New Year Calling

Tuesday, December 30, 2014

New Year “calling” was like speed dating in the 19^th century.    

The custom, which is thought to have been brought to America by the Dutch, involved gentlemen visiting the homes of as many ladies as possible on New Year’s Day.  

Calling Card Tray

Ladies would announce that they would be receiving callers or it would simply be assumed so.  The women would get all gussied up.  The men would, too.  In gloves and ties, men came bearing calling cards (about the size of a playing card) which they carried in ample supply in the breast pocket of their coats.  Men would present their card or leave it in a basket or tray at each lady’s door. 

A lady’s door was open to any man of presentable appearance--acquaintance or stranger.  For the man, a sort of mad dash from home to home ensued.  A quick introduction or greeting at the door was followed by eating and perhaps downing a glass of wine, sharing a hearty wish for a happy New Year, and shaking hands.  Then the gentleman was out the door and on his way to the home of the next lady. 

It was the calling cards that ladies vied for.  While the men sought to visit the most women, the ladies wanted to collect the most calling cards.

There was a ritual to follow with calling cards.  If the lady desired to formally visit with a gentleman again, she would send a card in return.  If no card was sent or his card was returned in an envelope, this was a signal that the lady did not wish for a personal visit.  It was the 1800s equivalent of failing to accept a friend request on Facebook.    

   

By 1900, the practice was out of vogue.  The Algoma Press in December 1899 reported that New Year calling had pretty much died out.   The newspaper relayed that in places like New York it was already going extinct by the 1880s. 

Today, while it might be ludicrous to open one’s home to strangers for New Year calling, perhaps the distinctive and mannerly art of presenting a calling card might be a custom worth resurrecting. 

Calling card photos are from “The Gentleman’s Guide to the Calling Card” and “Days of Elegance” websites. 

Just the Way She Likes It

Wednesday, December 24, 2014

“It’s just the way I like it,” she says.

The “it” Arlene Jadin refers to is the home she has lived in for nearly 65 years.

“I’ve only lived in two houses in my lifetime,” she explains.  “I moved from my mother’s to my mother-in-law’s home when I got married in 1949.”

 

She lives in the farmhouse she shared with her husband, Darrell, their five daughters and one son.  Now, it is a welcoming place for her many friends and relatives.  It is also home to an eclectic variety of handmade decorations which are the result of Arlene’s many hobbies.

 

Outside, her yard hints at the crafty nature of the homeowner.  In the side yard, Santa drives a big, horse drawn wagon carrying a Christmas tree.  A ceramic raccoon peaks out from the corner of one of her farm buildings.  Mary and Joseph are nestled in a crèche near the front door of the house.  A windmill is adjacent to the driveway.

Step inside the 110-year-old farmhouse in Thiry Daems in rural Kewaunee County to see how Arlene has brought the outside in. The south facing sun porch is perfect for reading the newspaper and relaxing.  A canopy of many little birdhouses--no two alike--hangs overhead, stemming from a tree mural painted up the wall that spreads across the ceiling.  A beautiful, lush fern and other greenery give an impression of sitting in a park on a summer’s day.  Fairy gardens are tucked beside a tree covered with ornaments she made with colorful pheasant feathers.  No cats are allowed in her home because Arlene says her house is “for the birds.”   

Further inside, the scope of Arlene’s many hobbies and interests becomes obvious.  Featuring the home’s original wood floor, her Victorian parlor is filled with period-inspired furnishings.  On a wall, she displays treasured, old wedding photos honoring her family’s ancestors.  Using her 30+ years of experience as a bridal shop seamstress, she has fashioned beautiful miniature replicas of the wedding dresses worn by the women in the photographs.  Dolls on the fireplace mantle wear the tiny bridal garments she made of scrap fabric and lace—of her mother, mother-in-law and grandmother.  

In the same room, a store mannequin has been re-purposed.  “She had broken fingers and was going to the junk,” Arlene says, “so I brought her home, fixed her hand and dressed her up.”   Parts of an artificial Christmas tree form her dress and parasol.  Handmade ornaments adorn her skirt.  Glass and crystal icicles hang from her umbrella.  The resulting Victorian lady can only be described as stunning.

Where does Arlene get her unique decorating ideas?  She says she always enjoyed shopping—especially in Door County.  Over the years, when she didn’t have the money to buy everything she liked, she would sketch what she saw.  “I knew I could recreate it myself!” she exclaims. 

Obviously, she can!  Arlene has so many talents and interests.  She: has milked cows in the morning and again at night; can source organic meals from her farmland—from potatoes and carrots to rabbits--and tops off the dinners with homemade apple pie; refurbished the home’s original floors and furniture; paints and wallpapers; makes jam for gifts from the myriad variety of fruits she grows, and; has created a house full of the most unique décor imaginable. 

Furthermore, she’s eager to use her new toy--an ATV--to run through the woods.  She has a bottle of wine reserved for the first occasion.  “I’ll christen it with holy water,” she says, grinning.  “The wine is for drinking later.”

Arlene has plenty of friends and family with whom she shares her lovely country home.  Her kitchen table is ready to welcome guests, fully extended with all of its leaves.  She is set to host her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren for a meal or up to ten guests each Sunday evening when friends gather there to play cards.  The card game of choice is a Belgian one pronounced 'Coo-you', she explains, “It's like Sheepshead but easier to play.”

Arlene says she’s a “fun-loving people person,” so the house is often full and noisy.  But, it is quiet sometimes, too.  “I have lots of friends to do something with, but I have nobody to do nothing with,” she adds.  “That’s okay, too.  That’s just the way it is and I like it.”      

My thanks to Arlene Jadin for the opportunity to interview her and visit her home.       

Jingle Bells

Monday, December 15, 2014

In 1857, when James Lord Pierpont wrote the song “One Horse Open Sleigh,” (more well-known as “Jingle Bells”) he did not neglect to include a common sleigh ride experience in the lyrics.  He wrote, “The horse was lean and lank, misfortune seemed his lot, he got into a drifted bank, and then we got upsot.”  Because, sleigh rides often ended with the sleigh “upsot.”  A lot.

Sleigh rides and sleigh ride parties were very popular in the 1800s and early 1900s.   Sometimes they were arranged by school groups, sometimes by friends and sometimes by church groups like the Ladies Aid of the Methodist Church.  The destination might be a winter picnic with a roaring bonfire, a friend’s home for an evening of entertainment or a dance hall for a party.

Who wouldn’t look forward to a lovely sleigh ride? Imagine the scene… The year is 1900. A jolly group is on a sleigh party, riding through the woods. The air is fresh and fragrant with the scent of pine and cedar trees. Snow sparkles like diamonds and covers the landscape. Horses, with harnesses laden with jingle bells, pull the sleigh. As the sled’s runners glide through the snow, friends are cuddled up under warm blankets and furs, giggling and singing...

 “Dashing through the snow, in a one-horse open sleigh, o’er the fields we go, laughing all the way, bells on bobtail ring, making spirits bright, what fun it is to ride and sing a sleighing song tonight!”

  

But, a sleigh ride was not for the unprepared; misfortune often befell the riders.

For example, in the winter of 1901, Miss Clara Bottkol of Euren invited 30 young people for a sleigh ride to her home.  She served an elegant supper followed by games and other entertainment which lasted until a few hours before midnight.  Then, her guests loaded the sleighs for the ride home.  Sledding conditions were poor on the return trip and the drivers had to follow the ditches to prevent the sleighs from tipping.  They had several near upsets.  The group finally arrived home, in time for breakfast. 

When Mr. Louis Kammer took a bunch out for a sleigh ride in December 1916, all went well until they reached Stony Creek.  That’s where Louis spilled the riders into a ditch.  Reportedly, no bones were broken.

  

And, a party of young folks from Sturgeon Bay rode to Ahnapee one cold night in January 1893.  On the way home, the cutter holding the gentleman and two ladies was upset in a snow drift a few miles from town.  Their horse ran home leaving the riders stranded.  Rescuers happened to see the horse and set out to bring the people home.  But, they too got upset and their horses returned to the stables, leaving the rescuers stranded, as well.  They all had to walk in the cold that night to find another team to hire to take them home. 

So, oh what fun it was to ride, unless the sleigh got “upsot!”

Pierpont’s “Jingle Bells,” with a few revised lyrics, became one of the most well-known holiday carols.  Perhaps the song resonated with so many people who: loved to take sleigh rides, liked to hold sleigh ride parties or had their own sleigh ride misadventures to tell. 

Shirley VerBruggen wishes you safe travels in your sleighs.  Enjoy Pierpont's song here.


Graphics are from Google.com .

Snake Oil Salesmen and Tippecanoe Too

Sunday, December 7, 2014

Got gout?  How about cough due to cold, convulsions, nervous prostration, brain worry, blood sores, or St. Vitus Dance (jerky movements of face or hands)?  If one suffered from any of these maladies in the 1880s there was sure to be a snake oil salesman ready to provide a cure.  Pages of old newspapers are filled with ads and testimonials for miracle cures for all sorts of ailments.

   

Readers were led to believe that Allen’s Lung Balsam cured a mother of consumption (TB).  Another testimonial claimed a severe case of bronchitis--one that had existed for twelve years--was cured by the Balsam.

 

Coughs, colds, croup?  There was a remedy fit for the whole family.  Always touted to be harmless to the most delicate child and containing no opium in any form, these bogus “medicines” were supposedly “recommended by physicians, ministers, and nurses.”  In fact, they were recommended by everyone who had given several bottles a good trial.  “Never failed to bring relief!” they claimed. 

    

Ailments you never hear of today could be cured with a good tonic.  Be it Scrofula, Kings Evil, Ugly Blood Disease, Catarrh, or Nervous Weakness, for $1.50 per bottle, the Dr. S. A. Richmond Medical Company would cure what ails.  Sold at all druggists! 

Apparently, a physician’s testimony was presumed to be very persuasive in an advertisement because the ads almost always touted an M.D.’s recommendation.  For instance, Dr. P. C. Ballou, of Monkton, Vermont, endorsed Kidney Wort as the sure cure for liver complaints, constipation, piles, and blood diseases. 

Cleanse the blood, strengthen the kidneys.  Rid the liver of all disease!  Bowels were sure to move freely and healthfully with another remedy, this one liquid or dry.  One such patented remedy was a vegetable concoction called Craig’s Original Kidney Cure.  Later the formula and rights were sold and the concoction was renamed Warner’s Safe Kidney & Liver Cure. 

Dr. Root’s ad claimed, “I CURE FITS!”  Root wrote, “When I say cure I do not mean merely to stop them for a time and then have them return…I mean a radical cure.”  A free trial bottle was available by mail order. 

Dr. Slocum of New York would send two bottles of his unnamed consumption elixir for trial along with a valuable treatise on the disease. 

B. M. Wooley, M.D. of Atlanta, Georgia, could cure opium and whisky (sic) habits at home without pain.  A book of particulars was available by mail from his address.

St. Jacob’s Oil, “The Great German Remedy for Pain,” claimed relief of everything from burns to frostbite, backache to toothache, swelling, scalds, sprains, and sciatica.  Bruises, too. 

At least those claims were billed as advertisements.  A more cunning sales approach was taken by Hulbert Harrington Warner (of Warner’s Safe Kidney & Liver Cure fame as mentioned above).  H. H. Warner was a businessman who made a fortune selling patent medicine and later lost his fortune in risky speculation.  One of his patented tonics was H. H. Warner & Company’s Tippecanoe.

Tippecanoe was peddled in a newspaper article which was not labeled as an advertisement.  A. G. Richards, M.D. of Boston, Massachusetts wrote in a Kewaunee County newspaper in 1884 that he was in possession of a truth, a revelation of “inestimable value.”  He related a story of his years of suffering from a sluggish brain and a “certain falling off in…natural intellectual acuteness, activity and vigor.”  He tried everything he could think of and ultimately sought help from a fellow physician who prescribed a bottle of tonic.  It provided no relief.   

His neuralgic pain caused him agony, his muscles were sore, his bowels were constipated.  There were no prospects for recovery.  Even the advice of yet another doctor to take five to ten drops of Magende’s solution of morphine two or three times a day didn’t do the trick nor did a blue pill to relieve constipation.  He had sleepless nights and irregular heartbeats.  He lived for days on rice water and gruel; his digestive function was destroyed. 

He became hypochondriacal and bent on self-destruction.  To snap himself out of it, he decided to take a trip to Europe.  He returned, still ill, and filled with no hope of ever again being able to leave his home.

Then, he was visited by a friend who had been similarly afflicted.  The friend told of his own remarkable restoration to perfect health.  To make a long story short, it was H. H. Warner and Co.’s Tippecanoe elixir that miraculously cured what ailed him.  After several bottles of Tippecanoe, Dr. Richards was brought back from the depths of debility.  He was cured!  Thereafter, he declared Tippecanoe to be overwhelmingly superior to all other tonics, bitters, and dyspepsia cures of the day.

Of course, the article made no mention that the product was about 99% rum.

Eventually the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906 was enacted to limit the excessive claims of patent medicine swindlers, preventing the manufacture and sale of deleterious foods, drugs, medicines, and liquors and their trafficking.  The Act required bottle labels to indicate their contents.    

Mother Schuenemann’s Family Tradition

Monday, December 1, 2014

For many years after the death of her husband, the Christmas Tree Queen of Chicago and her children kept the business and tradition alive.

Mrs. Barbara Schuenemann was the widow of veteran Christmas tree ship captain Herman E. Schuenemann, “Captain Santa.”  The captain and his crew lost their lives off the shore of Kewaunee when his 123 foot, 205 ton, three-masted schooner Rouse Simmons was sunk during a November 1912 snow storm while taking a cargo of Christmas trees to Chicago.

Mrs. Schuenemann carried on the family business and tradition.  The hearty German-born Barbara Schindel Schuenemann worked with her three young daughters: Elsie and twins Hazel and Pearl.  One daughter lived in Chicago to handle the sales and the other two helped the Christmas Tree Queen find the spruce, pine, and fir trees in the woods of Michigan and Wisconsin.  The widow and her children were committed to continuing in their husband and father’s memory.  Elsie, quoted in the “Milwaukee Journal” newspaper said, “Daddy stuck to his ship and we’re going to stick to the ship, too!  Our monument to him will be to carry on, as he would have done it…we have helped father all our lives, and we know the ropes.”   

The first year after her husband’s death, Mrs. Schuenemann toughed it out for eight weeks in the Michigan woods with a gang of lumberjacks.  That year she sent the trees by rail including five believed to be among the largest ever shipped to Chicago, one of which was a 36 foot tall tree for the municipal Christmas tree celebration at Grant Park.  Elsie, meanwhile, worked in the freight yards, walking among the cars, overseeing the men unloading the Christmas trees her mother had shipped. 

In the early days, in Chicago, several ships often delivered trees during the holiday season.  As early as 1875 or 1876 ship captains like Herman’s brother, August Schuenemann, took a load of Christmas trees to Chicago in the William H. Hinsdale and Ahnapee’s one-armed Captain John McDonald brought a cargo of trees in the scow-schooner Lady Ellen.  Trees were sold right out of the ships’ berths.  They would dock at Clark Street and, with lights strung from the bow to stern, customers were welcomed aboard to select their tree.  In addition to trees, the Schuenemanns sold wreaths and garlands which Barbara and her daughters helped to make.

“Every year I shall go to the northwoods,” Mrs. Schuenemann promised.  And she did.  Barbara and the girls shipped trees by rail or schooner.  If they were sent by rail, they would sell them from a docked ship.  Four years after her husband’s death, Barbara chartered a new schooner, Fearless, from Schoolcraft County, Michigan but by 1925, the trees were brought by freight cars to the family’s warehouse and no longer sold from ships on the docks.   

Daughter Elsie Schuenemann 1915

 “…After I am dead there will be others to carry on the work,” Barbara promised.  And there were.  At her death in 1933, Barbara Schuenemann’s pastor said that the sudden death of “Mother Schuenemann” brought much sorrow to the people of Chicago who loved her because of her devotion to the children at Christmastime when she brought the Christmas trees to them.  She was known and loved by hundreds of thousands throughout the metropolis.  After Barbara’s death, her daughter, Mrs. Elsie Scheunemann Roberts, and Elsie’s son carried on the tradition and continued to sell trees from the family’s lot. 

Shirley VerBruggen wishes “The County Times” and its readers a very Merry Christmas and happy holiday season filled with your own family traditions. 

The photo of Elsie is from google.com.

Celebrating Thanksgiving a Century Ago

Tuesday, November 11, 2014

There was a scarcity of turkeys in Kewaunee County in November 1916 and the price for a Thanksgiving bird was going up.  However, that wasn’t enough to put a damper on the holiday festivities nearly 100 years ago.

While newspapers had threatened a big increase, it turned out that customers would pay just one cent more per pound than the prior year’s price when they bought their Thanksgiving Day turkey.  Local butchers said that turkeys would sell for 25 cents per pound up from 24 cents the prior year.  ($0.25 in 1916 is worth about $5.66 today according to an online inflation calculator.)

The gobbler scarcity was not new.  The area had experienced a shortage of turkeys for several years.  More plentiful was the supply of ducks and geese.  Ducks cost 20 cents per pound; geese were 17 cents per pound—dressed weight.

Contrary to the problem experienced in 1916, there is no shortage of turkeys in my back yard this year!

 

The price of cranberries, another staple of the Thanksgiving dinner, was also up from the prior year.  Brey, Leishow and Company’s weekly grocery ad listed these bargains for Thanksgiving week:  cranberries for 10 cents and “extra good” bulk mincemeat for pie at 12 1/2 cents.    

The finest line of roasting pans “ever brought to (the) city” was offered for sale by F. W. Lidral’s store, “the home of good hardware,” to make a turkey that was sweeter and more juicy and tender. 

While the ladies planned the holiday meal, local firemen were busy preparing for the annual dance held on the night before Thanksgiving at the Perry Opera House.  The only person missing the preparations was Fire Chief Schmeling who had been absent for a week on a deer hunt.  Otherwise, plans for the dance were coming together beautifully without his direction and a “big time” was assured to all who would attend. 

Meanwhile, C. F. Schubich’s furniture store ran a Thanksgiving Special.  The store advertised that never before had they offered such a large, up-to-date variety of dining room furniture, buffets, and china closets. 

Thanksgiving, one newspaper ad stated, was “the day of good fellowship, enjoyable parties, excellent dinners and new clothes” and therefore the store offered a wide selection of women’s ready-to-wear for the lady who desired to be correctly dressed for the holiday.  Snappy suit and overcoat styles were in stock for men.  After all, “The matter of dress for the Thanksgiving season is of great importance; the parties call for new filmy dresses…; the automobile rides call for warm coats, the Thanksgiving church services call for new suits,” the ad proclaimed.          

Regardless which fowl, furniture, or frock customers planned to enjoy on the holiday, the shoppers had better procure their purchases by the day before Thanksgiving.  By agreement, the merchants had declared that their stores would be closed on Thanksgiving Day (as well as all day New Years, Memorial Day, Fourth of July, Labor Day, and Christmas).  First, however, they assured their patrons they would be open the evening before Thanksgiving Day to allow customers to “secure their needs.”

Despite the price increases, there was plenty to be thankful for on Thanksgiving Day in 1916.  While war was being waged in Europe at the time, peace and prosperity at home were cause for those in the county to count their blessings.  The Algoma newspaper declared that although there were higher prices to consider, the annual Thanksgiving dinner was still "possible" for the people of Kewaunee County. 

 

 

Shirley VerBruggen wishes her readers a joyous Thanksgiving Day filled with good health, happiness, and fun with family and friends.  Contact her at sverbruggen@new.rr.com

 

 

Rosie the Riveter

Tuesday, November 4, 2014

Lucy the Riveter

On Halloween this year, a couple of my favorite young relatives dressed up as Rosie the Riveter, the iconic WWII laborer who worked on critical jobs on the manufacturing line during the war.  "Rosie" is a compelling fictional character.  It’s important to consider how she came about and what she still symbolizes for women today.       

The “Women in War Jobs campaign” recruited women into the workplace during WWII.  It was a huge propaganda tool employed by the U.S. government.  The War Advertising Council targeted women already working, girls just out of high school, and ultimately married ladies in an attempt to get women into the workplace to fill important war production and civil service jobs.  The campaign was immensely successful. 

Behind the campaign were the ideas to use patriotism and fear to fill a need.  Workers were needed to fill critical jobs both for the war effort and the home front.  Women would help make the war come to an end sooner if they stepped up in the workplace while men were gone serving their patriotic duty.  Or, conversely, if women didn’t go to work, they might be viewed as slackers and more men would die if the war was prolonged.   

So, women met the call.  Six million more women were in the workforce in 1945 than in 1940 and they filled many previously male-dominated roles.  Although they did the same work, they earned about 65% less pay than the men who had done those jobs.  Women were also excluded from upper level positions.  A glass ceiling was firmly in place over their heads.      

J. Howard Miller's "Rosie"

Normal Rockwell, the famous illustrator, painted a version of Rosie, but the most well-known depiction was artist J. Howard Miller’s 1942 Westinghouse Electric and Manufacturing Company poster of the girl flexing her bicep wearing a polka-dot scarf on her head.  Rosie was portrayed as strong, confident, and feminine.  

Rosie, as the song “Rosie the Riveter” (released in 1943) said was “...part of the assembly line, she’s making history, working for victory, Rosie the Riveter.”  A riveter operated the riveting gun in the manufacturing line, often in defense related industries.  In actuality, while many women worked in manufacturing, few women really did any riveting. 

Marie Ver Bruggen Bastien

Some local women did work in similar jobs in the defense industry.  In 1944, at age 19, Marie Ver Bruggen was recruited to work at the Sturgeon Bay shipyard as a welder.  Her brother, Norbert Ver Bruggen, was just nine years old at the time but he remembers that there was a huge demand for women workers during the war, especially girls like his sister who grew up on farms and were hard workers.  He says the women didn’t need prior training; they were trained on the job.  Marie Ver Bruggen worked as a welder for about a year.  Her sister Audrea would have also been recruited but she was not yet old enough to hold a job.        

Although it seems as though she was, Rosie was not really a feminist icon.  When the soldiers came home from war, they took back the jobs and women were pressured into taking lower paying jobs, “women’s work”. 

However, once some women had become accustomed to the financial independence and personal satisfaction of their work, there was no turning back.  They opened the door for themselves, their daughters, and other women seeking advanced education and personal achievement to further pursuing paid work.

Ka, a modern day look for "Rosie"

Setting aside the origin of this saying (it was a slogan created for a cigarette brand), it’s true; “You’ve come a long way, baby” in so many ways.  But when it comes to pay, women still receive only 77% of men’s wages for the same work.  Seventy years after Rosie, young ladies dressed up in Halloween costumes remind us that we are locked in a time warp of wage inequality.  Getting equal pay for equal work remains a woman’s fight to achieve a value that is, simply put, the right thing to do.     

     

Monday, October 20, 2014

A crowd from Sturgeon Bay arrived on a special train one late Sunday morning in August, 1902.  They joined a large group already assembled in Algoma to say goodbye to a respected and beloved member of the community, Professor E. M. Phillips.

Elbert Merton Phillips, the principal at Algoma High School for the past seven years, had accepted a similar job in Oconto.  But, it was not a happy send-off to his new position that was cause for the farewell get together.  E. M. Phillips had died of typhoid pneumonia and those gathered were attending his funeral. 

Mr. Elbert M. Phillips was well known in Algoma and the northern part of the state as an able instructor and an ardent supporter of the Algoma Public Library.  He had taken his elementary course at the Oshkosh Normal school, taught in Auburndale, Ellis Junction, and Peshtigo, and then completed an advanced course and came to Algoma.  It was believed that he had contracted the disease while teaching a summer school program in Oshkosh.  At the time of his death, he had only been ill for a couple of weeks.  He was 33 years old when he died.       

Unfortunately, death by typhus was not a rare occurrence before water sanitation techniques existed and antibiotics were available to cure someone infected.  People attended many funerals in those days for typhoid victims. 

The concern recently over the potential for a widespread outbreak of the ebola virus must be put in context to the frequency in which otherwise healthy people contracted typhus and died within weeks just a century ago.  Essentially, isolation of the ill was the only method used to contain outbreaks.

Today, typhoid remains a common worldwide bacterial disease.  According to online sources, millions of people are infected each year.  About 200,000 of them die.  Typhoid is transmitted by ingestion of water or food that has been contaminated with the feces of a person infected with typhoid bacillus, salmonella typhi.  

The disease is usually curable.  People in North America and industrialized countries have a very low infection rate as they often acquire the disease only while traveling to developing countries.  Therefore there are a small number of typhoid carriers in every country including the U.S. each year.  They are contagious for a few days before any symptoms develop when, if they don’t wash their hands properly, they can transfer the illness to food or water and to another person or spread it directly person to person by contaminated hands.

 

The most famous typhus carrier in E. M. Phillips’ time was Mary Mallon.  “Typhoid Mary”, a cook in New York, was the first American carrier identified.  In 1907, she was associated with 53 cases and three deaths.  She was told to give up working as a cook or have her gall bladder removed.  Mary quit her job but returned later by another name.  She was held and quarantined after there was another typhoid outbreak.   After 26 years in quarantine she died of pneumonia.

It was only recently identified by a team of Stanford University researchers in a journal article published August 14, 2014 how Mary, who by all outward appearances looked perfectly healthy, could make so many people ill.   They theorize that the salmonella bacteria were able to wait out the body’s immune response before positioning themselves in cells where a protein called PPAR-delta allowed the salmonella to replicate itself inside macrophages and hack them.  

   

When the illness affected his lungs, Professor Phillips died of pneumonia.  He left behind a widow and a son who was just a year and a half old to mourn his death. 

As fate would have it, Mr. Phillips’ widow, Frances McDonald Phillips, met my great grandfather, Dr. James W. Tooley, and they were married two years later.  Were it not for the sad and untimely death of E. M. Phillips, I would not be. 

The Simon Hall Family Bible

Monday, October 6, 2014

Boxes in the basement, attic trunks, flea markets, garage sales, online auctions, long lost cousins, old aunties, or nooks and crannies of historical societies and museums offer a chance to find an elusive prize, an old family Bible.   

Simon Hall's Bible

Many years ago, above the rooms of a building purchased from the estate of Carl Melchior, Tony Woles, the owner of a local jewelry store, found an ancient family Bible with a rare surprise inside.  The Bible belonged to Simon and Desire Hall and tucked inside was the couple’s 1851 marriage certificate.  

  

Simon Hall came to Wolf River in 1854 having followed his older brother, Abraham, one of Algoma’s earliest settlers.  Abraham Hall owned a saw mill and the first mercantile (general store) in Kewaunee County.

The yellowed but well-preserved marriage certificate found in the Hall’s Bible reads:  “This certifies that Simon Hall of Fleming, and Miss D. D. Smith of West Lancing were by me united in holy matrimony on the eight day of January in the year of our Lord, 1851, in conformity with the laws of the State of New York and the Ordinance of God.”  It was signed “George Plumer, minister of the gospel.”

Simon and Desire (Desiah) Smith Hall were both born in New York state in 1826.  Hall brought his wife and family to Racine from New York.  In the fall of 1854, Simon Hall traveled to Kewaunee on the steamer “Fashion” and walked up the beach to Wolf River, now Algoma, to find his brother’s mill.    

Later that fall, Simon loaded his household furniture and his young wife and two small children on the schooner “Erie” at Racine and they sailed to Wolf River.  With no pier at the landing site, the family came ashore near the hill in a fishing boat manned by a Mr. Tweedale (possibly Edwin Tweedale, who was among the first handful of settlers in Wolf River).  Hall’s family goods were brought to their new home on a scow. 

 The Hall Bible, before it was found in an attic rummaged through by Mr. Woles, had belonged to May Elliott.  It was given to her by her “Sabbath teacher” Tweedale (maybe “M. J.” Mary Jane Tweedale).  It was likely left by May’s grandparents, Simon and Desire Hall, to their daughter, Sarah Hall Elliott, or to Tweedale, and ultimately gifted to her, Sarah’s daughter, Elsie May Elliott Boedecker.   

While this old hard-covered tome is a rare book, these ornate Bibles were popular with households in the mid-1800s for recording births, marriages, and deaths of generations of family members.  Now their record pages with lists of begets and begots, marriages, and deaths are historical gems for the lucky few who discover them.

Gifted to or purchased by couples at the time of their marriage, a family Bible would be used for ages, passed down from parents to surviving children, then grandchildren and great-grands to, hopefully, come to rest with descendants who cherish them or others who will keep them safe.

Family Bibles were the keepers of milestones.   Sometimes they were the keepers of the important documents like the Hall marriage certificate, too.  Simon Hall’s family Bible is on display today at the Jail Museum operated by the Kewaunee County Historical Society in Kewaunee. 

     

 

Not Teaching by the Test

Sunday, September 14, 2014

In 1873, if you were interested in becoming a rural school teacher, you need only show up on the appointed date and time with a sharp pencil to take a test to qualify. 

The earliest schools were usually arrangements whereby several families hired a teacher to educate their children.  When the kids in other nearby families started attending, the next year it might become a public school. 

Before 1907, there was no provision to train teachers for the rural schools of Door or Kewaunee County.  Citizens recognized that prosperity would come with good public institutions of learning.  And, because half of all Kewaunee County teachers came directly out of Algoma and Kewaunee High Schools with no additional preparation to teach, the community was prompted to act by a serious shortage of teachers.  A teacher training program was sorely needed and the Door County Board of Supervisors passed a resolution to establish a school. 

Algoma, being the most centrally located city of Door and Kewaunee counties was chosen as the location for the new County Training School.  The fact that Algoma also had railroad service, which was the only dependable means of transportation at the time, was also a contributing factor in the decision.

 Class of 1908-1909

The teacher training school opened on August 31, 1908 with 52 students admitted; nine were turned away.  It was held in the second floor of the west and south wings of the oldest part of Algoma High School.  Tuition was free to residents of Door and Kewaunee counties.

Once upon a time people believed that educating rural children in “the three Rs”--reading, writing, and arithmetic--should prepare students for a single purpose, namely, to make farming their life’s work.  To fulfill this objective, the county training school was expected to prepare high school graduates to become efficient teachers in rural elementary schools.

Work in the first year of training was “academic” focusing on reading, writing, arithmetic, language, and spelling.  Professional skills were acquired by those who attended the training school for a second year.  Subjects in the second year included instruction on the theory of teaching and school management.  Student teachers received ten weeks of practice teaching at the public schools.  Second year academic subjects included topics such as Geography; Algebra; American History; Grammar and Composition; and Literature.  Additionally, the rural teacher needed to understand rural life so the curriculum included study in Agriculture.        

A couple years after the school opened, Door and Kewaunee Counties purchased a lot on the corner of Fremont and Fourth Street as a new site.  An existing building on the lot was previously a Baptist Church and then a hotel.  It was remodeled for the 1912-1913 school year.

The County Training School became the County Rural Normal School in 1923 and then the County Normal School from 1927 to 1954.  (In 1938, the classroom building was destroyed by fire and a new Door Kewaunee Normal School was built in 1940.)  The term “Normal” referred to a school that was usually state supported that offered a professional course for the training of teachers.

School Dormitory

Before 1925, women students who required room and board were housed in a building next to the training school.  In 1924, plans were drawn for a new $30,000 school dormitory for women students for occupancy beginning in the fall of 1925.  With rooms that could be decorated to suit the students’ tastes, the building also had a dining room and lounge.  It was described as “Not ostentatious, but charming…” with a beautiful, natural setting on Fremont Street.  Mrs. Lillian (Arle) McDonald was named the first house matron of the Door Kewaunee Normal School.  Her role was one of friend and mentor to the women students, administrator, and perhaps disciplinarian, as needed.

As time went on, it was recognized that the art of teaching required more preparation than the Normal School offered in a one or two year program.  The state reduced support for normal schools and, as of 1961, graduates of county colleges were required to obtain four year degrees within seven years after graduating from a two year course. 

Ultimately, the Wisconsin Legislature determined that no certificate or license to teach in any public school could be issued unless the applicant possessed a bachelor’s degree with professional training as required by the state superintendent. 

Beginning in 1955 and through 1972, the training school was called the County Teachers College.  When the 1971-1973 Wisconsin Budget Bill eliminated all state support for county colleges, the school closed.  In May 1972, the school property and textbooks were liquidated and teachers in training were steered to attend four year schools which would qualify them to get city school teaching jobs. 

Today, public school teaching in Wisconsin requires a minimum of a bachelor’s degree, appropriate certification in the subject matter, and continuing education to recertify to keep a teaching license.  Many educators acquire a master’s or doctorate degree to keep their skills at a level that provides them the knowledge and ability to not only teach the curriculum but to:  effectively manage classrooms in an environment of constantly changing technology, differentiate instruction to meet the various learning style preferences of students, support children with a wide range of cognitive and emotional special needs, prepare students for an endless variety of eventual careers paths, and coach sports or facilitate a myriad of extracurricular school activities. 

We should truly appreciate our children’s teachers.  They do so much more than show up to take a test--or, to teach to one.   

 Photos from "Algoma Record-Herald" and "Monograph of Door Kewaunee County Teachers College" available at Kewaunee County Historical Society Research Center.

A Mother's Labor Day

Saturday, September 6, 2014

“Labor Day” takes on a whole different meaning when talking about the day a mother gives birth.  Over time, a medical approach to labor and delivery has developed which has dramatically changed the natural process of pregnancy and childbirth.    

  

In the pioneer days of Kewaunee County, women attended to the birth needs of expectant mothers.  Although medical schools proliferated in the east coast states after the War of 1812, there were few doctors in early Ahnepee and it was considered indecent by some for men to attend to women.  Childbirth was often faced with fear of death for both mother and child.

With the arrival of trained doctors, there was a shift among the urban middle class from using midwives to using doctors to attend to delivery.  However, that was not the norm for the rural poor of Kewaunee County. 

While midwives had been perfecting their craft and observing sanitation for hundreds of years, physicians unwittingly sometimes perpetuated deadly childbed fever.  Lack of hand washing between medical procedures was a leading cause of maternal death before Louis Pasteur identified the Germ Theory of Disease which called to light that bacteria and lack of sanitation were the main cause of puerperal fever.

       

By the late 1800s physicians were becoming more integrated into society and prejudice against the intelligence and capability of women was used to defame midwifery.  Midwives were not organized or in a position of power.  Doctors didn’t earn a lot of money but midwives made even less and were not considered professionals.  As a result, doctors began to take over about 50% of the nation’s births by 1900 and midwives were relegated to caring for women who could not afford a doctor.

Obstetric anesthesia became available around 1914.  Women sought to reduce childbirth pain.  Ether had been used as early as 1848 in Boston, but many women still suffered through the pains of childbirth.  Receiving chloroform during labor and delivery had become a status symbol long before, after it was used by England’s Queen Victoria.  In 1914, upper-class women in the eastern U.S. formed Twilight Sleep Societies.  The practice of Twilight Sleep, which involved using a combination of morphine for pain relief and scopolamine, an amnesiac which caused women to have no memories of giving birth, became a symbol of medical progress.  Ankle and wrist restraints were part of the process to keep women from injuring themselves under the influence of Twilight Sleep.    Only later were the negative effects for mother and baby publicized.

    

By 1920, midwives were still attending 20-40 percent of all births in many cities, sometimes practicing illegally where laws were passed to limit or eliminate their use.  Less than 5% of women gave birth in hospitals before that time. 

    

During the 1920s, doctors were being trained to aggressively treat women during the so-called pathologic process of childbirth.  Doctors took active control over labor and delivery.  Specialist obstetricians sedated women at labor’s onset, gave ether during the pushing stage, cut an episiotomy, delivered with forceps, then extracted the placenta, and gave medications for uterus contraction and episiotomy repair.  Between 1915 and 1929, infant mortality from birth injuries increased 40-50 percent.  These active interventions came to be routine by the 1930s when the American Board of Obstetricians and Gynecology was created.  To some degree American obstetrics is still under this medical paradigm but, fortunately, many people now question practices that have no medical necessity. 

    

Between 1921 and 1939, 30-50% of women (and 75% of urban women) gave birth in hospitals with the remaining women receiving home delivery care from midwives or doctors. 

Dr. Herbert V. Foshion

The transition of home to hospital birthing can be illustrated by the medical practice of Algoma’s doctor Herbert V. Foshion.  Dr. Foshion earned his Bachelor of Medicine degree after WW I and returned to Algoma to practice.  He and his wife Pearl were a home birthing team.

The couple made childbirth delivery visits throughout the county.  Pearl assisted by washing the newborn baby with cotton swabs and olive oil and later in Ivory soap while the doctor attended to the mother.  Mrs. Foshion filled out the birth certificate and cared for the newborn’s siblings.  Dr. Foshion charged $10 for a home delivery in the 1930s.   

Dr. Foshion recognized the need for a local hospital and established a small 10-bed operation—the first hospital in Algoma.  It essentially eliminated home visits for births among his patients.  After that time, most women were attracted to hospital birth which could help provide a more pain free experience than at home. 

Algoma Hospital

The 1950s gave rise to many developments in childbirth. By then, 88% of births occurred in hospitals.  The American College of Nurse Midwives was formed in the mid-1950s as was the La Leche League, the breastfeeding support organization.  Dr. Fernand Lamaze’s findings about childbirth preparation and pain management during labor and delivery were introduced to American women in the late 1950s.

Treating pregnancy and delivery as a medical condition rather than a normal life process has continued to evolve to create high levels of pricey physician intervention and even pricier hospital services.  Consider the number of women who undergo ultrasound exams to create sonograms today, the non-medically necessary cesarean deliveries performed, and the frequency of induced labor versus just a few decades ago.  The existence of medical insurance and availability of medical care, hospitals and their expensive medical equipment, medical malpractice liability costs for doctors, in addition to patient demand for services, all contribute to the current state of high intensity pregnancy and delivery care.      

Childbirth has not always been viewed as a peaceful experience but years of successful and failed practices have hopefully provided wisdom to the practitioners and helped eliminate the fear of labor and delivery for moms to be.  Yet, there is still work to be done to make Labor Day the best, natural, and safest experience possible for mothers and their babies.          

Circus Man

Monday, August 25, 2014

Andy McDonald was a showman.  He made his living as an Ahnepee storekeeper for a few years but show business was his true calling.  Local newspaper advertisements list Andy, in 1870, in the Ahnepee Dramatic Club, acting in plays at the Opera House.  As the troupe manager, Andy often performed on stage as one of his favorite characters.  

Andrew McDonald had big dreams.  He left home and the Ahnepee stage and moved to Chicago.  Andy McDonald ran away to join the circus. 

One of Andrew’s earliest forays into the world of the circus was a job as traveling agent for “Yankee” Robinson’s midwest circus.  Fayette Loadwick “Yankee” Robinson’s circus had a forty horse “Golden Swan Chariot”.  Robinson rode astride a speckled horse carrying a gold-headed cane in a mile long procession.  Robinson’s circus had a camel and a small elephant that showed “great agility” and some twenty cages in its menagerie.  During the circus season, in Chicago, huge crowds would fill the circus tents on the Lake Shore at Randolf Street. 

In the 1870s, the circus was by far the most popular form of entertainment in America.  “P. T.”  Phineas Taylor Barnum and James Anthony Bailey, ringmaster, were the best known names in the circus world.  Barnum was actually a museum owner and never owned a circus of his own.  He worked with many co-owners and marketed and produced the most popular circuses. 

Barnum was persuaded by a man named Dan Costello to use Barnum’s name for Costello’s circus.  Costello (or Castello) had earned a reputation as a dancing clown and was at one time a partner of Yankee Robinson.  Barnum and Costello formed a traveling combination show that was part museum, part animal exhibition, and part human oddities show (later known as the sideshow).  Andy McDonald became assistant manager of Barnum and Costello’s Great Combination Show.   

In 1871, the “Green Bay Advocate” newspaper mentioned that Andrew McDonald had been hired to travel in advance of Barnum’s Great Show.  He was to make arrangements for its advertising and movement.

     

As the advance man, Andy McDonald would come to town before the circus to distribute billboards and other advertising, to hang banners, and to publicize the show.  He would check on contracts, arrange for feed for the circus animals, and confirm all of the other details of running an involved operation like a circus. 

In addition to promoting the circuses, Andrew managed his own act.  An article from 1879 described the exciting races Andy McDonald held at the state fair in Minnesota.  Andrew ran Roman chariots.  As a charioteer, he had two chariots drawn by four black and four white horses described as Kentucky racers.  A lady drove one of the spirited teams and a man the other.  The horses were so wild that they could not be driven on ordinary roads.  Several men had to hold them until they were brought on the track and the drivers were placed in the chariots.  The horses ran a half-mile dash in 57 seconds. 

Andy was a circus man through the 1870s and 1880s.  He eventually left the demanding life of the circus.  In June of 1900, at age 64, then a carriage blacksmith, Andy lived with Addie, his wife of 31 years, in Chicago.  He died in 1903.

Both Robinson and Costello’s circuses went belly up as did so many others.  Barnum joined Bailey’s Great Show which ultimately merged with Ringling Bros. of Baraboo, Wisconsin to form the most enduring circus of the 20th century--Ringling Bros. and Barnum and Bailey Circus.