The Bennington evening banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 19??-1961, 1920-08-02
BIC CHANGE NOTED
Life in Country Today Compares
to Twenty Years Ago.
Custom of Sleeping Outdoors, for In.
stance, Is Growing-What the
"Moves" and Canned Music"
Have Accomplished.

entire villages, up in New York state
at least, seemed to fear fresh air o
nights and slept with their windows
closed. Night air was not healthful,
they sald-and a lot of them lived to
be ninety-seven even on that theory.
The window sashes were nailed down
and stuffed with rags at the first sign
of snow and We slept under those con
ditions.
In those days IL anyone had prac-
tlced sleeping outdoors, even in sum-
mer weather, it would have caused n
sensation. Cracked, | swami the old
farmers would have said.
The change came gradually, presum-
ably because the sons and daughters
of the old residents went to work in
the large centers whore opened win
dows were, If not the rule, surely not
the exception, remarks n writer In the
New York Evening Sun. Now the com
plete change hits one fairly In the face
when he returns to the once airless
districts OF early youth.
Night and day now the windows are
wide open and sometimes even doors
are never closed; no one thinks OF lly-
ing without screens and mosquito net
ting, even the poor in hollows and by
lanes. The families frequently eat out
doors under the old apple tree, on red
and white table covers or oilcloth or a
bare scrubbed board Like the omni-
present fiyver that carries the clerk
and his family to picnics along the
roadside, the collaborating habit has
done wonders for the health and hap
piness Of all, particularly the country
folk.
Out-ofdoors sleeping is now we'll
nigh habit, Hardly a porch in that
country nowadays is complete without
a khaki swing couch, a made-up cot or
one of the old time hard, harcIoth
"sohes' with pillows and patchwork
quilt or two, ready for the sleeper.
Most Of these were hung with mosquito
net curtains, looped back by day.
Nowadays on these outdoor touches
are seen reclining in daytime the old
man of the family, lying at full length
with his bare feet toasting In the sun.
Twenty years ago he would have slept
In the darkenad parlor behind closed
shutters; or, If very fooIhardy, he
might have been caught by watchful
eyes Of his family mapping under the
old apple tree '
Yes the country has come on! ...u
But outdoor sleeping by rural chill
dreh has not Yet arrived. Here the
farmers wife draws the line. 1t may
be all right for grandpap and herself
and husband, but she is not yet sure
about the night air for little lungs. So
childreu's. cots are not seen upon the
porclies. They stlll sleep within four
walls and Il ceiling. irH .NtW q,} "
The city and large towns have come
to this airy regime through years of
propaganda In newspapers, In churches
and In social centers. The country alb
Sorbel It through newspapers and mag
azInes.
But If there has been a notable
change IN the attitude of farm and Yil-
lage folk toward fresh air there has
been an even greater change In their
social life. The small town of twenty
years ago Is not the small town Of to-
day. Then they. had church sociables.
They may still have them, but do not
know where. There used to be buggy
rides and prayer meetings. and the
greatest dissipation Of the younger vii.
layers was going walking with pos
sible "sody" at the corner drug store
Booth Harrington depicts these rural
scenes truthfully, but his pointed view
is now out of date.
The movies and canned" music have
recreated village life. Even In those
families where there is no automobile
life is a far pleasanter thing than IT
was twenty years ago. The movies en-
terrain th6 whole family. And In the
evenings, when the movies fail, the av-
erage soda fountain draws not with
ice-cream cones and candy alone but
with rollicklng, jazzing mechanical
player. The drug store has become
largely a refreshment parlor; 1t is now
n social center. Young and old meet
there and strolling and loadng have
gone into the discard.
The closing of saloons may have
helped, but even before prohibition the
lifting notes Of music boxes in ice
cream parlors began to WOO the viii
layers.
Twenty years ago never was there
such joyousness in country life, such
clothes worn by the young girls, such
sang-froid among the boys, such naive
sophistiCation upon all. There spoke
the screen in Mary pickford curls, in
styles Of an extremity, in a youths
cane in a girls vampish SLOUGH. And
all the Joy life. That is the secret
of the change that has come over vii
lage habits of living. The cheap cost
of the photoplay and the graphophone
has taught the public In out-of-the-way
places to get into the game to live joy.
ously.