Читать книгу Old Rail Fence Corners - Various - Страница 19

Mrs. Silas Farnham says: I came to St. Anthony in 1849. My husband had a little storehouse for supplies for the woods, across from our home on the corner of Third Avenue and Second Street, Southeast. A school house was much needed so they cleared this out and Miss Backus taught the first school there. It was also used for Methodist preachin'. Our first aid society was held there in '49.

I well remember the first Fourth of July celebration in 1849. The women found there was no flag so knew one must be made. They procured the materials from Fort Snelling and the flag was made in Mrs. Godfrey's house. Those working on it were Mrs. Caleb Dorr, Mrs. Lucien Parker, Misses Julia and Margaret Farnham, Mrs. Godfrey and myself. I cut all the stars. Mr. William Marshall who had a small general store was orator and no one could do better. That reminds me of that little store. I just thought I'd laugh out loud the first time I went in there. There were packs of furs, all kinds of Indian work, hats and caps, tallow dips and more elegant candles, a beautiful piece of delaine for white women and shoddy bright stuff for the squaws, a barrel of rounds of pork most used up, but no flour, that was all gone. There was a man's shawl, too, kind of draped up. You know men wore shawls in them days; some hulled corn the Indians done, too, I saw. But to return to that first Fourth—it seemed a good deal like a Farnham Fourth, for the music which was just soul stirrin' was sung by them and the Gould boys. When the Farnhams all got out, it made a pretty big crowd for them days. Perhaps their voices wan't what you call trained, but they had melody. Seems to me nowadays some of the trained high-falutin' voices has just got that left out. Seems so to me—seems so. All the Farnhams just sung natural, just like birds. Old Doctor Kingsley played the bass viol so it was soul stirrin' too. Margaret Farnham, the president of our first aid society married a Hildreth—Julia a Dickerson.

In '49 my husband paid a ten cent shin plaster for three little apples no bigger than crabs. I tried to make these last a long time by just taking a bite now and then, but of course, they couldn't hold out forever.

The Indians was always around, but we never minded them—always lookin' in the windows.