The Old Cookbook

30 years ago, as a new bride, I got this Betty Crocker cookbook from my dear Aunt Mabel. It was my first cookbook, and I consulted it frequently over the years, always thinking of her when I used it.  It was not only myself using it, but my children and grandchildren learned to cook with this book open on the countertop.  It is missing the front cover, pages are warped from being wet, and the pages with the best recipes have little bits of this and that stuck to the paper.  Here and there, pages are torn from over-anxious children wanting to see what goodies were on the next page. 

Someday, when I’ve gone on to a better place, someone will be going through my belongings here on this earth.  They’ll find this old cookbook and wonder why I still have it.  “Was she unable to afford a new one?” they might ask.  But little will they know, it’s this one that’s priceless.

Nicolai Knutz - Looking for a Better Life

This blog post was inspired by Amy Johnson Crow 's "52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks" challenge.  Learn more at her blog.

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Franken  and Nicholas Knutz
[photo courtesy of Mabel Seigenthaler]

After 16 days aboard the Amalfi, the Port of New York must have looked good to Nicolai Knutz.  With his wife, Franken, and children Andreas, Georg, Hannchen, Boye Friedrich, Nicolai Jr., Wilhelm and Anna, they set out from their home in Tatting, Schleswig-Holstein, Germany, for Missouri.  Life had been hard for them in Tatting, and Franken's brother Boie Nissen had come to America two years prior, and said the future held more promise than in Germany.  So Nicolai sold the family's meager home to the city, getting enough money to pay for their passage on the ship and get them to St. Louis.

The small house south of Sedlia, Missouri, where the Knutzes raised their family.
[photo courtesy of Mabel Seigenthaler]

Once they made their way to Missouri, they settled on 40 acres of land in Pettis county, about 5 miles south of Sedalia, where they grew vegetables to sell.  They lived in a small house with their seven children.

My grandfather, who was their grandson, met Nicholas and Franken once, as a small child when his family make the long journey from South Dakota to Missouri.   He remembered Nicholas as "seeming like a giant" and having coal black hair and a red, brush-like mustache.  While he did not remember his grandmother at all, his younger sister remembered that Franken would hand-piece quilts for them, which helped greatly during the harsh South Dakota winters.

Nicholas died in January of 1925 at his home, a result of chronic kidney problems.  Franken died in October of 1933, also at her home, from complications of cancer.  They are both buried at Crown Hill Cemetery in Sedalia.

Many of us have one - an ancestor who was a stinker, put quite frankly.  And this can be quite a can of worms when writing and documenting our family histories.

I descend from William Nickerson, a fellow who gave the colonial government quite a run for their money back in the 1600s, and was well-documented for it.   There are amply written, unbiased sources documenting his behaviors and punishments, and it's a part of who he was.  He poses no problem for me in writing the family history - he was a character, and his own person, and no one is likely to be offended by what I write about him.

Then there's Aunt L.  She's not so far back in history, having departed this life not quite 30 years ago.  Many in the family still remember her.  She left no descendants that might be more easily offended than the rest of us.  But still, how exactly do I handle her in the family history?

She was my grandfather's aunt, and out of his own mouth come the memories of her locking he and is brothers in a dark closet and terrorizing them, and calling them names, because she hated their father.   Or all of the Christmases that the girls got gifts and the boys got nothing. One of her nieces has less than fond memories of her as well, saying that she tried to cheat their mother out of anything that she could, be it family heirlooms, inheritance, or their brother's insurance money.

My own memories are much tamer, but then, Auntie was quite a bit older by the time I knew her.  Once a year, at Christmas, we would gather at her house for a Christmas dessert and open small gifts.  She got out the family china, and spent time trying to tell us about her father and mother, and trying to show a largely (unfortunately) uninterested bunch of people about the family history.  No one, including me, seemed to care at the time.  Under that tame exterior, though, still lurked the same anger and temper that she had as a young woman.

After a bad fall, she ended up having to go into a nursing home.  She was furious.  And it was my grandfather, the same little boy she terrorized as a child, who looked after her.  He and my grandmother went to her house those last few years she lived there, and mowed the lawn, took her shopping, helped her clean, and visited with her... and in the nursing home, they went out twice a week to see her.   One particular week, they took me with them.  I was standing in the doorway when Auntie L., in a fit of rage, suddenly kicked her trash can violently out into the hallway. Two older gentlemen with walkers were approaching when the projectile shot out of her room, ricocheted on the opposite wall and came to rest in the middle of the hall.  Without missing a beat, one of them said, "Well, looks like another one kicked the bucket!"  Nursing home humor... not a great situation, but it has ended up being one of my favorite memories of Aunt L.  It was so very... her.

So, do we try to leave future generations with positive impressions of their departed family members, or do we do our best to capture them as they were, warts and all?  Should the wishes of other family members be taken into consideration, and if so, to what extent?  Do we, as family historians, respect truth, or respect the dead?  Is there a way to to both?

My Second Favorite Thing to do with my Ancestors

I love to do research.  I've been known to work on other peoples' ancestors when I hit an impasse on my own.  But I also love to see the fruits of my labor in my home in the form of photos, and particularly photo displays.  I'm not sure if my family shares my enthusiasm for this sort of decorating, but no one has complained.  Then again, I'm not sure they realize that not everyone decorates in Early American Ancestor!

I like to find common themes in grouping photographs.  This simple grouping to the right is of three brothers - the three sons of Earl and Mary Seeman.  Earl died young, and two of his sons died in middle age.  Here, they are pictured "together."

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The next display is a "mother and child" theme.  The top photo is my great-great grandmother, Alfhilde Monsen with her oldest child, daughter Gabriella ("Ella.")   Alfhilde's husband, Gabriel, was a fisherman in Bergen, Norway.  One day he went off to sea, and a storm erupted.  He never returned, leaving Alfhilde to raise her three children alone, struggling to provide for them.

The middle photo is Ella and her oldest child, daughter Lillian.  Ella came to the United States at age 17 to find a better life, later sending for her mother.  She married a Danish immigrant who owned his own bakery, and they raised five children on the plains of South Dakota.

The bottom photo is Lillian with her oldest child, daughter Betty, my mother.  Lillian married a farmer, and they had four children.

If I only had another frame to match, I could have added my mother holding me, her oldest daughter.  But here, the pattern ends, regardless of how many frames I could come up with.

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I love to find unusual frames, which means hunting flea markets, thrift shops, and garage sales.  Most of the time I have no idea what I'm going to do with my finds, until just the right idea presents itself.  This grouping is one of my favorites.  This standing frame holds only three photos.  I found it at a thrift shop several years ago.  The photos are of my grandmother - as a teenager, as a middle-ager, and finally, in her senior years.  I like the "snapshot" it gives of her life, and the frame itself looks like something she would have had in her own home.

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With the displays above and below, I wanted to give a "nod" to our ethnicities.  Above are pictured my husband's family's generations, starting top left with an aerial photo of the family farm in Schleswig-Holstein, and below that, immigrant Hans Seemann, and moving toward right each man's son.  At top is the current generation.  I made one of these for my husband, and one for each of our sons, and I made a similar display for my husband's brother.

Below, I pay tribute to my Norwegian ancestors.  I also learned how hard it is to frame a silk flag squarely!  At the top are my great-grandparents, Andreas and Anne Larsen, pictured in an oak frame made by my father (these were his grandparents.)  To the left is their son, my grandfather Adolph, with my grandmother Agnes.  They left Norway for South Dakota in 1923, with one child and another on the way.  Agnes died at age 48, and Adolph then married his childhood friend in Norway, Lisa, and she joined him in the United States in 1952.  The are pictured at right.  This display honors both of my "grandmothers."

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I had two wedding frames, and wanted to put the black and white wedding photo of my in-laws in one, but was at a loss about how to use the other one.  I decided to print a black and white copy of one of our wedding photos, in as similar a pose as I could to that of my in-laws.  This is the result. 

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This is a common type of frame - the Tree.  I wanted to do something different with two of the tree frames I have, and I printed pictures of all of the "Grandmas" for them.   I am using these "Grandma Trees" to teach my granddaughters about the women of their heritage.  The five year old knows most of their names, 13 in all, and a little snippet of something interesting about each one.  

I had another tree frame that was reversible, and I made a gift for my daughter-in-law.  Her photo was at the top of the tree, with her mother below, grandmother, great-grandmother, and great-great-grandmother after that.  The reverse side held photos of each of her five children.

I hope you've enjoyed these ideas, and I would love to hear (and see) what you've done with your old family photos.  If you have blogged about this, please put the URL in a comment box below. 

Christmas Walnuts

Before Christmas, I was thrilled to find unshelled mixed nuts at not one, but two local grocery stores.  I hadn't seen them in a number of years, and remembering how much fun my youngest son and I had feeding them to the neighborhood squirrels, I bought several pounds of them.  But looking at the walnuts brought back memories even further back, of "helping" my grandma make the prettiest decorations for her Christmas tree.

I could not have been more than five or six years old when Grandma Lill sat me down at the dining room table with a stack of walnuts, a paintbrush and a cup of thinned-down glue, and several packets of pretty glitter!  We never got glitter at home, and rarely got it at Grandma's, as there were always little sparklies of glitter to be found around the house months afterward, no matter how thorough the cleanup seemed to be.  But this time was an exception.  Grandpa Bill had put a metal hanger into the top of each walnut, and Grandma "painted" them with the glue, and I sprinkled glitter on them.  To my knowledge, the one pictured above is the only one of these ornaments to have survived that wonderful afternoon almost 50 years ago.

So one day last week, I went about putting gold ornament hangers into the walnuts, and gluing them in place with craft glue.  This morning I did the fun part - sprinkling them with glitter - gold, silver, red, green, blue, and a shimmering opalescent.  My husband may roll his eyes, but I think next year we're going to have a Christmas tree decorated with sparkly walnuts.

Treasure Chest Thursday - The Doily Box, Part 2

More from the Doily Box:

This doily, old and tattered and stained as it is, is one of my favorites.  It was made by my great-grandmother, Elvirta Knutz.  I don't know when she made it, but I remember seeing it on my grandmother's couch when I was young, and my grandmother gave it to me when I moved into my first home back in the 1970s.

Here's another garage sale find.  I love the colors!

Who remembers silver asbestos mats?  I picked these up from a garage sale.  My grandmother had similar ones on her kitchen table, and it was a *big* deal to get to pick out a new cover and put it on for her.  Note the Good Housekeeping seal on the back of this mat - a little ironic, knowing what we know today about asbestos!

More to come~

Another Sentimental Treasure Bites the Dust

Well, another sentimental kitchen item bites the dust, and I killed it.  I know nothing lasts forever, but I didn't think it would go down like this.  I have not been so traumatized since the demise of my electric frying pan three years ago.

This may seem like a silly thing to be upset about, after all, a double boiler is easily replaced.  But this was not an ordinary double boiler.  This item has been with me since I left my parents' house at the tender age of 18, with nothing to my name but some clothes and an old car.

I had rented a small, unfurnished house, and my grandparents, who had little or nothing as well, set about helping me get started with "adult life."  They scoured garage sales and auctions, and before I knew it, I was set up with a bed, a washing machine, my grandparents' old silver kitchen table, and my great-grandparents' old couch and chair.  I made a purchase for myself as well - a color TV, from a garage sale, for $2.  What they didn't tell me was that it had only ONE color - green.  But I digress.  I also had a kitchen full of various gadgets.  I saw the double boiler and had no idea what it was, so I stored it in the back of the cupboard with the hand-held potato masher and other mystery items, and went on with my life.

Eventually though I discovered my "culinary side" and I used the double boiler frequently.  I often thought how well-made things used to be, that I could have a second-hand double boiler for 35 years and it was still awesome.  I loved that thing - it had a smaller than typical footprint, and had a deep well, perfect for dipping candies at Christmas.  And it reminded me of my grandma, and how she lovingly took what little she had herself and put together a functional kitchen for me.  I can honestly say I never used it without thinking of her.

And, it was during just such an acitivity (dipping candies at Christmas time) that it met it's demise.  The large, hardened glob of almond bark in the bottom of the pan was driving me crazy, so I picked up the Murder Weapon -

- and attempted to stab the glob in half for faster melting.  Unfortunatly, the sharp blade went through the bottom of the upper pan -

- and managed to even pierce the bottom of the lower pan as well.

Is that "Taps" I hear?

I'm going to keep that knife in mind if I ever have an intruder in my home.

And now, I can't bear to throw it out, although it's completely nonfunctional for it's intended job.  I'll need to find a way to repurpose it.  Perhaps they'd make the perfect pots for kitchen herbs - they already have drain holes.  :)

Thanksgivings Past

Of all the days of the year, the day before Thanksgiving is one of my favorites.  I usually spend it in the kitchen, cooking and baking, alone with my thoughts and the wonderful smells wafting through the house.  Those smells invariably take me back to childhood Thanksgivings - walking in the door at Grandma and Grandpa's, and going up the stairs to the sounds of Shorty barking and posturing like he was going to attack, all from the safety of Grandpa's lap in the recliner.  And opening the door at the top of the stairs to those wonderful smells - roasting meats, and buttery potatoes, and the fantastic gravy Grandma made from cream of celery soup.  A few more steps, and we'd have to endure the torture of seeing the plates with the slices of pies of various kinds, all topped with whipped cream, sitting on the buffet.  It was as if they talked - "I'm going to call your name all through dinner..." but the sight of all Grandma's wonderful masterpieces spread out on the table usually got my attention back where it belonged.  Seeing the two pink bowls was always a treat, and still something stirs in my heart and my palate when I bring mine out of the buffet for our own holiday dinners.

I hope my own grandchildren come through my door with anxious anticipation, enjoying the sights and smells of the Thanksgiving table, and that they will hold onto those precious memories throughout their lives.

Happy Thanksgiving to all!

Inside Grandma's Sewing Machine Table, Part 3

As I headed downstairs to continue cleaning the basement this morning, I thought I had finished going through my grandmother's sewing items, and had things much less interesting to sort through today.  However, in cleaning out the shelves under the stairs, I found her sewing baskets:

This was the one she used the most when I was young, and in later years, it was delegated for the "better" sewing things.  Her everyday one was the brown basket, which sat with the old photo albums on the small wire stand by her front door:

Inside these baskets were many packages of rickrack and other old trims, most of them still unopened, in the original cellophane packages.  I can certainly use them for my own sewing projects, but something just seems wrong about opening them up and sewing with them.  I guess for now Ill just put them back where I found them and think about it. I'm not sure an old package of bias tape or piping is worth much, but seeing that old label is like a trip back in time.

Some of today's interesting finds:

There were two of these little rulers from the "Medical Sickness Society" in London.  I don't know how old these rulers are or where they came from, but this business appears to be a financial services business, at least in 2012.

When I first found this item, I thought it might be a maraca (hey, I've found stranger things in my basement!) but turns out it's my great-great-grandmother Nettie Graves' darning tool.  Had it not been labeled as such, I never would have known.  I would have kept trying to shake it and get some sort of rhythm going.

 

This little mending kit must have been a promotional item from The Lampe Market in Huron, South Dakota.  The inscription reads in part: 1889 - MEATS - 1927.  Since the market was still in operation in 1930, I'm guessing this mending kit was made and distributed in 1927.

Another promotional item was this shoe horn from Osborn Clothing Company, also in Huron.  Oddly enough, I do remember as a child my grandmother showing me how to use a shoehorn she kept in her sewing basket, perhaps this one.  While the Lampe Market had closed shop before my time, Osborn's is still in business.

In Part 2 of this series, I found a small mending kit for silk stockings; today I found a full-fledged mending kit, with 10 different shades of floss.  The box still has cellophane covering the bottom part.

And this item... I was reading a blog post by Nancy, owner of My Ancestors and Me, at her other blog, Joy For Grace, on the topic of "Unsewing."  This looks like the perfect tool to use in "unsewing."  One end has a thin blade, the other a sharp pick, and a handy cap for each end.  It's only stamped with "Rip 'n Pik."  Looks so useful I almost hated to pack it back up!  Looks to me like a "Million Dollar Idea" if someone would brings these back into production.

Sad to say, the rest of the afternoon spent cleaning the basement was not nearly so much fun...

Sources:

1930-31 Huron, South Dakota City Directory, R. L. Polk

Inside Grandma's Sewing Machine Table, Part 2

Inside Grandma's sewing machine table, I found some of the neatest sewing/craft items from long ago - who remembers doing embroidery?  Or liquid embroidery?  My great-grandmother, Elvirta Knutz, did a lot of both, as well as crocheting.  She made a lot of beautiful pillowcases, so delicate and dainty with beautiful ladies, such as this one, decorating the opening ends...

I found numerous iron-on transfers, from silhouettes to cowboys to graceful ladies, flowers and butterflies.

And then there's Barnacle Bill.  According to Wikipedia, "Barnacle Bill the Sailor" was a bawdy drinking song, of which the first printed version appeared in 1927.   The song inspired a Betty Boop cartoon and two movies.  In the first Popeye the Sailor cartoon, Barnacle Bill was used as the inspiration for what would become the Bluto character.  Wikipedia furnished the lyrics of the song, and since this is a family blog, I won't repost them here!  Nonetheless, I was a little surprised to find Barnacle Bill among the iron-on transfers!

Who remembers bobbins like these?

These are a set of "Sta-Tied" braided elastic shoelaces.  They are thick, and quite stretchy.  I can't imagine these wearing out any time soon...  The Nov. 28, 1958 issue of the Mason City, Iowa Globe-Gazette features an article on the Sta-Tied Lace Co. and their new shoestring, said to be most ideally suited for sports footwear.  The University of Iowa and Notre Dame University athletic departments had already begun using their laces.

Tiny rick rack!  Never seen it this small.

And lastly, this most interesting mending kit, apparently for silk stockings -

The directions say to "Tear off Run-Arrestor Wand like any match book stick.  Moisten with tongue and touch both ends of stocking run.  Mend before washing."  Included are mending threads of many different shades.

This item was manufactured by the Real Silk Hosiery Mills, Inc. of Indianapolis, Indiana.

That's all for now, but more to come.

Inside Grandma's Sewing Machine Table, Part 1

This morning I brewed up a pot of the delicious Pecan Pie flavored coffee my son brought me, drank a couple of cups, and the next thing I knew I was down in the basement cleaning and going through things!  I don't know what was in that coffee...  After an hour or so of sorting through the usual boring things (clothes the kids had outgrown, half-finished craft items, piles of computer paraphernalia), I came upon Grandma's old Singer sewing machine that Grandpa gave me after her death in 1991.  It sits inside its beautiful wooden and wrought iron sewing table, tucked down in its little cubbyhole, with all kinds of stuff piled on top of it.  Today, I cleared it off and brought the machine up for a good cleaning, and proceeded to go through the sewing table drawers.  Some of the items inside belonged to my grandmother, and some I picked up at garage sales.  All neat stuff.

I don't remember Grandma using this machine - I think it was the 1950s when she got a new or newer Singer with a "gas pedal", the same machine I learned on.  I was 12 years old before she'd let me use electricity - until then, it was crank, crank, crank.  Naturally, she told me one of her little white lies about knowing a girl who sewed too fast with electricity, and ran the needle right through her fingernail and out the other side.  I believed it then and was horrified, and still think of it while sewing occasionally today.  But Grandma, if you're listening, I'm on to you now.  But I'm still scared.  And I never go fast.

By that time though, this machine was tucked away in her basement, with stuff piled on top of it, much like it's been at my house for the last 21 years.  I remember her mostly patching Grandpa's clothes and making blankets, not so much sewing clothes except for our Barbie dolls.

I checked the Singer website to see if I could find out when this machine was manufactured, and it was in 1920, which was a bit of a surprise.  I didn't think it was that old.

The first thing I found was tucked down on the bottom of the table - and old Climax sewing machine that I had picked up cheap at a garage sale many years ago.

The Climax Sewing Machine Company was a sub-company of New Home.  Singer bought out the company in the 1920s.  This machine has a motor added on to the back of it.

I will save what I found in the sewing table drawers for the next blog post or two.  A nice glimpse into the past, if I do say so myself.

I think I'm going to have another pot of that Pecan Pie flavored coffee tomorrow and see what else I can find...


Sources:
http://www.blurtit.com/q860236.html

I Lied to Read True Story Magazine

"What are you doing in there?" Grandma hollered through the locked bathroom door.  "Nothing," I answered.  "Are you 'having trouble?' " Grandma asked.  "No!" I was quick to respond.  If Grandma even suspected you were 'having trouble' in the bathroom, there would be a spoonful of Green Drops waiting for you upon your exit, and that stuff was a punishment worse than any kind of bathroom trouble.

"I'm almost finished," I yelled back to her, as I turned a small piece of the corner of the page to mark my place, and stuffed the magazine quickly back in the linen closet.   A needless flush later, and trying to look as nonchalant as possible, I exited the bathroom and hoped Grandma wasn't standing there with a spoon and that bottle of nasty green liquid.

I was reading her True Stories.  She knew I was reading her True Stories.  I knew *she* knew I was reading her True Stories.   Such forbidden tales as "A Case of Cradle Robbing" or "My Runaway Wife" or "I Am the Other Woman" were about as close to excitement as it got in my small town life.  And to a young girl on the cusp of being a teenager, this glimpse into mysterious and exciting adult lives was too much to resist.

Grandma and I apparently were not alone in our enjoyment of this magazine and the exotic lifestyles and stories it featured.  According to Wikipedia, True Story came into existence in 1919, and in the next few years circulation soared, and the magazine lasted 92 years before the publisher finally pulled the plug.

One afternoon, to my dismay, the magazines were no longer in the linen closet in the bathroom.  I did a thorough search (more than once), but Grandma apparently found a better place to store them, at least temporarily.   Being unable to find their new hiding place was driving me crazy.  They did at some point make their way back into the bathroom closet, and my extended bathroom breaks resumed.  Did Grandma know I was reading her True Stories again?  Of course.  Couldn't hide anything from that woman.  But she never did move them again.

Lies Grandma Told

I was recently looking at some photos of my brother, sister and I as kids, with Grandma Lill's cockatiel, Charlie, sitting on our shoulders.  All of us had our heads cranked straight ahead, but were looking at him out of the corners of our eyes.  I realized that all of our pictures with Charlie were like that - because Grandma always told us if we looked right at him from close range, he'd peck our eyes out.  I don't know if that's true, or if she thought it was true, or if she didn't want to take a chance on it being true, but I'm still scared to look a bird in the eye at close range 40+ years later.

Are you happy, Grandma??

I started thinking about some of the things she told us as kids - "If you swear, rocks and dirt will come out of your mouth, but if you talk nicely, flowers and sweet things will come out of your mouth instead."  I wondered briefly what rocks and dirt would taste like, but then decided that a flower in my mouth probably would not taste much better, so I went into the bathroom, locked the door, and crawled up to the mirror above the sink, and very cautiously said the first bad word I could come up with.  Shortly thereafter, I started to wonder if Grandma was full of... well... baloney.

Being a woman small in stature, and having charge of the three of us all day while my mother worked and Grandpa was out at the farm, she needed an Equalizer - and I think she found one in her little white lies.  For a long time after the "Rocks and Dirt" story, we talked nicely.  When I discovered that her attic was filled with wonderful old things to play with (without permission) she told me the floor was bad in spots, and if I stepped in just the wrong spot, I'd fall in between the walls and even Grandpa would not be able to get me out.   I never went up in the attic again without her.

She told me about her classmate at school, who squeezed a pimple on Friday and was dead of blood poisoning by Monday.

She told me the man across the street was a policeman, and if I left the yard without permission, he'd see it, and he *could* arrest me if he had a mind to.  Not saying he would, but you never know.  He doesn't like it when kids leave the yard without permission.

But she was right regarding a lot of things in life, and despite the occasional bamboozling, she taught me a lot. "Don't always trust whoever you're doing business with, they may not have your best interest at heart."  "Never quit your job until you have another one lined up."
When someone is talking trash about you, "consider the source."
Don't brag up your boyfriend to your girlfriends.
And, "If you have leftovers, you know everyone at your table got enough to eat," followed quickly by "Grind up your leftovers and put them in the meatloaf."

Love ya lots, Grandma, and miss you every day.

The Original Party Animals

The year was 1963, New Year's Eve.   Over the decades, I've brought in many new years, some of them tremendously fun, some of them awfully dull, some of them not feeling so well, and I've slept through a few of them, but none of them were healthier or happier than this one.

To be honest, I don't remember a lot of the details of our party.  We likely watched Guy Lombardo on TV, and ate yummy munchies that Grandma Lill had prepared .  Lill, who was behind the old brownie camera that took this picture, had a stash of little tiny hats with elastic bands to hold them on, and a box of various noisemakers - some you twirl, some you blow in, others you just shake.  It was a fascinating collection, which we only saw once a year, and then, briefly.    We donned our garb, and for about a minute - no more - we were allowed to make as much noise as we could with our noisemakers, and then they were collected, put back in the box, and hidden in places unknown until the next New Year's celebration.

I was nearly four years old in this picture, my brother just days away from turning two.  We had an inter-generational party, with our grandparents and great-grandparents, and "warm fuzzies" like we'd never have again.  We had one more year with both sets of grandparents, before my great grandfather, Will Knutz, developed stomach cancer.  But on this particular year, we gathered, we loved, we celebrated, and we made memories.

Dippity-DON'T!

Ninety percent of the time I spent at my Grandma Lill's house was fantastic - helping her bake, learning to sew, and when I was old enough, she let me watch her "stories" (soap operas) with her.  But that other ten percent of the time, well...

I was a little kid with goofy hair.  It was fine, but thick, and Grandma hated looking at it.  To call it "unruly" would be an understatement.  Most of the time, she let it slide, but one day, she decided to show me how nice it could look with a "little" work.

So she stuck my head in the sink, towel-dried my hair, and gathered up her "makeover kit" - a comb, a container of rollers, and, of course, her jar of that miraculous green goop, Dippity-do.  That stuff still scares me to this day.  After she got my hair combed out (anyone who had long, thick hair as a child knows the pain that combing entails) she would part off a section, slather it with a generous dip of Dippity-do, roll it up, and proceed to the next piece of hair.

To stop my incessant complaining ("that stuff stinks," "I want to go watch TV," "Stop it, Grandma!" and, of course, "OW!!") she let me play with a few of her rollers - we called them Spaceship Rollers, but the real name for them is Spoolies, probably for more obvious reasons.  These were soft, pliable, rubbery curlers.  A section of hair would be rolled in the middle, and then each end would flip back toward the middle, creating a spaceship sort of shape, and securing the hair.

It seemed to take forever for her to finish rolling my hair - actually, it probably did take forever.  We used every one of her Spoolies in all that thick hair, and she had a lot of them.   Between all those curlers and Dippity-do, the sheer weight of my head hurt my neck to the point of having to lay down, but resting my head on anything hurt worse.  One valuable lesson I learned that day (besides RUN when Grandma gets the curlers out) was to not stress her out while she was rolling my hair, or the curlers would be tight - really tight!

Hours later, she finally took all those miserable little spaceships out of my hair.  I was left with a head FULL of curls so tight and crispy that neither brush nor comb would get through them, and hair bigger than any 1970s rock star ever had!  Grandma looked a little shocked - I started to bawl - and when my mother came to pick me up, I hid on the floor of the back seat all the way home, and immediately stuck my head back in the sink to rectify this terrible situation.

On a positive note, Grandma Lill never tried to fix my hair again.  Instead, she turned her attention to my little sister, who was not nearly as fast as I was after that.

Wordless Wednesday - Farm Boys

Ugly – In the Eyes of the Beholder?

In Part One of the Ugly Baby Doll story, I wished I knew more about this piece of my history. Using Google, I searched for Ugly Baby Doll and got one hit. Apparently, when you substitute “squalling” for “ugly”, you actually get useful information.

One site about old dolls suggested that most have inscriptions on the backs of their necks. I have to warn you – if you thought the Ugly Face pictures were “Yoogly” (thanks, Greta) just wait till you see the neck pictures. Without further adieu -

 

Yeah, I know. Sorry.

Hidden among the cracks and discoloration were some letters.  All I could make out was “COPR LASTIC PLASTIC 49”. Turns out “COPR LASTIC PLASTIC 49” was stamped on dolls manufactured by the Fleischaker Novelty Company. It was unclear to me if this company also sold the dolls, or if they were sold by Horsman Company. Several companies produced these “squalling” baby dolls, but the Lastic Plastic ones were the earliest, dating back to 1948-49. And speaking of the Horsman company, while they apparently made some attractive dolls, someone there had a mean streak, as is evident by their Bilikin doll of 1909, or the Carnivale Kid of 1915-1918. My doll is looking more attractive by the minute.

The Doll Reference website showed a picture of what Grandma’s garage sale find looked like originally. There were molded tufts of hair, blue eyes, rosy little cheeks, and red lips. While any signs of rosiness on the cheeks or lips have long since worn away on my doll, its eyes are still a faded blue, and there are faint mounds of “hair” on its otherwise bald little noggin.

According to the Doll Reference website, two models of this doll were made: a 16” version, and a 19” version. My doll measures 16”, and at one time allegedly had the ability to make a “squeak” or “cry”, perhaps by one of those irritating squeakers implanted in its little belly. If that’s true, it would explain why Grandma quickly sewed it a new fabric body. I assumed the original body was ripped or rotten; however, Grandma was smart. We didn’t have squeaky toys over at her house. Ever.

 
Plush Memories even has a post from a lady who use to have a pair of these dolls as a child, and would love to be able to find one now. She says, “My favorite dolls when I was little were two of the ugliest little life size twin babies I had ever seen.” See Grandma? I’m not the only one to use the “U” word.

While I’d still have to say this is an Ugly Baby Doll, I have a new respect for it and its origins - 63 years is a long time to hang around being disrespected, especially ~55 years by the same family. Grandma, it took a long time, but I finally have an appreciation for this doll, and dare I say, it’s as precious to me now as you’d hoped for then.  Thank you.
 
Sources:
http://www.antiquedolls-collectors-onlineadvisors.com/Vinyl-Head-Dolls.html
http://plushmemories.com/8728/1948-lastic-plastic-fleischaker-squalling-babies.html
http://www.dollreference.com/horsman_dolls1910-1940s.html

The Ugly Baby (Ugly! Ugly!)

I don’t remember the first time I laid eyes on it (him? her? We checked, but back in the 1960s, they didn’t have Him or Her baby dolls).  Grandma had procured it from a garage sale, and set us up with a little crib and all the fixins’, but nobody played with it.  One day, she asked me why.  I replied, simply, “It’s ugly.”  She said, “That’s exactly what newborn babies look like.”  I replied, “Then I’m not interested in having kids.”

Despite the fact that no one ever played with it, Grandma kept it anyway.  After she died twenty years ago, I felt strangely drawn to ask for it.  Before she left us, Grandma made it a new cloth body, but she couldn’t do anything about the rubbery, discoloring face.  Oh well.  It’s not like it’s going to get any uglier…

I found it a new blue outfit at a rummage sale this morning, so I dug it out and cleaned it up a little, and then got curious about where this doll originally came from, and if it had any ugly twins out there in the world.  A quick Google search turned up this:

 

Yes, I ruthlessly swiped this from a blog post of the World’s Strongest Librarian, but judging by the eBay icon in the bottom corner, it may not be his photo either.  Manners and ethics aside, I know there’s at least one more Ugly Baby out there somewhere, and its body didn’t hold up well either.  There are no markings on the head, arms or legs that I could find, so at this point, I’m out of luck.  If anyone knows anything about these dolls, or has any suggestions for finding out more, please let me know.  As ugly as my doll is, it’s about as dear to my heart as anything I own.  Grandma would be pleased.