Farming was a way of life during the 1930s, and it provided the means necessary to sustain a family. My grandmother wrote, "We grew all our own vegetables and butchered for our meat, and made our own bread. ... In winter we made ice cream. ... Our meals were plain and regular and the whole family ate at the same time." Even Jim, who you met last week, had a garden in the city of Madison.
Not surprisingly this self-sustainability, coupled with a lack of transportation and communication, led to a sense of isolation. During the 1920s and 1930s, some people still traveled by horse and carriage; there were no daily car trips into town. Certainly, there were no cell phones or mass communication outside radio and movie reels. As Daryl explained, "You'd have a couple farms form their own little tight-nit community, but we had no idea what was going on across town, or even a few miles down the road."
In an extreme example, Daryl told me of a time when the Pleasant View Complex was still used as an institution:
There must have been some poor management (at Pleasant View), because there were patients just wandering around the countryside. It was common to see a patient walking down the road. They'd wander, not knowing where they were or where they were going. One time I saw a man standing face-to-face with a telephone pole, shouting orders and having this big long conversation with it. I later found out that he used to be a construction foreman, or something, and he thought the telephone pole was his crew. He was standing there for like 45 minutes giving orders to a telephone pole!
I asked him, "Was anyone ever hurt in these instances?"
Daryl responded: No, not to my knowledge, but I remember one time when a neighbor was at home, milking his cows. He heard some commotion coming from the house, and realized that one of these patients had wandered to the farm and made his way inside, with the farmer's wife. No one got hurt, but imagine coming in from the barn to discover an asylum patient in your house with your wife! That's the thing though, we only heard about this through word of mouth; we had no idea what was going on down the road.
My friends, there is something that continually strikes me about this series. Daryl, Ken, and Carol all vividly remember when they got electricity, "It was a big deal, you know!" - as Daryl boasted. There were no phones, and transportation was highly limited. A recurring question that I ask is, "What did you do for fun?" To this question, I inevitably receive a range of answers, all very enthusiastically relayed.
Daryl told me of the gas lanterns they used to have in the house, before the family got electricity. These lamps were sometimes called Aladdin Lamps, and gave off quite a glow - not as good as electricity, but better than kerosene. Anyway, it didn't take much to extinguish the flame, which was little more than silk ashes that were ignited. As a kid, Daryl had this toy, which was a monkey on a string, attached to a bamboo pole. Daryl would take that monkey, and by swishing the pole, would snuff out the gas flame with the monkey! "I guess my old man got sick of beating me for it", he said, because his dad resorted to breaking off a section of the pole each time Daryl flicked out the flame. Finally, "Well, one time he saw me going for it, and monkey and all went into the fireplace!"
Halfway up the state, one of Ken's sources of excitement came during the wintertime when he and his brother took out the one-horse sleigh. "We'd go miles down the road on that old sleigh", Ken said. "We'd have a whole crowd following us! I suppose we'd go look at girls, too."
In Madison, Jim enjoyed swimming, fishing, hockey, and even made himself an iceboat. When the lake was frozen, Jim would sail across the ice on his wind-driven boat; there was even a special dock for them!
Back on the farm, my grandmother played games with her sisters and cousins. She wrote, "We played games like anti-over the shed, Fox and Goose, Baseball, Pump-pump pull away, checkers, and cards. We learned Jass, Old Maid, Heart, and Solitaire. We only went to see a movie once a year."
Just south of Daryl, Jim, and my grandmother was a young girl named Carol, growing up on a farm outside Winslow. "I had a dog named Boots, and that Boots would grab a hold of my dress and rip holes in them! Finally Dad gave him away, but he said that he sold [Boots] for fifty cents. So, we made [Dad] pay us the fifty cents!" One of Carol's neighbors had a big strawberry patch, and she got paid three cents a quart for picking strawberries. "I think that one time I picked so many strawberries, and I saved up my money until I had like two or three dollars, and I went through the catalogue and bought myself a dress! It was a good dress, too, for $3. I also remember going to town. Once a week we'd head up to Monroe to get groceries, so that was our weekly source of entertainment."
Between my grandmother's card games, Daryl's toy monkey, and Carol's dress, there is one memory that they all have in common, "Our weekly trip into Monroe." My friends, it is not that long ago that the Monroe Square had four grocery stores. It is not that long ago that not everyone had a car - there were still some horses.
Next week we'll see what was so special about "Our weekly trip into Monroe."Jeff Rogers 4/17/08
- Dan Wegmueller of Monroe writes
a weekly column for Friday editions of
the Times. He can be reached
at dwegs@tds.net.
Not surprisingly this self-sustainability, coupled with a lack of transportation and communication, led to a sense of isolation. During the 1920s and 1930s, some people still traveled by horse and carriage; there were no daily car trips into town. Certainly, there were no cell phones or mass communication outside radio and movie reels. As Daryl explained, "You'd have a couple farms form their own little tight-nit community, but we had no idea what was going on across town, or even a few miles down the road."
In an extreme example, Daryl told me of a time when the Pleasant View Complex was still used as an institution:
There must have been some poor management (at Pleasant View), because there were patients just wandering around the countryside. It was common to see a patient walking down the road. They'd wander, not knowing where they were or where they were going. One time I saw a man standing face-to-face with a telephone pole, shouting orders and having this big long conversation with it. I later found out that he used to be a construction foreman, or something, and he thought the telephone pole was his crew. He was standing there for like 45 minutes giving orders to a telephone pole!
I asked him, "Was anyone ever hurt in these instances?"
Daryl responded: No, not to my knowledge, but I remember one time when a neighbor was at home, milking his cows. He heard some commotion coming from the house, and realized that one of these patients had wandered to the farm and made his way inside, with the farmer's wife. No one got hurt, but imagine coming in from the barn to discover an asylum patient in your house with your wife! That's the thing though, we only heard about this through word of mouth; we had no idea what was going on down the road.
My friends, there is something that continually strikes me about this series. Daryl, Ken, and Carol all vividly remember when they got electricity, "It was a big deal, you know!" - as Daryl boasted. There were no phones, and transportation was highly limited. A recurring question that I ask is, "What did you do for fun?" To this question, I inevitably receive a range of answers, all very enthusiastically relayed.
Daryl told me of the gas lanterns they used to have in the house, before the family got electricity. These lamps were sometimes called Aladdin Lamps, and gave off quite a glow - not as good as electricity, but better than kerosene. Anyway, it didn't take much to extinguish the flame, which was little more than silk ashes that were ignited. As a kid, Daryl had this toy, which was a monkey on a string, attached to a bamboo pole. Daryl would take that monkey, and by swishing the pole, would snuff out the gas flame with the monkey! "I guess my old man got sick of beating me for it", he said, because his dad resorted to breaking off a section of the pole each time Daryl flicked out the flame. Finally, "Well, one time he saw me going for it, and monkey and all went into the fireplace!"
Halfway up the state, one of Ken's sources of excitement came during the wintertime when he and his brother took out the one-horse sleigh. "We'd go miles down the road on that old sleigh", Ken said. "We'd have a whole crowd following us! I suppose we'd go look at girls, too."
In Madison, Jim enjoyed swimming, fishing, hockey, and even made himself an iceboat. When the lake was frozen, Jim would sail across the ice on his wind-driven boat; there was even a special dock for them!
Back on the farm, my grandmother played games with her sisters and cousins. She wrote, "We played games like anti-over the shed, Fox and Goose, Baseball, Pump-pump pull away, checkers, and cards. We learned Jass, Old Maid, Heart, and Solitaire. We only went to see a movie once a year."
Just south of Daryl, Jim, and my grandmother was a young girl named Carol, growing up on a farm outside Winslow. "I had a dog named Boots, and that Boots would grab a hold of my dress and rip holes in them! Finally Dad gave him away, but he said that he sold [Boots] for fifty cents. So, we made [Dad] pay us the fifty cents!" One of Carol's neighbors had a big strawberry patch, and she got paid three cents a quart for picking strawberries. "I think that one time I picked so many strawberries, and I saved up my money until I had like two or three dollars, and I went through the catalogue and bought myself a dress! It was a good dress, too, for $3. I also remember going to town. Once a week we'd head up to Monroe to get groceries, so that was our weekly source of entertainment."
Between my grandmother's card games, Daryl's toy monkey, and Carol's dress, there is one memory that they all have in common, "Our weekly trip into Monroe." My friends, it is not that long ago that the Monroe Square had four grocery stores. It is not that long ago that not everyone had a car - there were still some horses.
Next week we'll see what was so special about "Our weekly trip into Monroe."Jeff Rogers 4/17/08
- Dan Wegmueller of Monroe writes
a weekly column for Friday editions of
the Times. He can be reached
at dwegs@tds.net.
