Moment in History - 001 Flies and chores
There were lots of flies in those days. People would make screen fly catchers, putting bait such as honey or preserves under the catcher. The flies would fly under for the bait and up through the funnell in the bottom of the catcher where they couldn't get out. We would sell them by the quarts or by the tablespoon to the county agent for pennies. It made good spending money. Later on, people would hang up sticky fly paper to catch the flies.
One of my task every Saturday was to get the lamps and lanterns together. I had to fill them with coal oil, trim the wicks, or replace the wick if it was burned too low, wash and shine the chimneys, then return them to their apropriate places. Later we got carbide lights. That was wonderful compared to the lanterns and lamps. It was a joyous event when we got electricity.
Being the last girl in the family, much of the dishwashing fell to me. The washing and scalding water was all heated on top of the stove in the reservoir that was attached to the wood cookstove. The morning dish washing was not just breakfast dishes. There were stew pans, milk pans, milk strainers, milk buckets, milk cans, a separator, and often bread pans and loaf tins. These were, of course, in addition to the normal breakfast.
When the folks killed chickens we would scald them with boiling water and pluck off the feathers. We would wash and dry the feathers and sort them as to size. With the large feathers, we would strip the soft feathery part of the hard quills and put them with the others in beautiful ticking for feather beds and pillows.
We sure were glad when two people were making the bed. It was rather hard to fluff up the feathers and make the bed look just right with just one person doing it.
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