago, we saw on the way to the house a fence on which had been painted an advertisement in black letters, and our small girl explained, "There's a fence all draped too." We found that burglars had ransacked the house; but we thought it was the work of boys, as nothing of value was taken but my mink furs, and three books that would appeal to boys: "Hoyle's Games," "Around the World in Eighty Days," and "Betsy Bobbitt and I."

About this time we had a horse that was very skittish and would shy and jump at seeing a piece of paper lying in the road, or any such thing. One day their father took the children to Lincoln Park, and the horse jumped sideways, when all were thrown out of the buggy, cutting our little girls' head badly, but not hurting the baby at all; but the next time their father wished to take them out, she would not go, saying: "Horty hurt Baby." "Horty" was the only baby-talk word she ever said, as she would not try to say a word until she felt she could pronounce it correctly.

When she was about four, my niece spent six months with us and as she was an accomplished pianist, the Steinways, friends, ordered their agents in Chicago, Lyon & Healy, to bring to our house a concert grand piano and keep it there as long as she stayed in Chicago. This was very convenient when young people came and wanted to play four-hand music, my piano having been tuned up to "concert-pitch." When my niece played, Gertrude would take her little chair and sit very close to her and listen.

When about three or four she began to draw pictures with a pencil. The floor was always strewn with papers, and which I always looked at before throwing them away, as some of them, though crude, showed talent in so young a child. One day she saw her sister starting to school in the rain, and said, "I'll make her going to school," and drew a picture of her under the umbrella, with the rain coming down.

She had heard us talk of the opera and concerts, and drew a picture of a woman standing, singing, holding a music book open, so that part of the written music could be seen on the page, drawn in perfect perspective.

When she was three or four she attended Sunday School. Also, I sometimes took her along when I took her sister to dancing school. Once a friend of her father's called, and took her on his knee and talked with her. When he asked what they did in Sunday School, she replied, "O, they dance!"

When she was five she attended a kindergarten, wearing a little blue sunbonnet instead of a hat. One day she said she didn't want to wear it any more, because the boys said "shoot the sunbonnet."

When she was seven she played in a recital her piano teacher gave for her pupils, the program of which I have now.

When about nine she was one day reading a newspaper, and asked me what "retreat" meant. I explained different meanings, but she still looked puzzled and said "No, a part of a man," so I asked her to read aloud the passage, and she read a sentence about a fire, "and his retreat was cut off."

In 1880 the two children and I went to the farm at Traverse and made my parents a long visit. Traverse City is a pretty place on the bay, about thirty miles from Lake Michigan. The farm was about six miles from Traverse City. On the Fourth of July a very energetic neighbor arranged an old-fashioned "Celebration" in a picnic grounds in the woods near. There was a platform with speaking, and the thirteen oldest men in the vicinity were marched up and seated on the platform to represent the thirteen states, and the "Declaration of Independence" was read. After the speeches, then came the dinner on long tables, loaded with good things to eat.

(Photo of Declaration of Independence)

Just before we returned to Chicago there was an excursion on a steamer from Chicago to Fort Mackinac, which we joined at Traverse City. It was a very interesting trip, seeing the fort with its guns pointed across the Straits of Mackinac, the houses in which the officers lived, and the Lovers Leap, a great rock, very high, jutting out into the Straits. It was so named for some Indian legend. We found on the island the loveliest flowers, daisies, big blue harebells, and others.

(Photo of the Fort)

In 1893 Gertrude's drawings were exhibited with those of other high school pupils at the World's Fair. When she was seventeen she sang "Ye Noble Knights" from "Les Huguenots," in a recital which her teacher, Professor Gill gave, her rendering of which delighted him.

(Photo of Gertrude, 1895 at So. Haven)

She married in 1896, and her first son, Alan was born 1898. The next day, when I called to see her, she said, "What have I done, that God should give me such a beautiful baby." He was christened in Grace Church. She preferred to have him call her "Mother," though at first he called his father "Papa." One day he seemed to be considering the subject, saying to himself, "Mother, Papa, Mother, Father," and from that moment always said "Father." When he was about five he had a serious illness and when he was convalescing, Gertrude asked me to take him with me on a trip to Brother Willis' farm, thinking the change would do him good. While there, one day we were talking about names, and he said, "Mother has several names, she is Mother and she is Gertrude, and baby calls her Mama." Baby could only make a noise, um um, which he thought was meant for "Mama."

(Photo of Gertrude and her children)

The Iroquois Theatre fire occurred during a Christmas matinee, at which about six hundred lost their lives, mostly women and children. A young lady, a dear friend of Gertrude's was there with her uncle, who was visiting her family at the time. The uncle's body was found at once, but that of his niece was taken away and brought back to the morgue three times by others, before her friends identified her. Most of those in the upper balconies were found dead in their seats, evidently instantly killed by the rising intense heat.

Gertrude died August 4, 1904, from the effect of a gasoline explosion the previous Saturday. Alan was not six till the following September 26th, but he was a hero at the time of the accident. He was at play in the yard when he heard her scream, and ran to the side door, but it was hooked on the inside. Then he ran to the front door and finding that also fast, climbed in the cellar window, ran upstairs and let in a neighbor passing by, who carried his mother to the next neighbor's. Alan then took his baby brother, sixteen months old, from his baby-jumper and carried him to the same neighbor. Then he ran across the street and said, "Mrs. Elliott, please phone to the doctor and the fire engine. Our house is afire, and mother is burning." The lady afterwards said, "The little fellow was so earnest I thought it must be so, and phoned." Later, when I spoke to the little hero about it, he said: "I carried baby out so the plastering wouldn't fall on him."

(Photo of Alan, age four)

When Alan finished high school he immediately joined the Navy, April 1916. From April to December 1917 he was on patrol convoy duty between the U.S. and France, and then was on the Columbia to January 1918, and then swept mines on the North Sea on the U.S.S. "Quail" until September 1919, and was honorably discharged October 1919. He married, and lived in Los Angeles many years.

(photo, Alan 1919) (photo, Columbia)

Donald, Gertrude's younger son, was born March, 1903, and was christened in St. Bartholomew's Church. He has always lived in Chicago, is married, and their children are Richard, born September 15th, 1928, and Mary Louise, born Sunday, September 7th, 1930.

"The child that is born on the Sabbath Day,

Is blithe and bonnie, good and gay."

(Photo of Donald, Richard, Mary Louise, my two great-grand children and their father)

Chapter 18

John A. King, President of the Fort Dearborn National Bank, from whom we rented the house we occupied on West Adams Street between Wood and Honore Streets, had moved our cottage from Monroe Street and built for himself a more pretentious house on the site. He owned all the land between our house and Wood Street, and later built a double brick house next to us. He then moved into one house and rented the one on the west to a Mr. Valentine, General Agent for the Woods Reaper. Mr. Wood had a son just out of college and wished him to learn the business. As the son and his step-mother did not agree very well, he asked Mr. Valentine to take the son into his family and make a home for him while learning the business, to which Mr. Valentine consented. Mrs. Valentine had a younger sister who visited her frequently, and when she heard of the contemplated addition to her family, she sent for her sister to come and help entertain the young man. She came, and the young people promptly fell in love with each other, and were married. Not long after the wedding the young man developed tuberculosis and they went to California. In time they had a baby daughter, and the young man died. The young widow and baby came to live with the Valentines.

We moved away from West Adams Street, so I did not see them for a few years. Then I met Mrs. Valentine at a painting class, and she told me the baby was then four or five years old, and called her "My other Mother." Mrs. Valentine had two sons, but no daughter, and was very happy to have the little girl almost her own.

(Photo of M. M. Granger, 1880)

From about 1874 I spent much time painting, inventing the "Game of Languages," and many little things, also in making translations from the French: the "Autobiography of the great French Tenor, Gilbert Duprez," and many short stories; the one I liked best, showing how the bunnies came to be thought to have laid the colored eggs, being called, Easter Eggs.

[The eighteen-page story titled "Easter Eggs" was included in the retyped manuscript]

Chapter 19

One of my paintings of "Morning Glories," I sent to the Iowa State Fair, which received a premium and a diploma.

(Photo of diploma)

A lady of Des Moines who saw the picture, was so pleased with it, she came to Chicago on purpose to take lessons of me. I had received lessons from teachers of drawing, water colors, oil painting and China painting, but had had no experience in teaching, so all I could do was to let her see me paint, for which she seemed very grateful and paid me well.

I have three landscapes in oil, one of them being a view of Loch Levan, where Mary, Queen of Scots was imprisoned.

But I liked to paint flowers best, and sold four of "Morning Glories." A small panel of these I sent to a friend in New York, who showed it (delphiniums water color) to several artists, and received admiring letters in regard to it, as follows:

"49 East 20th Street, January 14, 1884

Dear Madam:

The painting of flowers on light panel by your friend, Mrs. Granger, is extremely beautiful. She has remarkable talent, and ought to have the best opportunity to cultivate it. I am confident she will meet with distinguished success.

Very truly yours,

D. Huntington."

(painter of "Mercy's Dream" and the life-size portrait of Caroline Scott Harrison, in the White House, Washington)

"March 15th, 1884

Mrs. Granger:

Dear Madam: I thank your friend for letting me see a little bit of your flower painting, so sweet and pure and so true to nature.

Hoping you will come and see us, my daughter and myself, I am very much your friend in art.

Eliza Greatorex"

"Sherwood Studio 41:

Will you not let me add a line on my mother's note to echo her hope that you will come to see us, as your work proves that we work for the same end, you in a way that though I admire it for its exquisite delicacy, my own hand refuses to follow, and I hardly think you will approve of my broad impressions of the flowers.

Trusting I may soon have the pleasure of meeting you,

Yours very sincerely,

Eleanor Greatorex"

(Photo of the panel, Martha Granger and Delphiniums - water color)

In 1895 some girls and women employed "down town" in Chicago, formed an association to build a cottage across the lake at South Haven, in which to spend their vacations. In the spring my daughter was sent over to superintend the building of the cottage, which was called "Aloha." The site was let them free by the owner. A lady, in sympathy with the plan, was engaged to be "house Mother," and much of the furnishings were donated by people who were pleased with the idea. In the summer, Daughter went over for her vacation. Her sister went over at the same time; but we had to board at the hotel. Some of the Aloha girls took their meals at the hotel, and others at private houses.

(Photo "Aloha" 1895)

For recreation there was the bathing beach, straw rides to the country roundabout to buy summer peaches from the farmers; trips up Black River in row-boats, dancing in the Hotel Pavilion in the evening; walks along the lake shore, etc.

(Photos of straw rides, Black River)

One evening when another steamer load of girls was expected, there was a very high wind. We could see the lights of the coming boat and we watched fearfully as she approached, expecting a crash, as the entrance to the South Haven harbor was narrow. However, she reached the dock all right, but one of the girls fell off the gang plank coming ashore, and a sailor jumped in and rescued. her. One lady said she and her chair were blown across the deck, and had it not been for the railing which stopped her, she would have fallen into Lake Michigan.

Another boat did not try to come into South Haven harbor, but went to St. Joe for the night, and came on in the morning when the wind had gone down.

I brought with me an eight-day clock, which a jeweler gave to the club, also a Visitor's Registration book which a printing firm made for it. They were given more carpets than could be used, and the house-mother had a large one put in the attic, via ladder. When I went there five years later, they wished they had a carpet to lay down in front of the cottage, where it was shady but sandy. I remembered about the carpet in the attic, and a man and ladder were procured, the carpet was found and brought down and spread out, just what they were wishing for.

(Photo Mr. Granger)

Mr. Granger was very fond of seeing the Chicago White Socks play baseball in their park, and often attended the game. Once when I went down to the store, I found the card he had left on which he had written, "be back so-and-so time" had been replaced by one saying, "Gone to the Ball Game."

One Fourth-of-July his brother John and wife, Minnie, came from St. Louis to visit us. Mr. Granger thought the greatest treat he could give them was to take them to the ball game. We had fine seats, directly behind the batter. Once when he did not bat the ball, it came and hit Minnie in the face, in the hollow between the nose and eye. It bled terribly, and we took her out, to a cousin who lived near. We went home and brought down their bags, as they insisted on leaving for their home that night. To much baseball for them, and me too. Afterward there was some fence wire put up behind the batter, so that such a dreadful thing could not happen again.

Chapter 20

When General Grant ceased to be President, he and his wife took a trip around the world, and were paid great honor wherever they went, and he was given many valuable gifts, which are now in the Smithsonian Institution Museum at Washington. Upon returning to the United States, they arrived at San Francisco, where they received an ovation, and also at all the principal cities on their way east. When they arrived at Chicago, they and some of the principle citizens rode in carriages through the streets of the downtown section, so that everybody could see him. All street cars and teams were kept off the route, and the streets were packed solidly with people all along the way.

In honor of General Grant, was given a new play, "Rip Van Winkle" from the legend of Sleepy Hollow in the Catskills, as portrayed by Washington Irving. The part of "Rip" was taken by our much loved Joe Jefferson who played it for many years thereafter. General Grant occupied a box almost directly opposite from where we sat, so that we had a good view all the evening of him and his party, Marshall Field, the successful Chicago merchant of fifty years ago, and other prominent citizens.

(Photo of Joe Jefferson)

A day was set apart for the children to see him, so all the schools in the city and county were closed. The old Exposition Building, 800 feet long, was arranged for them. They entered at one end and passed along to the other end in an aisle about ten feet wide, which was boarded about three feet high at the sides to keep the children in line.

In the center of the building at one side of the aisle, a platform about two feet high had been built, on which General Grant sat in a large chair. His son, Fred Grant, stood a little at one side and back of his father, and the Mayor and a few other gentlemen stood on his other side a little back. As the children passed along, a man said, "Children, this is General Grant, and this is his son."

My child was too small to be trusted to go with her teacher, who had forty or fifty other little tots to attend to, so I took her. As we passed by a florist's shop on the way, I bought a lovely red rosebud for her to throw to the General, but as we passed him I saw she had forgotten the flower, so I snatched it from her hand and threw it for her. General Grant held out both hands to catch it, did not smile nor speak, but looked right in my eyes with a keen and piercing glance. I feel sure that he would have known each of those three hundred thousand children should he have seen them many years later. Although it was only about ten o'clock when we passed, the flowers the children had thrown to General Grant already, were banked about his chair, at both sides, at the back and in front up to his knees, and the procession did not stop till late in the afternoon. I believe the flowers were afterward sent to the different hospitals in the city.

While living on Calumet Avenue, a Mrs. Montgomery who I had at one time employed as a nurse, used to make me occasional friendly calls. At one time she was taking care of Mrs. Lincoln, when partially insane, and while with her she visited me several times, apparently as a relief from caring for her patient. She told me at different times, the following: "Mrs. Lincoln said: "After Mr. Lincoln was elected, I said to him, after you are inaugurated, you will be President. What will I be?" and he said, "Just the same fool you always were, Mary."

"The other boarders where Mrs. Lincoln lived used to play tricks on her. One day when she sent a ten dollar bill to be changed, the messenger returned it all in "shin plasters" (the fractional currency used during and for some time after the Civil War), which flustered Mrs. Lincoln very much to count the cloud of paper money."

Mrs. Lincoln was making a dress for her son Robert's little girl. The other boarders said scornful, "Do you suppose Bob's wife will ever let her be seen in it?"

Many other things I was told. Mrs. Lincoln's many sorrows caused the poor disordered brain to imagine many things during her last few years.

Chapter 21

While living on Calumet Avenue, our maid, Kate, went visiting on the southwest side one afternoon, and when coming home she somehow got between some strikers and the soldiers battling them. She was not injured at all, but was a very scared woman.

Before the Fire 1871, the Academy of Design had a very fine building on Adams Street, just west of State Street, which the fire destroyed completely. All artists left the city, thinking it would be a long time before the city would recover enough to have any resources for art. But about 1879 or '80, some of those who had courage to remain there, and others who came, tried to get up enthusiasm to rebuild the Academy, and so held a reception and exhibit of art works. One of my "Morning Glory" pictures was on exhibition. The sculptor, Leonard Volk and his wife, attended, as also G.P.A. Healy, painter, whom Mrs. Volk introduced to me. It was a fine reception and exhibit, but nothing came of it. Some years later the Art Institute was established, and well has taken the place of the Academy, wished and planned for so long.

[A two page poem titled "Ambition" was not included in this retyped manuscript]

We all were very fond of attending the Opera, hearing in the course of time "Fra Diavolo," "Faust," "Sonnambula," "Aida," "Paul Jones," "Robin Hood," and various others, with Christine Nilsohn, Adelina Patti, Sembrich, and other celebrated singers. Fra Diavolo, was given in Crosby's Opera House, before the Fire in 1871. "Bohemian Girl" was given the winter after the Fire in a little West Side Hall, which was so cold that the chorus came on in heavy shawls and waterproof cloaks. Later some operas were given in McVicker's Theatre, still later, some in the auditorium, where we also saw Ben Hur, Shenandoah, Uncle Tom's Cabin, and many others. And there also we heard the "Messiah," and celebrated pianists and violinists. Music was our best loved dissipation, and good drama the next best, with the elder Salvini in Othello, (his part given in Italian and the other players in English); Edwin Booth in Hamlet, Modjeska Ellen Terry, Henry Irving, and many others.

(Photo Maggie Mitchell - Lillian Russell)

One evening a small company of five or six having gathered to hear my niece's playing, Philo and his cousin Wilbur stood on either side, leaning on the piano, looking at her hands. Suddenly Mr. Granger said in a low tone to the rest of us: "The two Dromio's," and as we all had recently seen Robson and Crane with merriment, the two cousins so exactly copied unconsciously one of the attitudes of the Dromios.

While my niece was with us we saw much of Leonard Volk and his family. Mr. Volk had made the statue of Stephen A. Douglas for Chicago, Volk's wife was a cousin of Douglas, who bequeathed to her the "Douglas Cottage" in which the Volks lived, and other property. Volk had made a cast of Lincoln's hand, and he made a copy of it for my niece. Volk later wrote an article for a magazine about the "hand," saying Lincoln's hand was much swollen the day he made the cast, from being shaken by the multitudes gathered in Chicago just before Lincoln went to Washington, Mr. Granger among others.

(Letter of Leonard Volk)

One Sunday afternoon Douglas Volk the artist, son of Leonard Volk, called to say "Goodbye" as he was soon leaving for New York to teach in the Cooper Union Art Institute. Frank Stockton's book, "Rudder Grange" was just out, but Volk had not yet seen the merry volume, so I gave him my copy to read on his journey.

The late Professor Swing was then preaching at Central Music Hall, and we often went to hear him. Professor Gill was the chorister and came upon the stage and led the singing. One Sunday Professor Swing invited Professor Gill and us to go home with him to dinner, which we did, and enjoyed the visit very much.

Just before we left Chicago for the west, I took a number of volumes of music to Professor James Gill to put in the Library of the Chicago Conservatory of Music, which he promised to do. In this collection there were 2 volumes Bach: 1 of Chopin's Nocturnes: 1 Gavotten Album; Schumann, etc: 1 volume Nocturnes, John Field: 1 of Thalberg's Works: 1 of Chopin Mazurkas: and 1 of Chopin Waltzes, 8 volumes in all.

One day in summer, our street car being an open one, stopped by a pile of mud being shoveled up by four "white wings" after a rain, ready for carters to carry away. One of the men picked up a carnation from the mud-heap and placed it in his buttonhole, the other three leaning on their shovels for the moment, interestedly watched their comrade with a half-smile on each face. Then our car moved on. I have always wished I were artist enough to paint the incident, well worth portraying.

In the summer of 1881, Brother Wallace visited our parents at Traverse, and on his way back to his home in Des Moines he also visited me. He showed me some relics they had given him. Mother gave him the large round pewter platter belonging to the set of pewter dishes given to one of her ancestors when a bride in the early seventeen-hundreds. Father gave him the sampler his Mother had made when young, and also a small brooch of hers, containing a curl of her hair. I had often seen both when Father opened his "Little tin trunk" where he kept his small treasures and legal papers. I do not know whether Wallace gave these keepsakes later to the Des Moines Chapter of the Sons of the American Revolution of which he was President for a time, or whether they were stolen by the family to whom he rented part of his house after his wife died. I have not yet been able to get a trace of them.

About the year of this visit of Brother Wallace there was a great storm on Lake Michigan. A large passenger steamer was coming from across the lake one evening and came so near Chicago her lights were seen, and then she was driven back, and all that was ever seen of her was a few bits of wreckage drifted on the opposite shore. Some years later there was another bad storm, in which one giant wave set a large schooner on top of the breakwater, and the next wave took her up and set her inside the breakwater, where she was safe. About that time when a steamer, I think the Lady Elgin, was burned, some people saved their lives by floating on their backs.

Chapter 22

In the fall of 1881, Father died, at the age of seventy-six. Mother came home with me, selling most of her furniture, etc. Among other things she sold was a fall-leaf (gate-leg) table, made of cherry wood, of which Father had always been very fond, although it was a very heavy table. The leaves and bed of it were made of cherry boards about two and a half feet wide. I have been very sorry since that she let it go and also a "center table" which when closed was about 18 inches wide and some three feet long. In that shape it stood by a wall. When open, the top turned around and when one leaf was turned over, it made a square center or card table, the space beneath making a good drawer in which to keep programs, etc. Both tables would now be kept as precious heirlooms, if we had them. But at that time neither Mother nor I knew anything about the value of such things. I have now two of her Birds Eye Maple chairs.

(Photo of Mother 1886 - Father's monument)

Mother remained in the winter with us, but returned in the spring, sold her farm and bought a house in Traverse City and lived there until her death in 1887. She was laid to rest in Long Lake Cemetery, near Traverse City, by the side of my Father. My eldest brother (Jarvis) who lived nearby, telegraphed me that she was very ill, and I went as soon as possible; but arrived too late to see her once more alive. Brother Ebb came from Iowa, and brother John from Illinois, to attend the funeral. Sister telegraphed why she could not come. Mary and her husband had visited her while ill, and George, thinking she could not recover and their presence was an inconvenience, left two days before the end.

Mother often quoted aphorism to me, some of which have been of much value to me all through my long life, such as:

"Patience and perseverance will conquer all things.

"Try, try again.

"A winter fog would kill a dog.

"Look before you leap.

"As the days begin to lengthen, the cold begins to strengthen."

The last time I visited her when she was alive, she gave me some verses she had written:

"The Old Lady's Song"

"Time was when I was young and fair,

Had sparkling eyes and gloss of hair,

And cheeks of roseate hue,

With pearl lips of crimson dye,

And teeth that might with ivory vie,

A heart light, warm and true.

Now I am old and not a trace,

Of beauty left about my face,

To tell what once I've been.

The roses from my cheeks have fled,

The luster of mine eyes is dead,

My lips are pale and thin.

Time was when I was called a belle,

And flattering words, -- the truth to tell,--

Were ever in my ear.

Some praised my figure, some my face,

Some said I sang with such a grace,

'Twas charming me to hear.

Be warned, young maiden, do not place,

Thy thoughts to much upon thy face,

Or on thy form, though fine.

Thy face will wrinkled be,

Thy locks become as wintry,

Thy form as bent as mine.

Then lovely maiden do not place

Thy thoughts too much upon thy face,

But seek thy mind to store.

Twill abide with thee

When wealth is gone and friends do flee,

And youth is thine no more."

L. M."

Chapter 23

My eldest daughter (Edith) was born on Friday October 8th, 1869. "Friday's Child is Loving and Giving."

When four or five, upon seeing a lovely sunset, she exclaimed, "Oh, Mama, Come see God's carpet!"

About that same time, one day when I was much exasperated about something, I said, "If you do that again, I shall spank you right on the spot." And she calmly said, "What spot?"

She graduated from High School and was the Class Poet. While my daughter was in High School, fire destroyed her father's business. Autograph collecting was then at it's height, and she thought she might collect some on silk and satin to make a little extra money for her little sister's musical education, so she solicited autographs far and wide. Many not only sent their own autographs on the silks for the "worthy enterprise," but sent with them letters from their correspondents, and even cut the names from private letters to send.

(Photo of graduation 1887) --This may be the photo someone shared with me.

She had not collected enough for her contemplated piece of handiwork, when entering college put a stop to the collecting. I believe she had received about a hundred. I have borrowed a few from her collection, as follows:

Autographed letters:

Douglass Jerrold

Mary Shelley, wife of the Poet Shelley, author of Frankenstein

Ruskin

Gounod

S. L. Clemens, "Mark Twain" (last page of letter)

Autographs on paper - signatures only:

Ellen Terry (card)

Edward Everett

William Cullen Bryant

Autographs on silk:

Adelina Patti

Tommasso Salvini

Modjeska

Chen Tsao Ju, Chinese Minister

Franz Liszt

Henry Irving

Meissonier

Ellen Terry

In the fall of 1887, she began attending Smith College at Northampton, Massachusetts. She took a through train to Boston, where Sister met her and went with her to college to be entered, and to get addresses of good boarding places, as her application for entrance had been too late to get "on the campus." Sister found a satisfactory boarding place of a family on Elm Street, with whom she lived the first year, and her sophomore year was on West Street. The two following years she was on the campus, in the Washburn House. Since then the number of houses has increased wonderfully.

When Daughter graduated from college in 1891, I went to Northampton to attend the exercises, staying the week. On the way I stopped off at Schenectady to spend a night with Cousin John, who had been for many years a minister. His wife was not at home, but I became acquainted with his two daughters. My cousin was very anxious for me to stay over the next Sunday, but I had only the night, however I attended prayer meeting with them, and it was a very old-fashioned pulpit in the church, so different from anything I had before seen.

One day with Daughter, wishing me to see some of the picturesque scenery roundabout Northampton, we took a long drive with some of her classmates, and coming to the Connecticut River, we were ferried across on the most primitive ferry boat, that must have been used in Revolutionary times. We also drove to Mt. Holyoke and saw the college where a neighbor's daughter attended. We also saw Mount Tom, where is laid the scene of Holmes' "Elsie Venner."

The last day, Daughter went to Providence to visit a classmate before coming home, and I returned to Chicago alone, arriving just in time to attend the grammar school graduating exercises of my younger daughter.

After returning to Chicago, Daughter tutored private pupils for a time, later going with A. C. McClurg & Company, publishers, making their catalogs, and reviewing books for their large annual catalog. She spent two years making "Granger's Index to Poetry and Recitations, called "A Monumental Work."

In the spring of 1892 we lost Mr. Granger, who was taken suddenly ill in Omaha. I was telegraphed to, but it was impossible for me to go there at that time, so his brother John, of St. Louis, attended to everything for me.

We have a large collection of agates from near the falls at Minnehaha at Minneapolis, near the falls, which were collected and sent the children by their father. Some are very large and some are small, just the right size to be polished for setting.

In 1893 the Columbian Exposition was opened in Jackson Park, Chicago. This was our first World's Fair since the Centennial in Philadelphia in 1876.

It had been intended to open the Columbian Fair in 1892, the 400th anniversary of the discovery of America in 1492, but it was not ready then. We attended many times, and saw exhibits from all over the world, as well as from all our own states. Spain sent two large banners which were hung in the end of one building. She also sent replicas of the Santa Maria, Pinta, and Nina, the Caravels of Columbus, and of the Convent of La Rabida.

In the Agricultural Building was a very large picture of a farmstead, all made of grains. It would take a large book to mention all the lovely, marvelous and instructive things we saw. The song, "After the Ball is Over" was very popular that year, and visiting musicians carried it to the ends of the earth.

At the Worlds Congresses of Religion, held in the as yet unfinished Art Institute, I attended an afternoon meeting. I do not know what that particular meeting was called, but I saw there Susan B. Anthony, Madame Modjeska, and a Miss Field. Susan looked just like her photographs, and so did Modjeska. Susan and Miss Field met on the platform, and after a few words tearfully embraced. I do not remember the cause of their emotion, but it was affecting to see it.

The Fourth of July saw the greatest number of visitors on any one day. We started to go home at ten o-clock in the evening, but waiting and waiting for a chance to enter a train, we did not reach home until daybreak next morning. I had taken some shares of stock in the fair at the beginning of it, and two or three years after it was over, I received ten percent of my investment. The other ninety percent I received in pleasure and pride in the City's Great Fair.

(Photo of the stock)

Not long after the close of the fair, fire broke out and consumed many of the buildings. Others were wrecked from time to time. I went there one day and took a photo of one of the remaining relics, a German building. I brought home a piece of the cornice that had ornamented one of the buildings, which I have given to the Santa Rosa Museum.

(Photo of the relic)

The Art Building was fine, two hundred feet long and intended when built to be left permanently, as a memorial to the fair. When the fair closed, many foreign exhibits were given by their hosts to the city and were used as a nucleus for a museum. Marshall Field gave a million dollars to start with and those foreign gifts were gathered into the Art Building which housed the Field-Columbian Museum until the present museum building was finished on the Lake Front, on land "made" out in the lake. Later Mr. Field gave several millions to the museum, ten I believe. Recently the Art Building has been let for a shooting range for soldiers, I understand.

(Photo of The World's Congresses)

(Photo of The California Building)

(Photo of The Golden Doors of Transportation Building)

(Photo of The Brick Battleship)

(Photo of The Cold Storage Fire)

(Photo of my daughter in 1898)

My daughter remained with A. C. McClurg and Company until October, 1897, when she went to New York to accept a position. Just before Christmas I joined her, remaining a few months, looking up data in Astor Library and reading old books there, and taking home some to read more carefully. One of them was "A Life of Alexander Hamilton" by his son, from which I copied "The Treason of Benedict Arnold" and "The Execution of Major Andre."

(Photo of the map)

From another old book printed in 1778, "An Impartial History of the War in America", by the Rev. James Murray, Newcastle. I copied a photo of a map, and "The Mischianza," a pageant given by his officers in honor of General Howe when he departed for Europe. Also from the same book I copied "The Massachusetts Charter."

I do not know if this "Massachusetts Charter" is the one hidden in a tree, which tree has ever since been known as "The Charter Oak." In 1856 the tree was blown down in a great storm and had a "funeral," this account being in a newspaper:

"FAMOUS CHARTER OAK HONORED BY FUNERAL."

"There is one instance on record in which a tree was given a funeral. It took place on an evening in 1856 in Hartford, Conn. Flags and mourning streamers covered the shattered stump of a tree on the hillside, while hundreds stood around with bared heads.

"Amid the crashing thunder of a fierce storm the mighty Charter Oak had fallen and the entire State of Connecticut was honoring its passing.

"There is little of which this State is prouder than its ancient Charter granted by Charles II, endowing the Colony with liberties far exceeding those of others.

"It was a strange coincidence that this Charter, which was hidden in an oak for safety's sake, bore the seal of a monarch who himself, years before, had taken refuge in a tree of the same variety.

"Visitors to the State Library at Hartford today may see a copy of the original Charter, its frame containing fragments of the celebrated Oak preserved under glass these many years"

"Grit."

When I was a young girl, our neighbor, Mrs. Clark, gave my Mother an acorn from the Charter Oak. Mother always kept it, with other curios, in the prison-made basket, on her parlor table. I do not know when it disappeared, but I suppose someone, thinking it just a common acorn, threw it away. But I remember very well how it looked, not so long as other acorns I have seen, but shorter, and a great deal broader.

(Photos, Grant's Tomb, and Washington Arch)

We visited many noted places in New York, and rambled around the city, taking many photos. The house Alexander Hamilton built, 10th Avenue and 42nd Street, as a summer residence at that time, had been moved to the side of St. Luke's Church, and was then occupied by the Hamilton Grange School. Hamilton had named his country place "Hamilton Grange," in memory of his Scotch forbearers.

(Photo of Hamilton's House)

We thought we would like to see the inside of the house in which Hamilton had lived, and so sought entrance. We were graciously received, and the lady showed us around, even calling our attention to the enormous key-hole in the front door, saying the key had been lost long years before.

We also took a picture of the thirteen trees Hamilton planted to commemorate the original thirteen states of the Union. But they had been planted too close together, and were then, 1898, dying. A few years ago it was stated in the newspapers, that the trees had been removed, to make way for "progress."

(Photo of the 13 trees)

We also took a snapshot of Hamilton's Tomb, in Trinity churchyard, which keeps watch and ward at the head of Wall Street over the financial system he set going.

(Photo of Hamilton's Tomb)

The Jumel Mansion next claimed our attention, which was built by Roger Morris in 1758, who cut the date in the stone over the door. He fled, with other tories, the property was confiscated by the United States, and it was used by Washington for a time as his headquarters. Then Stephen Jumel bought it, and his widow lived there many years until her death in 1865. In her old age she married Aaron Burr. When I was in New York it was resided in by Mr. and Mrs. Ferdinand P. Earl, who had four young sons, all of whom were members of the Society of the Children of the American Revolution, which was founded by the late author of "Five Little Peppers."

The day I called to take a photo of the mansion, I rang the bell and asked if it were permissible to come in and see a little of so noted a house, as I was a stranger from Chicago and would consider it a great privilege. The maid said Mrs. Earl was not at home, and she could not admit me. I could see in the hall beyond her, a brass cannon about five or six feet long, and probably the house was full of the most interesting relics. The maid said there was no objection to taking pictures of the house and grounds. On the lawn I found a lovely statue of a peacock on a pedestal, of which I obtained a good photograph.

(Photo of peacock)

The Jumel Mansion, as it has always been called, has since been bought in 1901 by the city of New York, and its grounds made into a park.

I made many visits to Astor Library to look up some data. This library was, not long after, combined with the Lenox and Tilden Foundations, to form the present magnificent New York Library, erected on the site, at that time, occupied by the City Reservoir.

We also visited Fort George, where we saw the wooden cannon. And at Staten Island we saw the Sailor's Snug Harbor, with many old men enjoying the sunshine in old age.

We crossed on the ferry to Long Island City to take a picture of the "Texas" which was then at the Navy Yard; but the incoming tide was so strong it took our boat too far away to get a good photo. However, we saw the sandy beach of Wallabout Bay where so many Revolutionary soldiers, prisoners, who died while on the infamous British prison ships, and were buried there, whose bones were afterward collected and interred in Trinity Churchyard and a fine monument erected to their memory. There also lies Captain Lawrence, of "Don't give up the ship" fame, and Charlott Temple, in their last sleep.

(Photo of Wallabout Bay)

On the front of Old St. Paul's Church is a monument to the memory of General Montgomery, whose widow saw the Government ship pass her door on the Hudson, with his body on board, on the way to New York, after so many years coming home to rest in his eternal sleep.

(Photo of Montgomery monument)

In some of the old streets we saw rows of three-story brick houses with a wistaria vine growing to the roof without branches, with a bunch of green leaves and lavender flowers at the top. In Central Park there is a very long arbor of wistaria, which when in bloom in the spring is one of the lovely sights everyone wants to see.

(Photo of Frannce's Tavern)

The Spanish War coming on, President McKinley asked everybody to put flags on their houses and places of business, and then New York looked very bright and gay. Here is a view of 136th Street, with its many flags, though not all that we could see, show in the picture.

(Photo of 136th Street, N.Y.)

While in New York we had a small apartment, next to the one occupied by Mrs. Rudolph and her daughter Adalaide, with whom we soon became acquainted. Mrs. Rudolph was the widow of a brother of Mrs. (President) Garfield. In time she told us much of the family and White House life. We liked her and her daughter very much. Adelaide was attending Columbia College and studying Sanskrit. Some years later she sent to Daughter a small book, her translation of "Nata Damayanti, a Love Tale of East India."

Mrs. Rudolph accompanied us on Memorial Day on a trip across the Hudson, between Forts Lee and Washington, to Englewood, New Jersey, where we took a long ride through the town and the country roundabout. In the evening we all went to the Metropolitan Opera House to hear Souza's Band, which played, for the first time, Souza's new march, "The Stars and Stripes Forever."

I corresponded with Mrs. Rudolph many years, until her daughter wrote in answer to my last, that she had passed away. Mrs. Rudolph sent me a photo of the Statue of General Garfield, which stands in Cleveland, Ohio.

(Photo of Garfield statue)

Chapter 24

In June 1898, neither of us liking to live in New York, Daughter gave up her position there, I came home to Chicago, and she went to Boston on one of the Long Island steamers to visit a college classmate who had visited us during the Columbian Fair for a few days, where she took a few photos.

(Photos: Boston Public Library, Shaw Memorial on Boston Common, Daughter 1898, Home again 1898, Chicago Festival 1899)

Upon Daughter's return home, she was in the Chicago office of Harper Brothers a year, and then was back again with A. C. McClurg and Company, until we left for California in 1906.

In October, 1902 there was a large reunion in Washington of the Grand Army of the Republic, which I attended with Brother Frank, and his wife, Emily. We started the trip on Sunday afternoon, in the second section of the special train, about twenty minutes after the first section, and we expected to reach Washington Monday afternoon. But the engineer of a freight train, against orders, started to go between the sections, and broke down near Indianapolis. That delayed us so long that we lost our "right of way," and having to stop every little while to let regular trains pass, it was not till Tuesday afternoon that we reached Washington. However, the Grant Procession was on Wednesday, and except for being nearly starved (as there was no diner on our train) suffered no inconvenience. Going over the mountains was very pleasant, and we saw in the evening the Coke Ovens brilliantly lighted up with their fires. Coming down the Blue Ridge mountains we had a splendid view of Washington and the Potomac.

On the train Mrs. Wilson invited Emily and me to join the Circle of the Ladies of the G.A.R. of which she was president, and also invited us to attend an evening reception of the G.A.R. in Washington. That evening Emily and I donned our best attire and went to the hotel which Mrs. Wilson said was headquarters, to go with her to the reception. The elevator man showed us the room and told us to walk right in, so we did, expecting to find Mrs. Wilson there. But instead, there was Mr. Wilson and some other men playing cards. They jumped up, startled, and we explained that we had been told to "walk right in, as that is headquarters." Mrs. Wilson was already gone, and as we did not like to go without her, we returned to our hotel.

The procession of the Veterans in Pennsylvania Avenue took from nine o'clock in the morning till four in the afternoon, to march past the grandstand for review. The great majority of those men have now, 1931, passed away.

We saw President Roosevelt in a carriage riding down one side of the procession, in that wide avenue, and up the other side, so that all the old soldiers could have a close view of him. He was not yet recovered from the accident which injured his leg. We visited Mount Vernon, via boat on the Potomac, Arlington Cemetery, walking across the "Long Bridge," over which our soldiers ran, after the Battle of Bull Run; the Soldiers' Home, where President Lincoln spent his vacations in summer; the White House; the Senate and House of Representatives; the Hall of Statues; many committee rooms, in one of which was a portrait of Postmaster General Granger; the Corcoran Art Gallery; and the superb Congressional Library, of which I acquired a fine book of illustrations; and a large picture of the Capitol and many other pictures.

Many of the places we wanted to see but which Frank, man-like, was in to much of a hurry to let us. He had lived in Washington awhile some years before and much of it was an old story to him.

At the Post Office we were shown wax figures, life size, of various methods of transporting the mails; in different countries, also framed stamps arranged artistically.

At the Smithsonian we saw the gifts that were given General Grant by Kings, Emperors, and other great people. At the Bureau of Engraving and Printing we went up some steps to overlook the people at their work.

At the Corcoran Art Gallery we saw full-length portraits of Mrs. Roosevelt, and Alice, now Mrs. Longworth, as well as many other beautiful and interesting paintings.

When we visited the Soldiers' Home about 2 miles from Washington, Emily did not feel very well. When we were shown the dining room after supper, she asked if she could buy a cup of tea, and was told they could not sell anything. Then she asked if she could be given a cup of hot water. They said yes, and when it was brought she took up a shaker of red pepper, which stood on the table, and shook some in the hot water and drank it. They made no mention to that. As medicine, it did her much good. We then went back to the city, and on our way passed the Calvary Baptist Church, where a young lady was standing at the door. She invited us to come in and attend the C. E. meeting about to begin, which we did.

I did not take any Washington photos to bring home, as I borrowed at the last minute, a camera which used film instead of glass, as did mine, and when having the films developed, they were found to be all blank, as I had in my hurry not understood how to use the camera.

After returning home, Emily and I joined the Ladies Circle of the G.A.R. I had previously joined the Beethoven Society of Chicago, and sang in the chorus of the concert in which Miss Emma Thursby was the soloist, singing Elsa's song, from "Lohengrin."

(Photo of monument in memory of the Fort Dearborn Massacre)

While Mother visited me one summer, President Hayes made an address in Chicago. We had a good place to see and hear him, just across the street, on the second floor. Mother enjoyed the occasion very much, as she said it was the only time she had seen a President of the United States.

I saw President McKinley riding by in a procession in Chicago. Brother Frank's daughter, Ethel, led the Grand March with President McKinley at the Auditorium Reception and Ball. To be sure I was correct in this statement, I wrote her, and received the following reply: "I did walk with President McKinley at the head of the dance, the reception given him by the returned Spanish War Veterans. I went to the party with Webster Smith, from the Flag Ship "Oregon," Admiral Dewey's prize ship. They captured the "Christopher Colon" of the Spanish Navy. I have the ship's bell and a piece of the stationery from the Captain's cabin, and the hatband worn by Webster on that memorial occasion. He was an Ensign, and his cousin was in command of the Flag Ship."

(Photo of Ethel at that time)

I had seen Grant after he returned from his trip around the world. I saw Roosevelt twice; once when he rode horseback on Oakwood Boulevard, escorted by the Chicago Hussars; the other time in Washington, 1902.

In St. Louis in 1904 was opened the Louisiana Purchase Exposition to commemorate by the United States the purchase of Louisiana from the French. Daughter and I attended at different times, a few days each. Among the many beautiful exhibits were those from the Philippine Islands, brought home by W. H. Taft and his wife, and loaned to the fair. There were table tops made of one board ten feet or more wide; bedsteads made with "cane seat" instead of springs; beautiful pineapple cloth woven by the natives. There were Japanese exhibits, and a replica of the old Spanish Cabildo at New Orleans; some Indians, with pottery and other things for sale; there was old Geronimo himself, who had learned to write his name, and would write it for you on a card for ten cents.

(Photo of our new house in 1905)

(Photo of Lagoon of St. Louis Exposition)

(Photo of our library)

Chapter 25

When the verdict came to Daughter in 1906, "You must give up and close work, to save your eyes; and also go to a warmer climate, spend not another winter in Chicago," at first it seemed impossible to uproot ourselves from the soil where I had lived thirty-eight years, and Daughter all her life, go to a "far country" and make a new home for ourselves. But since it must be done, we canvassed the "warmer climate" states by maps, books, and letters to agents having real estate to sell. This change meant that we must say goodbye to all and everything we had known hitherto, and go to some place where we might get some land and raise fruits and vegetables, near a good market in order to sell whatever produce we might raise. As we both had always been fond of working in a garden, such a prospect seemed rather alluring than otherwise. Therefore, with pleasurable anticipations we studied maps and all the literature we could obtain. Tidewater Virginia seemed to hold the most attractions for us. The climate, the soil, the historical associations, all taken together seemed what would fulfil our desires in a financial way, and where we might make a charming home.

(Photo of M. M. Granger, 1906)

(Photo of my daughter, 1906)

Before we had fully decided, a friend who had been traveling through California and Oregon to find a place to which he might remove his family and raise fruit, gave us a report of what attractions he found there, and also gave us some literature concerning California. He was undecided whether the Hood River Valley of Oregon, or the Sonoma Valley of California held the most attractions for him. We studied the California literature he gave us, and finally decided that some land near Santa Rosa in Sonoma County, near the experiment farm of Luther Burbank would suit us. Then we sold our new home which we had lived in but a year, and packed our Lares and Penates, and Monday morning, April 1, 1906, said goodbye to our friends, and boarded an Illinois Central train for New Orleans. We had never visited that city, and having friends there, we thought we might just as well "go the longest way round," as we would eventually reach our destination where we would find "life is real, life is earnest."

We found the City of New Orleans the quaintest of the quaint. We visited Audubon Park with its lovely Washington Oak, of which I have now a painting. The National Geographic Magazine says, "The Washington Oak in Audubon Park, New Orleans, is the largest tree of its species of live oak in the world."

(Photo of Washington Oak)

We visited a curio store, and there saw nearly a whole set of dinner China which belonged to Napoleon Bonapart. I had seen three pieces of it in the Art Institute of Chicago, and instantly recognized it. I could have bought the set for seventy-five dollars, but not knowing what kind of a place we should settle in after reaching our destination or whether we would have room for any more treasures, did not buy. I have ever been sorry since for my decision.

We visited City Park, with its celebrated shell roads and in our rambles around the city, kept looking for the places Cable describes so well. A glimpse through a door in a wall revealed an inner court paved with flagstones, with gay flowers in tubs and boxes, and vines running up the pillars to the balcony above, this door opening onto the sidewalk, here called banquette.

(Photos of Old French Quarter)

(Photo of unloading of bananas)

(Photo of cotton bales)

It was hard to tear ourselves away from this fascinating place, but at last we did, and northward we leisurely went, by the side of the mighty Mississippi, by marshes with tropical-looking vegetation, and trees hung with streamers of gray Spanish moss, past little cabins with many little pickanninies staring at the train. Then our train rolled onto a ferryboat and crossed the Mississippi. Until now the train had seemed to loiter along, making many stops, and in no particular hurry to get over the ground. After reaching terra firma on the western side of the great river, however, the engine seemed to wake up to its responsibilities, and snorted and puffed and rushed away westward, ever westward, day after day. Through Louisiana, with pleasant varied scenery, then through Texas where mile after mile the omnipresent darky and mule were plowing the richest-looking dark red soil in perfectly level fields; through Arizona deserts, where nothing was to be seen but sand and cactus, and at a little distance, more or less, masses of bald bare stone, not high enough to be called mountains and certainly were not hills, just rock, somewhat smooth and rounded by erosion. We fancied they might be the basis of the sand storms, one of which we ran into, when all ventilators and windows had to be instantly closed.

In one place our train had to proceed very carefully and slowly. There was a wide ditch a few feet from the roadbed, where water was rushing and tearing along, as if there had been a cloudburst not far away. The ditch was so near and the water rushed so impetuously, it seemed as if at any moment the sand under the train might turn to slush through which the train might sink. However, nothing happened. The train carefully picked its way along until the ditch was lost, and we were in Imperial Valley. Here we passed close to the Salton Sea, produced by a break in the Colorado River. Our railroad track had already been moved back three times to higher ground, and the water was then only a few rods away. The tops of telegraph poles at different heights, showed where the tracks had previously been.

All one day or more, we rode in sight of snow-capped Mt. San Jacinto. At last we began to see the lovely green of California and the brilliant orange of her poppies, the State Flower.

(Photo of Poppies)

(Photo of Poinsettia, California's Christmas flower)

(Photo of Sea Moss)

Before long we reached Pasadena, and remained there five days, visiting our friends, Mr. and Mrs. James C. Chamberlain, and seeing the attractions of the place. One day we took the balloon trip from Los Angeles, seeing Santa Monica, gathering moonstones at Redondo Beach, seeing Venice, and best of all, Hollywood, the home at that time of Paul de Longpre'. The house was lovely, somewhat Moorish in design. Three large rooms were filled with his paintings, and open to visitors. The grounds too were lovely. Before we left we were all stationed on the front steps and our collective photo taken.

(Photo of balloon trip)

(Photo of Hollywood)

(Photo of Hollywood Bowl)

Not long afterward the artist died, and his widow felt she could not afford the expense of keeping it up, the lovely place was sold, and soon after became the "Hollywood" it is known now.

One day we spent going to San Gabriel Mission, in which we were much interested.

(Photo of the Bells of San Gabriel)

One day Daughter and another young lady went up Mount Lowe, which there seems so near that it must topple over on Pasadena. Another day we attended a Japanese auction, where we bought some pieces of china, which we presented to our hostess, who had been Daughter's friend in high school days.

We left Pasadena Thursday and reached San Francisco Friday evening. We stayed there over night, next morning attended to having our furniture forwarded to Santa Rosa, and then took a sightseeing car to see something of the city. We left San Francisco in the afternoon and reached Santa Rosa at six, going to the Occidental Hotel. Sunday morning I attended the Baptist Church, (the church built from the wood of one tree) to the pastor, Reverend Mr. Young, of which I had letters. Daughter attended the Episcopal Church as Bishop Anderson of Chicago had given her letters to the Rector, Mr. Burleson.

(Photo of one-tree church)

(Photo of the late Bishop Anderson)

In the afternoon we called on Mr. and Mrs. Turney, at the Baptist parsonage, who had some years before lived in Chicago. They advised us, that when we left the hotel, to go to a nice boarding house a few doors from the parsonage, which we did the next day. But first we went to the Santa Rosa Bank and made a deposit, and then finding the sunlight much brighter than we were accustomed to, we went into an oculist store and bought dark glasses for our eyes. The proprietor called our attention to the numerous Indians sitting along the curbstone, saying there was to be a circus parade soon, and the Indians always came to town on circus day to see the parade. Then we went to our boarding place. The next day we took a trip on the electric cars to Sebastopol to see what there was to be seen out that way.

The next morning, Wednesday, April 18th, we were awakened at five o'clock by the bed being violently shaken as if all its joints were loose. Daughter said, "Its an earthquake!" We had to cover our heads, the lime dust from the falling walls was so thick. The ceiling did not fall, apparently because the tremors were circling, as pictures on the walls had swung out and turned completely around, their faces to the wall. Our heavy bed had rolled about six inches from the wall, letting the plastering fall between it and the wall, so that none of it fell on us. There were several shocks, the last one taking the house from its foundation and letting it drop with a thud straight down.

As soon as it seemed quiet and the dust a little settled we arose and dressed. While doing so, the landlady's daughter pounded on our door and called, "Are you alive?" We then found the lock on the door had jammed so it could not be opened. Then her father came with an ax and opened it. So many buildings had been leveled that we could see across, the fires were starting in many places. So we packed our trunks, plaster and all, and went down the stairs, which were deeply covered with plaster, by hanging tight to the railing, and went out on the street. We found that the kitchen, which was an addition, had not fallen, and could be reached by a step-ladder; but our landlady had been thrown against a bedpost and had two broken ribs, and could not get us any breakfast. So we walked around and saw the frantic efforts of about fifty men trying to rescue the dying and the dead from the Occidental Hotel ruins, by pulling on ropes to raise the roof of the hotel so they could be reached. The dead, among others, a bride and bridegroom on their wedding trip, were taken to the rooms in the back of the Christian Church, opposite our boarding house, for a temporary morgue. The front entrance to the church, being made of large stones, had fallen into the street. The injured were taken to the High School buildings for a temporary hospital which seemed not to have suffered so much. All chimneys, of houses left standing, were down, and the Mayor issued orders for no fires to be built in stoves until the chimneys were repaired. Ladies piled up the fallen bricks to make fires in, so they could make coffee for the men working so frantically to save lives. Hearing I was a stranger from so far away, the ladies gave me a cup of coffee.

We walked past a yard where a boy about ten years old was lying dead, on the grass. We took a snapshot of the Court House, partly fallen down. We took only a few photos, for it was all so dreadful we could not.

(Photo of ruins of Court House)

We had stood in line at the Post Office Monday morning to ask for mail, and a young lady in the line, had a yellow Persian cat in her arms, which she said she had brought all the way from St. Louis. Later, one day we passed by a house where the lady was talking to a man by the fence who was hobbling with a cane. He said he had been injured in the collapse of the Hotel St. Rose. While listening to him a neighbor woman came in the yard with the Persian cat I had seen the young lady from St. Louis hold, and I said so. The woman said the cat had come to her house and she had cared for it. The man said he knew where the young lady was staying, who had been in the Hotel St. Rose collapse, but was not injured much, and he would tell her where to find it, as the woman gave her name and address. No doubt the young lady was glad to find her pet, glad that ships "pass in the night."

By afternoon on that Wednesday there was a continual procession of buggies, etc. going up and down the streets, loaded with people who came to town to see the effects of the earthquake, which had thrown down chimneys all over the county.

We walked to the Baptist Parsonage, to see how the family fared. The pastor had started for the north the night before to attend a meeting of pastors. Mrs. Turney was in the yard, (nobody stayed in the houses, even those that were yet standing, fearing another shock), and she told us of her China closet being thrown down on its face, and all her cut-glass wedding presents being smashed. While we stood talking with her, one of the deacons of the church, knowing that Mr. Turney was gone, came to see how she fared. Soon a man came along who had on a coat and shoes, but no trousers. The deacon said to Mrs. Turney, "You might give this man a pair of your husband's trousers." The man looked at the deacon, who was tall and slim, and then said "A pair of yours would fit me better." He evidently knew the pastor was short and stout.

About three o'clock a lady came by, and asked if there was any one who had no place to go, as she had a spare room; which we were very glad to take at once. So we found an express wagon and ordered our trunks taken from a house we were very glad to leave, without trying to mount the stairs, which were so covered with plastering it had been dangerous to come down.

(Photo of the ruins of the boarding house)

We stayed with that lady and her family three weeks, the cooking being done outdoors on a little camp stove. Many incidents of the earthquake and fire in San Francisco were later told to us. Our friend. Mrs. Blake in San Francisco, when obliged to run after the earthquake and flames, saved a precious chair by carrying it, and a friend carried a picture for her, to Golden Gate Park where they all fled. Mrs. Blake's daughter was ill in bed at the time, and she obtained permission to have her carried to the Presidio Hospital where only soldiers were allowed, but they could not turn her away when there was no other place to lay her except on the ground in the park.

One neighbor told us their daughter was employed nights in the Telegraph Office in San Francisco and the earthquake made the wall of the room on the 7th floor, where she was working, fall into the street. It was a month before they knew whether she was living.

When we left Chicago, although intending to settle on a farm, if we did not find a place to suit us or if anything went wrong, Daughter had intended to seek a position as Librarian in some rich person's library in San Francisco, for which she was eminently fitted but the earthquake and great fire there had destroyed the libraries, so we had to go about the country with real-estate men, in search of a small farm. We found all were called ranches, from one or two acres up to fifty thousand. We went once toward Sebastopol, and just before crossing a creek where there was no bridge, the man happened to see a ring around the sun and was frightened, thinking it meant another earthquake. He wanted to turn back, but as we saw a couple of women were coming down to the creek on the other side, waited until they were near us, and he asked them about the ring around the sun. When they said they had often seen one, he felt better, and drove on, carefully going through the creek just where he had seen them drive.

Another man took us to see a place he had for sale. After showing us all around, inside and out, just as we were about to start, the lady said she had given the place to another man to sell. This made "our" man so angry he gave the horse such a blow that it jumped and we were almost thrown out on the ground.

Another man took us to see a mountain ranch, with buildings in a little cleared space, tall trees close around from which he said we could sell enough wood to more than pay for the place. As we were two women we did not want such a farm. Whenever there has been a forest fire, how glad we are not to have invested in that place, where fire would have wiped it and us out in a few minutes.

We found one real estate man in Sebastopol seated on a pile of bricks with revolver in hand guarding the safe in the ruins of his bank, who would not consider sales just then.

After viewing many places, we decided on one about four miles northwest of Santa Rosa, and later named it Rainbow Farm, because we saw so many rainbows across the valley, in front of our house. It had an almost new house of four rooms, with a wide back porch, one end of which had a little room opening into the kitchen, which we promptly planned to use for a bath room. There was a good-sized barn with a large loft in which we could store such furniture as the house would not contain. We moved into the house May 9th, having ordered a bath tub, sink, and cookstove brought out by a plumber from Santa Rosa that day, and also our furniture, which arrived at the ranch about half an hour before we did, we having to wait for the ten o'clock train. One load was unloaded and the wagon sent to the station at Fulton, nearly a mile, to meet us. I was somewhat dubious about getting up so high as the driver's seat, but the ascent was safely accomplished, and we were glad to be saved the walk.

(Photo of Rainbow Farms in winter)

Everyone said it did not rain here so late in the spring so we left many boxes on the front porch and in the back yard, for further time to unpack them. But one day a big rain came and we had to hurry and cover what we could not move to shelter.

Twenty-five or thirty years before, the place had been a part of a large cattle ranch, with a dug well about twenty-five feet deep which by that time was pretty well filled with rubbish and bones. There was a "drive" well on the back porch but the water was not good, nor much of it. So the agent advised us to have the old well cleaned out and a windmill and pump installed, which we did.

(Photo of Rainbow Farms in summer)

(Photo of our chickens)

There was a chicken house, and we bought the flock of a family next door who were just leaving. There was then no fence on two sides of our holding, being on a corner, with neighbors on the south and west. Every night the rooster, which we called "Captain," led his flock to their old home, and after dark we would go after them. This continued until a fence was made on the south side. After our windmill was up we kept a trough full of water for our chickens. Our neighbor on the west had some horses, which found our chicken's drinking place, and we had to fill it often, till a fence was made on the west also.

Our farm had never been plowed, and had many wild flowers in bloom, and a dozen or so large old trees, valley (white) oak and black oak, scattered here and there, parklike, as it was in the whole of Sonoma Valley at first, and is yet in many places.

(Photo of our two black oak trees here)

(Photo of rocks at ocean)

For instance, in Burbank Park, where the first unit of the junior college has just risen, just in time for the graduating class of 1931 to receive their diplomas there. We often think how beautiful the scene must have looked to the weary pioneers as they came to the top of the hills to the east and gazed into this valley, a very paradise.

We bought one hundred and fifty hens of a dealer, some of them roosters. When the dealer brought them, there seemed to be a preponderance of roosters. We sold eggs in Santa Rosa, set hens and raised chickens. Later we learned to buy baby chicks, thus getting them to laying size sooner.

(Photo of us ready to go to town)

(Photo weighing eggs for market)

I sent Mr. Burbank some tree seeds, given to me while having to wait in Charlottesville, Virginia, on the way to Washington in 1902, by residents who said the trees had been brought from France by Thomas Jefferson. Mr. Burbank was so pleased by the courtesy that he wrote me a letter and sent a dozen packets of choice flower seeds. Afterward I bought of him some of his Spineless Cactus, and one of his new cherry trees.

(Letter from Mr. Burbank)

California was so proud of Luther Burbank that his birthday, March 7th, was made the State Arbor Day. Now, each recurring year that day is celebrated with exercises around his grave, which by his own wish is under the much-loved Cedar of Lebanon he planted in his garden and reared to be the lofty and lovely tree it is today. At Christmas time the tree is lighted with electric globes for a week. Scientists from all parts of the world visit this shrine, as they used to visit Mr. Burbank.

(Photos of Mr. Burbank)

(Photo of Cedar of Lebanon near grave)

From year to year we have hired plowing and cultivating done and planted some small fruits, grapes, and flowers. Later we had the yet unoccupied ground all marked out for fruit trees, mostly prunes, and each hole-to-be, dynamited through the "hard pan" (rock) to let the surplus water from the rains filter through and drain away. In course of time the whole place was planted to peaches, apples and prunes. The peaches were soon large enough to bear so we had some fruit to sell. The apples were slower to come into bearing. The prune trees grew well and were greatly admired by the neighbors and all passer-by. Finally we had a good crop and they continued to bear well.

Chapter 26

In 1908 my daughter married a neighboring rancher, and I was alone for three and a half years. Then she lost her husband, and with a baby daughter came home to live with me again, and we have been together ever since.

(Photo Daughter and baby)

(Photo baby and Bruce)

In 1915 the Panama-Pacific Exposition opened in San Francisco, to celebrate the opening of the Panama Canal. Daughter and I attended, at different times. On Sonoma County Day, the friend with who I was stopping, and I visited all the attractions shown by the county at the fair, where all visitors were given apples, supplied by the Gold Ridge section of the County. Also, carnations, supplied by Luther Burbank, were pinned on every visitor. At noon, all in the county section were given sweet cakes and other goodies, for luncheon.

Four weeks would have been none too much in which to have seen all the interesting things shown at this fine Exposition.

My birthday occurring that week, a friend invited me to lunch with her. While there, my friend with whom I was staying, phoned her and asked her not to keep me to supper, as she was making a birthday cake for me, and expected a few friends in. Upon reaching her home again I was delightfully surprised.

In the Great War, 1914-1918, we brought home from Santa Rosa Red Cross Chapter, yarn from which to knit socks, sweaters and scarves for our soldiers. Then we brought cut-out bed-socks to be sewn on the sewing machine. We took some of the bed socks to the Ladies Aid, and asked the ladies to help sew them. At first some of the ladies seemed to think it an imposition to ask them to lay aside their tatting and embroidery and sew for the soldiers. Others soon became enthused, but we thought it too much of a burden for one to carry home materials to our ranch from our train for others to work on, and so we got the privilege of meeting in the Woodmen's Hall at Fulton. The Santa Rosa Red Cross appointed Daughter as Chairman, and then she brought out on the train cut-out garments and left the bundles in Fulton, we living on our ranch nearly a mile away.

In the forenoon Daughter would go to the Hall, taking her lunch, and baste and prepare the work for those coming in the afternoon. I sent my sewing machine to the Hall and went there every day at one o'clock and stitched as fast as I could until five. There were three other machines there also, as Mrs. Faught, Mrs. Cox and Mrs. Morrison sent theirs. We worked there every Thursday afternoon until after the Armistice. Every spare moment at home we knitted socks, and got many of our neighbors to knit also. Also, Daughter bought 500 parchment jelly cups and in the summer got the ladies to fill them with jell, when they were making their own, selling to each lady two or three dozen of the cups at exact cost.

These cups had to stand in cold water while being filled with the hot jelly. We sent the whole five hundred cups of jell to the hospitals for soldiers.

Daughter and I sent two packages of old silver, to be melted and sold for the Aviation Fund. Daughter sent a large package of seeds to the Smith College Relief Unit in France. The seeds were collected from neighbors and friends, as well as from our own garden. Luther Burbank sent us a large package of seeds, corn, tomatoes, etc., to increase our shipment.

Just before the World War began, my grand-daughter's Godmother had brought to the child, a doll, from Holland, said to be exactly like the one the "Orange Bud" played with. Afterwards she brought her Godchild, from Canada, a doll dressed like a Red Cross Nurse.

(Photo of the "Orange Bud" doll)

(Photo of nurse-doll from Canada)

While we were doing Red Cross work, our little girl received a gift of a doll, exquisitely dressed. She had heard us talk about the things we were frequently sending to the Belgian relief, and one day she brought us this most beautiful doll, and said she wanted to send it to the poor children in Belgium. We sent it, with a note to the headquarters explaining the gift from her, and received a reply that it should be sent just as requested, with thanks to "the dear child for thinking about it."

In the winter of 1923-'24 I received letters from a friend in Chicago, urging me to join The Daughters of the American Revolution. I wrote to the then State Regent, Mrs. Stookey, of Los Angeles, to know if any member of the D.A.R. lived in Santa Rosa, whom I might get to endorse my application for membership. She did not know of any, but gave me the name Mrs. Dresel, of San Francisco. I wrote to this lady, who invited me to visit her chapter, La Puerto de Oro, of which she was then Regent. In May I did so, stopping at the Somerton Hotel, to which she came, with three other ladies, who she said were all Past Regents. She came to take me to the home of the hostess for the day, Mrs. Doxier.

I had a very pleasant afternoon, talking with the different ladies, refreshments, and a program.

Mrs. Dresel advised me to form a chapter in Santa Rosa, and gave me the address of the new State Regent, Mrs. Mannhart, who lived in Berkeley, across the bay, whom she thought would come over and tell me just what to do. After the meeting closed, Mrs. Dresel brought me back to my hotel, directing her chauffeur to drive through Golden Gate Park so I could see the lovely rhododendrons, which were in full blossom at that time.

I wrote to Mrs. Mannhart, who came over the next morning and made a long call and said among other things, that she would come to Santa Rosa anytime I could get a few interested ladies together and talk to them about the aims and work of the D.A.R. She was a lovely and gracious lady, and explained what I should do. I tried to follow her instructions, but it was not till the spring of 1925 that I succeeded. I wrote invitations to many ladies whose names I knew, inviting all who were interested in discovering their Revolutionary Ancestors and wished to join the D.A.R. to meet the State Regent, Mrs. Mannhart, at the Santa Rosa City Council Chambers on a certain day. The State Regent met me at the Annamay Tea Rooms, bringing her young daughter and Mrs. Greene, a genealogist, with her. I had also invited Mrs. Byrd Weyler Kellogg, a Society Editor, to meet with us, and after we finished luncheon we went to the Council Chambers, where we found about twenty-five ladies assembled. I had asked Mrs. Mannhart not to appoint me as Organizing Regent, as I was too old, and besides it needed somebody who lived right in town and not a little way out, as I did. And she said most emphatically, "Yes, it needs someone right on the spot." So she then asked Mrs. Forsyth, Mrs. McMannis and Mrs. Meneray, in succession, but they all refused. She then asked Mrs. Russell, who accepted. All four ladies were already D.A.R. members, and there were others there who were also members, but not enough to form a chapter. So Mrs. Russell spent the summer interviewing those whom she knew, and those of whom I had given her the names as "prospects." By fall we had sixteen, and December 15th, 1925, Mrs. Mannhart and several ladies from Berkeley and San Francisco chapters, came and installed us, as the "Santa Rosa Chapter of the Daughters of the American Revolution." I was appointed Chaplain, and have been Chaplain ever since.

(My placecard at a D.A.R. dinner)

(Our emblem)

In October, 1926, I was appointed Chairman of Genealogical Research to get the records of California Pioneers, as no vital records for California were kept before 1905. So I put notice in our daily paper that to anyone interested who wrote me, I would send blanks for them to fill out and return. Some called on us to get blanks, others wrote me. In 1927 as a result of my labors, I had fifty-six pioneer records to take to San Francisco to one of the monthly Northern D.A.R. Reciprocity Meetings at the Clift House Hotel. They thought I had done so well that I had to rise, and receive applause.

At this meeting I heard the sad news that our lovely Regent was very ill, from overdoing at her strenuous work for the D.A.R. Mrs. Mannhart died soon after. She was a Gold Star Mother.

I gathered about twenty-five more Pioneer Records, and then resigned my Chairmanship, on account of old age, finding the work too strenuous for me. The work was very interesting and I would gladly have gone on with it if I could have done so.

Many letters to me from the Pioneers or their descendents were often as interesting as the records sent. Here are a few incidents told me, which are recorded in those pioneer papers. "William Riley Robertson (grandson of General James Robertson of Tennessee) and his wife, Artilla Powers, started for California in 1851. The family

[Note: The next sixteen pages of the original manuscript are missing].

Chapter 27

Since living in California, we have had visitors from Chicago, from one to three times each. My sister-in-law Emily came in 1912, on her way home from a convention in Los Angeles of the Ladies of the Grand Army of the Republic, and we had an extremely pleasant two weeks visit with her. A young lady friend of Daughter's came in 1915 and visited the World's Fair with Daughter. She has visited us twice since, once bringing her sister with her. Brother John came several times. Other friends at different times.

In 1929 Mr. and Mrs. Seigfrid Edstrom, with their daughter Miriam, visited us on their way from Sweden around the world. Mrs. Edstrom was a schoolmate of Daughter's in High School days in Chicago, and they have kept up a correspondence ever since. Since they returned to Sweden, Daughter has received Miriam's wedding cards, and her mother wrote us a vivid description of the wedding ceremony. Miriam arranged every detail of the wedding herself, as she is an artist, having studied at the Boston Art School, afterward teaching at an Art School in San Antonio, Texas.

In 1928 Daughter received cards for the great meeting at Stanford University for herself and daughter, to hear the acceptance speech of Herbert Hoover, who was afterward elected to be President of the United States. It was a great honor, and they enjoyed the meeting highly.

In 1928 I visited my grandson, Alan, and his pretty little wife, Mae, at Los Angeles. They took me to visit the great Los Angeles Museum of Science and Art, which is crammed with the most interesting objects. One evening we attended the Mission Play at Pasadena. Mae was a splendid driver and took me in their pretty car all over Los Angeles.

Also, while there, I attended the California State Conference of the Daughters of the American Revolution at the Hotel Ambassador. I went from San Francisco on the Steamer Harvard, with the Regent of the Santa Rosa Chapter of the D.A.R. We returned on the Steamer Yale, of the same line. The Harvard was wrecked in a fog in the early summer of 1931 on the rocks, with nearly five hundred passengers on board, who were all saved, and all the crew, but the splendid ship was a total loss.

(Photo of the Harvard)

Mr. Lyon, of Lyon and Healy, Chicago, asked me to write the Libretto for a musical comedy for a friend of his, a pianist. He wanted it to be an incident of the Civil War, and insisted there must be a young lady spy in it, who was discovered and thrown from a bridge. I wrote quite a bit of it, calling it "The Suttler's Daughter." The "daughter" was to bribe the suttler to claim her as his daughter. But I had not reached the bridge episode, when I gave it up.

After silent movies came in, I wrote one on "The Man Without a Country." Then I wrote to the author, Edward Everett Hale, for his terms for producing it as a movie. Here is letter of reply:

(Letter from E. E. Hale)

When my late sister spent many years in Europe she sent me many photographs of her favorite pictures there, the finest one being a life size copy of the Sistine Madonna, universally considered the finest in the world. When she returned in 1885 she brought me many curios, among which is a large vase, on a light bluish-green glass, on which are painted the arms of the various German states. Since the revolution in Germany, I prize it very highly.

On a later trip she brought me some Kenilworth ivy, and a picture of where it can be seen in all its beauty. The ivy she brought me has grown so well and is so beautifully green all the year round, that I have promised rootings of it to adorn the new High School at Santa Rosa, and for the new Junior College, as fast as the various units are finished.

(Photo of the picture of Kenilworth Castle Ivy)

(Photo of Santa Rosa High School built 1895 after the first burned down)

In Sonoma County a few miles north of Santa Rosa, there is a farm on which was discovered a few feet below the surface, a prostrate forest of petrified trees.

(Photo of the petrified giant)

Many of them have been uncovered, and the farm is now maintained as a show place. It is well worth visiting. A few years ago my grandson came from Los Angeles to visit us, and took us to see it, and I procured a photo of one of the fallen giants.

In the early part of the Nineteenth Century, or earlier, Russia began to colonize the west coast of what is now California. When the United States became the possessors, Russia was notified, and the colony they had begun was withdrawn. Their church remains, and is cared for by the State. Once or twice a year a Priest of the Creek Church comes from San Francisco, and holds services in it. It is one of the points of interest in Sonoma County, or early day history.

(Photo of the Russian Church at Fort Ross)

After the earthquake, a new courthouse was built for Sonoma County as soon as possible.

(Photo of new courthouse in 1910)

Afterwards the fountains on the lawn were replaced by round flower beds, which are gay with flower all the year round, in winter as well as summer, in this mild climate.

Some years since a cannon was given to the World War Veterans, and erected, with a bronze tablet on it with the names of our county men who died in that war, on a corner of the courthouse lawn.

(Photo of the courthouse today in 1931)

On Memorial Day the few G.A.R. men still living, belonging to the post here, gather by this corner for the annual parade to the Veteran's Park for the Memorial exercises, assisted by all other organizations in the city.

For some years much of my thought has been given to the project of having a museum in Santa Rosa, as a great educational force in the community. I told our D.A.R. Chapter that I would give a five hundred dollar set of mink furs to be sold, the money obtained to be a nucleus for a home for a museum. Nothing came of the offer until about two years later, when we had a new Regent, who took up the idea with enthusiasm. Since then a group of us have accomplished much. We have obtained incorporation papers from the State of California. We have collected a thousand or more historical relics and other objects of interest. We have received many thousand promises to give or loan exhibits as soon as we have a place to publicly display them. We have several plans under consideration for a suitable building; but are awaiting decisions of the City Fathers as to a bequest of $75,000 to the City. "Many men of many minds." Some think the money ought to be spent on city parks. Others think we have enough parks, and the money should be used for other things. I am hoping a decision will be made soon, so that I will have the pleasure before I pass from earthly scenes, of seeing the many things I have given, and those others have given, or promised, (as per my Records as Registrar) all in a suitable museum home near our beautiful High School; and the Junior College, one unit of which is now occupied, so that all our children, now and in a long future, may profit by frequently seeing the relics of early days in California; the art exhibits of other parts of the world, as well as those of our own; scientific and geological things; and many inventions and discoveries.

After eighty years, memory sees only the highlights, as distant mountain tops at twilight show only the sunset glow on the snow clad peaks.

Sunset!

A PRAYER FOR MEMORY.