The Little Red School House

After I grew big and strong enough, Mother started me off to school and did I love it! School was Heaven for me. I loved the teacher, the singing and the lessons, and I am not bragging when I say the top of the class was my position almost always. If by any chance any pupil did get me down, I immediately worked my way back again to first place. We in those days had class in a row on the floor in front of the teacher’s desk. We had a chalk line on the floor and each pupil stood with toes touching this line. The teachers used a long wooden "pointer to punish naughty children. Only once was I punished and that time unjustly. Mary Ellen Edwards, who sat ahead of me, told a lie and blamed me for talking when she was the guilty one. The teacher had me come up to her desk and gave me two cracks on each hand with a pointer, but honestly I think she hated to do it for they did not hurt at all. However, in my heart I felt it was unjust because I had not been talking. Mary Ellen was a very mean girl and very cruel. She loved to stick pins in flies, kill bugs and so on. One day she and I found a nest of little newborn mice out in the schoolyard. I picked one up and Mary Ellen threw a big stone on the rest and killed them all. I took mine in and told the teacher I had a present for her. She held out her hand and I dropped the little baby mouse in her hand. She hit the roof, but she did not punish me. Oft times I wonder which, Mary Ellen or I, most deserved to be punished.

Then, one time I remember there was a general examination of six schools; five townships and the town school (which was Sault Ste. Marie, or "The Soo"). What a time we had! Practicing arithmetic, spelling geography, reading, etc. For weeks our school was all excitement. At last the big day arrived! We were up long before daylight. I do not remember much about the procedure of preparations the other girls went through, but I certainly will never forget mine! Sister Maggie had made each of us three girls a new dress for the occasion. Annie’s and mine was a brown material trimmed with a sand material. Mine had a polonaise. We had a box stove in the big bedroom and Maggie curled my long red hair by winding it round and round a long iron poker heated in the coals in the stove. I remember brother William watching the operation and repeating at intervals, "Vanity, vanity, all is vanity, saith the preacher." This I believe is a quotation from one of the apostles. [Actually Ecclesiastes, ed]

This hair curling was a long operation. Annie had naturally curly hair, a pretty brown, but poor Ada! Her hair was straight as a string and mouse coloured, and she was always so solemn and quiet!

Finally, we were all curled up, except Ada, and we had our breakfast. Father brought the horses and sleigh to the door - it was winter time - we all piled into the sleigh, wrapped in buffalo robes, which Father had brought from his trip out to Portage La Prairie, and away we went, accompanied by the jingle, jungle of sleigh bells, What a grand day! I remember Aunt Maggie had made us a chicken pie for our lunch and was it grand!

I was a very proud girl that day. I spelled down all six schools in my class and won a big book called "Chatterbox" as a prize. I was so thrilled when my name was called to come forward and I was presented with the prize. Ada won in her class and Annie in some other branch in her class. Were we the proud family! Father drove in for us at four o’clock and I’ll never forget that drive home. I couldn’t speak, I was so full of excitement, and could hardly eat a bite of supper. Ada was quiet too but Annie was full of chatter. And, were my parents proud of us. Afterwards, we heard the Lamons and the Edwards say, "The Tegart family thought they were somebody."

During the time of this examination there was a Miss Carnahan from one of the country schools. At noon she had an epileptic fit. Someone found her lying on the street in the snow. It seemed she was very subject to these fits and sometimes lay like one dead. Well, not long after that she was pronounced dead by her doctor. She was prepared for burial and lay in her coffin all-night or part of the night. The casket must have been closed because when the lid was removed for the mourners to take a last look they found her indeed dead, but she had come to life and in a frenzy on finding herself in a coffin had torn her shroud to shred and had smothered to death. How or where they had put the coffin with supposed body I never knew, but I overhead Father and Mother and some of the neighbours telling and talking about it.

The Lamons lived north of us in a small house; they to had a large family. There was John James, the eldest, and quite a card he was, or thought he was. He wore his hat on the corner of his head and rushed the school marms. One teacher we had was a Miss Munroe; we all loved her and were we proud when she came home with us to our place for supper. We always knew at school when she was going home with some of the children because on such occasions she wore a pretty dress to school. Miss Todd was another teacher we had, prettier than Miss Munroe, though we did not love her the way we did Miss Munroe.

Ours was a little red schoolhouse with a picket fence around the yard and two "houses of parliament" in the back yard, one for the girls and one for the boys. One side of the yard had two tall poplar trees between which we had a swing. We had lots of fun in those days playing baseball, run-sheep-run, anti-over, blind man’s bluff, drop the handkerchief, etc., all these in the summer time. In the winter we had to content ourselves mostly with pussy want a corner, played in the schoolroom. Occasionally we had a snow battle outside of course. The older pupils would make a barricade of blocks of snow. The snow was usually just right for rolling; then the boys would range themselves on one side and the girls on the other and pitch snowballs over the top at each other. When the battle raged for a while they would forget which side they were on and tear around after each other. Somehow I always got put out of commission early in the battle. Especially do I remember once when Willie Lamon hit me on the side of the head with a hard snowball and knocked me our.

Martha Lamon was especial favourite. I just loved her. Poor girl, she died of black diphtheria; also both her little sisters. Every home in the settlement was visited and lost one or more of their children in this dread disease. Every home but ours. Each was laid to rest in the little cemetery on my father’s farm I shall never forget the day dear darling Martha Lamon was laid to rest. My father went to all these burials and assisted in laying the bodies to rest, yet never contracted or carried the disease home. We stood out on our grounds and watched dear Martha’s coffin being carried out to the sleigh to be taken to the cemetery. I thought my heart would break and I cried for hours. Something went out of my life then - child though I was - that never came back to me again.

Well, in the Lamon family, as I said, there was John James, then came Sarah Ann, Bessie (whom her father called Bissy), then Becky, Willie, Martha, Dimple, and Violet. I remember they always had sour bread, and Mr. Lamon would say, "Bissy had a miss in her bread." Mother used to laugh at home about it because she said, "Bissy always had a miss whenever she baked."

I remember Mrs. Lamon always looked so sad. Years afterward she left Mr. Lamon and went to live with Mr. Plummer who had a store in the Soo. Mr. Lamon always sat in a chair tilted back against the wall. He wore a beard like der Captain. They must have been terribly poor because all they ever had for lunch at school was some sour bread with a dab of molasses in the centre of each slice. They had no sugar bush on their place and they were envious of us because we had, and for years they would sneak over at night to where my father was preparing to sugar off and burn up all his hard earned syrup; burn it until it would take father hours to clean his kettles. In those days they boiled their sap for syrup, and their syrup to make sugar in a great big iron kettle. Then usually the last night, when they were through sugaring off father made a taffy pull for the neighbourhood. There would still be some snow on the ground; usually plenty of it. And the road would be slushy. Father would pour the boiling syrup (after it was the right consistency) over some snow and it would at once harden into the grandest taffy. Of course, I never was allowed to participate in all this fun. "Minnie was too small." But Mother would sometimes make some at home and cool it on the snow.

Guess I was quite a problem as a child and must have been puny because I wasn’t allowed to go to school in the winters much before I was 8 or 9 years old. There was one time Mother thought I was old enough to go along with Annie and Ada, so I was wrapped and bundle up and sent along. After going some distance I got stuck in a snowdrift up to my middle and couldn’t pull myself out. Father must been watching because he came on the run and extracted me and carried me back to the house. Of curse when I grew a bit bigger I went along with the rest to school.

I was always daydreaming and imagining I was a grand lady in a pale blue satin dress and thought suicide the most beautiful word I ever heard and always decided I’d have one when I grew up big. I had no idea what the word meant, but thought it beautiful.

Then there was the time a bunch of the older girls were sleigh riding down Gravel Hill near the schoolhouse. They put me on the front of the sleigh (a long hand sleigh) because I was small and they said I could steer the sleigh. They said, "Now, Minnie, if the sleigh starts to go this way stick out your foot whichever way it is going and dig your heel into the snow and that will make it go straight." Well, I did and over on top on Minnie doubled sleigh, girls and all and just about killed me. The girls ran to the schoolhouse for my brother William who came running and took me home on the sleigh. I remember how gentle he was. He could lift and carry me so gently he never caused me a twinge of pain. With that accident I was confined to home for a month, and did I suffer! Then one time I fell from the hayloft onto the hard barn floor and broke my left arm up near the shoulder. My sister Maggie was home that summer and took such good care of me.

All the Edward children died young; most of them diphtheria. Mary Ellen, the one who squashed the mice, and for whom I took the only licking I ever got in school, died after we left Sault Ste. Marie. She contracted TB. Her father bought my father’s farm there when my father decided to go west. My father got only a few hundred dollars cash and never did get the rest. They were poor Irish and always had fat boiled pork for dinner. The schoolteachers always boarded with them and how they ever ate Mrs. Edwards’ cooking is beyond me.

On my eighth birthday, Santa Claus brought me a beautiful wax doll; long golden curls, big blue eyes and the most beautiful face! I loved that doll. We kids (or children) were up bright and early, found our stockings packed with apples, candies, raisins and some other good things of which just now I can’t remember. Anyway, I thought it was the grandest lot of goodies. I remember I was munching away contentedly on something and sister Maggie (I can see her still, standing by the stove preparing breakfast for the family) said to me, "What did you get Minnie?" I proceeded to show her what I had found in my stocking and she said, "Is that all? Are you sure? Look on the table and see what is in that box; see whose name is on it." I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw my name on the box. Eagerly, and with wonderment I carefully opened the box and there lay the most beautiful doll in the world! They said I gave the most excited scream they ever heard. I just trembled with delight. Christmas times were wonderful; though now looking back I know our gifts were never lavish. A few little things, but scant as they were we were made happy.

The following summer I picked raspberries to pay Mrs. McDougal, the storekeeper’s wife in Sault Ste. Marie, for dressing my wax doll. She made pretty undies for it and a red cashmere dress trimmed with white lace. That doll was the most precious thing I ever owned. I kept it in the same box from that Christmas day for years. I was never allowed to play with it. If I was very, very good I could open the box and look at it and once in a long, long time Mother allowed me to sit in the rocking chair and hold it in my arms. I named the beautiful doll Isabel, after my mother. She had such big blue eyes and beautiful yellow curls.

But, alas, Isabel came to a sad end! After I was married several years and had three boys, Eddie, Tommy, and Huntley, I had been outside hanging my washing on the line and had come into the house. I found Eddie and Tommy had made a windlass by putting two chairs back to back and putting a stick of wood across from one to the other. I suppose as nearly as possible like the windlass their father used to hoist a beef or hog, to skin and clean, and here they had my beautiful doll strung up with a rope around her neck, her hands, arms, legs, and body all cut to pieces and her beautiful head and mutilated beyond all semblance of a doll.

Did I punish them? I do not remember but probably did. Hunt was only about one year old so I suppose he didn’t receive a walloping; but I was sick!

However, I am ahead of my story. How lovely the springtime was when I was a child back at the Soo. Even after all these years I still can remember the adder tongues and their beautiful perfume. The wintergreen vines and their little red berries and the chains we children used to make with them; and the wild honeysuckle and lady-slipper we used to gather in the woods.

Mother and the older children used to go to sociables and tea meetings. One time we had a tea meeting in our little red schoolhouse and I spoke a piece. Annie did likewise, something about, "I’ll pack my goods in a carpet sack, I’ll hie me West and I’ll not come back." It created quite a furore because at that time Father and Mother were contemplating moving west. Annie was a very pretty girl. Our minister, Mr. Church (Methodist) was a very prominent figure in the program that night and there was a young woman playing the piano which must have been hauled out from the So in someone’s sleigh and she played and sang a duet with some young man - probably from the Soo. Her song was "I looked up and he looked down and his name was Charlie Brown," and there was something which ran this in the song, "Oh, who stole my heart away, riding on a load of hay, I looked up and he looked down and his name was Charlie Brown." I remember how thrilled I was! Such a beautiful song! Ah, me! Then after the program was over everyone had tea, cookies and cake. It was a grand night!

One time the teacher at the Indian School, situated a short distance north of Sault Ste Marie, asked Mother to bring me in for a visit on their way to town; so one Saturday afternoon when Father and Mother were going to town, Mother had me dress up in my Sunday clothes and dropped me off at the school and left me there. I rang the bell and was admitted by an Indian girl. I told her I had come to see Miss ________ (I have forgotten her name). The girl said Miss ________ had gone to town but would be back soon. The girl took me in to a big lively room and gave me chair. There I sat in state, it seemed for hours. Evening came and the same girl came in and lit the lamps. She spread a snowy white cloth on a table and set several places. Then, as Miss ________ did not return, the girl had me sit up to the table and she served me a lovely supper. Miss ______ did not return, but Father and Mother did and took me home without having seen my lovely lady.

Not far from our home in Torentorus there lived a family by the name of Greer. They too must have been very poor. There were Mr. and Mrs. Greer and a little boy about ten years of age named Bobby. I never liked him. Mr. Greer had been ill for some time one winter and one bitter cold morning Bobby came to our door with the news that "Dad is dead. Now I’ll have the old black horse." No tears, no sorrow at the death of his father, only jubilant over the fact that he was going to be the owner of the old black horse. Poor boy, I guess the old black horse was all there was to claim. They were poorer than the proverbial church mouse, as I remember them.

Sundays were long days when I was a child. The mornings were lovely with Sunday School and roses, but the sermons were hard to listen to, and the squeaking of the men’s shoes when they tried to tiptoe quietly as they came in or went quietly to the old box stove to replenish the fire. When we returned home after church, if the minister came home for lunch or dinner, we ate. If he wen home with someone else, we didn’t eat until suppertime, so naturally we kids were glad when the minister came home with us. Of course, he drove his own horse and cutter in the winter and horse and buggy in the summer, as he had to drive over to the next township - Korah - to hold service there in the afternoon. All afternoon we kids had to be quiet on Sunday afternoons. No playing, no laughing or running around. When evening came Mother used to sing hymns such as "On Jordan’s stormy banks I stand and view the landscape o’er," and "There is a gate that stands ajar," and I always thought there was an old wooden gate somewhere with a big jar standing on it. Then we had supper and the dishes were set-aside until Monday morning when "Minnie" was called early to wash Sunday night’s dishes. Then after breakfast, always, I had to clean the porridge pot, and how I hated the beastly thing! And the smell of porridge! Bah! It used to make me ill. I was determined when I had a home, never would I have oatmeal porridge, and never would I clean or pluck a fowl! But many a pot of oatmeal have I made and many a fowl have I cleaned since I had my own home. More of this later on.

When Miss Muroe was teaching our school, my brother William made a lovely desk for her schoolroom. It was a lovely thing. Just as nice as anything one could buy. When it was all finished, he took it to the schoolhouse after dark, for some reason. I remember so well the next day all the kids were looking at it and admiring it. I said my brother William had made it and Annie Greasel (the Greasels were French half-breeds, and were the greasy) said, "That’s a lie, no one but God could make it."

There were so many people whom I later knew were funny and ignorant. There was a family by the name of McKinleys, Irish, and then the Morlands, the Boles, Greers and the Christners. The Christners were very nice and Mrs. Christner always wore pretty dresses.

There was also the Johnson family. They were Norwegians and Mrs. Johnson was always dirty. If ever we went to their house, she always took pains to explain, "I washed that side of the floor yesterday and this side today," and by Gorrah, both sides were positively black. Mrs. Johnson used to make bastlings and one day I was there with Maggie and ate some and they made me sick! They had a girl named Agusta. She wet pants one day in school while up in her class. She had asked permission to go out but it was denied her; hence, the flow! They also had one boy named Martin. One night a skunk got in their house and sprayed things in general. His clothes and book got the full benefit of the obnoxious perfume. Nevertheless, he still wore the same clothes and brought the same book to school so we called him Skunky. Long before this happened, when he was at our house playing with us, he and I got married. He put on one of sister Maggie’s long white nightgowns, got the Bible and married us. My brothers, Reuben and Harry, were witnesses. Many years later he visited me in my home on the prairie in Saskatchewan. He still had his freckles and turned up nose.

Then there were the Penmans. They were very nice too. Mr. Penman’s name was Johnny. They had a baby boy named Alex. Mother used to let me go down to their place to nurse the baby. I was so fond of babies that I’d walk miles to rock one.

How well do I remember one occasion when my mother and father were going to town. Mother said I might go with them as far as the Penman’s and stay there until they came by on their way home. Well, after they left me off at Penmans a bad storm came up and Mrs. Penman thought that perhaps my parents would stay in town all night. How I hoped they wouldn’t come for me. Mrs. Penman was cooking tripe; boiling it on the stove. Oh, how it stank! She liked it though because she took a piece out of the pot on a fork and sat down in the rocking chair and ate it. They had it for supper but I did not eat any. I never ate any meat unless Mother assured me it was "next to the ribs."

Well, I began to grow sleepy and it was getting late so Mrs. Penman said I had better go to bed because she was sure Father and Mother wouldn’t come as it was so late. Oh, how I wanted to stay there all night! Mrs. Penman put one of Mr. Penman’s shirts on me for the nightie, the sleeves dangled to the floor, but I didn’t care, and so badly I wanted to stay I got down on my knees and prayed, "Dear God, don’t let Father and Mother come for me tonight," sure in my belief that God would answer my plea, when up drove Father and Mother in the storm and Mother said no, I must dress and come home. Well, after that I somehow felt God didn’t always answer prayers.

A young man whose name was Eber Bradley was superintendent of our Sunday School. He was a rather nice fellow, so we children thought. He used to give us quite a talk after Sunday School was over. One Sunday he was discoursing on the text for that day which to the effect that "Surely the dogs may eat the crumbs from their master’s table." I do not remember what all he said but he tried to explain what it meant and said, "We, being Methodist, call the Presbyterians dogs." Child that I was I thought that very queer and when we arrived home told Father and Mother. They were shocked, yet Father had a good laugh and Mother said, "I’d be ashamed to be so ignorant." None of us ever forgot that episode. Eber had two sisters, Martha and Becky. I thought their father and mother very ancient people, though I now doubt if they were so old at that.

The Cristners had two boys who used to ride their big black Newfoundland dog to school in the summer. The dog’s name was Pluto. Later, he was killed in a bear trap.

The Christners, Bradleys and another family lived about two or three miles back in the woods from our place. This other family was very uncouth. They were so queer. For their lunch at school, they had only dry bread, and I mean dry, and it was always cut in hunks, not slices. When noontime came, they ate it like wolves.

Poor Pluto, the big Newfound met a sad death. He got caught in a bear trap that Mr. Christner had set it the woods to catch the bears. There were plenty of them in that country. One day at our home a big brown bear came sauntering up our road and jumped over the fence into the garden. Father grabbed his old muzzle loader, fire at the bear, but the old bruin was too smart; he jumped the fence and went rolling of down the path to what was known as the side road.

One morning in the fall of the year, brother William had loaded this same gun and was standing on the porch waiting for the dog, Nero, to eat his breakfast, when he and the dog were going bear hunting. William foolishly had the muzzle of the gun resting on his right foot and if the thing didn’t go off and blow off part of two toes. Consequently, the bear had a holiday and William was laid up, or least couldn’t walk much for about three months.

William was an artist and while confined to the house painted "The Empty Saddle" and a portrait from life of Ettie our youngest sister and, by the way, the youngest of the family. I curled her hair every morning and held her on my knee while he painted from life. He worked on her picture about two hours each morning. Then too, he painted a picture of Silver Creek Falls, which were near our place. They were beautiful falls. Father used to tell us how deep they were. He said they were deeper than Niagara but of course a much smaller falls. In fact, I don’t suppose they were over 30 or 40 feet wide except in the spring of the year when the snows and mountain streams increased their flow of water. You see, this was, and is, a great mountainous country. I do not remember the name of the mountain range. There were great silver and cooper mines in this range and from our house we could hear the blasting in the mines.

Along the sided of the falls there was a landslide and at the bottom of the fall a whirlpool. One day I tagged after Annie and Ada on one of their jaunts. Annie persuaded us to go with her to see the falls. She led us to the south end of this landslide, which really was quite steep and was composed entirely of sand and gravel and she said she was going to walk to the other end. Both Ada and I were scared stiff and were determined we wouldn’t follow. Annie called us fraidy cats and of course we didn’t like that. I still can see Ada. Her face was deathly white but she started out after Annie and I followed Ada. Each step we took was torture for below us ran the swift Silver Creek and near and below the north end was the whirlpool. It’s God’s mercy we didn’t all three roll down that sand slide and drown. Our bodies might never have been found had we ever gone down there.

Another time Annie led us out into the woods miles back of our farm into a boggy marshy place, among rocks and creeks, to a place where there was still water; a quiet pool with a lot of little islands in it. There were a lot of pond lilies growing in the water, beautiful lilies, so big and creamy white. Annie got a pole -- part of an old tree that was lying on the ground -- and walked out on a fallen log to one of these little islands. She shoved the pole down in the mud and the thing went clear down out of sight. Had we been foolish enough to step in the mud, I guess we too would have disappeared. However, Ada and I did not follow Annie that time and after she saw what happened to her pole, she hurried back and we went home.

I must relate the story of the picture my brother William painted of these Silver Creek Falls for Miss Todd our schoolteacher. He used to take his canvas, easel and paints and go down the Silver Creek and paint from nature -- in oils --. When the picture was finished, all she would pay was five dollars. He told her it didn't pay for the oils he used. The picture was three feet long by two feet wide. Our whole family was disgusted with Miss Todd. Mother said she was too ignorant to know better.

One day when my brother, Reuben, and I were out getting gum from the spruce trees, he was up in a tree knocking the chunks of lovely pink gum off the tree, letting it fall on the ground, and I was picking it up. All at once he dropped the monkey wrench (which he was using to knock off the gum) right on my head. And, did I yell. All the consolation I received from him was, "Well, you don't need to yell so loud."

One day Mother had just dressed us three girls up in new print dresses and starched sunbonnets and told us to go out and play. Wells Annie thought it would be great fun to get some little sharp sticks and go breaking the blisters on the balsam trees. Every time you broke a blister, they would pop like a pistol and this juice (which was just like pitch) would fly out and spatter all over you. Needless to say, our lovely clean dresses and bonnets were ruined. The stuff stuck like tar. I do not remember whether Mother ever got them clean or not, but I do remember how mad she was.

Before I forget, I must relate one terribly naughty and filthy thing I did in school. It was really deserving of punishment and had the teacher found out a threshing would have been lavishly administered to my anatomy. "Skunky" had been sitting ahead of me that day and doing his best to annoy me. He kept sticking his lead pencil up behind his back and wiggling at me. He knew I would hesitate retaliating lest the teacher see me. Finally, I took it, which surprised him. He put his hand back (behind his back) and I put the pencil in his hand but kept the rubber, which was a cap affair and fitted over the end of the pencil. When he felt secure from the teacher's eyes, he stuck his hand back for the rubber and I dropped a big juicy gob of spit in his palm. Evidently he thought it was the rubber for he took a good tight grip on it and gently drew his hand back and opened it. Wow" He found a regular spider net of saliva clinging to all his fingers. How we ever escaped being caught by the teacher was and is a mystery to me. Skunky nearly died. Devil that I was, I remember I never even cracked a smile but shook inside with laughter.

In those days we used slates and slate pencils for nearly all our work. We had slate rags and, if lucky, a little bottle of water to sprinkle on our slates, then rub them with our slate rags to clean them. Lots of kids never had a bottle of water; they would spit on them and rub the slates with rags or leaves. Some of the boys would wipe them with their coat or shirtsleeve, whichever happened to be in use at the time.

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