Henry Pratt's Memories II

Here we go on the serialization of Linda's 1965 paper. Henry's words are in quotes.

 

BORN

 

"1901. People were born at home then, and mine was a rambling farmhouse that zigzagged in consecutive wings from southeast to northwest. It had grown by three stages, each stage somehow requiring certain features of a full house, thus it had three porches and three stairways to each pair of second story rooms."

 

There were twelve rooms in that house not counting the woodshed, pantry and bathrooms. This seemingly large amount of space was amply filled by seven children, two parents, one grandmother and sometimes a hired girl. This is rather deceptive, however, when you consider that when the seventh child was born the first was a student at M.A.C. However, in the summer everyone was home and working on the farm

 

"One of the great joys of summer, the thing I and most kids looked forward to during the spring, was going barefoot. Bare-foot season began the last day of school and ended the day after Labor Day. The practice was universal and had little to do with poverty. Frequent cuts, bruises and stubbed toes were little enough penalty to pay for the glorious feeling of freedom it gave." (emailed July 4, 2008)