The daily Gate City and constitution-Democrat. (Keokuk, Iowa) 1916-1922, 1920-02-05
CAN YOU REMEMBER
WAY BACK WHEN
Valentines All Lace and FrIl's
Found Their Way to Your FROM
Door or Were Placed in the BOX
In School With Your Name on
Them.


They used to make them with ceilu-
loid, and decorate the edges with lace
paper and frilly trimmings. with doves
and cupids all around. Those were
the valentines Of the days or reai
sport" They were the kind that you
sent your first love back In the days
of "calf affection" in the fourth room.
You contrived to bring the wonderful
creations, breathing your declaration
of love in verses frequently without
rhyme or reason, to school under your
coat. 1t would have been the heighth
Of folly to have let any one see you
carrying such missive. You would
have been guyed to death and prob
ably would have had several fights on
your hands, to the Diet. ;ment OF the
precious valentine if not to yourself
personally.
Somehow or other you always man
aged to get the valentine to school IN
comparative safety. Once there 1t was
not hard to lay 1t on the fair ones
desk at recess, or when the geography
and spelling classes were passing VI
course, she never could guess-But
some how you always thought she
must have, because in some myster-
ious manner valentine, almost the
counterpart of the one you so cum
ningly devised to drop on her desk,
found it's way into your hands. Some
times the offering of love didn't get
to you until after dark. The mystery
Of Valentine night was almost as salts
flying and exciting as Halloween.
There would come a peal at the door
bell, or pounding on the door, ana
you. would hurry to the door. There
in the darkness you could see 1t, with
it's lacy frills and mushy verse. Some
times it had initials penned on IT, but
more frequently it was nameless. Back
to the sitting room you would go, hold
ing the treasure carefully, and steeling
yourself for all of the joshing from
the family.
Then there was the valentine box at
school. 1t was a wonderful chest OF
mysteries. and could not have been
any more exciting had 1t been the
blackbird pie of Mother Goose days
when four and twenty blackbirds
began to sing when the pie was
opened Teacher planned 1t and an
nounced it far enough ahead OF time
so that everybody could save up few
pennies from the candy store tempta-
ton that existed across the street, for
the purchase of valentines downtown.
That was when you could buy both
candy and valentines for copper
cent, too. The box was usually a big
pasteboard affair, and was placed on
teachers desk. There was slit IN
the cover of the box, and the yalen-
tines were put in through this open
ing. Then Just before dismissal the
box was opened. Everyone got val
entine, and there were only a few,
those who used to bring their lunches
and stay at noon, that ever guessed
the reason that no one was forgotten.
That was because teacher would put
a valentine for every pupil in the box,
before the rest of the school had ar
rived to deposit theirs.
Valentines were not always of the
pretty kind, either. There were the
comic ones that were printed on the
cheapest kind of paper, and smelled to
high heaven with cheap ink. They
were examples of the horrible in art,
if such things could be called art.
No one was spared from their shafts.
1t was the custom then, to pass valen.
tines" at night Up one street and
down another you went, throwing
your messages of hate on the door
steps of the butcher, the baker, candle
stick maker, teacher, preacher and
even your relations.
But the days of real sport are
.eclipsed now in the candy and flowers
that have crowded the frilly, lacy mes
sage of cupid off the doorsteps OF
your hearts desire. ~