The Marietta Register, January 26, 1882
By Stephen Powers
In early times wolves were so thick that it was difficult, almost impossible, to keep sheep; hence wool was very scarce. There was no yarn to be bought in the country, and shoes were equally scarce. I have seen a transcript from a memorandum made about 1810 by Benjamin Daud, in which he mentions the sale of a small lot of wool-grown by himself to a merchant in Marietta at $2.00 a pound. The consequence of this was that the children often had to go barefooted the greater part of the winter, if not the entire year. I have heard an old pioneer relate in his boyhood, when sent down to the pasture late in the fall to fetch home the old white cow, he would drive her up and jump into her bed to warm his feet. At a later date, when there were six or eight of his brothers and sisters, they would probably have one pair of socks apiece, and these would be heeled with buckskin. They had to be washed sometimes, and his mother, a notable housekeeper, would take them at night, when the children were put to bed, wash, dry and mend them all, and had them ready for the numerous family in the morning.
This same veteran pioneer relates a story which would be incredible did I not now him to be truthful; a story which will please the boys, and at the same time show that sometimes the game in the woods was so utterly wild that it was tame, so to speak. There was an old man named Dougal Walker, who came to the relater’s father one day in search of work. While he was standing in the yard talking, a young deer, hotly pursued by dogs, bolted over the yard fence and made straight up to the old man as if for protection. He held open his arms to catch it, and the frightened animal leaped into them with so much violence as almost to overturn his captor. It now struggled desperately to get away, and drawing up its hind legs kicked with so much force that it tore a great part of the clothing off the old man. He was glad to let it escape. At another time they had a pet deer which grew to the age of two years, and would follow them about everywhere, wearing a little bell. One night the dogs got after it, and it ran wildly and dashed itself against the kitchen door, but as no one opened it in time, the dogs killed it.
Time hung very heavy on the hands of the women of the house, so far as social pleasures were concerned. They had to labor with unceasing industry to provide for their families even the rude food and dress which were possible then, and for recreation they were driven to attempt work of ornament, humble devices of womanly ingenuity. They made several kinds of workboxes of bark; one kind was made of a section of hickory bark taken off the tree entire, the size of the tree determining that of the box. One end of this box was provided with a bottom made of a thin piece of wood or bark, and the other end – the box stood upright as when on the tree – was covered with a lid. The rough outside bark was planed off. A better sort of a box was made of the bark of the slippery elm. This was peeled off in strips of some width, dressed smooth, then dried and pressed flat. It was made into boxes like the axle tree boxes of to-day, a shaving or hoop bent around an oval shaped bottom, with the inside of the bark turned out, the ends beveled and stitched or gummed together. A lid like the cover of a band box was put over it. If the taste of the manufacturer dictated, the box was ornamented with colored figures, autumn leaves, etc
An inferior kind of rope was made of the bark of the linn. It was cut into convenient strips and water rotted, as flax or hemp was used, which operation enabled the workman to peel off the finer inside bark from the outside. The former was then split up fine and twisted into ropes, which answered the purpose moderately well for tugs, bedcords, etc., etc.
The winter evenings were whiled away by reading such scanty volumes as they had brought with them from New England – such robust but desiccated works as Drelincourt on Death, Edwards on the Will, Owen on Forgiveness, Pilgrim’s Progress and the like – in telling stories, shelling corn with a cob held in the hand to prevent the ear from wearing off the skin, cracking nuts, eating scraped turnips, drying pumpkin, etc. It was a feat of skill for a neat housewife to cut a huge Yankee pumpkin into one continuous spiral, a slice about a quarter of an inch thick running round and round, until the whole pumpkin was used up, which was then pared and hung on a string running through the whole length of it, suspended from the joists overhead.
Corn husks were plaited into horse-collars; they were woven into door-mats. Powder-horns were scraped down thin, polished, carved with infinite patience and ingenuity. Chairs were bottomed with strips of hickory bark, with rawhide, or with thin splints of white oak; the bottoms being finished in various geometrical figures and bizarre patterns, lozenges, diamonds, zigzags, etc. The legs of the chairs wore off with constant use, sliding about from year to year on uncarpeted, rough, gritty floors, until they became two or three inches shorter than they were originally and a person not accustomed to them would go down farther than he anticipated, executing movements not graceful or suitable to polite society. At first, however, they sat mostly on three-legged stools, blocks of wood, etc.
Ohio Farmer
By Stephen Powers
In early times wolves were so thick that it was difficult, almost impossible, to keep sheep; hence wool was very scarce. There was no yarn to be bought in the country, and shoes were equally scarce. I have seen a transcript from a memorandum made about 1810 by Benjamin Daud, in which he mentions the sale of a small lot of wool-grown by himself to a merchant in Marietta at $2.00 a pound. The consequence of this was that the children often had to go barefooted the greater part of the winter, if not the entire year. I have heard an old pioneer relate in his boyhood, when sent down to the pasture late in the fall to fetch home the old white cow, he would drive her up and jump into her bed to warm his feet. At a later date, when there were six or eight of his brothers and sisters, they would probably have one pair of socks apiece, and these would be heeled with buckskin. They had to be washed sometimes, and his mother, a notable housekeeper, would take them at night, when the children were put to bed, wash, dry and mend them all, and had them ready for the numerous family in the morning.
This same veteran pioneer relates a story which would be incredible did I not now him to be truthful; a story which will please the boys, and at the same time show that sometimes the game in the woods was so utterly wild that it was tame, so to speak. There was an old man named Dougal Walker, who came to the relater’s father one day in search of work. While he was standing in the yard talking, a young deer, hotly pursued by dogs, bolted over the yard fence and made straight up to the old man as if for protection. He held open his arms to catch it, and the frightened animal leaped into them with so much violence as almost to overturn his captor. It now struggled desperately to get away, and drawing up its hind legs kicked with so much force that it tore a great part of the clothing off the old man. He was glad to let it escape. At another time they had a pet deer which grew to the age of two years, and would follow them about everywhere, wearing a little bell. One night the dogs got after it, and it ran wildly and dashed itself against the kitchen door, but as no one opened it in time, the dogs killed it.
Time hung very heavy on the hands of the women of the house, so far as social pleasures were concerned. They had to labor with unceasing industry to provide for their families even the rude food and dress which were possible then, and for recreation they were driven to attempt work of ornament, humble devices of womanly ingenuity. They made several kinds of workboxes of bark; one kind was made of a section of hickory bark taken off the tree entire, the size of the tree determining that of the box. One end of this box was provided with a bottom made of a thin piece of wood or bark, and the other end – the box stood upright as when on the tree – was covered with a lid. The rough outside bark was planed off. A better sort of a box was made of the bark of the slippery elm. This was peeled off in strips of some width, dressed smooth, then dried and pressed flat. It was made into boxes like the axle tree boxes of to-day, a shaving or hoop bent around an oval shaped bottom, with the inside of the bark turned out, the ends beveled and stitched or gummed together. A lid like the cover of a band box was put over it. If the taste of the manufacturer dictated, the box was ornamented with colored figures, autumn leaves, etc
An inferior kind of rope was made of the bark of the linn. It was cut into convenient strips and water rotted, as flax or hemp was used, which operation enabled the workman to peel off the finer inside bark from the outside. The former was then split up fine and twisted into ropes, which answered the purpose moderately well for tugs, bedcords, etc., etc.
The winter evenings were whiled away by reading such scanty volumes as they had brought with them from New England – such robust but desiccated works as Drelincourt on Death, Edwards on the Will, Owen on Forgiveness, Pilgrim’s Progress and the like – in telling stories, shelling corn with a cob held in the hand to prevent the ear from wearing off the skin, cracking nuts, eating scraped turnips, drying pumpkin, etc. It was a feat of skill for a neat housewife to cut a huge Yankee pumpkin into one continuous spiral, a slice about a quarter of an inch thick running round and round, until the whole pumpkin was used up, which was then pared and hung on a string running through the whole length of it, suspended from the joists overhead.
Corn husks were plaited into horse-collars; they were woven into door-mats. Powder-horns were scraped down thin, polished, carved with infinite patience and ingenuity. Chairs were bottomed with strips of hickory bark, with rawhide, or with thin splints of white oak; the bottoms being finished in various geometrical figures and bizarre patterns, lozenges, diamonds, zigzags, etc. The legs of the chairs wore off with constant use, sliding about from year to year on uncarpeted, rough, gritty floors, until they became two or three inches shorter than they were originally and a person not accustomed to them would go down farther than he anticipated, executing movements not graceful or suitable to polite society. At first, however, they sat mostly on three-legged stools, blocks of wood, etc.
Ohio Farmer
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