St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1884-07-05
TwO-sCoRE YEARS AGO.
Aeanaonea Customs of Our Fathers.


San Francisco Chronicle. Family cooking
was better than at present. Our mothers
and grandmothers ''took hand' in it.
Bread was made at home. Coffee was fresh
ly ground every morning for breakfast The
grinding of the family coffee-mill was ia
miliar sound of the early morning long ere
the children were up. Foreign help had
less sway in the kitchen than now, and Euro
pean hands did not make a botch of such
purely American dishes as pumpkin pie,
Goldfish cakes, pork and beans, corn bread,
buckwheat cakes and succotash.
People then did not live as long, nor was
the average health as good as it is to-day;
they ate more meat, more grease, more hot
bread, more heavy dishes, drank more at
meals and afterward chewed more tobacco.
Dyspeptics and consumptives were more
common; disease and premature death were
devoutly laid at the Deity's door and alluded
to as Interpretations of Providence
Tombstones had larger epitaphs and more
verbosity engraved upon them.
At funerals undertakers cried with the
mourners, the flow of tears being proper
tionate to the funeral.
Collins were very plain and burial caskets
unknown.
Young folks in couples counted it privi-
ege to sit up nights with the corpse before
burial, and in many cases it was welcome
recreation.
New Orleans molasses, very black and
thin, was the common "sweetning" for
buckwheat cakes. Refined molasses was
com paratively scarce.
rl.a tox,I- b;1Ic ,,,o,o 80 .@o+o lo.,1-. H.
further west Their locality the shaker were
they, Illinois and Indiana bills would barely
pass in New York City.
Much of the silver acknowledgements
shillings and dollars-was of Mexican coin
age, brought to this country by the Santa Fe
traders.
The country retail trade was better than
now. People then could not so easily by
rail run up to the city and spend their largest
cash accumulations for the more expensive
stuffs
Eggs were shilling dozen, and butter
was considered high at eighteen pence per
pound.
There was "York currency being eight
shillings to the dollar, and New England
currency, six shillings to the dollar.
Business letters were more voluminous
and formal than now, and written in pre-
else, round hand.
Isolated rural settlements contained a
proportion of lunatics and victims of st. Vi
tus' dance than they do to-day.
The railroad had not strung places to-
gether, and there were fewer hospitals for
special diseases, hence most of Their cases
were kept at home.
The diet was more sureharged with grease.
The winter breakfast at thousands of tables
insisted Of sailed ham and hot cakes.
Dinner was simply hasty lunch at noon
Little importance was attached to the neces-
sity for good digestion or period OF rest af-
ter eating.
The same heavy diet prevailed in many
families, without change, winter and sum-
mer. Hence on the first approach of the
warmth Of spring came "sprIng fever'' and
billiousness. For this the doctors of the pc
Rod gave strong cathartics, possibly blue
mass pilln or dose Of ..calomel''.
The regular profession then used mercury
in a manner which would not be deemed
reckless. The patient was given regular
purgatiQn and directed to diet for few days.
Children were strongly dosed with castor oil
and salts and SIENNA on the least provoca-
ton.
1t was strong age for medicine and an
age Of strong medicine. Under such treat
ment the strong managed to recover, the
weak died and the medium class physically
fingered on and suffered.
Lightning rods made their way into use
with difficulty. The ultra-devout actually
opposed them on the ground that they were
an insult to the Deity and that it was an in
reference with the works and viii Of P-ovi-
dence