Henry A. Haigh 1 -- The Beginning of His Diaries

The Haigh Diaries, Part I (1871)

Dearbornites know the name Haigh -- there's a Haigh School and Haigh Street.  Most of us interested in Dearborn’s history have read an occasional excerpt from the Haigh diaries.  A man who appreciated the written word, Henry A. Haigh provided information and insights in the diaries that he kept for 71 of his 88 years of life.  These diaries covered the years 1871 to 1942 and not only reflect his own life in Dearborn and Detroit, but much about life in Michigan and in the United States, as well. The Diaries are part of the Dearborn Historical Museum's collection of documents.  They were written with a bold hand by a man of whom I have become quite fond -- even if he died before I was born.  As you will see, his words still speak today.

Having grown up in Dearborn, I fondly remember the stately tree-lined lane off Michigan Avenue that  led to the Haigh Mansion. The lovely house had burned down in 1901 and was rebuilt, then razed forever in the 1950’s to make room for a Holiday Inn and the Dearborn Towers.

Born on March 13, 1854, Henry Allyn Haigh grew up on this farm (it had previously belonged to Joshua Howard) and was educated in Dearborn’s public schools.  The diaries begin with his leaving Dearborn for Lansing, where he attended Michigan Agricultural College (“MAC”, now Michigan State University).  The first years of the diaries (1871-1874) were reworked by Mr. Haigh sometime after 1931, and he makes his own introduction to his diaries at this point in his life.  His own words are a wonderful beginning to his adventures in journaling and his years at MAC.

Henry A. Haigh:  His Early Life 

The Following Attempt to restore some lost scraps which I formerly and fondly regarded as my Diaries during the period of the Civil War (1861 – 1865) is made here for what it may be worth.  These were hardly more than mere memories.  And yet memories, turning into traditions, were the only records of the human race for ages.

I think I can remember trying to set down something about the First Election of Lincoln, when I was not yet seven years old.  I distinctly recall having the little flagpole on which I hoisted for a time the little flag bearing Lincoln’s picture.  I know I must have written something about my older brothers going to War in 1861.  Also I must have attempted something about the Assassination of Lincoln in the spring of 1865, an event which stirred the nation to greater grief than anything else.

But anything like Diaries, if they may be called such, that were at times attempted prior to any entrance to the State Agricultural College of Lansing in February 1871, are gone for good. Lost or destroyed in the fire which consumed the entire interior of the Old Homestead of Dearborn in spring of 1900.

I do not think that anything like a regular diary was attempted prior to 1869 or 1870.  I remember that in the winter of 1864, or thereabouts, my brother, Thomas, coming home on a visit from New York, and finding me writing something in an old unused account book, suggested that I keep a record of Farm Events during the year, setting down the time of planting and harvesting each crop, and how the crop turned out. He showed me how to enter the items, the number of acres of Oats, for instance, the cost or value of the seeds, the date of sowing, the cost of labor preparing the land and the cost of tending and harvesting the crop.  And then the yield, the value and the profit.

I presume I went at this with the untrained zeal of a ten year old lad, only to leave it in a few weeks for something more novel or exciting.

I also have a distinct recollection of starting, with great enthusiasm, a “Record of the Return of the Song Birds and other birds of passage.”  Probably my brother George or my father or mother may have suggested this.  But I cannot recall that the record was kept for any great length of time, or that it was ever of much subsequent interest or value.

Likewise I recall that prior to these exploits I was seiged with a childish propensity to write something regular, preferably a history of some kind.  It may have been that I had heard some portion of Dickens’ “Child’s History of England” which came out about then and was very popular.  My brother George used to read from Dickens at Dearborn sometimes in the evening.

Anyway, I started a “History of England Vol. 1,” which greatly amused my mother, specially the spelling.  She insisted that the spelling should not be corrected, being an essential part of the authorship and one of the best things about the “History.”

So I went at the “histry” (history) with great zeal, beginning with the conquest and telling about William the Conqueror whom I much admired.

Youth loves victory, and the victor is his hero.  He delights to see his hero dashing forward at the head of his army, vanquishing his enemies and trampling upon his fallen foes.  He gives little heed to the stricken soldier being mangled under the hoofs of the gallant victor’s charger.  He is for the man who wins the fight.

Questions of the justice of the victor’s cause, its merits, methods, and its results, do not concern, nor never concern the youthful narrator.  They are left for mature minds, unblended by the glamour of the victory.

In this respect William the Conqueror seemed to me most glorious, and I depicted him in glowing terms.  William Rufus seemed to one much less picturesque, and as for Matilda, I had little use at that time for women in war or politics; and so the “histry” lapsed.

Besides we had a War of our own, and it seemed to me better to write about that.  “You know nothing about war,” my brother Richard asserted.  “And I would like to ask what you really know about this war or what it is really for.  How are you going to get the facts?”

To this I probably parried that I knew some things about the war as it was going on right there in Dearborn, where the First Michigan Sharp Shooters, a whole regiment of them, was recruiting and drilling at the Arsenal, where Barry Magoonah had both his arms shot off which happened while firing a salute last Fourth of July in honor of Governor Blair who came to deliver the colors to the Regiment.

“If you want to write about that, well and good,” my brother Richard replied, “only be sure to tell only what you really know.”

But the “History of the War in Dearborn” was never written, interesting as it might be now.  Events were coming on too fast, and too confusing, for youthful composition.  Other things more active and compelling to a growing youth claimed attention, and efforts at literary pursuit were swept aside.

Civil War Days

Two Old Dearborn Doctors

Civil War Days Recalled

by Henry A. Haigh

The Dearborn Press

March 18, 1931

          Dr. Sweeney and Dr. Snow, rare old characters of Old Dearborn, were among the men who interested me much.

          It seemed to me, in my youthful days in the good old town, that there were more interesting and odd old characters there than anywhere else in the world.  Perhaps it was because my observation was then limited to the little hamlet of about 500 people that lived in Dearborn in those wonderful days of long ago.

          And it was a glorious time, especially for wild-eyed boys of ten and twelve, those thrilling days of the 1860’s, when the Civil War was on and everything seemed fateful and terribly important.

          The soldiers were there at the Old Arsenal, a full regiment at times, sometimes separate companies, squads, recruits and veterans, coming and going, training, marching and holding grand parades.  War worked wonders in the little town.  Bands of martial music, fifes, drums, the call of bugles, and the firing of the great sunrise and sunset guns kept old and young alert.

          Great men came and went; General Grant and his staff on a special train, the town turning out to meet them; General Sherman, much beloved, who remained overnight and was entertained at my father’s house, and local heroes like Governor Blair, Michigan’s war governor and General Custer, famed Michigan soldier from Monroe--are among many that I recall.  They were received with cheers and cannon salutes, reviewed parades, held conferences, made speeches and departed, while the natives watched and wondered.

          The common talk of the town was of great heroes like “Old Abe”, and great events like “Gettysburg” and “Appomattox” and the shock of the assassination of Lincoln.

          This was the setting of the times in which the old characters of Dearborn can best be pictured.

          Of the dozen or more whose names come back distinctly, two stand out in memory as among the interesting characters of old Dearborn – Dr. Thomas Sweeney, and Dr. Edward A. Snow, both bright men, good citizens and good physicians of the old “family doctor” type, both devoted to their patients, their families and the public welfare.

          But politically they were diametrically opposed.  Dr. Snow was a “black Republican”, a stalwart champion of the Union, an advocate of the war as a protection of human liberty and as a means of procuring the freedom of the slaves.  Dr. Sweeney was an old-time, unregenerate Democrat, opposed to war, an advocate of the right of secession, a sympathizer with the South and a justifier of the rebellion.  He was called a “copperhead” but he could support his position by arguments hard to refute.  Yet at heart he, like Dr. Snow, was a kindly man, with a wide range of knowledge and a fondness for discussion; but Dr. Sweeney was not much given to story telling.

          Dr. Snow, on the other hand, was very fond of telling stories and could tell them well.  He enjoyed a “dish of conversation” specially if it ended with some humorous conclusion.  Space permits repeating but one of the good doctor’s stories, though all were wholesome and some funny, as the following may show.

          It seems that in those early days there was an old fellow who was a pretty good citizen in a general way, but who had one serious failing—more common formerly than now—that of “going on a spree”—with no evil intention further than having a harmless good time.  But on one occasion the “spree” extended to such length and was pursued so ardently as to result in an illness bordering on delirium tremens.  The devoted wife knowing of this weakness, finally succeeded in getting the old chap home and in bed where he dropped at once into profound slumber from which he refused to be aroused.

          The poor woman, knowing the danger of the dreaded delirium drowse, became so alarmed that she sent for the doctor and the priest.  On their arrival, rushing them to the bedside and shaking her husband, she exclaimed shrilly, “Rouse ye, rouse ye, the doctor’s come and the priest has come.  Rouse ye, lest it be too late.”  But all to no effect.  The more the good priest pleaded and the doctor dosed, the deeper seemed the drowse.  While they were giving another heart stimulant, a storm that had been brewing broke suddenly with a crash of thunder and a blast of wind. 

          The terrified wife in desperation grabbing the patient by the ears and bumping him up and down cried out, “Wake up, the storm is raging and the wind is blowing down the house!  Wake ye, we’ll sure be kilt.”

          At this the patient roused himself enough to utter faintly, “Wind, Hum!  Throw out a little peppermint.  It’s good for wind!”

1865 -- Dearborn's Arsenal Receives Proclamation Regarding Abraham Lincoln

Here are the words from a Proclamation that my Great-Great Grandfather had in his possession.  He was a doctor at the Arsenal. Edward. S. Snow. Here are the words:

Detroit Arsenal,

Dearbornville, Mich., May 31^st, 1865

Post Order No 16.

            The President of the United States having appointed to-morrow, June 1^st, as a day of humiliation and mourning for our good and martyred President, work of every kind will be suspended at this Post, and all connected with the Arsenal are earnestly enjoined to comply with the spirit of the President’s Proclamation.

            Abraham Lincoln is dead and buried; while an upright and conscientious Magistrate needs no nobler monument than the flag which floats to-day triumphant from the lakes to the gulf, from ocean to ocean – over one Union and one People – let us mourn for the man, true and just let us freshen his grave with our tears, and with our prayers, keep his memory green in our hearts.

                                                O.E. Michaelis

                                                1^st St. Ord. Confr.

                                        Com’dt

1912 Missing the Titanic; Scottish Folk Tales; Mention of the Lusitania

1912 - At age 27, Clara Snow had tickets for the Titanic, due to leave New York on April 20.  Three weeks before sailing, she changed to a later ship and I don't know why.  The Titanic sank on its trip to New York, on April 12.  We have the letter from the Steamship Tour company explaining how to receive her refund.  It seems rather brave that she sailed only 2-3 weeks after the sinking of the Titanic.

Shipboard  May 4 – 14, 1912

Rather good passage with one storm and rather rainy at the end.  Wonder of wonders, I was not seasick.

Played shuffle board, which is stupid, and deck golf, which is nice.  Played the last with Mr. Watson, the staid bridge groom with a young bride.

Met Mrs. & Miss Atwater who knew Mrs. Mary Mumford Weiss in Washington.  Had several nice talks with her, when the wind was blowing and it was most wet.  She and her mother are interesting, wife & daughter of a college professor deceased.

Had two roommates.  One a hard-faced English woman who was very nice, but we were careful not to interfere with her.  The other was Miss Nelson, who was traveling with her sister and Mrs. Hunt.  They were very nice to me.  I sat at table with them when they were there.  The first night we had a lovely walk around the clipper.  The sea was calm and the lights of an Italian steamer showed plainly.  Miss Sarah (my roommate) was most awfully sick.  Miss Mary and I played games together and walked.

Then there were the Perrys from New York City.  Miss Mary a very good sweet woman.  Helen the daughter with more sense than most fourteen-year-olds.  Very pretty too.  Dear Fred the son nineteen or twenty who was most sick but quite good fun.  We watched the shore of the river together and laughed at our first English train & its funny whistle.  They came to London to join their father who is at work here.

Then Mrs. Abeel from New Jersey, a woman of social ability who was most interesting to me.  She told me she thought I was a person whose life would grow fuller as I grew older.  I am sure I hope so.  She has a small boy who tells history in original verse, & who always called me “Detroit.”  Also two very energetic girls. 

The trip up the channel was lovely, although we saw little the first day of land.  But it was light & warm & so gentle.

The next morning we saw the cliffs of England and Dover.  It was the most beautiful sight I have ever seen.  The blue of the water and sky & the red & white of the cliffs with the green beyond.

It was four before we reached Tillbury.  The tide was out & we went in on land in tenders.  Grace, Harry and William [Grace Beecher Moore and her husband and son] came out in it, & I was glad to see them.  Said farewell to S.S. Minnetonka & to the steward who was a typical Dickens character & always hurrying people up.

July 10.  Wednesday.  Packed & helped Grace with dinner.  Mrs. Perry came in and made a call.  Had a lovely birthday dinner.  The table was beautiful in lavender and sweet pea.  Lovely lavender & white cake with “Clara 1912” on it.  Left in a hurry with Gus to get train for Edinburgh.  He did the stunt very nicely and started me off in a 3^rd class carriage—ladies only.

July 11.  Thursday.  Had a very comfortable night rolled up in my steamer rug.  Changed at Edinburgh & at Perth & at Inverness.  Leachy Dunelly [?] offered to see me to a lavatory carriage .  Crossed the Forth Bridge & saw the Channel fleet – real this time, not lights.  The ride from Perth to Inverness was lovely. Crossed two passes & passed the highest point reached by railway in Gt. Britain, 1435 ft. – I think – The hills without a tree for miles and purple with heather & the occasional loch.  Had two girls in my charge from Inverness to B.B.  Lovely ride through to more hills, now mostly blue in the distance.  Louise met me at B.B. with Mr. Vass & a cart & we drove eight miles to Spinningdale, quaint village with a mill burned 100 years ago & some quaint people & cottages.  Walked over to Mr. Wall's study after supper.  He is supposed to be the most [illustrious annual?] painter alive today.

July 13.  Saturday.  Went down by the sea in the afternoon to read & Louise painted.  Came home by crossing the river on stepping stones & by walls cottage.

Heard great stories in the evening about the lady who arose from the dead when a tinker chopped off her finger for a ring & afterwards bore twins, both of whom were famous preachers.  & of the Case of the Red Dog out of which a dog comes every night, & which Louise herself always [?] something, and of the funerals where only men go & the coffin is always carried & of Mr. Vass who is so godly a man he can not clean stables.

July 15 Monday.  Took our lunch & book & Louise & I walked to Migdale Rock which was blown out of the earth & left a hole which is now Migdale Loch.  Passed the place where Mr. Vass himself saw a mermaid very beautiful with a findly tail who dived into the water when he passed.  The Loch is lovely and the rock on one side with the bell heather and the fine forest on the other & the blue bells in the distance.  Found the entrance to the Cave of the Hurly man, who lived there about sixty years ago & would come smashing into a house to grab porridge from the woman’s hand.

Mr. Vass said it was two stags fighting on the skyline of the rock & they say they fought all day long & the battle was tremendous.  Both were royal stags, 12 pointed horns.

July 16 Tuesday.  In the morning after having left all our losable articles at home we went by the way of the Reeveloch to the cairn of the Red Dog.  The Reevelach is a walk through bridges.  There are many beautiful waterfalls and the whole is lovely.  We passed the tin house built by Mr. Callegin & went through the woods to a road.  On one side of it is the open moor.  Beautiful hills of heather with one or two crofts in sight.  Beyond this the wild moors stretch with no sign of habitation.

The Cairn of the Red Dog is a curious place.  It is probably an old Pictish tomb.  It was a cabin & a few years ago was opened by the dignitaries.  There was found in opening a chamber about four by five & 3 high with a probable passage way.  Old weapon of stone was found within.  They have been unmoved and the tomb is open.  And they do say that it is guarded by a red dog, part fox & part wolf, who crosses the road every day at dusk and then guards the tomb by night.  The funny thing is that every time people go there they lose something.  This time Louise lost her side comb, mounted in gold.  They have lost only valuable things.

We came home through the woods looking for deer.  We saw lots of the unused crofts & their walled gardens, and in one place a row of pins set like in [?].

July 17 Wednesday.  We secured two Gadder [?] berths and started for Dornoch.  We had permission to drive through Carnegie if [?] at Lkibo Castle and do so.  Not so much though part of it was very pretty.

Then we went to Mrs. McCron for tea and saw the inside of a real Scottish house.  Then we went to see the Witch’s store where the last witch in Scotland was burned in 1722, and saw the “little village” which grew up of the crofters who were burned from their land to make a game preserve, & over the famous Dornock golf link, to the Earls cross where Sir Richard Murray having broken his sword in a fight with a landing Scandinavian chieftain, cut off the leg of a horse & slew the chief with that.

Monday, July 22.  Left for Inverness.  Drove down with Louise & Mr. Skinner, engineer of S.S. Lusitania, Dollie’s husband Andy Chrisholm.  [The Lusitania was sunk in 1915.] Actually saw a deer on the way down.

Jane Hicks and The Flying Machine

Jane Hicks graduated from the University of Michigan about 1915.  She worked for both Henry Ford and Clara Ford, and she taught at Dearborn High School until 1959.  Here are some of her memories:

To me DEARBORN is HOME.  In all the years before we moved to Dearborn we lived in rented houses.  My father was a traveling salesman for gas and electric appliances.  Sometimes we moved because his territory was changed; other times we had fixed up a house and then were told it was sold, so we had to move.

My college days at the University of Michigan held thrills and tragedy, but always I went through those times on a shoestring.  Summers I was fortunate enough to be given positions in the Detroit Public Library – work I enjoyed, and the remuneration enabled me to buy clothes.

My first teaching job ended in an illness, and when I recovered, again I was accepted in the Detroit Public Library and entered a class of training in librarianship.  Shortly after I had completed that course, I was interviewed by Olive Day (later Mrs. Pulford) and was offered a position as librarian in the Henry Ford Hospital library.  I thoroughly enjoyed this position, both the work and the personnel.  But one day, out of a clear sky, I was moved to Dearborn.

 At this time we lived beyond Water works Park on the east side of Detroit.  To get to Dearborn on time I had to leave my home at five o’clock in the morning to catch the interurban for Dearborn.  It was dark and spooky, but this I did for years.

My days were busy in the Ford Motor Company library.  Mr. Henry Ford had a beautiful, large room made into the library with panels that opened to hide the filing cabinets.  There were luxurious draperies, stacks for the books, and boxes for the magazines.  A partition divided the room – one side was his office and the other the library.

Distinguished men were ushered through the library and usually I was introduced to them.  Fred Black and Ben Donaldson would tip me off when distinguished visitors, often authors, were coming, and I would have a copy of their book ready for them to autograph.

One incident I shall never forget!  Fred Black was proud of taking flying lessons.  One day about closing time, he came in and said: “Jane, would you like to take a trip to Ann Arbor?  I have to deliver a plane there.”  Of course I would, and off we went for one of my first plane rides.  He was proud of his new skill.  We turned upside-down and went through all the tricks.  Finally we arrived, right side up, in Ann Arbor.  Then Fred said:  “Jane, do you have any money?”  I looked in my purse.  “Three dollars,” I answered.  Fred had forgotten his wallet.  We went to a restaurant and ordered cautiously for we had to return to Dearborn on the Interurban at a cost of about one dollar.  It was great fun and when we got back, Fred took me first to his house to tell his wife, Maude.  She joined in the joke, after reproving Fred for his forgetfulness.

Mr. Ford brought Mr. and Mrs. Lovett to Dearborn to introduce old American dances to Dearborn.  Under Mr. and Mrs. Ford’s sponsorship, they became important social events.  They were delightful, and everybody got into the spirit.  The card-club group attended, augmented by many others.  It was a “dress” occasion and became very popular – an invitational affair.

There were also the Sunday evening concerts of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra to which invitations were issued by Mr. and Mrs. Ford, featured by a talk by William J. Cameron.

Gertrude's School Days in the early 1900's

I didn't go to school regularly until I was in the third grade.

I started school at the usual age but came home every day sick with a headache.  The odors were just too much for me.  The toilets were really just privies but were in the school basement and were very smelly.  And some of the farm children were sewn into their underwear at the beginning of winter and didn't get a bath until spring.  My stomach just couldn't take it, so Mother taught me at home for several years.  She had had more education than most of the teachers and was good at teaching, so that when I did go back to school, I had no difficulty with the classes.

Our school was the two-story square red brick building in the middle of the block bounded by Morley, Monroe, Garrison and Mason.  It had been built while my grandfather was alive and he had been one of the leaders who had pushed for it.  Until then there wasn't a high school in Dearborn.

The school was completed while my older sister Clara was in the first grade and she remembered being in a long procession of children carrying their books from the Upstairs-Downstairs School on Park to the new high school.

That was the school that everybody went to.  It had four rooms downstairs and three upstairs -- one of the upstairs rooms was double-sized.  The kindergarten, first, second, third and half of the fourth were downstairs.  And then the other half of fourth, fifth and sixth were upstairs.  When you got into the eighth grade you went into the big room that went all across the building.  That half was the seventh and eighth and all the high school.

There were no lockers -- just a board down the middle of the hall with hooks for coats.  The rooms generally had six rows of seats, three for each grade.  Most rooms held two grades.  One grade, I think the 4th, was divided.

They rang the school bell for the start of classes; if you came after the doors had been closed, you were late.  Few of the girls went out for recess; I never did.  The boys had some games they played but I don't know what they were.  The girls didn't participate.

I remember that when I was in the eighth grade there were five high school graduates that year, four girls and one boy.  One teacher and the principal were all the teaching there was for the high school youngsters then.  They taught algebra, history, English, and so on in high school but no science -- there was no lab.

Some of my classmates in the Dearborn schools were Thad Moon and Sherwood Foley, Florence Hurst --Ethel Hurst was two grades ahead of me --, two of the Sollinger boys, Clemens and Stanley, and Albert Wittelsburger who lived out on Telegraph.

Nita Clark of the Dearborn Clark family was my teacher for most of the years that I was in school all day.  She changed grades when I did.  I had a Miss Van Buren as my first teacher.  She was a pretty blond who died during the year and Nita Clark finished out the year.

Dearborn High School was not accredited and I wanted to go to college, so I changed to Detroit Central High School after the eighth grade.  I either had to do that or take an examination to get into college.  Transportation was easy: interurban to downtown, then streetcar up to a block from school.  It took not quite an hour and a half, and I used to study on the way home.  But Mother thought it was too hard to go in and out on the interurban every day, although my brother did it. 

So I lived with my Father's first cousin, Cousin Lizzie Hulbert.  I think that was one of the best things that happened in my life because I was the youngest in our family.  I didn't know anything about children at all.  They took me in and I think Cousin Lizzie did a wonderful job.  She had three little children, one was only about two when I went in and one was about four years younger than I.  They still think of me as an older sister.  They gave me training in children and that sort of thing that I wouldn't have had in my own home.  I was the baby there.

I would go into Detroit on the interurban on Monday morning and come back to Dearborn on Friday afternoon.  I did well in high school.  I even got all A's one year when my brother told me he didn't think I could do it, and I determined to show him I could.  

The only time I can remember being upset by our modest financial circumstances was when Mother had to tell me that we couldn't afford to have me attend Vassar College.  I was a senior at Central High School in Detroit at the time.  Vassar had always been my goal and my grades were good, but I just couldn't go.  The first thing I did was to drop my fourth year of Latin, which I detested.  I went to the University of Michigan as had my sister and brother.

Note:  Gertrude graduated from the University of Michigan in 1915.

Dancing School in Detroit by Gertrude Snow

For two or three years before I got into high school, I went to Mr. Strasburg's dancing school on Friday afternoons. It was in Detroit upstairs on Adams about a block east of Woodward. I would be excused from school early, at two o'clock, then take the interurban into Detroit and walk up to the school. We would be through at five o'clock and I would walk down and take the street car home again. I carried my dancing slippers in a cloth bag and changed into them in the girls' cloakroom.

We learned a wide variety of dances, the waltz and two-step, polkas and square dances, how to curtsy or bow. Music was provided by a piano on the balcony. Mr. Strasburg was a German and he was assisted by his sister, Mrs. Hyde. I remember her son Eric, who was younger than I but attended there too.

I was not a natural dancer and Mother thought it would be good for me. She was right, and I was very glad later that I could dance. My brother Harry started earlier than I and was attending when I first started. We didn't dance together much. He was not a natural dancer either, and he preferred to dance with someone who was better at it than I. He stopped after a year and I kept it up alone. Some of the others from Dearborn attended, too. Edwin, who was eventually to become my husband, did for about a year.

Most of the students were from Detroit of course. There were quite a few in my class -- two lines along the length of a good-sized ballroom. Small children had a special class on Saturday mornings. Some of those that I played around with there were the O'Briens -- two William O'Briens (cousins), Irene and Adelaide O'Brien, Laurence Crawford, and a Marguerite whose last name I have forgotten.

In the middle of the year and again in May, at the end, we would have parties. We dressed up especially for these. Sometimes they were fancy dress parties. I remember one dress Mother made for me of China Silk. She sewed by hand strips of red and white silk together and made the body of the dress. Then she made a little blue jacket with white stars and embroidered around the stars. Once I got into high school, I didn't have time for dancing school, but I had a good foundation in dancing.