25 January 1913 “First Sedan Style Car, Electric Cars, the Model T, and William M. Burton Cracks Petroleum for Standard Oil”

  This year, 1913, Hudson car company introduced the first Sedan style cars. That is a car with distinct motor, passenger, and storage areas and looked less and less like a carriage with no horses.

“The Hudson Motor Car Company was started in early 1909 by a group of Detroit businessmen headed by Roy Chapin. Chapin had previously worked with Ransom E. Olds (of Oldsmobile and REO fame) and had decided to produce an automobile that could be sold for under $1,000. Since this group was funded primarily by department store owner Joseph L. Hudson, the Hudson Motor Car Company was born. The first car, the Hudson Twenty was one of the first moderately priced cars in America and was very successful, with over 4000 produced in the first year. The company grew quickly thanks to several innovations like the first “idiot lights” rather than gauges to warn of oil pressure or generator issues. They were also the first to introduce a balanced crankshaft which allowed the Hudson engine to run smoothly at much higher RPM’s than their competitors. This rapid company growth also saw the Hudson price increase and Roy Chapin, realizing that they were straying from the formula that had brought them success, started the Essex Motor company in the late teens as a subsidiary of Hudson to provide a lower price alternative to the Hudson.”

This Hudson would be the last year they offered a 4 cylinder engine and would,starting next year 1914, begin the 6 cylinder. This car was an internal combustion engine as well.

In fact, in 1913 most cars were Electric. Most people actually preferred the electric cars as they were easy to operate (no cranking, and less parts such as no shifting gears) and they did not smell. In many cases they were preferred by ladies as they were thought to be more refined and generally more safe.

Here is Henry Ford and Edison with an electric car from this year, 1913.

Here are a few ads one would see this year in various periodicals.

This interesting article talks about a car going 104 miles, in bad roads then, as well, the did not have smooth interestate paved highways then, on one charge! (You can click on image to enlarge and read)

I had forgot that during my brief time in 1933 I stumbled upon electric cars. I had let it slip from my conscious that we had, indeed, rather reliable electric cars longer than we had gas driven.

And don’t think they were simply low powered compared to the gasoline engine, for their were also heavy duty pulling and carrying trucks as well. Here we see an ad for such an electric truck and that the prices are also going down.

The cost of cars were still such that they were mainly the province of the wealthy but the middle and upper middle classes were more likely to begin to afford them this year. A car could run from around $600 to $3000 depending on the make and model. Adjusted for inflation today that would run you around $14,000 to $70,000. Oddly enough that seems to be similar to car prices today for new cars. Yet, in the 20’s and into the 1950’s car prices were greatly reduced and even working class families in the 1920’s had no problem owning a car.

Henry Ford’s Model T was, however, a more affordable car. And his cars continued to go down in price as the years lead into and past WWI. Here is the assembly line in a Model T plant in 1913.

By 1914, the assembly process for the Model T had been so streamlined it took only 93 minutes to assemble a car. That year Ford produced more cars than all other automakers combined. The Model T was a great commercial success, and by the time Henry made his 10 millionth car, 50 percent of all cars in the world were Fords. It was so successful that Ford did not purchase any advertising between 1917 and 1923; more than 15 million Model Ts were manufactured, reaching a rate of 9,000 to 10,000 cars a day in 1925, or 2 million annually, more than any other model of its day, at a price of just $240. Model T production was finally surpassed by the Volkswagen Beetle on February 17, 1972.

Henry Ford’s approach to auto making was getting right, making a reliable affordable car and sticking with it. However, the other car companies began to offer more color options, different seating and other ‘extras’ while simultaneously building cars to not be as reliable and having more ‘bells an whistles’ than practicality.

Ford’s Model T was so well built and even used some innovative technology such as its use of vanadium steel alloy. Though Ford no longer makes parts for the Model T, many private makers still do to this day, as these cars continue to run and run and many owners simply replace parts to keep them on the road. A Model T in 1913 had dropped to $550 from it’s 1909 price of $850. By the 1920’s it had fallen to $260 (adjusted for inflation in the 1920s that would be similar to $3,400. We, unfortunately, have no similarly priced new cars in today’s market.)

 

Now, concerning gasoline, this year, 1913, on the 7th William Burton, a scientist and vice president of Standard Oil’s Indiana Refinery, patented a process for Cracking petroleum. Prior to this the production of gasoline was very inefficient. Only one fourth of crude oil could be turned into gasoline using the traditional heating method. That made the price too high.

The process he found used both high heat and high pressure which operated at 700–750 °F (371–399 °C) and an absolute pressure of 90 psi (620 kPa)This was not completely well received and one local reporter remarked, “Burton wants to blow the whole state of Indiana into Lake Michigan.”

Here I am only just beginning 1913 and I wonder what lays ahead. I recall in 1933 the similarities in some things became to heavy and insufferable for me to go on. Some of the mistakes and the parallels to last year were so great it literally made me ill and I had to stop. Here I see this discussion of cracking in petroleum and I can’t help but think of today’s discussion of Fracking and Tar sands. How much will the past and present parallel one another. And can we, this year, perhaps learn some things that are in a way a crystal ball to what we may expect to see in our futures. And, further on, if these ‘past prophecies’ prove wrong, will we have the ability or wherewithal to change. Or even, really, the power to do so? I am not sure.

I well continue to look at basic history, politics, and invention this year as well as homemaking to see how far we have come and what improvements there truly are. I am getting rather excited at the prospect and a bit curious to see how greatly 2013 and 1913 may mirror one another.

Until next time, have a lovely day.

22 January 1913 “The New Household Discoveries Book to Share, Functions of Food, Meal Planning and Recipes”

Some of you who followed my blog thus far may have seen this book of mine pop up occasionally. It is an old 1909 book of household running and recipes. There are copies I have seen that were updated in 1913 as well. I may order one. This, so far, has not shown up online for free as of yet.

This book, however, is free. And is available to anyone to read online or to download and keep. I am going to put it in the library and you can download it from the Domestic Concerns section, simply click on that link.

This book was reprinted in 1913 and again in 1917. So it will be one of my main references this year. It has topics on car of the skin and hair with recipes and various other guides for the homemaker of the time.

I found these images and descriptions of the uses of food really interesting and actually rather simple and accurate for even today. More so than the complicated way we are often told of food and the contrary and changing ‘rules’ that come out every few years.

Here is one of the charts with simple break down of food:

 

The simple rule of Protein as tissue repair, Fats as stored energy and Carbohydrates (sugar and starch) are transferred into fat a sound and easy way to view diet. I am often surprised that many people today do not even know that sugar turns to fat when not used up.

These color charts are easily divided and use an easy to follow color coded key. These images can be enlarged by clicking on them.

These breakdowns on even the separate kernels of the various wheat used in flour and cord are very specific yet have a tangible and easy to reference use to the homemaker even today, I would think. It seems, as we move back well past the 1950’s and beyond 1933, we see homemakers given credit for having enough sense and general knowledge to take in such information and use it as a wise guide to plan meals and prepare for nutrition. Health, at this point, needed to be preventative so diet was more important than medicine which was not available as it is today in every shape and form for every malady both real and some may say contrived for the purpose of selling the medicine in the first place.

This bit on meal planning has a similiar ring when it begins, “No doubt the cost of food is increasing”. We certainly feel such a crunch today. And in fact, had I not started my 1955 blog four years ago and kept a strict weekly food budget and diary of what things cost, I may not even realize today how much food has gone up. And in many cases the quantities in cans, boxes, and bottles have been reduced as well as the price increasing so there is even a greater amount of increase then might be observed by the casual shopper.

And here it goes on to say, which has been my finding as well, that “The efficient housewife plans a WEEKLY rather than a daily menu, and intelligently distributes the money allowed for food among the seven days.” This may seem to simple a solution, but it really needed to keep a proper food budget.

When I go marketing every Friday I have a list for the week. That list is broken down into a 7 day budget. My original 1955 budget was 40 a week. I now find I cannot shop on that amount, do to increases so my budget is now 55. So, I have roughly 7.85 to spend for each of those seven days. When I am in the store I consider that 2/3 of that goes to the protein for dinner and so my meat/fish/protein source is the greatest part of my shopping. I get eggs from my chickens and some supplemental vegetables, this time of year it is cabbage, carrots, kales mostly in my garden under the snow.

It also recommends shopping in season. Even though we live in a world where tomatoes and strawberries are available year round, one can see they are higher priced in our own seasons. So this time of year I could buy a head of cabbage rather cheap or even apples compared to tomatoes and blueberries. And if we are ants and not grasshoppers we can also can and preserve fruit in the bounty of Summer to enjoy in the cold winter days. This also helps the food budget.

Here are some sample menus provided, including a vegetarian one as well. There are quite a few sample menus and all the food suggested include recipes so the book is certainly worth the time to download or bookmark to look online for free.

I may try the carrot timbales for Gussie who is vegetarian and see what she thinks of them.

 

This sounds like an easy recipe for home-made pretzels. I am going to try this and will post my results. These would be fun to make and cut into bit size and serve with dipping sauces or even on a large salad tossed with fish or meat as a main course.

Now a bit about how I plan to organize the site this year with my current project and past projects as well. I am going to add little visual buttons under the various headings. For example this would fit under Cooking but also under Home Ec (I am going to make that button this week). And so as the year goes by I should hopefully build up the log of my posts this way. I have tried simply using the tags with links in the past but find it still not as effective as I would like it to be. This shall continue to be a learning process in the computer skills as well as ever improving or trying to improve in the skills of the home and hearth.

I hope all have a lovely day.

19 January 1913 “My new Project Redux and 1913 Fashion”

First off I want to start today by saying that when I began to consider my 1913 posts on Friday I was rather excited. The more I thought about it this week, I realized I would rather retain the focus on one year for the whole of the year. My posts may not be daily but will be at least 3-5 a week.

I will not be entirely immersing myself into 1913 as I need my car and the other restrictions would be too great for me at this time. But I shall be trying many recipes, crafts, sewing, cleaning and other notions from the time. The other wonderful part is that many books of this time and earlier are free of copyright so I can find them online and then of course share them with you by putting them in the library, which I am keeping from the Charm of notions page.

The links on the left will pages that will become the storehouse of my various posts. So we can refer to them again based on their topics. I feel this is the best way to move forward for me, as I feel I may continue to do other years each year and this will eventually build up an easy to follow catalog. I wish I had done this in my 1950’s blogs, but we learn from our past, don’t we?

I am excited to look back exactly 100 years ago and see how things have changed or in some ways, maybe stayed the same, who can see. We shall see what we uncover as the year progresses and I hope you wish to come along for the ride.

Addendum:
I have decided it makes sense to simply make over the blog for this year of 1913 but that way we can all stay where we are comfortable.
I am currently trying to recall how to log into my own Forum! I cannot access it so I cannot make anyone else an administrator and having no luck contacting the company who is hosting it. I will keep you posted about this. Thank you all and I hope you come along for 1913

Well, let’s begin today with something fun: Fashion.

 

The fashionable silhouette given us here on this 1913 Vogue shows the new slimming woman. The cinched in waist is disappearing and a smoother over all look is appearing.

Of course, those ladies in the upper classes would don the latest styles rather quickly, as they were the trendsetters and the main customers of the Fashions houses of Paris, London, and New York.

These are wonderful examples of how the very artful fashion illustrations of that time looked in actual cloth on actual flesh.

The illustrations are romantic and rather decorative in themselves.

Though the corset remained it became much more of an undergarment rather than a body shaper. Here we see there is no need to contort the woman’s shape into wasp-waist thin. In some outfits, bulky appears to be the goal. Rather a saving grace if one were allowed such fashion today. It almost became the decoration of the drape and clothes more so than the woman’s body.

In this fullness, too, we see the dropped waist making various appearances. Another look that we will see full time come 1920’s.

There was perhaps a looking back at the time as well. If we look to 100 years earlier, 1813, we certain similarities. The empire waist for one. On the left we have 1813 on the right 1913.

There is even a similarity in the hair being worn low on the sides but swept up and back away from the head. And the lower forehead being decorated with beads or bandeau. This will eventually lead to the tight fitting cloche hats of the 1920s.

On the left is 1813 on the right the use of feathers in 1913 and the bandeau and hair also 1913 but looking rather Regency. 

However, it would be wrong to thing that all ladies of all classes looked the same then, any more than all of us look like fashion magazines today. The middle classes in 1913 would have added a few changes here and there but overall would have still kept the lower waist and more Gibson Girl hair of the 1900’s.

Here we see some middle class ladies from 1913 who work in an office (a growing work face is burgeoning for our ladies, though the ladies of the lower classes have always worked). Over all their hair and dress is not much changed from five years earlier. Though the lady on the far right is already wearing a narrow skirt and her shirt is not given the forward blouse that was prevalent in the Edwardian period.

And of course the working classes appear not only 5 years out of date but of another century entirely. This photo of a farming family from 1913 could almost be mid Victorian. In fact their clothes almost look like the styles of the 1940’s, but of course there was not even photography yet. This photo is by famous photographer August Sander who was German. This photo and other’s are at the Tate and this link HERE will take you to more of his photos.

Here catalog outfits, ready made, show the more masculine look that sees to be the opposite of the light and free flowing empire waist look of the high fashion house neo-Regency look of this time. In many ways these suits are simply a female version of a man’s walking suite, or sport clothes. Ladies are now becoming more active in many sports once reserved for men.

Though the first World War is often given as the reason for ladies ankles to reappear do to the need for ladies to get around easier to work in munitions and the field, we see that fashion was toying with the idea already.  Though, again, middle class women, particularly older ladies, would most likely have kept their skirts to the floor until after WWI begins.Yet, these shorter ankle bearing clothes were most likely part of the ‘hobble skirt’ which showed more leg but restricted one’s ability to get about. The last gasp of pre World War attempts to show ladies of upper classes hadn’t need to move about too much. Something that forever changed after the War years.

Though I will not be wearing clothes and undergarments of the period as I did in my 1950’s projects, I would like to at least sew up a few skirts or dresses from this year. So, I shall see what I can find for patterns and maybe get my hand on an old treadle sewing machine, just for the fun of it.

I hope all who still read me will be glad that I am returning to the format of focusing on one year. I really feel it will be more interesting and fun overall.

Have a lovely day.

10 October 2012 “Turkey Dinner or Best Friend?”

First let me say it felt wonderful to check my blog today (something I have not done for a bit as I said I was rather unplugged for awhile) and see comments. I do miss that and all of you.

A quick response to some questions: I actually still dress vintage inspired most of the time. While working, which is simply slinging coffee at a coffee house, I started wearing skirts but now do wear trousers more. When I am not working I mostly wear dresses and skirts. However, my  return to the “present” has been making me almost hungry to create new vintage inspired ways of dressing. We still do our Sunday outing at our local tea house and I often wear hat and gloves and always dresses of course. I even wear dresses to my art class, though I am thinking of running up a few simple cotton dresses that I won’t mind getting printing ink on. As the class is screen printing I plan on designing and printing some simple cotton fabric to make clothes from. And I have a wallpaper idea I may try this semester and will happily share with all of you.

Now, I am still considering my schedule for writing but I simply felt like writing a little post today so here I am.

This is Alden my turkey. He is an Heritage breed known as a Holland White. How he came into my life is rather a spur of the moment decision. In this photo you see Alden with his best friend, a Polish hen named Beatrix.

Alden is named after my hubby’s Mayflower descendant, John Alden. I felt a turkey meant for the Thanksgiving table should have a good old-stock Pilgrim name. His little friend, Beatrix, is named after Queen Beatrix of the Netherlands. Polish hens are actually not from Poland but from the Netherlands.

As some of you know we had our home on sale this year. Because of that I sent my lovely chicken flock to a local educational farm and they now all live happily on many acres on the ocean. When I began waffling about the sale of our house this summer I happened to be at our local grain and feed store. They had just got in a small batch of rare white Holland's. This is an Heritage breed that is on the endangered list. They are a very old breed that started in South America in the 1500’s were brought to Europe by the Spaniards and returned to North America with the colonists. They were prized for their white color for both show (originally brought to ornament lawns as do peacocks) and then for their desirable white flesh as a meat bird.

This breed was crossed with the broad-breasted bronze in the early 1900’s to create the super hybrid white broad breasted used commercially today. The modern hybridized version are such a sad tale, as they grow insanely quick often snapping their own legs due to their weight and are unable to breed naturally and thus are only breed through artificial means. That is the type of turkey one finds in the grocery store. If they are allowed to live they eventually die by being crushed by their own weight.

So, these heritage Holland White’s are quite rare and a local man wanted to start and maintain a flock (as the heritage happily breed amongst themselves and are a very tame bird). You can see in the photo how long and strong Alden’s legs are. His sad modern hybrid relatives ride so low to the ground their legs bend with their own weight. Rather a sad commentary on today’s food and how distanced we are from the humanity and reality of what food what meant to people.

Here are more shots of my handsome lad:

  The darling little chicken looking up at the camera is Heloise. My current chicks/hens are not as friendly as my last batch but this little darling always comes up to me with Alden when I go to their pen in the morning. She is a Favorelle, a breed of chicken that has feathered legs and a big feathery neck piece that rather looks like an Edwardian ladies opera cape of feathers. They also have an extra toe that makes them look rather silly, but adorable none the less.

After deciding to get Alden (I had not chickens at that time having got rid of mine due to the house being for sale) I felt bad his being a small little downy turkey chick. All lone in a big chicken house. So, I bought him Beatrix as a friend. They were close in size as chicks and obviously now are miles apart. But, they have remained friends and Beatrix sleeps not on the roosts with the other hens, but cuddled on the floor of the coop with Alden under a heat lamp I had in their for chicks. They love it so I simply left it for them.

So, now I have 7 hens in total (they won’t begin laying for another month or so) our turkey and a fun little mini flock of miniature show chickens. I will share those with you on another post. My current hens do include two Americaunas for blue eggs and two French Cuckoo Marans for the chocolate brown eggs. I simply have to have a colorful group of eggs. They just look so good in my wire chicken holder in my kitchen. I like my farming to have a little style.

So the long and short of it is, Alden was purchased to be part of my grow at home Thanksgiving. I have a lovely large bucket of potatoes I dug that I planted this summer. Some acorn squash packed in my cellar from my garden. My big fat pumpkin is still happily on the vine at present and will make a wonderful pie and by Brussels sprouts are still fattening on the stalk as we speak. All of these will play a role on this year’s Thanksgiving table, but I fear the only way Alden may appear at the table is in tie and tails as a guest of honor. He has remained so sweet and beautiful I am not sure we can eat him. We shall see come November. I know it is hard to raise and kill your own food, but it has a dignity in it and a pure quality of life that I rather long for. But, we must take baby steps and this first attempt may simply remain to remind us to not ‘name our dinner’ as it were.

So, from Alden and myself, happy dreaming on Thanksgiving treats to come. And as always, Happy Homemaking.

9 October 2012 “A Quiet Return and Thinking of You”

I have been unplugged and absent for two months. The rest was needed for many reasons but I am finding my way back. I hope some of you have remained and are looking forward to my tentative return.

I have photos of my garden over the past few months as well as my growing chicken yard. My life has changed to the modern world but with a strong hold in the past. I am now working outside of the home 2-3 days a week at a cafe. I am taking an art class this semester and considering more schooling in my future. I find myself dressing more modern. Yet, with all these changes, the skills of the past and the general outlook on life as frugal and well planned could not serve me better than in the present.

I find that I miss this portion of my project; the writing and hearing from all of you. My life is moving more towards the arts and with the skills of the home and the immense study of the past, it cannot but help color my art. I want the site to move in that direction but to also maintain the importance of history. And I would like to begin sharing my life, my projects, and what I learn and garner from all of that with all of you.

I hope all are well and I look forward to hearing from you. My hubby and I find that the past will never leave us completely. We both are history lovers at heart and our home is still TV free. He enjoys his typewriters and I my antique appliances. In many ways we consider more ways to bring the past into our daily lives and to better arrange our futures.

I hope you will enjoy the changes that I will be sharing in the months ahead and look with excitement at the coming new year. I’d like to work towards our making a meeting place of creativity and old skills to better our lives. To share one another’s stories, answer questions about how to use the past to better the present and a great place to document the adventures of my odd little life.

I also plan on making a set writing schedule for the blog and to try and update and bring in more interactive aspects. I am currently fighting a cold (a consequence of working outside of the home I fear) and plan on next week beginning to write every Tuesday and Thursday. I also plan a way to have an easy but fun way to share daily. I have let the last forum subside due to the problem (as we had with our original old forum back in 1956) of spam. A move to Wordpress may be in the future as well, as it might better allow apps and add-ons to improve our enjoyment of our online history loving community.

So, to all of you out there, you have all been in my thoughts and I hope you will continue to be in my on-line life. Until I write again, remember to learn from the past to enjoy the present and improve the future.

50s gal

19 July “The Joy of Unplugging and My Hopes for the Future”

I believe I am well past apologies at this point. Here it has been well over a month since my last post. As many discovered through my posts that the Depression was far too near to our actual times for comfort. The increasing discoveries of our past through politics and how they shadow and color today began to be overwhelming. It was not unlike an extensive art renovation peeling back the layers of a loved old painting to realize that the foundation of a lovely bucolic scene had been built upon the mad renderings of a Hieronymus Bosch depiction of Hell.

I hadn’t any original intentions to unplug as I have done. It simply happened. One day, guilt free, away from the computer. Another day came and went with meals and cleaning and gardening but no computer. Their were mornings spent watching my new chickens, afternoons weeding the garden and occasional breaks in the days with bike rides to the shore with hubby and friends. It began to feel almost like a delicious decadence, these blog-less days. My chores done and the day stretched before me with no need to touch a key nor sit in front a screen. The earth called and my nails grew rich with dark soil.  There were trips to local garden centers with friends; happily choosing flowers. Dinner parties under the trees lit with candles, our laughter, and the late night crickets. And still no computer. I reveled in a world in which the most advanced technology I needed was my old stove and pad and paper.

So, to say the least, I have used the computer very little. There were very few reasons to touch it. I have taken my break from writing. I have no interest in TV and any movies I wished to indulge in I could do so on our old set rigged to play dvd’s with the black and white feel of the past. What are my plans for the future with this site? I am not sure.

I do know that I love to write and wish to do so again. With the missing part of my day being the discipline of desk/computer/writing/research time, I have looked more to my studio. Dreaming up art projects.

The main thing I seemed to have learned during these past three years of time travel is that if one learns skills one can manage more things. I find having more to do each day makes the day more enjoyable and gives me a better feeling about myself and my own accomplishments.

I think my posts may begin to return to one day a week to get me back into the swing of the things. I have so many things growing in my garden that would be fun to share. And various things I am I always doing or trying that would be good as well. Like my good ole’ fashioned homemaker blogs. I think that might be of interest to all. I shall still touch on the past, of course, in context of that post. And all the while begin compiling my book of my experience.

Well, for those of you out there that have stuck around I hope you continue to do so. For any new followers, simply click the link to start at my 1955 year to see the insanity that has brought me to where I am. And, as always, Happy Homemaking.

17 June 1955 “Touching Base”

Just checking with all of you. You have all been on my mind, but busy gardening and just enjoying the Summer really. I shall post soon. I hope all are enjoying their Summer.

5 June 1948 “Your Thrift Habits, In the Garden, and How to Make Short Pastry”

I may have shared this film with you before, but come along and learn how Ralph can teach Jack (and us) some common sense saving tips. In the modern world, unfortunately, the 0% interest rates do not encourage savings. One finds now it costs more to keep one’s money in the bank. But, we should learn from the smart aspects of the past and forgo the bad behavior our modern Federal Reserve and Spend Thrift government demonstrates to us.

I call this my ‘edible bouquet’. You can see a cluster of broccoli, little radish seedling leaves, and the flowers from my arugula. This looks lovely and I keep it in water in the kitchen and cut off it for my meals. Why not enjoy your garden produce as art as well as food.

My little garden is coming along nicely this year. I downsized as we have the house on the market. I am now farming four 4 x 4 raised beds. One row of the picket fence around my veg garden also has some fennel, rhubarb, chives and onions. And my tomatoes and herbs are in pots on the terrace. If we decide not to sell or it doesn’t sell, next summer my garden will double, that’s for sure.

Here I caught this little insect pollinating my arugula flowers. You are not meant to let them flower, but they grow so fast and I simply hack them down and put them in my ‘bouquets’. They are edible and look lovely in salads. As long as I don’t let them go to seed.

Arugula is a wonderful salad green. It has an almost savory quality to it, rather like meat or slightly peppery. It is a treat fresh or also quickly pan seared with served with meat.

Radishes are the easiest thing to grow. From seed to food is mere days! The seeds are fine you simply sprinkle them close together and then as they sprout you want to thin them. And don’t they look wonderful all lined up in their loamy beds. Next to them are sprouting two rows of carrots.

 These thinned sprouts here, demonstrating they are radish by their lovely red and white roots, are delicious. They are milder than when they are full grown and go straight into salads. What doesn’t end up in my mouth of course. Even if you only have a pot on a window sill in the city, you could grow radish non stop for your summer eating.

I just loves the up close images of these so had to share a closer photograph. Aren’t they beaufitful?

  My broccoli is growing like a weed! In fact I let these bunches go a bet too far, as they are about to flower, but I rather like them this way. Again, salads or steamed or simply dropped on top of your grilled chicken for the last minute of cooking and its a dream. Fresh garden veg will always outside the Styrofoam over grown varieties at most major Super Markets.

Snow peas, or sugar snap peas, are another easy to grow crop. You start them early in the ground, they like a little cold. And while these are producing I have my lima beans starting on the same structure. When these are gone the limas will be going nicely and I will plant a second crop of snap peas in another spot this year. They are eat of the vine wonderful.

Some of the other fun plants in my garden this year include this Tesal plant (medicinal) the beautiful artichoke (the fern like one in front) and fever few and dill. The fever few is both medicinal and good in herbal teas. And we love artichokes here, so good and fun to eat, sucking each yummy morsel out of their little shells. Rather like the Lobsters of the Garden, really.

My blueberry bushes are brimming with a nice little harvest. And my graps are beginning their budding. The little flower clusters look like mini bunches of grapes. These are a small seeded old variety, but the taste. When you eat these and compare them to the plum-sized hard and firm seedless market variety, you can really taste the difference. These old small seeded grapes taste like heaven and are as sweet as candy. Of course, I have to fight the birds for them, but enough make it to my kitchen to make me happy and every year the vine grows bigger leaving a bigger share for both of us.

As we are in the 1940’s today, I though I’d share this fun scan of making short pastry from the war time ministry of foods in Britain. Short Pastry, of course, is simply flour and fat. It is used for both sweet and savory.

I realize I am still rather lax in my posting. And as I said last post have begun to simply live more and research less. I still research, though, its simply part of my life now, but much more focusing on doing. I think I see myself and this blog moving in a new direction but still keeping the old values. I believe what I have done thus far has been a solid base and that I in no way see me abandoning it. My new project might be more focused on an outside source, such as an artwork project that goes for a year, that I can share but with still sharing my daily living and usual tips on living vintage.

The old ways are now simply My ways. I no longer see a differentiation between what I am trying to do and what is modern to do. I see the vast crevasse between how we live now and how we used to and I simply try to do more of the old ways, as they have become more normal to me. Though I am daily reminded (well not daily, many days I am happily at home blissfully ignorant of the changing world out there) of how much harder it is to simply be frugal.

As an example I was going to sell some homemade things this summer at my local farmers market. Now there are SO many laws set up to ‘protect’ us that the homemaker and small business starter has little chance to make it against the big guys. After I would get my kitchen inspected ($70 every year), pay to take a two day Serve Safe class (around $400), buy Liability Insurance (insurance the scourge of the modern man and the road block to cheaper prices for all and more money for the little man!)which is $550 a year, plus the food license for my town also required, another $60. All that before I even pay for the table at the Farmers Market or buy the ingredients.

At least in the Depression one could put out a sign and sell things no problem. Today the road blocks to self-sufficient money making are immense. And many of these ‘health precautions’ mean little to the large factories where chickens float in vats of bleach. Yet, if I wanted to slaughter my own home raised chicken and sell it to my neighbor I could literally go to jail for it.

It is hard, sometimes, living in the past when the present slaps one in the face at every turn. But, I try and shall endure as I hope all of you shall as well. We can do it, we past loving home bodies, but we must be craftier in how it is done.

Happy Homemaking.

 

29 May 1956 “Living My Life and Father Knows Best: Don’t Wear Your Pants So Low”

I have no real reason for my long 13 day absence from my blog. I have to admit to not even using the computer for the past few days. At my last check in I saw that our good follower/friend Sanne noted that we are having Spam on our new Forum. As I am paying monthly to have that forum so as NOT to have spam you can see that is rather frustrating. It was sort of another ‘straw breaking camel’s back’ for me.

I have been, then, simply living my life. Each day has not been any particular year but my own now certain form of timeless living. I still watch no modern media and only read vintage magazines, but most of the day is filled with gardening, planning out a new project for my barn/studio and biking and walking.

Where I live is certainly a Summer Season destination, so you can imagine this time of year it is lovely. The days are warmer but still with a hint of cool sea air. The wooded path where we walk and bike down to the sea is alive with blooming wild jasmine and roses right now. I feel rather transported back in time when wheeling down that lane, my skirts flying and the fragrance of the wild flowers begin to mingle with sharp notes of the sea.

Have I seen to the problem with the forum? No. Have I bothered to research a particular moment and compare and contrast with today? No. I have simply and happily swirled through these days with mornings punctuated by my old percolator popping as I stand on the terrace of the kitchen and dream up my next garden. Or laugh with friends on the rolling lawn of our local tea house, watching the birds play on the waters of the old Mill Pond downtown. An afternoon spent poking around the antique shop, trying on Victorian rings and helping friends try on 1800’s silk bonnets.

I seem to be coming to a point in which I have begun to see the world as it truly is. I can see the funny old professor behind the curtain pulling the strings that manipulate the great and powerful OZ that is our modern world and while it first scared me, it has now brought me to a place of complete neutrality. I feel I have no real power to change the vastness of our world. I, much like many of the masses during the hard times of the past, simply must wait to be swept up into whatever the puppet master chooses to be our next production. In the meantime I want to live.

And the things I am doing and have been learning since 1955 seem to be quite helpful in the changing times. Gardening, cooking, mending, de-cluttering. Even things as simple as selling and donating things once bought at big box stores for the look of it with China stamped on the bottom for one small item that is truly old and has true value. It needn’t be expensive, but whole shelves of cheap knock offs can be worth nothing and can quickly be yard-saled and one nice piece of sterling silver, a pair of sugar tongs say, can replace them. They take up less space. They hold a store of value (as they are sterling and mostly silver) and are also useful. And what fun to polish them and be proud when serving guests tea and asking “One lump or Two” to which the little clawed pincers goes into the sugar bowl and presents the cleverest little claw of sugar.

Yesterday, Hubby had the day off and we worked in the yard. We trimmed out some more trees, though it is rather late to do it, but we have fun. And I finally decided the old lilac, which has been rather sick and gets worse for the wear every year, should go. Its sacrifce gave me not only a flood of light in my little kitchen but literally another sunny area to expand my vegetable/fruit garden. I was excited at the prospect.

“Aren’t you moving?” you might ask, Well we do have our house on the market. But, I am also realizing that we are no where near the bottom of the housing market, despite what is said in the press. (again the professor happily presses the button and the Great Oz Speaks!) and see that what we would want for our home means it might sit here for some time. And that realization also makes me wonder if my future plans should not involve keeping our lovely old home after all. Again, acceptance, realization, prepare, then move on to living and enjoying each day.

I have decided this summer to do some fun art courses. I am going to learn some wheel throwing in ceramic/pottery. This week I will also be going to learn more about encaustic, a very ancient art form where one paints with layers of wax and colors. Again, living my life today as well as appreciating the past.

I am not sure how my posts will change. I do know that I shall be trying to ease back into more daily posting, but I need to emerge from this cocoon of strict past rules and spread my wings of joy and living.

I will close now with this link. I was unable to find a YouTube version but was able to find it on Hulu. It is free, but you will need to watch commercials. I luckily have these shows and many others on old dvds my hubby made for me back in 1955 to ‘watch tv’ as it were then without any modern things breaking in. This episode I found funny and topical as in the late 50’s the fashion of teen boys (not girls though) wearing their dungarees or (Levi’s as they say here, branding) was becoming popular. As was a more casual look for girls when not in school. This episode compares the parents 1920’s youth to the current 1957. It is a good episode and I hope you enjoy it. HERE is the link.

Have a lovely day all and Happy Homemaking.