Christmas in South Dakota, 1910

Dec17

She unwrapped an unwieldy bundle, covered with newspapers. Out of it fell a giant tumble weed, its spiny leaves dried on its skeleton stalk; its bushy top mounted on a trunk made of a broomstick. “Do you think that would do fer a Christmas tree?” she asked.

Becky looked at the dry bush with softened eyes.

“I thought maybe I could use some plum brush fer a tree, went on the child. “But I just hate the switchey look of’em for Christmas. So when this whopper tumble weed came along last fall it stuck in our chicken wire, and I hung it up in the barn. It dried just that way, and I thought maybe the children would like it fer a tree. The little ones never seen no pictures of one, even, and they wouldn’t know if it wasn’t just like. I got a pail of sand to stick that broomstick down in. I could hang the popcorn and the light strings on the tumble weed, and put the rest around it. Do you think that would work, Miss Linville?”

“I’m sure the children would love it.”

~The Jumping Off Place by Marian Hurd McNeely

Last night and today I have been enjoying this story, first published in 1929 and republished this year by the South Dakota State Historical Press for a new generation of readers. (The cover pictured here is from the older edition since the new paperback cover is not available at Amazon.) Little House on the Prairie fans who have exhausted Ms. WIlder’s canon and all its spin-offs, should try this story of a family of four orphan children who take up a homestead in South Dakota, determined to hold down their claim for fourteen months until they can gain title to the 160 acres of South Dakota farm left to them by their beloved Uncle Jim. Uncle Jim’s death at the beginning of the story gives the children a grief that is slow to heal, but the words and plans that he left them guide them in their new life on the prairie.

The Jumping-Off Place was a Newbery Honor book in 1930. (Laura Ingalls WIlder didn’t win her first of four Newbery Honors until 1938.) It’s a wonderful story of pioneering on the Great Plains in the early part of the twentieth century. Only one caveat: one of the characters does use the phrase “ni— work” to refer to the hard work of making a life on the prairie, a phrase I’m sure was common usage in that time and place, but offensive to modern ears nevertheless.

The book is for a bit more mature readers than those who first come to the Little House books. Ms. McNeely doesn’t sugarcoat the drudgery and suffering that those who settled the Great Plains had to endure. In one scene a baby dies of snakebite in a poverty-stricken dugout home, and fifteen year old Becky, the oldest of the four children, helps to lay out the body of the little girl and prepare it for burial. Some of the settlers are kind and helpful to the children, while others are mean and ornery. I think older children (ages 11-14 or so) who like this sort of tale will read anxiously to see if and how the children hold their claim and become part of the new Dakota society.

Other read-alikes in the pioneering children and young adults genre:

Hattie Big Sky by Kirby Larson. Another Newbery Honor book, reviewed here at Maw Books Blog.

By Crumbs It’s Mine by Patricia Beatty.

My Face to the Wind: The Diary of Sarah Jane Price, A Prairie Teacher. Broken Bow, Nebraska, 1881 by Jim Murphy

West to a Land of Plenty: The Diary of Teresa Angelino Viscardi, New York to Idaho Territory, 1883 by Jim Murphy.

Any other suggestions?

The American Patriot’s Almanac by William Bennett and John Cribb

Dec16

I just got this book in the mail from Thomas Nelson publishers, and I wanted to get a review posted before it’s too late because I think it would make a wonderful Christmas or New Year’s present for anyone interested in American history or any homeschooler or teacher of American history. As soon as the book came, Brown Bear Daughter was browsing through it, reading me excerpts, partly to avoid finishing her math lesson, but also because she was genuinely interested in the short vignettes from U.S. history.

The book consists of a story for each day of the year related to events that occurred on that date. For instance, for today, December 16th, Bennett and Cribb recount the story of the Boston Tea Party which took place on the evening of December 16, 1773. Then, underneath the short four paragraph account, there’s a list of other events that also happened on December 16th.

I have a similar book called On This Day in History, but what I like about this one is its unabashed Americanism and willingness to mention, and even feature, Christians and spiritual heroes as well as secular ones. For example, the entry for October 5th tells about the Great Awakening and about preacher Jonathan Edwards who was born on that date. Another entry features the first American-born Catholic saint, Elizabeth Seton. Also, I think the entries in The American Patriot’s Almanac are more kid-friendly and interestingly written to draw you into the story and inspire further research.

In addition to the page for each day of the year, there are extra features scattered throughout the book: Flags of the Revolutionary War, The History of the Stars and Stripes, Fifty All-American Movies, Flag Etiquette, The Declaration of Independence (text and history), The U.S. Constitution (text and history), The Gettysburg Address, The Emancipation Proclamation, The Pledge of Allegiance, The American’s Creed, songs and poems of American patriotism, and the written words of various prayers for America called Prayers for the American People. You get a lot of information here, a lot of bang for the buck, packed into 515 pages, including an index.

The American Patriot’s Almanac isn’t a chronological look at U.S. history, but I plan to use it daily next year as we study through the history of our country chronologically. These daily nuggets will review or preview what we’re studying and help me to reinforce the meaning of the events that make up our history. I”ll be using it for blogging, too, since I like to feature birthdays of famous people and events in history. Can you tell that I’m really excited about this book?

Thanks to the folks at Thomas Nelson for sending me a copy of this book for review.

Christmas in Switzerland, 1948

Dec16

“On Christmas Eve Georges Laurens stirred himself from his books and they all went out and climbed up the mountain and brought home a beautiful Christmas tree. Flip and Paul had been making the decorations in the evenings after dinner, chains of brightly colored paper, strings of berries and small rolled balls of tinfoil, and Flip had carefully painted and pasted on cardboard twenty delicate angels with feathery wings and a stable scene with Mary and Joseph and the infant Jesus, the kings and shepherds and all the animals who gathered close to keep the baby warm. When the tree was trimmed they sang carols, ending up with The Twelve Days of Christmas. Paul took Flip’s hand and threw back his head and sang.

On the twelfth day of Christmas
My true love sent to me:
Twelve drummers drumming
Eleven pipers piping
Ten lords a-leaping
Nine ladies dancing
Eight maids a-milking
Seven swans a-swimming
Six geese a-laying
Five golden rings
Four calling birds
Three french hens
Two turtle doves
And a partridge in a pear tree!”

~And Both Were Young by Madeleine L’Engle

Christmas in London, 1876

Dec15

“Christmas and New Year are a very merry time for some people; but for cabmen and cabmen’s horses it is no holiday, though it may be a harvest. There are so many parties, balls, and places of amusement open, that the work is hard and often late. Sometimes driver and horse have to wait hours in the rain or frost, shivering with cold, while the merry people within are dancing away to the music. I wonder if the beautiful ladies ever think of the weary cabman waiting on his box, and his patient beast standing till his legs get stiff with cold.” ~From Black Beauty: The Autobiography of a Horse by Anna Sewell.

I wonder whose hard work and maybe even suffering we ignore in our pursuit of a merry Christmas? Sales clerks? Restaurant workers? Who else?

Black Beauty was published in November, 1877, and its author never wrote another book. In fact, she died on April 25, 1878 only five months after the publication of her classic horse story, whose aim she said was “to induce kindness, sympathy, and an understanding treatment of horses.”

Christmas at Winchester, 1234

Dec12

“The whole court was beginning to hum and shine with Christmas hilarity, for Henry loved Christmas, loved to celebrate it as a day of high jollity with, of course, religious undertones.

The Christmas matins had been sung just before dawn with all the proper ceremonial. The bishop himself, wearing his dalmatic, had chanted St. Matthew’s Genealogy, after being escorted by the acolytes to the rood loft, where candlesticks were elevated above him. It had been a solemn occasion. The King had spent it on his knees, thrilling to the deep gloom of the edifice, the drone of the bishop’s voice and the the rich chorus of the monkish voices in the Te Deum which followed. He loved ritual. It uplifted him, made him feel more than an earthly king, gave him, perhaps, a sense of participation in heavenly rule.

Now the festivities of the day were starting and everything would be done with the refinement and magnificence which the Normans had introduced into such celebrations. The yule log had been dragged in already while gleemen sang the popular carol of the day, To English Ale and Gascon Wine, the refrain of which ran:

May joys flow from God above,
To all those whom Christmas love.

The wassail bowls were ready with the fragrant hot spiced ale and the roasted apples. The meats were making on the spits, pig and boar and goose, and the kitchens were still busy preparing such holiday delicacies as dilligrout and karum pie.” ~From The Magnificent Century by Thomas B. Costain.

What, pray tell, is a dalmatic? And what are dilligrout and karum pie? The aforementioned Henry is Henry III, aka Henry of Winchester, son of John I (Magna Carta) and father to Edward I, Longshanks.

7 Quick Takes Friday: Living and Learning

Dec12

Jennifer at Conversion Diary sponsors 7 Quick Takes Friday. If you’re in the mood for some trivia about the quotidian pursuits of ordinary people, which after all is what life is made of, check it out.

***1***

I like the word “quotidian”. I first saw it at someone’s blog. I think one of the reasons I blog is so that I can use words that I find and like, and no one will look at me with a puzzled expression and a “who are you trying to impress” attitude. I’m not trying to impress anyone; I just like words.

***2***

I’m still reading Cybils nominees. I would like to review all of the books, over 80, I’ve read for the Cybils, but I know that it’s not going to happen. THis morning at homeschool co-op, I was reading Chancy of the Maury River by Gigi Amateau. I’m not really a horse person, but this book reminds me of Black Beauty. I think horse-loving girls would love it.

***3***

Another book for horse lovers is last year’s Paint the Wind (Semicolon review here). Those two books together would make a great gift for some horsey young lady. All my friends in junior high loved horses, and they were all going to grow up to be veterinarians —except for me. I don’t even do small pets, let alone horses.

***4***

Mostly we learned about snow this week. We saw, we experienced, we froze. I’m still freezing, and it’s supposed to be up to 68 degrees today.

***5***

We also did a little math this week, read a little history, made this fudge (thanks to Brenda and Rachel). Our learning week has been somewhat desultory (another nice word), but relaxing.

***6***

I had planned to make several crafty-type Christmas gifts with the girls from this list, but we made exactly one of them so far, the play dough. I should already know that I’m just not the crafty type, except in the sly sense of the word. Maybe this next week will be craft week at Semicolon house.

***7***

Tomorrow Artist Daughter and Engineer Husband have their piano recital. I’ll miss the sounds of their practicing their pieces at random times of the day, but I’ll be glad to have the recital done. Christmas music playing here when someone isn’t playing the piano: Sufjan Stevens and Kemper Crabb.

See you all tomorrow at the Saturday Review of Books.

Christmas in Arizona, 1902

Dec12

“In 1902 an Act of Congress officially opened for land claims what had previously been the San Carlos Apache Indian Reservation. One fellow, upon hearing the news, immediately rushed there to stake his claims on December 25, Christmas Day. He then rapidly rode on horseback to file them the next day at the government office.”

This eager beaver land claim is what gave Christmas, Arizona its name.

~The Naming of America by Allan Wolk

Semicolon Author Celebration: Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Dec11

According to WIkipedia:

Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn (December 11, 1918 – August 3, 2008) was a Russian novelist, dramatist and historian. Through his writings, he made the world aware of the Gulag, the Soviet Union’s forced labour camp system, and for these efforts Solzhenitsyn was exiled from the Soviet Union in 1974. He was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1970. He returned to Russia in 1994.

I actually read The Gulag Archipelago, the whole thing I think, some twenty or thirty years ago. Honestly, I don’t remember much about it —except that it was long.

Solzhenitsyn, the man, was not a perfect person. He has been accused of anti-Semitism and of a superficial Russian patriotism that ignored the deep problems in post-communist Russia. Perhaps so.
But in his 1978 address to Harvard graduates, he was not afraid to speak truth to the elite students who were there to hear an innocuous commencement speech from a famous dissident. They got more than they bargained for.

Solzhenitsyn said:

The Western world has lost its civil courage, both as a whole and separately, in each country, each government, each political party and of course in the United Nations. Such a decline in courage is particularly noticeable among the ruling groups and the intellectual elite, causing an impression of loss of courage by the entire society.

Hastiness and superficiality are the psychic disease of the 20th century and more than anywhere else this disease is reflected in the press. In-depth analysis of a problem is anathema to the press. It stops at sensational formulas.

Such as it is, however, the press has become the greatest power within the Western countries, more powerful than the legislature, the executive and the judiciary. One would then like to ask: by what law has it been elected and to whom is it responsible? In the communist East a journalist is frankly appointed as a state official. But who has granted Western journalists their power, for how long a time and with what prerogatives?

If humanism were right in declaring that man is born to be happy, he would not be born to die. Since his body is doomed to die, his task on earth evidently must be of a more spiritual nature. It cannot unrestrained enjoyment of everyday life. It cannot be the search for the best ways to obtain material goods and then cheerfully get the most out of them. It has to be the fulfillment of a permanent, earnest duty so that one’s life journey may become an experience of moral growth, so that one may leave life a better human being than one started it.

The speech itself is worth reading.

So today we celebrate Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, an imperfect man who wrote long books, showed great courage in his resistance to the oppressive system of Soviet communism, and spoke some hard truths even at Harvard. If you have something to say about Solzhenitsyn and his writings, please leave a link in the linky.

One more quote from Mr. Solzhenitsyn: “If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?”

Christmas at Westminster, 1140 AD

Dec11

Christmas revelries at Westminster were lavish that year, deliberately so, as if rich fare and dramatic spectacle could somehow validate Stephen’s contested kingship, as if roast goose and spiced red wine and baker’s dozen of minstrels could make people forget the burning of Worcester, the sacking of Nottingham, the newly dug graves, and the uncertain tomorrows that lay ahead. The great hall of William Rufus had been adorned with so much greenery that it resembled the forest in which Rufus had met his death, decorated with evergreen boughs and holly and beribboned sprigs of mistletoe. The meal had been so bountiful that the leftover goose and venison and bread and eel scraped from the trenchers would feed Christ’s poor for days to come. The entertainment was equally extravagant: a woman rope dancer, a daredevil who juggled daggers, a Nativity play that offered not only the requisite shepherds and Magi but even a few sheep as props. Then the last of the trestle tables were cleared away and the dancing began, the irresistible, exuberant music of everyone’s favorite, the carol.

~From When Christ and His Saints Slept by Sharon Kay Penman. Semicolon review here.