D 
 
 ■ 
 i 
 O! 
 9 \ 
 7 I 
 4 i 
 2 I 
 61 
 01 
 
 Uncle Henry's Ch-Ti '^to^y 
 of His 0\m life 
 
 F 
 621 
 
 W18 
 v.l
 
 Uncle Henry's 
 Own Story 
 
 BT 
 
 HENRY WALLACE
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 of His Life 
 
 PERSONAL RExMlNlCENCES 
 
 VOL. 1 
 
 By 
 
 HENRY WALLACE 
 Editor Wallaces' Farmer 1895-1916 
 
 DES MOINES, IOWA 
 
 The Wallace Publishing Company 
 
 1917 
 
 Copyright 1917. All Rights Reserrod.
 
 The last photo of Henry Wallace, taken less than a month before his death. It shows "Uncle 
 Henry" holding his first great-grandchild, Henry Browne Wallace, then about four and one-half 
 months of age. In the center is his son. Henry C. Wallace, and at the left is hia grandson, Henry 
 A. Wallace. Four generations of oldest sons.
 
 Contents 
 
 Introduction .... 
 
 My Childhood Home . 
 
 What We Ate in the Forties . 
 
 My People .... 
 
 The Old-Fash ioned School 
 
 Recreations .... 
 
 Sabbath Keeping 
 
 The New Barn .... 
 
 The New House 
 
 Transportation .... 
 
 A Scene on the Turnpike 
 
 How My Father Farmed . 
 
 Doctors and Medicine 
 
 INIanners and Customs . 
 
 A Glimpse of the Big World . 
 
 The Whisky Rebellion 
 
 My First Year from Home 
 
 My Second Year from Home 
 
 The Small College . 
 
 IMy Third Year from Home 
 
 At Jefferson College 
 
 Jefferson College — The Professors 
 
 College Societies and Fraternities 
 
 The Great Revival of 1858 . 
 
 11 
 
 13 
 17 
 22 
 27 
 34 
 36 
 41 
 46 
 51 
 56 
 59 
 64 
 69 
 74 
 79 
 82 
 87 
 91 
 97 
 102 
 108 
 114 
 118
 
 Introduction 
 
 THESE letters, written by Henry Wallace, and addressed to 
 his great-grandchildren, were the result of a chance sugges- 
 tion made some years ago. Mr. Wallace had lived a very 
 full and eventful life during a most wonderful period of the world's 
 liistory. Between his boyhood and old age, a transformation iiad 
 been wrought in the methods of living and in civilization itself. 
 Means of transportation by land, sea and air had been wholly 
 changed. The world had emerged from a period of hand labor 
 to machine labor, with a revolution in the lives of laboring people. 
 It was a period of invention, discovery and wonderful progress in 
 transportation and science; a period of world-wide evolution in 
 agriculture. All of this he had seen, and in some of it he had 
 played a very important part. 
 
 It was suggested to him that the ordinary biography, or even 
 autobiography, fails to tell the things that people most like to 
 learn about. That his great-grandchildren, for example, would 
 be intensely interested in the sort of life he lived as a boy and a 
 young man. They would like to know about the things in which 
 he had an active part, and in which ho was vitally interosted. They 
 would like to know of the manners and customs of the people with 
 whom he grew up and lived. Why not, as he had leisure, write a 
 series of intimate letters to the yoinig folks, who probably would 
 be coming on years afterwards — the sort of letters that would 
 reveal his own personality as no biographer could do it? 
 
 The suggestion was received with instant favor, and very short- 
 ly afterwards the first of these letters was written. From that 
 beginning, during the next three or four years, as the spirit moved 
 him, he wrote additional letters, the last one but a few months be- 
 fore his death. 
 
 We have felt that the thousands of people who admired and 
 loved Henry Wallace have a very real claim to share these letters 
 with the great-grandchildren to whom they were addressed; and 
 we began their publication in Wallaces' Farmer in the autumn of 
 1916. The present volume contains all of the letters published up 
 to the autumn of 1917. 
 
 Wallace Publishing Compaxy, 
 
 Des Moines, Iowa.
 
 MY Dear Great-Grandchlldren : At this writing, none of 
 you have put in an appearance as yet, and probably 
 will not for some 3'ears to come. Nevertheless, I am 
 morally certain that you will appear in due time. [Uncle Henry's 
 first great-grandchild, a boy, appeared September 18, 1915, some 
 five years after this letter was written.] You will make your ap- 
 pearance in a world so different from that in which I made my 
 appearance, some seventy-five years ago, that when you read my 
 description of my world, you will no doubt wonder how I managed 
 to get thru. You are coming into a world that has railroads and 
 street cars and telephones and telegraphs and automobiles and 
 flying machines and Sunday papers. You have electric lights and 
 gas, bathrooms and sewage, and furnace heat of various kinds, 
 pianos and piano-players, and rugs, to say nothing of electric 
 carpet cleaners. You have baby carriages that fold up, dolls that 
 can talk, washing machines and sewing machines run by electricity. 
 Your '.roning is done by an electric iron, and, for all I know, you 
 may be having all your cooking done by electricity. 
 
 When I Avas born, we had none of these things ; at least there 
 were none in our neighborhood. They had railroads of a very prim- 
 itive sort "down east," and also steamboats as primitive. I never 
 saw a railroad till I was twelve years of age ; never rode on a rail- 
 road train till I was eighteen. You will think that your great-great- 
 grandfather and great-great-grandmothcr lived in a very primitive 
 way. So they did ; but they lived happily and reared a large family 
 of children, none of whom except myself, however, lived to be thirty.
 
 12 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 I am writing these letters for your information, that you may 
 know these matters in detail ; not for your information solely, but 
 because I wish you to realize that you would not have had the com- 
 forts you have, and the opportunities, educational and otherwise, 
 that you now enjoy, unless the people who lived in my day had 
 faced the difficulties and endured successfully the trials and hard- 
 ships of that day ; and it is important for you to know the steps by 
 which the world has made progress, giving you the advantages and 
 opportunities which you now enjoy. 
 
 The progress of civilization has been slow but fairly steady. 
 Each generation is apt to look back upon the past one as slow, old- 
 fogyish and out of date, forgetting that they are indebted to these 
 seemingly slow-going people for the privileges they themselves en- 
 joy. It will not do for one generation to put on airs and imagine 
 that they are the only people, and that wisdom will die with them. 
 We owe a great deal to our fathers and mothers, our grandfathers 
 and grandmothers. You are enjoying luxuries which kings and 
 queens, with all their wealth and power, could not possibly have 
 secured two hundred years ago. 
 
 I want you to see how civilization has developed slowly but 
 surely, step by step, thru toil, privation, struggles, victory some- 
 times, and again partial defeat, but, on the whole, making a grad- 
 ual advance. I wish you to realize also that with all their disad- 
 vantages, people were just about as happy in those early days as 
 you are now or ever will be ; that neither education nor wealth nor 
 improvements nor comforts nor conveniences can change to any 
 great extent the fundamental problems of existence ; that nothing 
 blesses except right living, which may be summed up in faith in the 
 Supreme Being, and following our Savior's rule with regard to our 
 treatment of our fellowmen. In short, the sum of all human duty, 
 as stated by Moses thousands of years ago : "Thou shalt love the 
 Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul and with all 
 thy might," and "Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself," applies 
 alike under the highest civilization and under the most primitive 
 conditions. (You may think I am sermonizing. So I am ; I rather 
 like it.) I must now tell you something about the life of my 
 childhood. 
 
 Your great-grandfather, 
 
 Hknry Wallace.
 
 My Childhood Home 
 
 IF jou will take a map of Peiiiisylvania, and find Pittsburgh, at 
 the junction of the Allegheny and Monongahela rivers, and 
 
 then follow up the latter to its junction with the Youghiogheny 
 river (an Indian name, pronounced as if it were spelled Yo-ho- 
 gan'-ny); then follow that, you will find West Newton, anciently 
 called Robb's Town, because the site was owned by a man named 
 Robb. When the whisky rebellion broke out — of which I may tell 
 you more hereafter — the soldiers burned all his fences, and he laid 
 out a town which was afterwards called West Newton. Well, five 
 miles up the river from that (and a very crooked river it is), you 
 will find a station called Fitzhenry, which in my boyhood, before 
 the railroad came, was called Port Royal; and a mile from there, 
 out in the country toward West Newton, was my father's home and 
 farm — three miles from the latter place if you rode or drove ; two 
 if you walked. 
 
 It was at first an exceedingly heavily timbered country — ^white 
 oak, sugar trees, black walnut ; but my great-grandfather or his 
 brother — I don't know which — came out there about the time of the 
 Revolutionary War, and with an ax chipped the bark off a num- 
 ber of trees surrounding the land he wanted to occupy, and thus 
 became the owner of the farm or farms. A very crooked outline it 
 was. As I recollect it, there were thirteen corners to the part my 
 father afterwards owned — for the old fellow wanted just about all 
 the kinds of land there were in that county. There was some sugar 
 tree land on the north side of the farm ; some limestone land, whicn 
 grew great white oaks, in the middle: and then some rich bottom 
 land as well. They had a funny way of describing lands in those 
 days. The deed would run something like this : Beginning at the 
 white oak, running so many rods north and so many west to a 
 black-jack, then changing the direction and going on to a sugar 
 tree, and so on around until the place of beginning, adjoining the 
 lands of so-and-so. 
 
 Each farm had a name. For example, my father's farm was
 
 u 
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 Ross Home, Built in 1805, Girlhood Home of Uncle Henry's Mother. 
 
 called Spring Mount, because there was a spring where he built 
 his house. My grandfather's farm w^as named Finleyville, because 
 he married a daughter of "old man Finley," who entered the land, 
 comprising both farms. In taking up land in this wa}', some strips 
 were missed. We had a neighbor who entered a piece of land thus 
 missed, belonging to the state of Pennsylvania, not to the national 
 government. It was a long piece along the Youghiogheny river, 
 which we called the River Hill, perhaps eighty rods long, and con- 
 taining fifteen acres. The man who entered it was one Jacob Budd, 
 who gave it the name of "Jacob Budd's Bag String — All Hill and 
 No Hollow." 
 
 The houses and barns were mostly built of logs, altho in my 
 childhood they had begun to build the former of brick and stone. 
 The house in which I was born was of logs, I remember it well, 
 and I date a number of the events of my childhood from that old 
 house. It was torn down in 1847, the year in which my grand- 
 father and grandmother died, shortly after their home, on the next 
 farm, w-as struck by lightning. I was then eleven years old. I have 
 associated the earlier events with the old house. So that everything 
 I mention as occurring in that house, occurred before I was eleven 
 years old ; and after-events were associated with the new house, 
 which was built in that year. 
 
 This old house was built of logs hewed on two sides, and, as we 
 said chinked and daubed. The chinks, that is, pieces of wood, were 
 put in where the logs did not fit, on the two unhewn sides, and then
 
 Uncle Honry's Own Story 15 
 
 it was daubed with yellow clay, wet and tramped so as to make a 
 very stiff mortar. This house was 32x34 feet, with a hallway thru 
 it from cast to west. It was two stories high, with the stairway at 
 the west end of the hall, thus narrowing the hall, which ended in a 
 small porch on the west side and a larger porch on the east. On the 
 north were two bedrooms — one for visitors, the other for father and 
 mother. 
 
 The part of the house that interested me was the kitchen and 
 living-room, and what interested me most was the chimney. It be- 
 gan at one corner, widened out about one-third of the way at one 
 end, then retraced the width a third, and then tapered off to the 
 other corner, being about five feet deep in the middle. In this were 
 two great fireplaces, one in the kitchen and one in the living-room, 
 each of which would take in a log about four feet long. This chim- 
 ney was built of stones picked up over the place, what you would 
 call boulders ; and the mortar was apparently the same yellow clay 
 mentioned before. 
 
 In the kitchen chimney was a crane, on which pots were hung, 
 for my mother did her cooking over this fire. There were no fur- 
 naces, no hot-water systems, no steam, no stoves. I remember my 
 excitement when I heard that my father had gone to the store to 
 buy a cook stove. I did not know what a cook stove looked like ; 
 but I expected to see him coming up the lane carrying it, and was 
 surprised to find that he had to bring it in the wagon. 
 
 We children slept upstairs, for one of the downstairs bedrooms 
 must be the "spare" room for the preacher or friends who might 
 come. There was no heat in that room of ours, and on a cold morn- 
 ing we thought it a great luxury to gather up our clothes and scoot 
 down and dress by that great big, roaring hickory fire in the living- 
 room ; and you may be sure we had good appetites when we went 
 out into the kitchen for breakfast. As I remember it, there were no 
 carpets when I was little; afterwards there was a rag carpet in the 
 bedroom. 
 
 There was a clock, the kind you know as "grandfather's clock." 
 A very leisurely old clock it was. It ticked very slowly, quite dif- 
 ferently from the Seth Thomas clock which my father purchased — 
 I presume when I was about eight years of age — for which he paid 
 fourteen dollars, and which can now be bought for three or four. 
 The surprising thing was that the same peddler sold exactly the 
 same kind of a clock to one of our neighbors for twenty-one dollars, 
 and to another for twenty-eight. These two afterwards regarded 
 him as a great cheat, while my father congratulated hin)self on 
 getting a great bargain.
 
 ig Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 We tore the chimney out of this old house in 1847, and used the 
 stone for the foundation of the new house ; and I remember that the 
 table for the hands who were building the new house was set where 
 the old chimney had been, and it seated about twelve or fifteen 
 people. So you may know it was something of a chimney, and you 
 will not be surprised at my being greatly interested in it. My father 
 had me help to wheel the plaster out of this chimney into a rather 
 low place on one side of the large yard, and I was surprised to find 
 that in the course of a year this pile of mortar was covered over as 
 thick — as we used to say — as the hair on a dog's back, with ground 
 ivy, the same plants that ladies use in their hanging baskets, but a 
 most vile weed on the farm. It will be a vile weed on rich land in 
 the west, if farmers are not careful. The only way I have ever been 
 able to account for this — as the weed did not grow on the drier land 
 on which the house was built — was that this weed seed had remained 
 in the mortar for the sixty years in which that chimney stood, and 
 then grew when the moisture, the heat and the air were all supplied. 
 " The mortar was evidently made from the clay subsoil of the bottom 
 part of the farm, where this weed was always a great pest. 
 
 The furnishings in this house were very simple. The plain chairs 
 were home-made and unpainted, some of them with splint bottoms, 
 that is, bottoms woven by taking splints of hickory and weaving 
 them in the desired shape and size. These were exceedingly com- 
 fortable, and I find nn'self wishing I had one of them now. The 
 cradle in which the nine of us were all rocked was a very primitive 
 affair of oak — home-made. When the later children were born, 
 and I had to rock the cradle, I used to think the rockers were worn ; 
 but it was probably the unevenness of the floor. I am very sorry 
 that the cradle was sold at my father's sale, man}" years after- 
 wards, and if I can find out, on one of my trips east,, who has it, I 
 shall certainly buy it, so that you children may see what kind of 
 a cradle your great-grandfather was rocked to sleep in. 
 
 We had no fly-screens in those days, no netting or screen doors, 
 and my mother used to cut strips of paper and fasten them around 
 above the windows and the fireplace. I don't know what it was 
 for, unless to make a roosting-place for the flies, or perhaps for 
 ornament. There was no canned fruit in those days, but we had 
 dried fruit in plenty. It was run on threads and hung up around 
 the fireplace, and in time ornamented with fly-specks. It is small 
 wonder that consumption was common in that section, for the fly 
 did not wipe his feet then any more than he does now. The corn 
 and apples were dried out-of-doors.
 
 What We Ate in the Forties 
 
 You may wonder how we lived in the forties. Fine ; quite as well 
 as you do, altho we did not have so many fancy things in that 
 old house. We had elegant cream from the spring-house. I 
 must tell you about that spring and spring-house. In that part of 
 the country, houses were built near springs. The cattle, as they 
 roamed thru the woods, knew where the springs were, and made 
 paths to them ; and, naturally, when the roads were laid out, they 
 followed the cow-paths. A spring came out of a ledge of rock 
 about twenty feet lower than our house. Hence, all the water for 
 drinking purposes or use in the house had to be carried in buckets 
 uphill from that spring. There was a log spring-house there, and 
 the water passed from the spring into this spring-house, then thru 
 broad stone troughs in which the shallow milk crocks were set and 
 covered Avith board covers, into the horse trough on the south side. 
 The cream was skimmed off, and put in another crock, and set back 
 in the water. (^ly! how thick that cream was — almost like pan- 
 cakes.) So. when we came to the table, wc had milk such as you do 
 not get from the creamery, and cream that was cream — cream that 
 made the coffee taste just right. The coffee was bought by the 
 sack, green, and then roasted in a skillet, as I happen to know, be- 
 cause I used to have to stir it. So there was no adulterated coffee, 
 nor blue milk, nor milk mas(juerading as cream at our house. 
 
 Then wc had ham and breakfast bacon, tho we did not call it 
 that ; spare-ribs and sausage, home-made ; none of your half beef 
 and half pork, but genuine pork sausage, seasoned according to 
 mother's taste, with garden herbs picked green and carefully dried, 
 for she always saw to that. In the winter we had beef, and always 
 first-class bread — not the bread that the baker furnishes, nor the 
 bread that you bake in the range oven, but bread baked in the out- 
 oven. This oven had a brick foundation ; and the top was made of 
 mortar, not from lime and sand, but of clay, with cut straw, and 
 tramped until you could mold it like potter's clay. This oven was
 
 18 
 
 Un'^le Henry's Own Storj' 
 
 Henry Wallace, in His Study, 1914, Dictating From Personal Memo- 
 randa the Letters to His Great-grand Children. 
 
 heated up with what we called oven-wood, or dry old rails split up, 
 until the whole oven was hot. ^Mother knew by putting in her hand 
 when it was right. Then the coals were all raked out, and the 
 bread put in after it was properly raised. When the bread was 
 done to a turn, it was taken out, and the pies and cakes and tarts 
 put in. We had good feeding at all times. 
 
 In the winter we had buckwheat cakes and maple syrup and 
 fried mush. The mush was made of corn that was picked just after 
 it had glazed ; then kiln dried in the oven after the pies were taken
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 19 
 
 out ; then ground at a neighboring mill. The pot was put on in the 
 fireplace in the afternoon, and the corn meal, after being properly 
 sifted, was put in little by little, stirring all the time. Often I had 
 to do the stirring, and was not allowed to quit until it had a certain 
 consistency', shown by the way the bubbles came — just right — 
 slowly and with difficulty, each bubble finally emitting a jet of 
 steam. We usually had this mush for supper. Mbther said it made 
 us sleep well. Then the next morning we had fried mush. I wish I 
 could get such fried mush now ! With maple syrup and our good 
 butter, it was a breakfast fit for a kin^. 
 
 Altho we did not have canned fruit, we had many kinds of pre- 
 served fruit. When my great-grandfather or his brother entered 
 on the farm, along about 1780, or nearly sixty years before I was 
 born, one of the first things he did after the land was cleared and 
 the logs burned, was to plant out an orchard. These trees were all 
 seedlings, and hence in the whole orchard there were no two of a 
 kind. They were mostly summer and fall apples, some sweet ; and 
 I remember one tree on which the apples were so sour that we called 
 them "vinegar" apples. In those early years there was a famine of 
 winter apples with us, and for two reasons : First, there were not 
 many of them, and, second, we had no cellar. Hence, the apples 
 had to be kept in pits, and it was not safe to open the pit until 
 about March. Fortunately, we had one tree which we called the 
 winter apple tree, the fruit of which was not fit to eat until about 
 that time, and it kept splendidly up until corn planting time. 
 
 We usually loaded up a wagon with apples along in the fall, 
 took them to a neighbor's, who had a cider mill, and had them made 
 into cider on the shares. Then there was usually a gathering of 
 the neighbors for what was called an apple-butter boiling. The 
 girls pared the apples, and the boys came in the evening to make 
 the apple butter. It was not such apple butter as you folks buy, 
 but the genuine old-fashioned sort, made with cider and the best 
 apples. It kept all winter, and we could have all we wanted. It 
 took a lot of stirring to keep that apple butter from scorching. 
 
 Then we had peaches — some early and some late; but unless a 
 frost killed them, there were plenty of them. There were pears 
 also, some of the trees dating back to the first opening of the coun- 
 try, some sixty years. Some of these pear trees are no doubt living 
 yet. Some I know lived until they were over a hundred years old. 
 We had a pear on our place that was called the choke-pear, because 
 it was not very good to eat, and when we tried to swallow a bite, 
 there was a sort of choking sensation. Still, if we gathered up
 
 20 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 these pears and hid them away in the hay-mow for about a month, 
 they were pretty fair eating. 
 
 We had plums, too, and quinces ; not such green-looking truck 
 as you buy in the stores in the west, but great, big, yellow fellows, 
 as hard as a rock. If you folks have never eaten preserves made of 
 this sort of quinces, you have missed something out of your lives 
 for which an automobile ride will not make up. Then we had 
 blackberries. We did not buy them by the quart, as you do, in 
 boxes that do not hold a quart, and that are hauled hundreds of 
 miles. In fact, we did not buy them at all, but just took a bucket 
 and went to the blackberry thicket and gathered all we wanted — a 
 whole bucketful. We youngsters were wise in the way of picking 
 blackberries. We did not take the sort that grow on the tall canes, 
 but another sort, which I have never found since — black, juicy fel- 
 lows, that grew on a medium-sized bush, and seemed to prefer shade. 
 They just melted in the mouth. O, my ! 
 
 Our farm was not suited to watermelons ; but we grew musk- 
 melons and sweet potatoes. ]\Iy mouth waters yet when I think of 
 those sweet potatoes, just before they were ripe, boiled, and then 
 covered over with chicken gravy. After we moved into the new 
 house, the neighbors used to come in after supper, and about ten 
 o'clock they would have a good meal, the children having been sent 
 to bed. We older children used to lie awake till the folks had gone 
 into the parlor, and then slip down and eat what was left — some- 
 times not much, to our great grief and disappointment. 
 
 Not knowing anything about canning fruit, my mother used to 
 make jellies and jams and preserves and butters. When company 
 came, there would be a half a dozen different kinds set out on the 
 table, of which everyone must taste, and always with good, thick 
 cream. If you imagine for a moment that we did not live just as 
 well in those days as you do now, you are greatly mistaken. 
 
 Everything was cheap. I remember hoAv, before my grand- 
 mother died, she hired me one summer to carry her eggs to the 
 store, promising me "something nice" in the fall. I remember they 
 were only six cents a dozen ; and one of my early disappointments 
 grew out of that contract with my grandmother. When I took down 
 the last basket of eggs, and went after my reward, my heart was 
 set on a four-bladed pen-knife, of which the price was thirty-five 
 cents. My grandmother thought it was altogether too much, and 
 what she gave me was a one-bladed Barlow, which cost either eight 
 or ten cents — I don't remember which — but I know I thought it 
 rather mean of her. I never liked my grandmother so well after- 
 wards ; but after she died, I magnanimously forgave her.
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 21 
 
 I forgot to speak of our cherries. We had plenty of them — 
 fourteen trees, as I remember — big trees, as big around as the body 
 of an eighteen-year-old boy; trees that you could climb into, climb 
 up near the top and reach out to get the last ripe cherries ; big, 
 black cherries, which we thought better than all the rest, because 
 there would be no more till the next year; cherj-ies that the wood- 
 peckers and robins had left. As we could not use the fruit of four- 
 teen cherry trees, my father had half of them cut down, and still we 
 had cherries for ourselves and cherries for the neighbors who would 
 undertake to pick them on the shares. Sometimes mother thought 
 they did not give her a square deal. 
 
 Then there was a berry which I have not tasted since boyhood 
 — the dewberry — which grew wild in that section, especially on the 
 thinner soils. They were luscious fellow^s, few on a bush, and 
 happy was the boy who found them. We had another wild fruit — 
 the mulberry; not the little Russian mulberry that we have in the 
 west, but quite a different sort. It grew into a tree of considerable 
 size ; the timber was a favorite wood for making the old-fashioned 
 up-and-down churn, exercise on which was the bane of the small 
 boy's existence. Like all the other fruits, they were seedlings, and 
 varied greatly. Some were small and rather hard ; others were long 
 and fine in flavor, in fact, delicious. Of course, every boy had his 
 favorite among the mulberry trees, which grew here and there on 
 almost every farm.
 
 My People 
 
 MY father, John Wallace, was a Scotch-Irishman, or an 
 Ulster-Scott, as the Scotchmen who moved over into the 
 north of Ireland are sometimes called. He was born in the 
 County Antrim, in Ireland, in 1805, and came to this country in 
 1832, about four years before I was born. The family had 
 migrated from the ancestral home in County Ayrshire, Scotland, 
 about 1680. 
 
 I wish I could describe my father so that you could see him as 
 I remember him — now dead for forty years. He was just my 
 height (scant six feet), and of the same build. His plug hat, when 
 fitted to his head by a hatter, exactly fitted my head. When I was 
 grown, I could wear his boots. I judge that we weighed about the 
 same at the same age. He never reached my present weight of 
 nearly two hundred. His matured weight was about 175. He was 
 dark complexioned. In his youth, his hair was almost jet black, 
 and very thick, but it turned gray early, and was quite thin when I 
 was a young man. He shaved his upper lip and his cheeks, and let 
 the rest of his beard grow. His nose was very prominent. His 
 countenance was rather stern, except when listening to or telling a 
 good story. His eyes were gray. When pleased, they beamed 
 in a way that made one happy all over ; but when displeased, they 
 bored into one as tho they would bring to light every secret 
 thought. He ruled his family with those eyes. He never really 
 whipped any of us, but had a trick of tapping our ears with the 
 tips of his fingers. 
 
 He was very quiet; thought a great deal, but said little, often 
 giving his conclusions without giving his reasons. His eyes, rather 
 than his tongue, told us how much he loved us. He had a fairly 
 well developed sense of humor. He enjoyed a good, clean story 
 and a good laugh, which shook his frame at the beginning, ending 
 in a wreath of sm.iles gradually groAving fainter, as tho he regretted 
 to part with the pleasurable sensation.
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 23 
 
 John Wallace, Father of Henry Wallace. 
 
 Martha Ross Wallace, Mother of Henry Wallace 
 
 He was deeply religious, but said little about it. He was very 
 orthodox in his belief, but wonderfully tolerant in practice. I 
 never heard him pray except with the family. I never heard of 
 him making a speech, and I think he never wrote anything for pub- 
 lication ; but he was a man of commanding influence in the com- 
 munity. He was so generally recognized as being upright and 
 honest and fair-minded, that he became a sort of oracle in the 
 neighborhood, and the neighbors came to him for advice, and some- 
 times for the settlement of disputes and difficulties. He never vol- 
 unteered advice unasked. He had a horror of debt. ^ly father 
 sometimes speculated, but when he did he always bought whatever 
 he was dealing in, and paid for it, so it was really more investing 
 than speculating. 
 
 Taking into account the circumstances and conditions, I think 
 I never knew a better farmer. He bought a farm of which the 
 cleared part was badly run down, and which needed drainage. He 
 redeemed it by the use of lime and clover and feeding live stock. 
 I think he was the first man west of the Allegheny mountains to use 
 tile. I will tell more about his farming in later letters. 
 
 He was never very rugged in health, due, so my mother told me, 
 to a sunstroke in his early years, and to an injury which he in-
 
 Jii Uncle Henrj's Own Story 
 
 curred in wrestling when a boy in Ireland. His later years were 
 full of sorrow. In the last nine years of his life there never was a 
 da}' when some member of the family was not suffering from a dis- 
 ease from which all knew he could not recover. As one after an- 
 other was carried to the grave, my father's health and spirit failed 
 him, and he died in his sixty-seventh year, apparently from a gen- 
 ci'al breakdown. 
 
 My mother was a Ross (Martha), and was born on an adjoin- 
 ing farm. She must have been vcy beautiful when young. She 
 ruled my father completely, but the good man never suspected it. 
 She knew how to humor him when he needed humoring, and how 
 to intercede for the children when they bad offended. I never heard 
 in all my life a word of dispute or difference between my father and 
 mother; and this, as you will find out after a while, can be truth- 
 fully said of verv few couples. She habitually looked on the bright 
 side of things, which I think is one reason why she was such an ex- 
 cellent mate for my father, whose habit of concentration of mind 
 led him to take not exactly a somber view of things, but often a 
 more serious view than the circumstances warranted. 
 
 My mother w^s a very devout woman. She always attended 
 church, and saw to it that we attended, and that we learned our 
 Catechism and many of the Psalms. I remember trying to fool her 
 by repeating a short one which I had learned once before, but she 
 detected me in it. ^ She caught me in a good many scrapes of one 
 kind and another, mostly trifling things, but I always had a good 
 excuse to offer, in the main true. She said one day that I had such 
 a knack of getting out of things, that she thought I had better be a 
 lawyer. She had a keen sense of the ridiculous, and a certain 
 amount of Irish blarney. Her life was cheerful and happy, consid- 
 ering the sorrow of burying all her children but two. Her ability 
 to sec the funny side, and her optimism, enabled her to endure 
 things which crushed the life out of my father. 
 
 My Grandfather Ross was also a Scotch-Irishman, and from 
 the same section of Ireland as my father. I do not remember much 
 about him, as he died when I was but eleven years old. I remember 
 more about my Grandmother Ross. She was twenty years younger 
 than her husband. What interested me most in her were the 
 stories she used to tell about Indians when I was a little chap, about 
 blockades and forts, and the whisky rebellion. She used to tell 
 ftbout her father, a Finley, who came over the mountains, and how 
 everything had to be carried over in pack-saddles, as there were no 
 roads then — only trails ; and how people lived in those days, when 
 ivestern Pennsylvania was a great forest, with deer and wolves and
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 25 
 
 bears and Indians roaming around. I used to hear about the great 
 Indian fighters, and espccialh* about Major Brady and "Mad An- 
 thony" Wayne. 
 
 There were no railroads in those very early days, and people 
 had a hard time to get money. In fact, about the only way they 
 knew of to get it was to distill their grain into whisky, float it down 
 the Youghiogheny to the ^Nlonongahela, then into the Ohio, then in- 
 to the Mississippi, and down the Mississippi to New Orleans. From 
 there they would go around by boat to New York or Philadelphia. 
 I have a piece of cane somewhere, given me by one of my uncles, 
 who said it was given to his father on one of these trips. 
 
 So, while things may seem to 3'ou to have been very crude in my 
 childhood, they were very much advanced as compared with the 
 conditions which prevailed in my grandfather's day. The people 
 of this generation owe much to the generation which preceded them, 
 but the people of my childhood owed quite as much to the genera- 
 tion that came before us. 
 
 First came the trail over which the advance guard of civiliza- 
 tion came on pack horses. Then came the turnpike built with na- 
 tional aid, about which I will tell you more in another letter. Then, 
 when I was about twelve, came a railroad, a very primitive affair 
 compared with railroads now — but still a railroad. In fact, in my 
 childhood days, much of the pioneer work had been done. Those 
 great forests had for the most part been cleared. Some of the 
 fields had been farmed so long that they were said to be worn out. 
 For the story of the worn-out farm is not a modern one; it is very 
 ancient. The farmers who first cleared up the land and built the 
 first homes, did a good deal of fishing and hunting. Their chil- 
 dren followed their example, and it was only in the next genera- 
 tion that they really began to farm properly. 
 
 It used to be one of the delights of my life to visit my Grand- 
 father Ross. They lived first in a log house, much like the one in 
 which I was born; but when I made the first visit that I can recol- 
 lect, they lived in a big stone house, and had a big stone barn, both 
 of which must have been wonders when they were built. I noticed 
 when I was back there last that the date on the house was 1805, as 
 shown by the inscription on the stone — not, as you would expect, 
 near the foundation, but up near the roof. When I visited them in 
 my boyhood, my grandfather was a very old man, between eighty 
 and ninety, and very quiet. My grandmother, twenty years young- 
 er, was more lively, in fact, very lively for her age. (She lived only 
 two months after his death.) 
 
 If I had anything new to show to my grandmother, I was sure
 
 26 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 to go over across the fields that same evening. It was only a hun- 
 dred rods across. They lived with a son who was a wonderful 
 story-teller. When I was older, he gave me a book of fables — I 
 think the name of the author was Polyphetus, or some such name — 
 stories of the ancient gods, in which I was greath' interested. 
 
 But what interested me most was a dog that would get up on 
 my uncle's knees cAcr}' evening, and he would pretend to shave him 
 with his pen-knife. The dog would move his chin around, looking 
 as tho it was the pleasure of his life. When my older sister and I 
 would come in, he Avould bark at us fiercely in the hall, and when we 
 went away, he would amuse himself by chasing us out. 
 
 My Uncle Billy had a larger dog, of which my remembrance is 
 not so pleasant. When he was a puppy, I used to like to plague 
 him by poking a stick in his kennel. When I was about ten, my 
 sister had the measles, and I was sent over to my grandfather's to 
 get some wall-ink, which was a kind of herb that grew in moist 
 places, a mint of some sort. The dog was watching for me, and as 
 I went up onto the porch, ran up without barking, bit me, and then 
 ran off, as tho he knew he had done a mean trick. I did not realize 
 that I was hurt until the blood ran down my leg. I was taken 
 home, and held on a chair by my father, while old Granny Finley, 
 a neighbor, sewed up the wound with a needle and thread. I vowed 
 vengeance on her, but afterwards forgave her, as I did my grand- 
 mother for putting me off with a one-bladed knife. She meant it 
 for my good. This left a scar on that knee, just above the knee- 
 cap, about an inch and a half long, Avhich I am still carrying with 
 me. Dogs, like men, have long memories, and — also like men — they 
 seem to be conscious of it when they do a mean thing. I vowed I 
 would kill that dog, but I didn't, and we came to be good friends 
 after he had gotten even with me.
 
 The Old-Fashioned School 
 
 IREME^NIBER the old schoolhouse well, tho I do not remember 
 when I began to attend. ]\Iy mother told me that I began before 
 
 I was four years old, being carried on horseback, and that 
 I then knew my letters, that I had learned them without any aid, 
 and had learned them upside down. I suspect she was disposed to 
 brag a little on her oldest son when she said that ; for I have been 
 about a printing office for thirty-five years, and I am not now 
 able to read type. As you know, the letters in type are upside 
 down ; and if I had learned my alphabet upside down, surely I 
 ought to be able to read type that way today. So I am inclined to 
 think that she tried to make me out a good deal smarter than I 
 really was. That seems to be rather a connnon failing of mothers. 
 
 The schoolhouse stood on the comer of our farm, adjoining a 
 strip of timber. It was built of logs, after the manner of our house 
 and the spring-house — unhewn logs, chinked and daubed with com- 
 mon clay, tramped until it was thoroly puddled. As I remember 
 it, the schoolhouse was about 18x2i (possibly 20x30), and of one 
 room. 
 
 In the center was a round stove, made of iron, with a flat top 
 bigger than the stove, an ash-pan below, and near the bottom a 
 hole for the poker, and, of course, a door to put in the coal. On 
 three sides of the stove were what were called the "little benches," 
 sawed boards, with rough legs stuck into holes bored into the 
 boards. In my later school years, pine backs were put on these 
 benches, so the little folks could lean back. These little benches all 
 faced the stove. Then, on three sides, attached to the wall, was a 
 narrow board, perhaps four to six inches wide, and on this the ink 
 bottles rested. Attached to that board was a board from twenty 
 inches to two feet wide, slanting a little toward the seat in front of 
 it, and supported from below. The seats were a curiosity. They 
 Avere made of oak slabs, with the sawed side up and the bark side 
 down, with holes bored in the under side for the rough wooden legs.
 
 28 
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 The New Building Which Later Took the Place of the Old Log School House. 
 
 On these, we larger pupils sat, with our faces to the wall, when we 
 "wrote our copies" or "did our sums," and with our backs to it 
 when reading aloud. 
 
 The teacher had a platform at the east end of the room, and his 
 desk was on this platform, where he could see every pupil. Behind 
 him there was usually a fine collection of switches, of which the 
 beech was the favorite. The switches lay on some wooden pins 
 driven into the wall, all ready for use ; and they were used on any 
 reasonable pretext. The wraps were put up on shelves attached to 
 the inside of the room above the big writing desk. The girls sat 
 on one side of the room, and the boys on the other and at the end, 
 for there usually were not enough girls to fill more than one side. 
 
 There was one door to this schoolhouse — at the east end and to 
 the left of the teacher's desk ; and by the side of it was a hole in the 
 wall, in which there was a piece of iron called a "pass." No one 
 could leave the room unless the pass was in this hole. When a 
 pupil wished to leave, he took the pass with him, and no one else 
 could go until the pass was retumcd to its place. There was a 
 water bucket and dipper, and it was a treat for two of us to get 
 special permission to go to the spring, some forty rods away, and 
 get a pail of water. It was surprising how long it took us some- 
 times to get this water.
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 29 
 
 The books were of the most primitive sort. The very small 
 children had no books at all, but a broad paddle, such as we used 
 in playing town-ball — a piece of six-inch pine board, whittled down 
 at one end to a handle. The parents cut out the letters from news- 
 papers and pasted them onto this paddle — first the capital letters 
 and then the smaller letters beneath them. You can see that a child 
 could not very easily spoil such a book as that; and if he kept 
 
 awake, these letters were usu- 
 ally before him. 
 
 For the class next above, 
 there was Webster's Spelling 
 Book. Then came the New- 
 England Primer, with some il- 
 lustrations in the form of very 
 crude wood-cuts. Much of this 
 primer was made up of Bible 
 quotations, and in the back of 
 it was the Shorter Catechism. 
 In a neighborhood in which 
 Scotch and Scotch-Irish Presby- 
 terian children were in the ma- 
 jority, we were drilled in this 
 Shorter Catechism on Saturday 
 afternoons. Then followed the 
 First, Second and Third Read- 
 ers, ending with the English 
 Reader, which was rather strong 
 meat, containing many quota- 
 tions from such books as Locke on The Understanding. It com- 
 prised one of the best selections of literature that I have ever read. 
 
 My mother went to this same school, and read out of the same 
 English Reader that I used, and it was her brother's before her. 
 I don't know how many others of the family studied from it. It 
 was substantially bound in leather, and its good state of preserva- 
 tion was due largely to the fact that we were all obliged to use 
 "thumb papers" — that is, we took a piece of paper and put it under 
 the thumb when holding the book, so that we might not soil it or 
 wear out the edges of the leaves. 
 
 The arithmetic in use was the Western Calculator. T have 
 studied this book somewhat carefully in later years, and it is a 
 puzzle to me how anv person ever learned arithmetic out of it. 
 Mental Arithmetic came in during niv last days at school: aUo 
 
 In Adam's Fall, 
 We sinned all. 
 
 B 
 
 Thy life to mend, 
 This Book attend. 
 
 Tbe C^t doth play, 
 And after slay. 
 
 A Dog will bite, 
 A thief at ni<rht. 
 
 An Eagle's flight 
 Is out of sight. 
 
 The idle Fool, 
 
 Is whipped at schoci 
 
 A Page of the Old School Primer Used by 
 Uncle Henry.
 
 no Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 Ray's Arithmetic. We had no blackboard until about the time I 
 left this school. We "did our sums" on our slates and showed them 
 to the teacher. 
 
 The grammar was Ivirkham's, with definitions of the parts of 
 speech, rules, etc. I doubt whether it did us much good. We don't 
 learn English thi-u grammar, but thru reading good English ; and 
 it is a question with me whether there is any real advantage in 
 teaching grammar to j^oung folks until the later years of their 
 school life. 
 
 The pride of the school, however, was the spelling class, the 
 last thing in the afternoon. We were great on spelling. It was a 
 great honor to spell down the school on Friday afternoons ; and 
 great was the glory to the champion speller who could win in con- 
 tests with adjoining districts, or become the champion speller of 
 the township. 
 
 As to writing, the teacher gave us pot-hooks, then "set us the 
 copy" in our copy-books, which were made of sheets of foolscap or 
 some other large-sized ruled paper, fastened together. This was 
 before the day of steel pens, and the pens we used were made of 
 goose quills. One of the duties of the teacher was to make these 
 pens and teach us how to make them ; and his ability in this line 
 was one of the evidences of a good teacher. I remember well my 
 first lesson in writing, or rather in making pot-hooks. I thought I 
 was doing finely, but the teacher, looking over my shoulder, was 
 not of that opinion ; but gave me a box on the ear and a scolding, 
 which discouraged me to such a great extent that I have never 
 been able to write a hand that anybody else could read with any 
 certainty that they read it right — a sad case of the untimely sup- 
 pression of budding aspirations ! 
 
 We had a funny way of studying geography, or at least of 
 learning the names of the states and their capitals. We sang them, 
 commencing : 
 
 "Maine, Maine — Augusta, Augusta; 
 New Hampshire, New Hampshire — Concord, Concord ; 
 Connecticut, Connecticut — Hartford and New Haven " 
 
 and so on thru. One thing is certain, we enjoyed this geography 
 lesson. It was, in fact, great fun for the whole school together, 
 and we never forgot either the states or their capitals, tho just 
 where they were located would have to be discovered on the map. 
 
 There was no other singing in the school in those days, and no 
 devotional exercises except an occasional reading of the Bible and
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Storj 31 
 
 the Catechism in the schools where the Scotch Presbyterian ele- 
 ment predominated. This was finally discontinued in our school, 
 because most of the pupils were Pennsylvania Dutch, and many of 
 the youngsters could not speak English at all when they first came, 
 altho they learned it with amazing readiness. There was an inter- 
 mission of an hour at noon, when we played town-ball, baseball, 
 and three-cornered cat, besides such games as drop the handker- 
 chief and ring-around-a-rosy, in which the girls joined, and some 
 of the smaller boys. 
 
 I have a distinct recollection of three of my teachers. My first 
 teacher was an uncle of mine, of whom I have no recollection what- 
 ever. The next I have good reason to remember. His name was 
 Billy (lemons, a man of medium size, with but one eye, who had the 
 unfortunate habit of getting drunk occasionally — perhaps once a 
 month. There was a tradition among the boys that he had another 
 eye concealed somewhere in the back of his head. When drunk, his 
 pet amusement was to torment and badger and nag the best boys 
 in the school, and the head of the spelling class was sure to end up 
 at the foot. It was my ambition to stand at the head of the spell- 
 ing class, and I trembled when I saw him coming down the lane 
 with his drunken swagger, for I knew I was destined to go to the 
 foot that day. But w hat hurt me most was that he would leer at me 
 with his one eye and say : "Henry, you are a pretty smart boy, 
 but you know it !" Inasmuch as most of the parents took an occa- 
 sional nip at the "0, be joyful," they tolerated old Billy, notwith- 
 standing this failing of his, because of his real ability as a teacher ; 
 and he taught our school for a number of years. 
 
 The next teacher was named Harrison Markle, or "Miracle," as 
 he was usually called; and he surely was a wonder, if not a miracle. 
 He had the funniest way of punishing both boys and girls that I 
 ever heard of. One of his favorite niethods with a boy was to make 
 him run around the stove on all fours, and as he passed him each 
 time, he applied the paddle. Another was to have four boys ride 
 the offender on a rail. His way of punishing the girls was likewise 
 ingenious. He had auger holes of different sizes bored in the logs, 
 and when a girl committed a misdemeanor, he made her put her nose 
 in an auger hole, the holes being adjusted to the height of the girls. 
 He did not teach us very long, but he left a marked impression on 
 our minds. 
 
 The fourth teacher I had was a man of good education, a stu- 
 dent for the ministry, which he entered not long afterwards. I had 
 quit the school after the reign of Markle, but went back under
 
 32 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 Hargrave. He was one of those teachers who not only teach, but 
 who inspire the pupil with the desire to learn. 
 
 There were no women teachers in those days. They came after- 
 wards. The children in the school were all the way from four to 
 twenty-one year old. Boys over fourteen largely dropped out at 
 the advent of the woman teacher. For it is one of the principles of 
 human nature that boys of this age don't have any particular liking 
 for girls, and don't care to be taught by a woman, however radical 
 may be the change in their attitude to the fair sex later, which my 
 observation has shown to be quite a violent one. 
 
 Elementary as this teaching was, and absurd as it may seem to 
 you, there was this about it: There were no fads in our educa- 
 tion, no cramming. There was no kindergarten, no blackboard 
 even. Our schooling was largely "the three R's" — reading, 'riting 
 and 'rithmetic — with Spelling, and Spelling always with a capital 
 *'S." I am sure that those who attended that school could spell a 
 great deal better than most of the children of today. I think it 
 would be a fine thing if this spelling drill should be revived in our 
 modern schools. The schools were in session nine months in the 
 year, the largest attendance being during the winter season, when 
 it reached fifty to sixty in our school. * 
 
 I must not forget to mention one thing that was customary at 
 these schools. We demanded a Christmas treat. The larger boys 
 usually appointed a committee, who made the demand on the teach- 
 er in writing — so many bushels of apples, so much cider, so many 
 pounds of candy. The teacher Avell understood that if this was not 
 forthcoming, there would be a "barrin' out," which meant that on 
 the last day of school before Christmas, the boys would take pos- 
 session of the schoolhouse, lock the door, and refuse admission to 
 the teacher. One teacher, Billy Clemons, having taken a little too 
 much "tea" just before the demand was made, refused to treat. 
 Finding the door locked, he got up in the attic in some way, and 
 came down thru the trap-door ; but he went out quicker than he 
 came in. He learned wisdom for the next time. When teaching a 
 neighboring school, and finding the door locked, he simply went 
 away, saying: "There will be no more school this year," which, 
 of course, there would not have been anyway, as it was the Christ- 
 mas holidays. 
 
 I remember once coming home and announcing with great pride 
 that I had "ciphered" all the way thru the arithmetic. Father was 
 very glad to know it, and said he had a job for me, to find out 
 whether I really knew anything about it or not. The next day he 
 directed me to take down and measure a pile of boards which had
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 33 
 
 been accumulating for the new house, and tell him how many feet 
 there were, board measure. The next night, I presented him with a 
 rather astonishing lot of figures, at which he said, "Tut, tut !" I 
 told him that that sort of a sum was not in the book. "What is 
 the use of sending you to school to do sums in a book, if you can't 
 do sums out of the book?" Then he told me I had better tackle the 
 pile of boards the next day, and remember that some of them were 
 six inches wide and some of them a foot wide, and see if I could not 
 get a result somev.'here near the truth. This, in fact, was a better 
 lesson for me than any I had had in school for many a day. 
 
 The schoolhouse was not used solely for school purposes. It 
 was open to the singing school teacher, who took up a subscrip- 
 tion and then gave so many lessons. There was no musical instru- 
 ment — simply a tuning fork ; and it is needless to say that this sing- 
 ing school teacher was a very great man in the eyes of the small 
 boys and girls.
 
 Recreations 
 
 IN my boyhood days, amusements and recreations were somewhat 
 limited — perhaps not more so, however, than in many rural 
 
 communities today. There were some, however, that I am quite 
 sure the boys and girls do not have now. For example, we had 
 husking bees. The farmer who intended to give entertainment to 
 the young folks of his neighborhood, by having a husking bee, 
 snapped his corn, put it in a long pile, perhaps three feet high, 
 three or four feet wide at the bottom, and coming to a point at the 
 top. Then he invited in the boys. They chose two captains, who 
 chose sides. They then divided the pile evenly, and the question 
 was which side would get thru first. With the husking bee, there 
 was usually something doing at the house, perhaps an apple paring 
 or a quilting. After the work was done, there were "eatin's", and 
 after that usually some dancing of the old-fashioned sort, and, of 
 course, a fiddler. ]My father and mother regarded dancing as 
 something which belonged to the unregenerate, and I never learned 
 to dance. Possibly I was all the better for never learning. 
 
 The boys had more forms of amusement than the girls. One 
 of the favorite sports in the fall of the year was 'coon hunting. If 
 there was a pack of hounds, or even one or two hounds in the neigh- 
 borhood, there was some real sport in hunting 'coons on a moon- 
 light night, listening until the lead hound struck the trail, then 
 waiting until the barking showed that they had treed the 'coon. 
 Then came the interesting problem of how to get it down. It must 
 be done either by climbing the tree — which was sometimes done — or 
 by cutting it down. This we did if it was not too near the house, 
 for some of the good old farmers regarded the cutting down of a 
 'coon tree or a bee tree as something verging on sacrilege. If the 
 farmer was particularly irritable on this point, of course this was 
 a good reason why we should irritate him. Such is the perversity 
 of human nature. When the corn was in the roasting ear, it gave 
 zest to the sport to "hook" some roasting ears from the field, build
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 35 
 
 a log fire, and roast them while the hounds were trailing anotjier 
 'coon. 
 
 There was a good deal of recreation in the old-fashioned sing- 
 ing school. The teacher usually had three or four schools, which 
 he conducted on different evenings of the week. This gave a chance 
 for the boys and girls to get together. I do not know how much 
 singing we learned ; but I do know that about the only tunes I can 
 sing to this day are those that I learned in the old singing school. 
 One of the interesting things about singing school was taking the 
 girls home; for of course they must not be permitted to go thru 
 the woods alone. The boys usually got out first, and waited out- 
 side the door. Then when the girls came out, this was heard : "May 
 I see you home.'"' or "Will you accept of my company.'"' Some- 
 times she gladly said yes, sometimes no, in which case he was said 
 to have "got the mitten," and great was the glee of the other boys 
 who overheard it, and much he had to endure afterwards. 
 
 There was one diversion in our neighborhood that we greatly 
 enjo^-ed, and that was called "swabbing the river." The Youghio- 
 ghcny is a rather narrow stream, with riffles where some harder 
 and more enduring rocks come to the surface, every half mile or 
 so, and between these riffles stretches of water several feet deep, 
 and sometimes with deep and dangerous holes. We could "swab" 
 the river only when it was low, in August. Farmers would say to 
 their boys: Now, if you will get the manure hauled out, you may 
 have a day's fishing. The boys cut grapevines and brush and made 
 a rope about as thick as the body of a small horse, and stretched it 
 across the river. In the meantime, another detachment had thrown 
 up dams in a riffle leading into a pot. After the fish were scared 
 into that pot by the swab, which frequently had rye straw fastened 
 to its under side, they must themselves catch the fish by hand or 
 with a net. Sometimes we caught many fish, at other times none 
 or a very small number; but, fish or no fish, we had a fine day's 
 sport, and had fine appetites for supper. 
 
 Where there was a sugar camp, or a sugar bush, as it is called, 
 we had a good time during the month of February, when it came to 
 "sugaring off," in which the boys and girls could take part. In 
 spite of these things, as I look back over those days, I realize that 
 the amount of recreation and amusement was pitifully small.
 
 Sabbath Keeping 
 
 IN my jounger days, the Sabbatli was kept very strictly by fam- 
 ilies of all deijoiii illations, especially Presbyterians, and was ob- 
 served generally with much greater strictness than now. In 
 the family of the Presbyterian or United Presbyterian (then known 
 as Associate Reformed Seceder), the children were expected to get 
 out their Sunday clothes on Saturday evening, brush them, hang 
 them over the back of a chair, black their shoes and the shoes of 
 their parents — and those of the preacher if he happened to be there 
 — and fill up the wood-box or coal-box. The girls were expected 
 to grind the coffee and to do everything that could be done before- 
 hand in preparing food for the Sabbath. 
 
 There was family worship in the morning, in many families 
 every morning — a full family worship. A Psalm was sung, but 
 there was no musical instrument accompanying it. In fact, there 
 were no musical instruments in the house except perhaps a fiddle, 
 the use of which on the Sabbath would have been deemed sacrilege 
 of an aggravated character. A chapter in the Bible was read ; and 
 then came the long prayer, composed of much the same sentences 
 day after day, but sometimes in a different order. 
 
 Then we went to church. We belonged to a country church six 
 miles from the farm. There was never any question as to whether 
 or not we should go. We went, no matter how cold it was, altho 
 it was not expected of us that we start out in a drenching rain; 
 better be late than get soaked. It would have to rain hard and 
 long, however, to keep us from going to church. 
 
 The churches were constructed differently from the country 
 church of today. There were four doors and three aisles — a door 
 at each side, opening into a broad aisle in front of the pulpit, and 
 two narrower aisles leading to the doors in the end opposite the 
 pulpit. This was for communion purposes, of which more later. 
 The pulpit was half-way up to the ceiling. Into this, ascent was 
 made by a number of steps on each side. The structure of the pul-
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 37 
 
 The Old Stone Church at West Newton, Penn- 
 sylvania, Which Henry Wallace 
 Attended as a Boy. 
 
 Henry Wallace in 1914 Visiting the Graves of 
 
 His Parents and Brothers and Sisters 
 
 at West Newton. 
 
 pit was about as high as an ordinary man's shoulders. A reading 
 desk with everything open in front would have been regarded as a 
 mark of lack of orthodoxy. 
 
 The services began with an invocation ; then the reading of a 
 Psalm, followed by an explanation fifteen or twenty minutes long. 
 A Psalm was sung after that. There was no organ and no choir, 
 only a precentor, or, as he was usually called, the "dark." He 
 stood in front of the pulpit and gave out two lines at a time. Some 
 of these precentors fell into the amusing habit of hitching the last 
 note of the two lines sung to the next two lines, so that there was no 
 perceptible break between the singing and the reading, which was 
 intoning rather than reading. The tunes were limited to common 
 and long meter, and no repeating was allowed. I have seen gray- 
 haired ciders go out in a rage because the "dark" who sang or 
 "raised" the tune repeated the last line. 
 
 Then followed what was called the long prayer, anywhere from 
 thirty to forty-five minutes long, in which the Power to whom 
 prayer is offered received a great deal of instruction in Calvinistic 
 theology. Then followed another Psalm and the exposition, or 
 the Scripture or lecture, which was usually from an hour to an 
 hour and a quarter in length. It covered part of a chapter. Then 
 followed half an hour's intermission, and then came the sermon, 
 which was from three-quarters of an hour to an hour long. We 
 were by this time anxious to get home, it being somewhere between 
 two and three o'clock in the afternoon, as we had had nothing to 
 eat since breakfast except some little cakes, and were ready for a 
 square meal. 
 
 Communion was observed twice a year, and called the spring
 
 38 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 and fall communion. The Friday preceding was Fast Da}', in 
 which we were supposed to eat plain, simple food, and not too much 
 of it. However, my mother never allowed her children to go very 
 hungr3\ Fast Day was observed very much as the Sabbath, and 
 much more strictly than the Sabbath is observed nowadays. There 
 was usually one sermon on Saturday, at which "tokens" were dis- 
 tributed. You do not know what a token is.'' I can not tell you 
 how it originated, but a token is a small piece of lead, or perhaps 
 
 jsome other metal, about half an inch long, a quarter of an inch 
 wide, and about half that thick, on which was stamped the name of 
 
 ithe chprch. All "expecting" communicants, as they were called, 
 came forward at the close of the sermon on Fast Day and received 
 the token, which entitled the holder to a seat at the Lord's Table 
 the next Sabbath. I presume this dates back some hundreds of 
 years to the times of the persecutions in Scotland, when the Cove- 
 nanters needed something by which to identify the members of dif- 
 ferent communities who wished to attend the communion services 
 held in some out-of-the-way place, where there would be no danger 
 of being molested by their persecutors. 
 
 Communion Sabbath was observed wnth extra strictness. It 
 began in the usual order, but the sermon was called the "action" 
 sermon, upon which the preacher was supposed to have done his 
 best work. Then followed what was known as the debarment, 
 which was an exposition of the Ten Commandments, warning all 
 who were wilfully violating these in any particular not to come to 
 the Lord's Table until they had repented of their transgressions 
 and had sought forgiveness. The tables were simply long, narrow 
 benches, covered with clean, white cloths, with a seat on each side, 
 the minister standing at the head. The communicants came for- 
 ward, singing the proper Psalm — for example: 
 
 "I love the Lord ; 
 For He did hear my voice 
 And supplications all," 
 
 "With sacrifice of thanks I'll go 
 And on Jehovah's name will call ; 
 I'll pay my vows unto the Lord 
 Before His people all." 
 
 The minister then made an address before distributing the ele- 
 ments, which were passed down along the seats by the elders. In a 
 large congregation there would be three or four tables, and the 
 service would be very long. It was for this reason that communion
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 39 
 
 was held in the spring and fall, thus avoiding both the short davs 
 and the busy season. I know of few more solemn scenes than the 
 approach to the communion tables in my boyhood days. There 
 was something about leaving your seat, coming in at the foot of 
 the table, and passing out at the other end after the service was 
 over, which is entirely lacking where the comnmnicants sit in the 
 pews. There was a manifest relief on the way home from this 
 tension. 
 
 One regular part of the Sabbath evening was reciting the Cate- 
 chism. The boy of fourteen was supposed to be able to answer 
 every question in the Shorter Catechism from beginning to end, 
 which is the best and briefest compendium of Calvinistic theology 
 with which I am acquainted. Very few boys tackled the larger 
 Catechism. There wrt-e one hundred and seven questions in the 
 shorter; how many in the larger I do not know, for I never got 
 beyond the third or fourth commandment in that. As if this was 
 not enough, the older boys were expected to know part of the con- 
 fession of faith, and all the Psalms, one Psalm being committed 
 each Sabbath. I remember how delighted I was when the Psalm 
 for the day was a short one, and two of the Psalms which are almost 
 alike were my delight. We did not always understand the cate- 
 chism; and if we complained that we could not understand it, we 
 were assured that it would come to us afterwards, which it did. I 
 give it as my judgment to you young folks, that committing and 
 reciting intelligently the Shorter Catechism is equal to a full year 
 at school. 
 
 We had one religious paper, called The Preacher, which was 
 theological and controversial, particularly in what were known as 
 "distinctive principles." Besides that, our Sabbath reading was 
 limited to a few books, for example, Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, 
 Boston's Fourfold Estate, Aliein's Alarm to the Unconverted, 
 Daubigne's History of the Reformation, somebody's Meditations 
 Among the Tombs, which I never enjoyed. We usually went to bed 
 early on Sabbath evening, and got up early Monday morning. The 
 reading of secular books on the Sabbath was forbidden, and secular 
 conversation discouraged. Still, I noticed that both in going home 
 from church and on Sabbath evening, how easy it was to slip to 
 the secular. For example, this on the way home from church : 
 
 "George, that's a fine field of wheat of Alex. Milligan's." 
 
 "It is." 
 
 "It will probably be fit to cut by the end of the week." 
 
 "Well, if the weather is fine, it may be ; but probably it would 
 be better to wait a few days longer."
 
 40 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 "That ought to bring a dollar a bushel this year." 
 
 Thus the good men gradually veered off, and were soon talking 
 of matters belonging to this world. 
 
 During the intermission, the boys did not always avoid worldly 
 conversation, however. On my last trip to the old church, I re- 
 minded a gray-haired elder, who, when we were boys together, 
 prided himself on riding a fine horse, a gray, of a conversation 
 that ran something like this : 
 
 "That's a fine horse of yours, Jim. If it M^as not the Sabbath, 
 what would you take for it.=" 
 
 "I never trade on the Sabbath ; but if was not the Sabbath, I 
 would take a hundred and fifty." 
 
 "I never talk trade on the Sabbath, either ; but if it was not the 
 Sabbath, I would give you a hundred and forty." 
 
 "Come over and see me tomorrow." 
 
 How hard it is for any of us to live up to our ideals, or even 
 our convictions ! 
 
 While I did not enjoy reading Meditations Among the Tombs, 
 it was not an uncommon practice for us young folks, during the 
 intermission between services, to saunter into the church-yard nnd 
 amuse ourselves reading the inscriptions. I am sorry that I can 
 not remember any of them. The older form of tombstone was a 
 broad slab of native stone, low, resting on and completely covering 
 the grave ; later, a form of marble placed upright. It was easier 
 for us to read the inscriptions on the flat slabs, and, besides, thev 
 were convenient to sit down on. What was said in these "medita 
 tions among the tombs," I do not remember— and probablv wo"ld 
 not tell vou if I did !
 
 The New Barn 
 
 IT may interest you youngsters to know sometliing about what 
 kind of a barn your great-great-grandfather built, a few years 
 
 after he married and settled down and began to get a bit ahead 
 in the world. Fashions change. The hat or coat worn last year 
 will be out of style this year. Fashions in barns change also ; but 
 there is a much more sensible reason for the change of fashion in 
 barns than in clothes. Barns are built in every country, in every 
 age, to suit the conditions, and the student of agriculture could, by 
 studying a barn in any country, and in any age, however remote, 
 make, from that study alone, a pretty accurate guess as to the ag- 
 riculture of that country, just as the scientist, b}' finding a bone 
 of some extinct animal, can piece out the rest of it and tell us what 
 kind of an animal it was, what it lived on, and when. There was an 
 old barn on the place when my father bought it — built of logs, and 
 made to meet very primitive conditions. I remember seeing it once. 
 In fact, it is one of the first things I can remember. 
 
 I have no distinct recollection of the building of the new barn ; 
 could not be expected to have, as I was only about three years old. 
 It was built in 1839, the year my oldest brother was born. The 
 foundation was 30x70, but the long beams projected out nine feet 
 over the width of the barn, making what was called an overshot, a 
 place where cattle could get in, and out of the wet, when it was not 
 desirable to put them in the stable. It was of the bank type — that 
 is, the east and north sides were partially underground, the bank 
 being cut away from one to four feet. The object, I suppose, was 
 to provide warmer quarters for the cattle in winter. The bam 
 proper was divided the short way into four sections, a mow on the 
 east and on the west, with loose boards for the floor, and two thresh- 
 ing floors in the center. The walls of the lower story or basement 
 were of rock ; and the entrance to the threshing floors was by a 
 bank and a bridge. 
 
 This barn was built to last. It has now stood over seventy
 
 42 
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 The New Barn, Built of Oak and Maple in 1839, and Still Serviceabk. 
 
 3'ears, and, with the exception of needing re-shingling every twen-* 
 ty-five or thirty years, is apparently as good as ever. Roofs lasted 
 longer then than now, for the reason that you could get better 
 shingles, and for the further reason that they used iron nails 
 instead of the miserable steel nails that rust out in a few years. 
 Timber must have been cheap and plentiful when that barn was 
 built, judging from the size of the great hewn logs used for beams 
 and floor sills, else sills would have been placed on edge rather than 
 on the flat side. There was enough good oak and sugar-tree tim- 
 ber in it to build two or three barns of like capacity. 
 
 You may wonder why my father built a large and expensive 
 barn like this several years before he built a new house. Here is 
 another illustration of the changes of fashion. My father deemed 
 it necessary — and in this he did not differ from his thrifty Scotch- 
 Irish and Pennsylvania Dutch neighbors — to build a large barn in 
 order to save the grain crop from damage and to shelter the live 
 stock, and thus lay the foundation of future prosperity. The new 
 house could wait till afterwards ; for in those days people were used 
 to self-denial. jMoreovcr, the size of the barn had something to do 
 with the farmer's standing in the community. When a farmer in 
 the next township built a barn a hundred feet long, some of the old 
 fellows whose barns were only seventy feet long, thought that was
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 43 
 
 going a little too far, and rather suspected it was not all paid for, 
 and the more so because he had for a weather-vane an enormous 
 cow. 
 
 These great barns, when full of hay and grain going thru the 
 sweat, were sometimes struck by lightning; and the first insurance 
 company I ever heard of was a verbal agreement made between my 
 father and a number of his neighbors to rebuild the bam of any 
 one of them in case it was destroyed by lightning. None of them 
 were ever struck, and hence the soundness of this novel insurance 
 company was never tested ; but I have not the slightest doubt but 
 that the agreement would have been carried out. A man's word 
 pledged to a neighbor in those days was a sacred thing, whether 
 given as a pledge for the payment of money, for the fulfillment of 
 an agreement or contract, or anything else. 
 
 Some of you youngsters, who arc accustomed to seeing hay 
 barns with a great door let down near the top, thru which the hay 
 is lifted by horse power or gasoline engines, may wonder how we got 
 the hay and grain into this barn, and also what need there was 
 of two threshing floors. You probably do not know what a thresh- 
 ing floor is. The place to do the threshing, of course. This was 
 done in two ways, with a machine, or in the old scriptural way, de- 
 scribed in Isaiah, 28 :27, except that in Isaiah's day the threshing 
 was done by oxen, as in the days of Moses. You remember, Moses 
 said: "Thou shalt not muzzle the ox that treadeth out the corn." 
 
 The machine was a very simple affair, an enclosed cylinder and 
 concave driven by horse power, sometimes four horses, sometimes 
 six, sometimes eight — the power being transmitted from the horse 
 power outside to the machine inside by a tumbling rod. The sheaves 
 were thrown out of the mow onto a table by the machine, and there 
 unbound by hand, in order that the speed m.ight not be checked by 
 a knot passing thru the machine. They were fed into the machine, 
 which was so located that the straw and grain were shot into a 
 corner. 
 
 The hardest work would fall upon the man who stood at the 
 tail of the machine and raked the straw away in a direction at 
 right-angles to the machine. There were about five or six shakers, 
 with forks, who passed the strnw from one to the other, shaking it 
 as they passed it out, until it reached the stackers on the outside of 
 the barn. After running about three or four hundred sheaves 
 thru the machine, it was necessary to stop and "cave up," that is, 
 shove the grain that had accumulated to the far comer on the op- 
 posite side of the threshing floor. 
 
 Threshing was regarded as hard and dusty work. As the work
 
 44 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 was done co-operatively, neighbors helped each other in turn. After 
 I was fifteen, I had a good deal to do in "paying back," as my 
 father choked up with the dust, and I went in his place. I rather 
 liked it, because there was plenty of company (there was more iso- 
 lation in farm life then than now), but mainly because the eating 
 on those occasions was of the best. Nothing was regarded as too 
 good for threshers. What fine eatings there were ; and I suspect it 
 tasted better in those days, because I never lacked an appetite. 
 And then how handsome the girls looked as they waited on the 
 table! 
 
 But why two threshing floors ? Because the size of the bam 
 necessitated it. My grandfather had a barn of the same type, but 
 shorter; he had but one threshing floor in it, for the reason that 
 he could pitch from either mow onto that threshing floor. This 
 could not be done in a barn seventy feet long. The mows were at 
 either end, each seventeen feet wide ; and, to save time in pitching, 
 each required a threshing floor adjacent, wide enough to store a 
 day's threshing of grain. 
 
 The other way of threshing was tramping it out with horses. 
 This method was not used with grain except to supply the family 
 with flour until threshing could be done. For you must understand 
 that in my early days we did not buy flour at the store, by the sack 
 or barrel. When we wanted flour, a three-bushel bag was filled 
 with wheat, thrown on the horse's back, a boy put on top, sent to 
 the mill a mile away, and told to wait until the grist of grain was 
 ground, and bring home the flour, bran and shorts, less the miller's 
 toll— one-tenth. He was told he might go fishing while he waited, 
 if he liked. This was my job for some years, and I remember that 
 the three-bushel sack lasted us about ten days. That was some 
 years after we built the new house, however, and had plenty of 
 company. As it required a man to put three bushels of wheat (180 
 pounds) on the back of a rather large horse, if the boy let the bag 
 fall off, as I one time did, all he could do was to wait until someone 
 came along, put the bag on the horse, and lifted him on top of it. 
 
 Corn was nearly always tramped out, the threshing floor being 
 covered to a depth of about a foot. The horses went around and 
 around on the floor, a small boy usually claiming the privilege of 
 riding, an attendant shoveling the com out of the center into the 
 track of the horses, and shoveling back into the center the shelled 
 corn and cobs. 
 
 To get the hay and grain into the barn, the loaded wagons 
 were driven into one or the other of the threshing floors, and the 
 load pitched by hand into the mows on either side. Great beams
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 45 
 
 were placed crosswise of the threshing floor, about the height of 
 the bam, which was about the height of the loaded wagon. On these 
 beams, platforms were made, the hay or grain was pitched onto 
 these platforms from the wagon, again pitched into the mow, and 
 then, by another hand, pitched back, with one or two boys to tramp 
 — hot work on a hot day. After the mows were filled, one thresh- 
 ing floor was filled, and afterward the space over the other — these 
 last mainly with grain, preferably oats. 
 
 If you are interested in farm matters, which I hope you are, 
 you may want to know what kind of a com crib we had. Well, 
 you would have laughed at it. It was four feet wide, eight feet 
 high, and long enough to hold the bulk of the crop. It was located 
 four to six rods from the barn. As I remember it, it held about 
 six hundred bushels. The rest was left in the shock, for we nearly 
 always harvested our entire corn crop, and husked it as need be 
 after hauling the fodder to the barn. Farmers in those days never 
 would have thought of committing the extravagance of wasting the 
 forage. The reason for the narrow crib was the very significant 
 one that corn would not keep in that country in a wide crib.
 
 The New House 
 
 OUR new house was the pride of the neighborhood when it was 
 built, in 1848. At that time there were five of us children, I 
 being the oldest. A house with six rooms at the most, and no 
 cellar, was rather small for a family of that size, even in the da3's 
 of trundle beds and other primitive conditions. Father had good 
 reason to say, as I often heard him, as an excuse for building the 
 new house, that they "could hardly subsist longer in the old house 
 with comfort." 
 
 The new house was built of brick, with a stone foundation. It 
 was for the main part the same size as the old house, 30x32 feet, 
 but it had two full stories and a full cellar, with four rooms equal in 
 size, in one of which was a great fireplace. In this room the 
 washing and churning and rendering of lard and other rough work 
 was done. Another was the wool room ; for my father raised sheep, 
 and if the price did not suit him, he kept the wool crop from year 
 to year, and wisely kept it in a cool, damp place, where there would 
 be no shrinkage in weight. I heard when a boy of wool growers 
 who kept a barrel of water in the wool room, in which was inserted 
 a woolen cord or rope, which was laid back and forth between the 
 layers of fleece, the idea being that capillary action would gradu- 
 ally distribute the contents of the barrel between the fleeces, and 
 thus prevent them from drying out. My father did not do this ; 
 he found the cellar damp enough to keep his wool from shrinking. 
 "There are tricks in all trades but ours." 
 
 One of the back rooms of the cellar being dark, made an elegant 
 place for storing apples during the winter ; and the new orchard 
 having begun to bear, there was never any scarcity of apples at 
 our house. In fact, we did not think of bringing up less than a 
 good, big dishpanful in the evening, to say nothing of apple pies 
 and apple sauce and cider-apple butter. Occasionally there was 
 plenty of cider, and my mother would have scorned to use anything 
 but cider vinegar.
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Storv 
 
 The New House, Bailt of Brick and Stone in 1848 at a Cost of $600 Cash, Besides Home Labor. 
 
 The two upper stories of the house were divided into four rooms 
 each. All the downstairs rooms had fireplaces, but not those 
 above ; and there was no other provision made for ventilation. This 
 was a most pitiful mistake, and. I think, had much to do with the 
 early death of all my brothers and sisters. There was also a story- 
 and-a-half addition, 16x18 or 18x20, I don't remember which, with 
 a broad porch to the south, where it was the custom to eat dinner 
 and supper during the entire sunmier season. 
 
 Nowadays, and I have no doubt this will be none the less true in 
 your day, it is very little trouble to build a house, provided 3'ou 
 have enough money. Xo doubt 3'our folks employ an architect, 
 and then let the contract, which again is sub-let — contracts for 
 heating, contracts for plumbing, contracts for lighting, contracts 
 for plastering, contracts for painting, etc. 
 
 It was quite different in my boyhood days. We had never 
 heard of an architect. The plan of the house was figured out a 
 year or two in advance, by the fireside. Father always considered 
 economy ; hence he built a house nearly square, and the rooms were 
 nearly square, so that, when a carpet became worn at some point, 
 it could be turned some other way, and still fit reasonably well. 
 
 The first thing after the plans were made was to get the brick.
 
 48 ■ Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 They could not be bought, but must be made on the farm, and that 
 was a summer's work before the building of the house could be com- 
 menced. Fortunately, there was fairly good brick clay on the 
 farm, and water convenient, of which a great deal was required in 
 making brick. The surface had first to be stripped off, and the 
 brick clay dug. This was done the fall before, in order to utilize 
 the winter frost. It was then put into a mud-mill — a very simple 
 affair worked by one horse — until the clay was thoroly ground and 
 mixed. The clay as it came out was ready for the molder, who 
 with his hands filled the molds with this well-mixed mortar. Then 
 a couple of boys, of which I was one at least part of the time, be- 
 came "off-bearers" — that is, we bore or carried away the brick onto 
 a suitably sanded floor, on which they were laid out to dry and 
 afterwards turned. (I do not remember the details of this.) They 
 were finally ricked up, the long ricks covered with boards, and when 
 a sufficient number were made, were put into kilns, much of the 
 type in use today. Our kiln held 100,000. Then came a week or 
 two of burning brick, in which boys and men kept up the fires all 
 the time. There was a day shift and a night shift. There was 
 great fun during the night shift in roasting young corn, roasting 
 ears we called them, and having the good times that boj's generally 
 do after nightfall. 
 
 The next thing was getting out the lumber. Pine, as I recol- 
 lect it, was used only for inside work, for window frames, sills and 
 such like. The rest of the lumber was secured from our own forest, 
 or "woods" as we called it. The trees had to be cut down, sawed 
 into logs of suitable length, these hauled on the log-sled to the saw- 
 mill, about a mile away, and the lumber hauled back. .While brick- 
 making furnished a summer's work, getting out the timbers for 
 rafters, joists, plates, etc., provided a good, hard winter's work. 
 
 Then a kiln of lime had to be burned for mortar for the bricks 
 and for plaster. In this lime kiln was placed a little white lime- 
 stone, which was the deposit — almost pure carbonate of lime — in 
 the rocky bed of a stream which carried water heavily impregnated 
 •with limestone. This was for the white-coat. 
 
 There were no labor unions in that day. Carpenter work was 
 taken by the job, and, if my memory serves me right, it cost $120 
 for a ten-room house with four large rooms in the cellar, practi- 
 cally a fourteen-room house. I do not remember the wages paid 
 the bricklayers or the mortar men. I do remember very distinctly 
 that I was very ambitious to tend the bricklayers by carrying the 
 brick up the inclines ; but after I reached the second story, I was 
 compelled to give up. I never could keep my head if I went much 
 above the earth's surface. (Nor I might say ever since, if I got
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 49 
 
 too far ahead of the convictions of tlie best people.) Other boys 
 could walk the joists in the second story and in the tliird story, 
 could walk along the top of the brick wall when finished, could get 
 up on the roof and help shingle — but I never could. I remember 
 I cried about it when I had to give up, and everybody hooted and 
 laughed at me, which did not mend my feelings a little bit. 
 
 At that time, in building brick houses, we knew nothing about 
 building hollow walls, nor did we understand what has since been 
 called furring, that is, nailing on strips before putting on the lath, 
 so as to leave a dead air space between the plastering and the brick. 
 The result was that except in the rooms where there was fire con- 
 tinually in the winter season, the walls became damp. This was 
 particularly true in the northwest corner downstairs, the spare 
 room, which had but one window in it. I noticed that the paper on 
 it became moldy in the course of three or four months during the 
 winter season. This lack of proper ventilation, I believe, had 
 much to do with the ill-health of the family. None of my brothers 
 or sisters lived to be thirty, and all of them died with some form or 
 other of consumption, with the exception of little Mary, who died 
 of dysentery when about two years old. 
 
 Possibly there may have been infection from tuberculous cattle ; 
 I suspect there was. I am quite sure there was among the hogs, 
 which means that there was among the cattle; for, when butchering 
 time came, my mother always inspected the livers, and threw out 
 the spotted ones. We now recognize these spots as indications of 
 tuberculosis. But whether the disease originated in the barnyard 
 or not, or whether it was contracted in one of the many other ways 
 in which tuberculosis can be contracted, in some way all of the 
 younger children were infected, none of them, however, before I left 
 home, which was when I was eighteen. I suppose the only reason I 
 did not share the fate of the rest uf the family was because I lived 
 the rest of my life in an entirely different environment. In those 
 days, physicians knew nothing of the germ theory nor of the meth- 
 ods of infection. The disease was looked upon as practically in- 
 curable. When a physician saw that there was no hope, he ordered 
 the patient to Cuba, just as in later years they were sent first to 
 Minnesota, then to Colorado, then to California, and now to the 
 dry climates of New Mexico and Arizona. Up to the time when 
 my brothers contracted the disease, there was no healthier family 
 in all the country than ours. 
 
 This will explain why I give so much space to describing the 
 new house. First, I want you to understand the difficulties in 
 building a house then as compared with now ; and, second, to show
 
 50 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 the immense value of pro\ ision for ventilation in any house in any 
 country, where it is hoped to rear a family. 
 
 It need not be said that this house contained no modern con- 
 veniences, no plumbing, no toilet conveniences — a wash basin and 
 pitcher of water on a stand in the spare room, that is all. The 
 rest of us washed in the kitchen, or sometimes at a stand outdoors. 
 My father had no lack of means, and the arrangement of this house 
 was practically that of every other house, even the best in the coun- 
 tr}^ at that early period. There was scant provision for putting 
 away clothes. There were no wardrobes built in the house, but 
 plenty of hooks behind the doors and at different places in the 
 rooms. We never thought of screening the porch, for no one had 
 yet discovered that mosquitoes — of which there was one every now 
 and then, and sometimes several — distributed malaria, or that the 
 fly was the modern Beelzebub. But do not imagine for a moment 
 that we had no comfort in that home ; for it was one of the very 
 best in the neighborhood. 
 
 The total cost, that is, the money actually paid out in cash, was 
 about $600, as I remember. It would cost probably $6,000 now, 
 and possibly even more in your generation. Like the barn, how- 
 ever, it lasted. "Age does not wither" it, and it is practically as 
 good as ever. All it has needed has been rc-nainting every few 
 years, and, like the barn, re-shingling now and then. It will be 
 good a hundred years from now ; for it was not built for specula- 
 tion, but for a home, and to last. Is it any wonder, considering the 
 way houses were built then, that families were more deeply attached 
 to them than to those built in later days.?
 
 Transportation 
 
 IN no one respect has there been greater changes in the last sixty 
 or seventy years than in transportation; and the end of im- 
 provement in that direction is ncit 3'et. In my early boyhood 
 there were no railroads in that part of the country. The first road 
 (the Pittsburg and Connellsville, now part of the Baltimore and 
 Ohio) Avas built when I was about thirteen. I knew the whistle of 
 every engine on that road. I'here were five of them. Two or* 
 three years later, the Pennsylvania road was built. The Pennsyl- 
 vania canal had been built some 3'ears previous ; but it was quite a 
 distance from our home, and therefore I knew nothing about it. 
 You may wonder how a canal could be built across the Allegheny 
 mountains. It was not, but at a cei'tain point the canal boats were 
 taken up over the mountains and let down on the other side into 
 another canal, on what was called an inclined plane. 
 
 Before these early railroads came in, the transportation was 
 either by wagon or by water. There had always been more or less 
 traffic down the Youghiogheny river. The heaviest part of it was 
 coal, which was taken out of a mine in what is now known as the 
 Connellsville region, loaded into coal boats, which were about 16 
 feet wide, 100 feet long, and 8 feet deep, and floated down the 
 river in the wake of high water. The reason was that when the 
 river was rising, being higher in the middle, the tendency was to 
 float the boats to the shore ; but when it was falling, being lower in 
 the middle, it was comparatively easy to keep them in the channel. 
 • These boats were steered by large oars at either end. When they 
 came down to Pittsburgh, they were grouped together and steered 
 down the river by a kind of steamboat, of a kind I have never seen 
 anywhere else. A number of these boats were lashed together end 
 to end, the steamer took hold of the hindmost, and by a skill which 
 was acquired only by experience, steered them down the tortuous 
 channel to Cincinnati, Louisville, Vicksburg or New Orleans. Here 
 the coal was sold, and also the lumber of which the boats were con-
 
 52 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 structed, and the boatmen got back home the best way they could. 
 
 Lighter loads were taken in what are known as keel boats, 
 guided by oars, floated down stream, and either floated back or 
 towed back by steamers as far as navigation extended, and pushed 
 up the smaller streams by men Avith poles. A man standing in the 
 boat, with a long pole to his shoulder, could push (or pole, as we 
 called it) where rowing Avould be utterly impossible. This, how- 
 ever, applied only to certain kinds of traffic. 
 
 All the dry goods had to be hauled over the mountains on Can- 
 istoga wagons. These were large, broad-tired, hoop-covered wag- 
 ons, the cover rising at both ends much after the fashion of the old- 
 style poke bonnet that the Avomen wore to church during my earliest 
 recollections. They were drawn by teams of from four to six 
 horses, which were also called Canistoga horses, a breed developed 
 in Pennsylvania, the stock of which unfortunately has been lost. I 
 imagine the term "stogy," applied to a brand of cigars made in that 
 region, is simply a contraction of the word Canistoga. 
 
 The government had laid out a series of what were known as 
 national roads, running from New York thru Philadelphia, thru 
 the principal cities, and westward as far as Indianapolis. In short, 
 before the time of railroads, the macadam road was regarded as 
 the only practical means of transportation across the mountains 
 and out to the inland prairie country. These roads wtre well laid 
 out, always seeking the best grades over hills and mountains, and 
 were the main channels of communication. 
 
 The merchants bought goods twice a year. The modern "drum- 
 mer" was unknown in those days. The passenger trade was car- 
 ried in Avhat were known as Concord coaches, holding four, six or 
 eight persons, witli a "boot" behind for the baggage. They were 
 driven by four-horse teams of a lighter type of Canistoga horses, 
 the horses being changed every eight or ten miles. 
 
 Along these same roads traveled the great herds of cattle, hogs 
 and sheep that were needed to supply the wants of the eastern mar- 
 kets. During the summer season, one was scarcely out of sight of 
 these great droves. Every few miles along these roads were what 
 were known as taverns, which furnished accommodation for man 
 and beast. The houses were large and roomy, the barns large, the 
 water supply abundant, and the farms mostly laid out in pasture. " 
 
 Persons who complain of the discomforts of modern travel, on 
 the best trains, with parlor cars and Pullmans, with electric lights 
 and other conveniences, and who complain still more bitterly of 
 travel on branch roads, should have the experience of a couple of 
 days and nights of travel on the old-fashioned Concord coach. I
 
 Uncle Henry's. Own Story 53 
 
 tried it but once, when I first went from my home to the academy. 
 The journey was 130 miles, and at the end of the trip I was as 
 nearly done for as I have ever been in my life. Sea-sickness is no 
 comparison to what I suffered. We were bumped and jostled and 
 pounded over macadam roads, not of the best, going downhill on 
 the trot, and coming into town on tlie gallop; for the drivers in 
 those days blew their horns when they approached a town, and 
 drove in much after the style in which a judge in England or Ire- 
 land approaches the courthouse to open court. 
 
 The horses used for hauling merchandise and pulling the Con- 
 cord coaches were somewhat less in size than our draft horses, much 
 more active, with far better legs and feet, and it is a national mis- 
 fortune that this breed passed out soon after the immediate neces- 
 sity for them ceased. They were reared in the limestone valleys 
 in Pennsylvania and Ohio. The splendid blue grass pastures gave 
 them size. The character of the soil gave them bone; and men 
 gradually adapted them to the work which was required in those 
 days. 
 
 There must have been lively times at the taverns. There was 
 always a bar ; for a tavern without a bar would have been like the 
 play of Hamlet with Hamlet left out. There was no end of com- 
 pany, tho perhaps not of the most polite sort. 
 
 In order to avoid toll, for there was a toll-gate every two or 
 three miles, with a pole which could be let down directly across the 
 way in case the drover hesitated about paying, the drovers some- 
 times left the pike west of West Newton, crossed over Budd's Ferry, 
 and came past our schoolhouse, catching the pike again farther on, 
 where the roads were inferior or perhaps impassable. It was a 
 great day at our schoolhouse when we heard the bawling of cattle 
 or the squealing of pigs or the bleating of sheep; for even old Billy 
 demons' one eye could not watch all of us. It was most interest- 
 ing to note the length of the horns of those western cattle ; and it 
 was then that, for the first time, I detected what we now call actini- 
 mycosis or "lumpy-jaw" of cattle. We were always on the look- 
 out for steers with lumpy-jaw, which affected cattle even that far 
 back. 
 
 By and by the railroads came, and the tavern keepers and men 
 who had pastures on the roadside to let, were in despair. An enter- 
 prising Pittsburgher named Billy Lorimor conceived the idea that 
 by slacking the Youghiogheny from McKeesport to West Newton, 
 some fifteen or sixteen miles, and then planking the turnpike from 
 there to Cumberland, a distance of some seventy miles, and putting 
 on a line of steamers and stages, they could compete with the
 
 54 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 Pennsylvania railroad. Looking back at it now, it seems like a 
 fool's dream — as in the end it proved to be. The first thaw in the 
 spring took out all the dams used to slack the river, pushed the old 
 "Thomas Shriver" and one or two of the other boats which ran in 
 connection with the stage on the plank road, up on the bank, and 
 left them there. The project was abandoned, but the plank road 
 was still there. As the country was a hilly one, and the farmers 
 frequently had to rough-lock their wagons going downhill with a 
 heavy load, the friction of the tire on the planks made the iron red- 
 hot and set the wheel on fire. Then the question was where to find 
 water to put out the fire. 
 
 I remember a discussion in the harvest field when the Pennsyl- 
 vania road was built, while the men were eating their "piece." It 
 was the custom in harvest time to send a boy out with a "piece" at 
 half-past ten o'clock. This consisted of bread and butter, cold 
 chicken or cold meat, custard pie, coffee, and, on some farms, some- 
 thing stronger. While the men Avere eating their lunch one day, 
 being the carrier, I naturally listened to the rather interesting dis- 
 cussion between my father and some of the neighbors, as to the 
 effect of this building of railroads on the business of growing horses 
 — for that was a country of draft horses. Every neighbor but one, 
 as I recollect it, contended that it would be the ruin of the draft 
 horse business. My father, who was an unusually far-seeing man, 
 took an entirely opposite view. He held that the building of rail- 
 roads would build up cities ; that these would require more draft 
 horses than had ever been heard of before ; and said that he now 
 proposed to go into the breeding of draft horses more strongly 
 than ever, and advised the neighbors to do the same. In this, as in 
 most other things, his judgment proved to be correct. 
 
 The building of these national roads, temporary as they proved 
 to be, were still a vast improvement on anything they had before. 
 They were for the time being a national necessity. Prior to that 
 time, farming could be carried on only near the streams, a dis- 
 tance over which it was possible to haul the grain. The grain 
 was hauled to mills or distilleries, of which there were great num- 
 bers in the country on the streams, wherever there was a mill site 
 or a fall which would give water power. It was then ground into 
 flour, which could be more easily transported than the wheat. For 
 the same reason, the rye and a good deal of the corn was converted 
 into whisky. 
 
 The building of the railroads and the consequent disuse of the 
 turnpike changed the class of live stock. Prior to the time of the 
 railroads, the hog that could not walk to market was of no use. 
 
 I
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 55 
 
 Hence hogs were bred not exactly for speed, but for ability to walk 
 to market. There was no baby beef ; for the steer could not travel 
 over the mountains unless he had length of limb. The hogs were 
 large, rangy, sometimes white, but more frequently black and white, 
 and at a year and a half old would develop into about 300 pounds 
 in weight. The brood sows were terrors, and woe to the boy who 
 interfered with their little pigs ! The railroad has shortened the 
 nose, shortened the legs, done away with the bristles, and put a 
 more lovely kink in the tail, as well as changed the color from mixed 
 black and white to white, or black, or red. 
 
 The same change has taken place in the type of cattle. The 
 cattle of those da3's were of no particular breed, altho occasionally 
 we could see in the droves that passed our schoolhouse types of 
 what I now recognize as Short-horn blood. In fact. Short-horns 
 were being introduced in our neighborhood. They were roans, and 
 beefy. My mother objected to them on the ground that the heif- 
 ers from these cows were poor milkers in which I have no doubt she 
 was entirely correct. 
 
 The sheep in those days were mostly merinos — not the heavy, 
 wrinkled type, with a skin about fifty per cent larger than neces- 
 sary to cover the body, but smooth, dark, and with oily, fine wool, 
 and smaller than our mutton breeds, of which we heard nothing 
 then. There was also a larger type of native sheep, with rather 
 long, white and somewhat coarse wool, and occasionally one entire- 
 ly black. Women liked this black wool for stockings, because it 
 was not necessary to dye it, and there was no danger of its fading 
 in the wash.
 
 A Scene on the Turnpike 
 
 I HAVE given you a brief and rather imperfect description of 
 the transportation in my early days. I will now try to give 
 
 you a pen-picture of what you might see, and what I have often 
 seen on a trip to town, in which we passed over two or three miles of 
 this turnpike, or "national road." 
 
 But first I must tell you a little story about my Uncle Billy : 
 As I have told you, when pastures were short along the turnpike, 
 and more plentiful at some distance, and when the dirt roads were 
 good, drovers often left the turnpike, crossed at Budd's Ferry, and 
 came past the old schoolhouse. A hog drover came along one day 
 and rented a night's pasture from Uncle Billy, whose farm touched 
 the roadside. The next morning, my Uncle Billy took a walk out 
 over the pasture to see if everything was all right. I might say 
 that it was almost impossible to lose a hog from these droves ; for 
 if one got tired and gave out, he was sure to follow the drove, for 
 hogs have a scent almost equal to a dog's, and will follow a trail. 
 My uncle found no hogs, but found a lone little pig, possibly 
 •dropped in the night. At any rate, it was there, and, being a very 
 compassionate man, he took the little fellow in his arms, carried 
 him home, and gave him to a little orphan girl whom he was raising, 
 as he was childless himself, and told her she could have it. Of 
 course, he built a little pen for it, and of course that pig grew, for 
 it had the choice of the slops and waste. 
 
 We boys, when we went to my uncle's, were fond of teasing that 
 pig and seeing him fight. He finally learned to jump out of the 
 pen. Another board was put on, and he learned to jump that, 
 finally becoming unmanageable, and was put out in the herd. 
 Uncle Billy had a fashion of walking over his farm every Sabbath 
 afternoon, especially his pastures, while meditating, no doubt, on 
 the uncertainties of life, meanwhile keeping his eyes open to see that 
 nothing was going wrong. In the course of his meditations, he 
 noticed that the pig, now grown to be quite a hog, was eyeing him 
 with suspicion as a poacher on his preserves, meanwhile champing 
 and frothing at the mouth, as male hogs do when suspicious of 
 strangers.
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 57 
 
 Uncle Billy was <a short man, with an unusually long body and 
 short legs, and he concluded that discretion was the better part of 
 valor, and began a masterly retreat in the direction of a rail fence. 
 There were no barbed wire fences in those days, and few of boards, 
 the fences being nearly all made of rails, laid in the fashion of what 
 we then called a worm fence. Meanwhile, the hog had also begun 
 to move in the direction of that fence, and Uncle Billy moved a little 
 faster. The hog likewise moved faster — more champing and more 
 frothing. Finally, Uncle Billy ran as fast as his short legs and 
 heavy body could go. and it was a question as to which would get to 
 that fence first. Uncle Billy was just a little too late, for just as 
 he reached the fence, the hog made a strike at him, upward, as 
 hogs strike, and sadly marred Uncle Billy's Sunday suit, besides 
 leaving a mark on one of his short legs that might have proved 
 serious, had he not been a man of clean life and simple habits. I 
 did not hear what became of that hog, but I can guess. When 
 Uncle Billy was out of danger, we laughed a good deal about his 
 masterly retreat. 
 
 Now, as to what 3'ou see on the turnpike. You have been to 
 town, and are returning home. Just as you are ready to start, in 
 comes the stage, the horses trotting down the long hill, nearly a 
 mile long, which brings 3^ou from the uplands into the town and the 
 valley. As it passes thru the town, the driver blows his horn and 
 the horses come in on the full gallop. If you are right close, youl 
 may see Henry Clay, for he often traveled this road on his return 
 from Washington to Kenlucky. You may see a governor or a 
 congressman from Ohio or Indiana. You will see merchants from 
 the states farther west, going home after buying goods. If there 
 are any women in the coach, they will excite your compassion. 
 They will be too sick to eat anything, but the kind old landlady, 
 Mother Yowry, comes out with coffee or tea. 
 
 As you go up the long hill, you will probably see a Pennsylvania 
 Dutch farmer and his wife in a broad, roomy buggy, or possibly on 
 a farm wagon, quiet, placid, contented ; the horses smooth and sleek 
 and fat ; the wagon well filled with purchases. There is peace in 
 their hearts and contentment on their faces. After a slight de- 
 cline, the road begins to climb Miller's Hill, one of the highest 
 points in that country, and as it rounds the crest, you look down on 
 the narrows, which have been cut thru to furnish water for the first 
 paper mill ever started in western Pennsylvania. This was built 
 by General Markle, who once ran for governor on the Whig ticket, 
 but was defeated. 
 
 From the top of Miller's Hill, I once looked down upon a
 
 58 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 scene I shall never forget. To the north of it lies the Barren Run 
 range — not mountains, but a ridge of hills of poor soil, thrown up 
 after the great beds of coal — with which this section was covered — 
 were laid down, throwing out the coal. Beyond it you may see the 
 Chestnut Ridge mountains, and, on a clear day, rising beyond 
 them. Laurel Hill. Between the Barren Run range and the Chest- 
 nut Ridge, in the valley, lies the great coking vein of coal, of which 
 we have heard so much. It was early morning, and bright and 
 clear. (I was teaching in West Newton at that time, and tak- 
 ing a "constitutional'' before breakfast.) The fog was rising from 
 the streams and valleys, and as I watched it rise, it shut out from 
 my view completely the Barren Run ridge, until there was a sea of 
 fog — level and still — over which nothing could be seen except the 
 Chestnut Range. 
 
 As you climb the hill, you pass a drove of hogs. It is now 
 pretty near sundown, and every particular hog is squealing. Their 
 appetites will soon be satisfied, for IVIiller's tavern is just half a 
 mile ahead. You will meet, perhaps, climbing the hill on the other 
 side, a Canistoga wagon. It is drawn by six horses, weighing 
 about fourteen or fifteen himdred pounds each, of no particular 
 color, but clean of limb, and every horse has his weight thrown on 
 the collar, climbing the hill slowly and patiently. You notice the 
 driver. He drives with a single line, but rides the saddle horse, 
 Avhich is the near-side horse behind. He sits in a saddle with long 
 flaps. He has in his hand a blacksnake whip, which will crack 
 more sharply than any Fourth of July firecracker. You may won- 
 der how he guides these horses with a single line. The line passes 
 thru the hames of the middle span of horses, and with it he guides 
 the lead horse, usually the most intelligent animal in the team. 
 The off lead horse is guided by a jockey stick, one end of which is 
 fastened to the hamcs of the lead horse, and the other to the bridle 
 of the off lead horse. He guides the off saddle horse with his 
 whip, and reaches with it the middle ones if necessary. He is load- 
 ed with dry goods and other merchandise, and will take back a load 
 of flour. Behind, on the rear of his wagon, is the feed box, a long 
 box in which he feeds his horses; under it, the tar bucket, oil can, 
 and other necessary articles. You will pass a drove of cattle next, 
 on their way to the next tavern ; and so on, day after day, never 
 out of sight of hogs, cattle, sheep, coaches and Canistoga horses 
 and wagons. For this is one of the great "national roads," which 
 wore quite as essential to the life of the nation in those days as are 
 the railroads of today.
 
 How My Father Farmed 
 
 MY father's farm contained about 150 acres. Part of it was 
 very steep, a north hillside, on which grew naturally sugar 
 trees, black walnuts and black locusts. The ridge thru the 
 middle of the southern slope was clay loam and loamy clay land, 
 excepting a couple of points, that were tenacious limestone clay. 
 The rest of the farm was bottom land, the bed of an ancient lake, 
 long since drained out naturally, but which needed drainage, and 
 which my father eventually tile drained by putting a drain every 
 thirt3'-three feet. 
 
 The rotation was corn, oats, winter wheat and clover and tim- 
 othy, with a field or two laid down to permanent blue grass pas- 
 ture. We kept from four to six cows, raised their calves by hand, 
 and bought in enough to make a lot of ten or twelve steers for win- 
 ter feeding. Enough brood mares were kept to do the work on the 
 farm, and some colts were grown every year. The rest of the pas- 
 tures, especially those of blue grass, were given up to merino sheep. 
 
 The tools on the farm were very simple. There was the wooden 
 plow with the metal mold-boards, a removable share with a long 
 point, which had to be kept in order by a file or taken to the black- 
 smith shop, for in those heavy clay lands, it wore out rapidly. The 
 harrow, up to the time I was about thirteen years of age, was the 
 ordinary straight-tooth harrow. The grain was cut with a cradle, 
 the down spots being taken up with the sickle. When we raised 
 rye, it was always cut with the sickle, so as to keep the straw 
 straight for tying the corn shocks, or to cut up in the feed cutter, 
 to be mixed with shorts, wetted, as a summer feed for horses. The 
 other tools were a wagon, a bob-sled, hand rakes, and afterwards a 
 Wooden horse rake, which sometimes tumbled (dumped) when vou 
 wanted it to, and at other times tumbled twice when you wanted it 
 to tumble but once. There was also a heavy roller, made out of a 
 big log — home-made, of course. 
 
 Corn was grown generally on sod broken up in the late fall or
 
 60 Uncle Henry's Own Storj- 
 
 The Old Wallace Farmstead, Showing New House and Barn With Spring House Between. 
 Photo Taken in 1914. 
 
 winter; for there was seldom a year in which we could not plow 
 some time during the winter. The advantage in winter plowing 
 was that it did not matter how wet the land was, because the sub- 
 sequent freezing would correct the tendency to bake or'brick. We 
 aimed to plow about eight or nine inches deep for corn, throwing 
 the furrows on edge. Without disking, and with nothing but the 
 straight-toothed harrow, it was not possible to make much of a 
 seed bed. This disadvantage was overcome by what is known as 
 furrowing out. We had a small one-horse plow, called a Barshear, 
 or sometimes a "half-patent," for what reason I do not know, with 
 which we furrowed out the corn one way, having the rows four feet 
 apart. We then furrowed out crosswise, and the coni was dropped 
 by hand at the intersection of these furrows, and covered with the 
 hoe. Usually, the man who covered it put his foot on the top of the 
 hill, for the purpose of pressing it down, and thus insuring an early 
 germination. 
 
 After the corn was up, we usually harrowed with a V-shaped 
 harrow, taking out the first front tooth, with a pole strapped at 
 each side behind it, which a man could hold in his hand. He could 
 thus harrow one row at a time quite satisfactorily. The next thing 
 to do was to take the Barshear plow and throw a light furrow away 
 from the corn row, one on each side, leaving the row of corn stand- 
 ing on a narrow strip, possibly six inches in width, if the corn 
 was dropped properly. The next thing to do was to take the same 
 plow and throw this furrow back to the corn, thus giving plenty of 
 loose dirt for the now spreading roots. We rather liked to have 
 the blue grass grow in the middles, as it furnished food for the cut- 
 worms, which then, as now, were dreaded by the corn grower.
 
 Uncle Henr3''s Own Story 61 
 
 There being a good deal of limber left in the country, the crows 
 gave us a good deal of trouble, because the}' managed in some wav 
 to have their broods come out about the time the corn was coming 
 up, and they found that by pulling up the corn and eating tliu 
 grain at the root, they had a rather delicious morsel for their 
 young. We made rather vain attempts to scare them away by put- 
 ting up scare-crows and hanging dead crows on them. We boys, 
 however, preferred to take considerable time and hunt the crows' 
 nests in the timber. We sometimes managed to kill the young ones, 
 but the old ones were as wise then as they are today. 
 
 The next thing to do was to plow out the middles, sometimes 
 with a bull-tongue or a single-shovel plow, particularly if the land 
 was stumpy or stony, but generally with a double shovel, run by 
 one horse. The idea of cultivating two rows at a time, as by the 
 modern cultivator, had never entered our heads. We kept up this 
 cultivation until the corn was in tassel, having a sack or a basket 
 on the horse's mouth, to keep him from eating the leaves or stalks. 
 
 When harvested in the fall, the corn was put in shocks, eight 
 hills square, that being as large as it was supposed the climate 
 would permit. We regarded fifty bushels as a good yield. In 
 fact, I don't know that we ever surpassed it, altho, after the farm 
 was sold, many years afterwards, a couple of fields that had been 
 let lie in blue grass pasture for a good many years, yielded seventy- 
 five bushels of shelled corn per acre. This was regarded as mar- 
 velous. 
 
 Oats followed corn, and, singularly enough, we plowed the corn 
 stubble. Sowing on the corn stalks and harrowing it in, as is 
 usually done in the west, would have been regarded as very poor 
 farming. Possibly it would have been so in that section; I don't 
 know. The oats were cut with the cradle when ripe, and allowed to 
 lie in the swath. I was told by my father that some years before 
 my recollection, it was the custom to let them lie until they had one 
 heavy rain, the reason being that after one rain they threshed out 
 more bushels ; and as these oats were usually sold to the tavern 
 keepers along the turnpike, and by the bushel, there was no par- 
 ticular reason for getting the oats in Avithout getting wet. Oats 
 were followed by wheat, but usually after the manure had been 
 hauled out and turned under as a prepara,tion for the wheat crop. 
 
 It was customary to plow under clover when in blossom. This 
 was discontinued in the later years of my recollection. Clover and 
 timothy were sown on the frozen ground, and were not harrowed 
 in, as is the better custom in modern times. 
 
 The wheat was cut with a cradle, and bound up and shocked
 
 gg Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 immediately. A good cradler could cut three acres a day, and re- 
 ceived about $1.25 a day. A good binder could "follow" the 
 cradler, but he would have to be what was then known as a "good" 
 man — that is, good at the business. For the term, "a good man," 
 in those days had a somewhat different meaning from what it has 
 now. If in a timber country, a good man was like the one the 
 psalmist talks about : 
 
 "A man was famous and was had 
 In estimation. 
 
 According as he had lifted up 
 His ax thick trees upon." 
 
 There was great strife among the men as to which should be 
 regarded as the best cradler. The two best cradlers in our neigh- 
 borhood were Leth Wilgus and John McClellan. Wilgus had cut 
 our grain for years, working by the day. He finally took the 
 contract of cutting a twelve-acre field for four dollars, and chal- 
 lenged McClellan to a contest. The neighbors are talking yet 
 about that day's cradling. McClellan started in thru the middle 
 of the field at the usual time in the morning. Wilgus was late, 
 having to grind his scythe. As McClellan came back on the first 
 "thru," he met Wilgus, who politely asked him to wait till he caught 
 up with him. McClellan replied: "I will just go on slowly," but in 
 the meantime put in his best licks. The next time they met, Wilgus 
 asked him again, and got the same answer. Wilgus then replied: 
 "I will get you before the devil gets you, if he doesn't get you before 
 night !" 
 
 An uncle of mine and I were taking up after Wilgus, and two 
 schoolmates named Mellender were taking up after McClellan. Our 
 blood was up. About ten o'clock, my father came out and told 
 them to go slow and take it easy. Some time during the day, Wil- 
 gus caught up and cut around McClellan. At noon, my father 
 repeated his injunction. I think he was more solicitous about me 
 than anyone else. About three, he came out and issued peremptory 
 orders — but they were absolutely disregarded. By sundown, the 
 whole field was cut, with the exception of an acre, when my father, 
 now furious, stopped the contest. The Mellenders were behind, 
 but my uncle and I kept up. 
 
 The next day, Wilgus finished the acre, and we bound up what 
 was left behind. When the shocking was finished, there were 304 
 shocks of a dozen sheaves each. This has ever since been regarded 
 us the biggest job of cradling ever done in that part of the country.
 
 Uncle Henry's Own fetory (j{3 
 
 The hay was cut with the scythe, which left it in a rather heavy- 
 swath, that had to be shaken out. This furnished fine employ- 
 ment for the girls and boys, provided the weather was not too hot. 
 It was then raked up by hand, and when the swath became heavy, 
 it was forked into wnidrows, the raker following, and generally put 
 in cocks. If the weather was fine, it was shaken out of the wind- 
 row, forked onto the wagon, and forked off into the barn. All this 
 seems crude in these days of modern improved machinery. 
 
 One can readily see that the live stock was necessarily limited 
 on the farm, as it would be impossible to furnish the hands to cut 
 the enormous crops since grown on the prairies of the west. I 
 should have mentioned that the wages of mowers were from 75 
 cents to a dollar ; harvest wages for men were 75 cents, for boys, 
 50 cents. Until the advent of the binder, wheat and oats were put 
 up at quite as low a cost per acre m those days as in modern days. 
 The mower and hay rake, and later the horse fork and hay loader 
 and buck rake have further revolutionized the methods of hay- 
 making.
 
 Doctors and Medicine 
 
 IX my boyhood da^^s, even the city doctors were not driven about 
 in automobiles by chauffeurs, nor in closed carriages by driv- 
 ers — reading a magazine, medical or otherwise, and always in 
 a rush, as if on urgent calls. The country doctors always rode 
 horseback, and carried their medicine with them, in leather bags, 
 cue on each side of the saddle, with a slit in it thru which the back 
 part of the saddle protruded. They usually lived in the small 
 towns or at the cross-roads on the turnpike, and endeavored to 
 reach on the same trip as many as possible of their patients in any 
 given quarter of their territory. We did not have to decide what 
 kind of a doctor to call, for there was but one school of medicine 
 then — what we now call the allopathic, or, to use their own lan- 
 guage, the "medical profession." 
 
 In our neighborhood, we did not hear for a long time of homeo- 
 paths, and when they did appear later, they were derided as '"little 
 pill" doctors, whose medicine was harmless if an overdose was 
 taken, and useless in the ordinary doses. We did not have eclectic 
 doctors. There were no magnetic healers then, and osteopathy 
 was as yet unheard of. 
 
 We did not have the variety of diseases then with which we are 
 now afflicted. We had, of course, measles (two kinds, the black 
 and the other kind), whooping-cough, chicken-pox, scarlet fever, 
 mumps, malaria, sometimes smallpox. We did not have tubercu- 
 losis, but consumption — two kinds, tlie galloping, where the patient 
 died in a few months, and the other kind, where he lingered from 
 3'ear tq year. We had rheumatism, oftener called "rheumatlz." 
 We did not have paranoic people, nor neurasthenics, but we did 
 have hysterics. When some people had it, it was called by the 
 shorter name of "sterlcs" ; and the excuse was made that he or she 
 (generally she) was a "stericky" person, and no sympathy was 
 wasted on her. We never heard of the multitude of diseases now 
 well known, ending In "osis" and "Itls."
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 65 
 
 We did not have appendicitis, but we did have inflammation of 
 the bowels — the same disease under a different name. We had 
 boils, and always in the most uncomfortable places. A very com- 
 mon location was on the back of the neck, where we could not see it, 
 but we could always feel it. The proper course was to poultice it, 
 or, as the grannies would say, "bring it to a head." There were 
 various poultices — bran, slippery-elm bark, flaxseed. When the 
 boil was properly brought to a head, after several days of careful 
 nursing, then it must be opened. The operator made a small open- 
 ing in the "ripe" boil, with a needle or sharp pen-knife, then gently 
 squeezed with his fingers, with good results. It was a comfort to 
 the sufferer to feel the contents running down on the bare flesh, 
 and to hear the comments: "That's good! That's worth five 
 dollars !" Five dollars was the usual estimate put upon the value 
 of a boil, on the theory that there was corruption of that value 
 worked out of you. It was regarded as a process of physical 
 sanctification. 
 
 Then we had felons, usually on the thumb. The cure for a 
 felon was to hold it in lye, just as hot as could be borne, and as 
 long as you could endure it. We did not have scrofula, but we did 
 have white swelling; and when, for any reason, any part of the body 
 began to swell up and distend without any boil or gathering, it was 
 regarded as a case of dropsy, or, as usually pronounced, "drop- 
 asy." If the complexion turned sallow and stayed so for a long 
 time, the person had the jaundice, or what was known in local par- 
 lance as "yellow janders." 
 
 We did not usually send for the doctor unless a person was 
 quite sick. Wlien an addition to the family was expected, it was 
 customary to send for him ; but our women in those days were a 
 good deal like the women among the children of Israel in Egypt. 
 
 ]\Iedical practice has changed a good deal since my early days. 
 The doctor then did not come nearly so often, but when he did there 
 was serious business on hand. The doctor did not write prescrip- 
 tions then, but carried his medicines with him. In addition to his 
 drugs, he carried "pullicans," to extract teeth, and sometimes took 
 what the neighbors called "a piece of the jaw," which we now know 
 Was only a portion of the alveolar process, and not of the jaw at all. 
 He always carried a lance, and if he thought you had too much 
 blood, he relieved you of some of it. He was likely to either bleed 
 you or blister you, or, in extreme cases, "cup" you, that is, burn 
 some paper in an ordinary tumbler, thus creating a partial vacuum 
 — and then put it down on your flesh where there was some inward 
 pain he could not reach, and allow the flesh to be sucked up and
 
 66 
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 The Old Spinning Wheel. Which Was Part of the Equipment of Every Pioneer Household. 
 
 filled with blood. After removing the cup, he scarified the surface, 
 and was thus "getting the bad blood out of you." If none of these 
 remedies were indicated, or if they failed, then he gave you a dose of 
 calomel (blue mass) and followed it with jalap or some other 
 physic. Occasionally leeches were indicated. After the doctor's 
 visit, you either got better or worse, much as nowadays. In short, 
 the rule was : 
 
 "Puke, purge, bleed and sweat 'em. 
 And if they die, v/hy, let 'em." 
 
 It was seldom thought necessary to send for a doctor for a 
 young person, except in the case of smallpox or dysentery, which 
 last v»as somewhat common along in the fall of the year. If a boy 
 had been eating too many green apples or plums, and there was 
 trouble in the "department of the interior," that could be remedied 
 by giving him a dose of lobelia, a herb which every good housewife 
 took care to keep in stock. If he was bilious, the proper thing to 
 do was to give him thoroughwort tea, made from a weed which grew 
 in moist places. Babies, of course, were generously supplied with
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story GT 
 
 catnip. It was supposed that "sheep-saffron" tea would "bring 
 out" measles. It was easy enough to induce little children to drink 
 that ; but when a boj^ was ten or twelve years old, and became wise 
 as to what this sheep-saffron was, he would rather have the measles 
 stay in than to bring them out by drinking this tea. 
 
 If any boy had the "bark" knocked off of his hands, or had a 
 slight cut, and it did not heal, but festered around the edges, then 
 we knew that- his blood was out of order. If it was in the spring 
 of the 3'ear, he was dosed with sassafras tea, or "sassafrax," as we 
 called it. If this was not convenient, epsom salts were sure to "cool 
 the blood." A bottle of castor oil was always handy. If, after 
 once tasting it, the boy did not take it readily the second time, it 
 was easy to put your arm avound his head, take hold of his nose 
 with the left hand, and handle the spoon with the right. I am told 
 that castor oil has been much improved in flavor of late years, and 
 disguised in various ways. I am glad of it. 
 
 There was another remedy that was always kept on our man- 
 tel. If any of us youngsters was "simmet" at breakfast, and did 
 not appear well during the day, whether the feeling was the result 
 of unwillingness to go to the corn field, or work in the garden, or 
 not, there was always kept on the mantel-piece a fruit jar or other 
 vessel filled with some Avhitish stuff (I have always supposed it was 
 some kind of soda mixed with flowers of sulphur, what we now 
 know as sulphur). A spoonful of this in some molasses, or a 
 threat of it, usually worked a cure. 
 
 I really do not know whether the death-rate was larger then 
 than now. I am very sure the doctor bills were less, and that the 
 medicine was not nearly so pleasant. Except in the case of hys- 
 terics and boys inclined to be lazy, there was no letting on that you 
 were sick. A case of nervous prostration was never heard of, for 
 the reason that we all had too much to do to think of ourselves. 
 Thinking about yourself, your troubles, and your diseases, whether 
 real or imagined, is generally the cause of nervous prostration. 
 Some of the old ladies, however, took solid comfort in talking over 
 their troubles and the diseases thru which they had safely come. 
 I used to think some of them derived a good deal of pleasure out 
 of their sorrows. 
 
 If a wart appeared on the hand, the thing to do was to wait till 
 the new moon, take a piece of side-meat, look at the moon over the 
 left shoulder, rub the wart with the side-meat, and then bury the 
 meat under the eave, repeating the formula : 
 
 "As thou, moon, increases, 
 This wart decreases."
 
 68 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 I tried this once without much faith in it ; but in the course of a 
 few days or weeks, the wart became itchy and peeled off — whether 
 from this cause or not, 1 can not say. 
 
 There was a certain bone in a hog's head, which a smart boy 
 might discover when the hog was being cut up after butchering, 
 which, when carried in the pocket, was regarded as a sure cure or 
 preventive of toothache. It was marvelous, also, to see how soon 
 the toothache quit after the doctor appeared with his "pullicans." 
 I had some experience in that line when a boy, when it was my job 
 to turn the fanning mill, or, as we called it, the wind mill, and I was 
 begging off on the plea of having a toothache. This time I was 
 sent to the doctor's, but the toothache disappeared before I got to 
 town. 
 
 We had a similar primitive way of handling diseases of live 
 stock. If a cow got sick and the horns felt cold, then it was a case 
 of "hollow horn," usvially accompanied by "wolf in the tail." The 
 proper thing to do was to get a plentiful supply of red pepper, 
 bore a hole in the horn, work in red pepper thru a quill, then split 
 the tail for about six inches, and tie it up with fat meat, plentifully 
 sprinkled with red pepper. If a brood sow became weak in the 
 back, and was not able to rise, she was supposed to have kidney 
 worm, and the remedy was to feed her corn boiled in wood ashes. 
 Occasionally, the feeding steers had "foot-ail," caused by tramping 
 thru the muddy barnyards in winter. The proper thing was to 
 apply turpentine to a rope and run it thru the clefts of the hoof. 
 I hope to be forgiven for whatever share I had in applying these 
 cruel "remedies" to live stock. 
 
 Of course, we knew nothing of germs or germ diseases, either in 
 men or animals.
 
 Manners and Customs 
 
 THO human nature in all generations is essentially the same, 
 manners and customs differ from generation to generation. 
 For example, the love that grows up between young men and 
 maidens in every generation is essentially the same. By some mys- 
 terious law of attraction, which even they themselves do not under- 
 stand, the young man is attracted to the maiden and the maiden 
 to the man. They have the same hopes, delusions, lovers' quarrels, 
 reconciliations — but the manner of expressing them changes some- 
 what. 
 
 In the days of my youth, the young man did not buy a shiny 
 red buggy and go in debt for it when he was courting. Instead, he 
 managed, if possible, to get a good-looking horse, saddle and bridle. 
 If we younger boys saw any of the older boys taken with a sudden 
 love of horseflesh and the trappings thereof, and saw one of them, 
 in the cool of the summer evening or in the storms of winter, 
 dicssed in his best "bib and tucker," going to a certain house along 
 al)out eight or nine o'clock, we knew there was something going on. 
 If the horse was tied to the hitching post, we knew there was noth- 
 ing serious as yet; but if the young man piit his horse in the barn 
 and took off the saddle, then it was evident that he had become a 
 "steady," and something pleasant was imminent. If there was a 
 quilting bee, and certain mysterious nods and winks among the 
 girls, then we were quite sure of it. 
 
 When the engagement came, as it generally did in due time, 
 there was no diamond engagement ring, frequently no ring at all, 
 sometimes a plated gold ring with two hearts held together by a 
 Cupid's arrow. There were no pre-nuptial dinners, no "showers." 
 The wedding was rather a simple affair. Among the more well- 
 to-do, a preacher was called upon to tie the knot. Among those 
 of little financial or social standing, a visit to the 'squire in the 
 neighboring town was all the wedding there was. There was no 
 license law in those davs, nor for long afterwards. If vou and
 
 fO Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 your sweetheart were agreed, and a preacher or a 'squire was 
 handy, a brief ceremony was all there was of it. Among the well- 
 to-do and those of some social standing, there was usually consider- 
 able of a wedding — that is, a number of guests, relatives, neighbors 
 and friends were invited, and there was a dinner — the best the house 
 could afford. The bride and groom did not go on a "bridal tower," 
 but usually spent the first evening and night at the bride's home. 
 The next day was the "infair," or the reception at the home of the 
 bridegroom, and it was a matter of pride on the part of his folks 
 to have the dinner as sumptuous and elaborate as that given by the 
 bride's folks. After that, the young folks settled down in their 
 own home, which usually had been provided and furnished before- 
 hand. 
 
 There were elopements then, and separations, just as there 
 have been from the beginning of time, and will be to the end, I sup- 
 pose. There were some funny advertisements in the paper, how- 
 ever. In case the wife could stand it no longer, and "vamoosed," 
 the husband put an advertisement in the county paper, substan- 
 tially as follows (I quote from memory) : "Whereas, my wife, 
 Elizabeth, has left my bed and board without due cause or provo- 
 cation, I hereby warn all persons from harboring her, as I will pay 
 no bills on her account." 
 
 Sickness and death came then much as now. In our neighbor- 
 hood, a hired nurse was never heard of. There were always one or 
 more women, married or singk; — mostly single — who were nurses 
 by instinct ; and these were called upon in case of sickness. Every 
 neighbor felt himself bound to lend aid in this time of trouble; for 
 he did not know when he or his might be in like need. Where a 
 night watch was required, there were usually two, one watching 
 till one or two o'clock, and the other from that till daylight. We 
 k«€w that some diseases were "catching," but we had never heard 
 of bacilli, microbes or germs. Unfortunately, we did not know 
 much about sanitation, and hence there was more risk in waiting 
 upon the sick than there is under modern conditions in the average 
 home. 
 
 We had never heard of embalming the dead, except from the 
 Bible, and no undertaker was called in. If a man died, the body 
 was washed and dressed by some men in the neighborhood; if a 
 woman or child, by some neighboring women. It was then laid 
 out on the "cooling board" and a watch kept. There was always 
 a "wake"; that is, a couple of neighbors sat up in the same room 
 or in an adjoining room, with the door open between, with other 
 doors and all windows closed, for fear of cats, which it was believed
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 71 
 
 were ever eager to disfigure the body of the dead. An undertaker 
 furnished the coffin and hearse, unless the family was in rather 
 poor circumstances, in which case the farmer's spring wagon took 
 the place of a hearse. It was considered a very neighborly act to 
 dig the grave for a neighbor; for there were no incorporated ceme- 
 teries and no sexton to do it. There was no decoration of the 
 grave, no lining with cotton and evergreens. There was no me- 
 chanical arrangement by which the body could be slowly lowered. 
 This was done with lines, generally taken from the farmer's har- 
 ness. Two at each end lowered the coffin into a rough box ; then 
 lowered the lid. The family stood by until the neighbors filled up 
 the grave quite full, smoothing and leveling the surface. It was 
 regarded as rather bad form for an}' of the family to leave until 
 he had seen the last shovelful of earth put upon the grave and 
 smoothed down. Funerals were generally well attended. Some 
 kind neighbor or neighbors stayed at the house, to prepare dinner 
 or supper for the returning mourners, v.'ith some near friends who 
 were invited to dine with them. 
 
 There were no costly tombstones in the graveyard — a plain 
 slab, sometimes of native sandstone or slate, a narrow one if placed 
 upright, and wide if placed horizontally, and sometimes a small 
 monument of marble, with an inscription, frequently accompanied 
 by a line of poetry-, marked the resting-place of the dead. These 
 country graveyards grew up then, as they do now, with brush and 
 briers ; but it was customary for the neighbors to meet once every 
 two years and clean them up, making needed repairs and filling up 
 the graves that had settled in the meantime. 
 
 Birthdays were not much regarded in my young days, except 
 by the children. They, like children now, were anxious to get old 
 fast, looking forward with glad anticipation to the time when the 
 girls would be eighteen and the boys twenty-one, when they were 
 said to be "of ase." We had fewer holidays then than now. We 
 celebrated the Fourth of July, never working on that day unless 
 there was danger of losing the wheat harvest. It was celebrated 
 more in the way of picnics and family gatherings than by Fourth 
 of July orations. In fact, I can not remember that I ever heard 
 a Fourth of July oration until after I was twenty-one. Some 
 small respect was paid to Washington's birthday in the larger 
 towns, but not in the country. Thanksgiving was usually cele- 
 brated by a good dinner at home, sometimes a turkey, sometimes 
 not — but with nothing like the elaborateness of the Xew England 
 Thanksgiving. There was religious service in the towns. A few 
 years before the breaking out of the Civil War, the preachers
 
 72 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 availed themselves of this opportunity to express their views on 
 national subjects. The people of the opposite party regarded this 
 as "preaching politics," and did not feel under any particular obli- 
 gation to attend. In the country, we usually went hunting or 
 attended a turkey-shoot or vaffle. 
 
 Not very much attention was paid to Christmas. We Calvin- 
 ists had an idea that an elaborate celebration of Christmas indi- 
 cated a leaning tov^ard popery. We usually had a good Christmas 
 dinner, however, and if there was a turkey shoot in the neighbor- 
 hood, it was all right to go and take a shot. We paid little or no 
 attention to New Year's Day except to settle up book accounts 
 with the storekeeper or the neighbors. The ordinary farmer who 
 went to the store to settle up his account, and found there w'as 
 nothing coming to him en account of the butter and eggs that his 
 farm had furnished during the year, was rather out of sorts, but 
 felt happy if there was a comfortable balance due him for the 
 produce. 
 
 The presents given to the children at Christmas would surprise 
 you by their meagerncss and simplicity'. There were no wax or 
 bisque dolls, no dolls that could talk or cry, or that needed elabor- 
 ate clothes. If a little girl wanted a doll, she generally made it 
 herself, but she thought quite as much of it as of an expensive one. 
 In fact, I think she thought a good deal more of it, even tho it was 
 made of a kershaw squash or rags. In either case, it served as an 
 expression of the latent instinct of motherhood natural to the fe- 
 male sex, without regard to race, wealth, education, position, or 
 anything else. 
 
 The birth of a child in the family was regarded as a great 
 event, especially by the older children, tho there was not very much 
 said about it. I remember when my sister Margaret was born. 
 It was in hay-making time. My father had a very intimate friend 
 who neighbored Avith him a good deal, and I wondered the next 
 morning that he did not say aijvthing about the new baby. We 
 were raking hay, I leading and the two older men following. My 
 father said nothing about it till about half-past ten o'clock, and 
 then said : 
 
 "George, we had an addition to the family last night — a girl." 
 George answered: "The usual good luck, I suppose.^" 
 My father said, "Yes," and that was all there was of it. It 
 was assumed that children would come to every family about every 
 other year, or at least every third year, that everything would go 
 well, and that the mother would be up and about in nine days, or 
 in ten at the farthest. Of course, the neighbor women came to
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 78 
 
 look the new arrival over. The old grandmothers put on their 
 spectacles and said: "Lawsy me! Vv'hich side of the family docs 
 she take after?" on which point there was very naturally difference 
 of opinion. For my part, I never could see that the baby took 
 after either side. 
 
 The money in circulation in my earliest day was largely Span- 
 ish coin, which was brought into that section from New Orleans by 
 men who floated coal, grain, whisky, etc., in keel boats or flat boats 
 down the Mississippi river, and received this coin in exchange, com- 
 ing back thru the southern states, generally on horseback. The 
 denominations were dollars, half-dollars, quarters, eleven-penny 
 bits (121/2 cents), and five-penny bits (6I4 cents), and also big 
 coppers or cents. Gold was rarely seen. There was no national 
 currency. Paper money was issued by the state banks, and every 
 farmer who handled any money worth while had to keep a monthly 
 bank-note detector, with plates of the genuine and the counterfeit. 
 The notes of Pennsylvania and Kentucky were generally good, but 
 those of the western states, even if genuine, were extremely doubt- 
 ful, and it was hardly safe for the farmer to keep them over night. 
 We did not then have the variety of money, all good, that we have 
 now — gold certificates, silver certificates, greenbacks, national 
 bank notes, money orders, express orders, etc. There was no 
 temptation to hoard money except gold or silver.
 
 A Glimpse of the Big World 
 
 UNTIL I was thirteen years old, I had never been away from 
 home, save to church and town, three miles away, except 
 once. I shall never forget this journey, twelve miles. I was 
 never on a railroad train until I was eighteen, when I attended the 
 state fair at Pittsburgh, held in what is now one of the finest resi- 
 dential portions of that city. The only impression that remains 
 of the state fair is an exhibition of a reaper. I forget the name 
 of the patentee, but we called it the man-binder, because the bind- 
 ing attachment was an imitation of a man, with a long arm which 
 reached around when the sheaf was cut, gathered it up with the 
 fingers, pressed it against an iron apron, swung one-third around, 
 and dropped the sheaf. I might say here that my father bought 
 the first one in that part of the country, as he usually bought the 
 first improved machinery. I remember that it cost $300, and I 
 remember the crowd of neighbors who came to see the wonderful 
 piece of machinery. It was superseded in a year by the McCor- 
 mick, with its simpler method of delivering the sheaf. (All this by 
 the way ; pardon an old man for digressing. ) 
 
 When I was thirteen years of age, my father's youngest broth- 
 er, Daniel, came unexpectedly to our home. He was a man of 
 commanding presence, and the neighbors, when they became ac- 
 quainted with him, involuntarily gave him the same profound re- 
 spect which they had been accustomed to give to my father. He 
 was about thirty years of age, had evidently read much for so 
 young a man, was a fine conversationalist, and his coming gave 
 me a glimpse — a slight glimpse, it is true — of the big world. He 
 was born in the north of Ireland, on the same farm, of course, aSj 
 my father, and as the famine had been raging there for two years, 
 I learned why my father, the year before, had shipped some con 
 for the relief of the Irish people. 
 
 The fireside talks in the evening became intensely interestingj 
 He told us of the famine caused hy potato rot, which lost to Ire
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 75 
 
 land, in a very few years, one-fourth of her population — thru death 
 and emigration. I then learned of my paternal grandfather, 
 Henry Wallace. I got the impression that he was a quiet, tiiought- 
 ful sort of man. I remember my uncle telling my father that their 
 father was deeply affected when people left the neighborhood to go 
 to America. His thought was of his oldest son. I was nmch in- 
 terested also in the accounts of my grandmother, who went by the 
 name of Bebty ]\IcHenry, that being her maiden name. I got the 
 impression that she was a very strong character — industrious, ag- 
 gressive, domineering, resolute — who ruled my grandfather, pos- ' 
 sibly the faniil}'; who never saw any girl good enough for any of 
 her boys ; who, in short, was the dominating force. Subsequent 
 visits to the old home neighborhood in Ireland have convinced me 
 that my impression was about right. She evidently was not the 
 most agreeable woman to be with, but she put "ginger" into the 
 family. With all this, she was exceedingly kind and helpful, espe- 
 cially to the poor. The neighbors in that locality still talk of 
 Bett}' McHenry's soup, which was given freely to hungry people, 
 as they passed the place coming from the fair, most of them dinner- 
 less. I learned of my Uncle Henry, another strong character, and 
 my Uncle William, perhaps equally strong, who was pastor of a 
 church. These things may not be especially interesting to you, 
 but they were intensely interesting to me at that time. 
 
 My uncle stayed with us the first winter, and many were the 
 discussions to which I listened, to use the old saying, "with both 
 mouth and ears." He was an aristocrat, and believed, as the name 
 implies, in the rule of the "best." My father was a democrat, 
 using the word in its true sense, believing in the rule of the common 
 people. INIy father was an abolitionist, while my uncle believed 
 that the colored people were best where they were, and were un- 
 fitted for freedom. Naturall)', in after years, when questions 
 growing out of the war came up for discussion, my uncle became a 
 democrat and my father a very strong republican. 
 
 At this time, the repeal of the com laws, next to the famine, was 
 the great subject of discussion in Ireland. Xaturally, my uncle 
 believed in cheap bread for the starving people, and honce was a 
 free-trader, and my father was a protectionist ; for I may say that 
 the repeal of the corn laws was simply a question of free trade or 
 protection. My father argued that to encourage importation by 
 free trade or low tariff was simply importing everything that went 
 into the thing imported. He would say: "We have coal in plenty; 
 we have iron ore. WTiy not enact a tariff that will encourage the 
 development of infant industries.''" He argued that competition
 
 76 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 among manufacturers would keep down the price. My uncle ar- 
 gued that the nations were reall}^ one family — that each one could 
 produce something cheaper than another; that every man had a 
 right to buy where he could buy cheapest ; that raw materials for 
 manufacturing were abundant and labor cheap, and that industries 
 would be developed naturally in due time. 
 
 This was my first introduction to the tariff question, which has 
 not been settled yet. I think my father was right at that time. 
 He could not foresee, nor could anyone else, the combinations that 
 have come up since, and the possibility of infant industries being 
 developed at the expense of the common people until they were able 
 to dominate congress and therefore the government. 
 
 In those times, before the questions growing out of the war be- 
 came prominent, people who were at all religiously inclined thought 
 a good deal on religious questions. One of the subjects that was 
 discussed in public meetings, some of them attended by hundreds 
 and even thousands, was the issues between the Presbyterians and 
 Methodists, or, as they were then called, the Calvinists and the 
 Armenians. My father was a staunch Calvinist, and my uncle — 
 whether for the sake of argument or from conviction, I do not know 
 — ^took the other side, and the fireside arguments were often quite 
 warm. I remember one time in pai'ticular, when my father sat on 
 one side of the fireplace and my uncle on the other, both with their 
 feet on the mantel. My uncle, to give emphasis to his argument, 
 pushed his foot against the mantel, and, as he w^as a large man, 
 this shoved the hickory chair backward. Being made of w^ood cut 
 across the grain, it broke in perhaps half a dozen pieces. My 
 uncle, however, never stirred until he had finished his argument. 
 When he had finished, he gathered himself up and remarked: 
 "John, I believe I have broken this chair, and will have to get it 
 mended." 
 
 One thing impressed me very much, that neither of them inter- 
 rupted the other in the course of an argument, but w^aited until he 
 was entirely thru. INIy father would say: "Are you thru, Daniel.'"' 
 or my uncle would ask: "John, are you thru?" If at any time, 
 there was a variation from, this method — and this I have since ob- 
 served is common with gentlemen everywhere, one or the other would 
 say : "I beg your pardon," or "Allow me," or "Wait a moment, if 
 you please." 
 
 Another question that came up was that of Psalmody. My 
 uncle, being a member of the Pi-esbyterian Church of Ireland, was 
 accustomed to the occasional use in public worship of paraphrase-, 
 that is, portions of Scripture outside of the Book of ' , t'
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story ' 77 
 
 lated or converted into rhyme. ]\[y father did not belieVe in un- 
 inspired compositions in the worship of God. My uncle would 
 quote the text about "Psalms, hymns and spiritual songs, singing 
 and malcing melody in your heart to the Lord." My father would 
 argue that these were simply' different terms applied to different 
 Psalms of different character, and that this was reall}^ the strong- 
 est possible argument in favor of the use of the Psalms of David in 
 worship. My uncle would quote the Lord's Prayer, and argue that 
 if my father's argument was correct, we should limit ourselves to 
 the use of that prayer. My father would quote, "after this man- 
 ner pray 3'e," and argue that this was intended simply to give the 
 main heads of our petitions, and that the words were not to be used 
 exclusively. As a clincher, my father would say something about 
 the iniquity of "offering strange fire to the Lord," referring to an 
 event in the wilderness of Sinai well known to Bible readers, I do 
 not think, however, that he meant to press this home very closely. 
 
 After the first winter, my uncle engaged in business, but was a 
 frequent visitor at our home, and when business was slack, would 
 spend a week or more, during which these discussions, and in later 
 years the questions that at that time occupied the public mind, 
 would be gone over and over again, much to the edification of us 
 young folks, and especially myself, as I was the oldest of the 
 children. 
 
 My Uncle Daniel was a man of a good deal of tact. My father 
 and my Uncle Billy had got into trouble, as farmers have done ever 
 since, over a line fence. Uncle Billy's house was off the main road, 
 and he had been accustomed to reach this road thru what we called 
 the bottom field, on which the timber had been deadened so as to 
 allow the field to grow up in pasture. When my father fenced, he 
 put the fence on the line, arguing that my uncle had a way thru his 
 own land out to the road, and that he was therefore under no obli- 
 gations to give him the right-of-way. The coolness thus started 
 continued for years, neither of the men speaking to the other. One 
 day they met accidentally at the postoffice, my Uncle Daniel being 
 present. He had talked with me over the cause of the dispute, and 
 I had taken him over and introduced him to Uncle Billy. When 
 they met at the postoffice, my L^ncle Daniel, with great formality, 
 said: "Mr. Ross, allow me to introduce to you my brother, John. 
 I am sure you will like him." Both laughed, shook hands, and 
 were friends ever after. ' 
 
 One night I overheard my father and I'ncle Daniel when they 
 were having a confidential talk by the kitchen fire. My uncle had 
 just been over to see L"^ncle Billy, and I heard him say:
 
 78 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 "John, what are you going to do with Henry?" 
 
 My father, after a long pause, said: "Deed if I know." 
 
 "His uncle is very fond of him," said Uncle Daniel. 
 
 "Oh," said my father ; "Henry has a great gift of gab, and that 
 pleases his uncle." * 
 
 They were speaking, of course, of my future vocation. ]\Iy 
 Uncle Daniel and I were warm friends, as long as he lived, with oc- 
 casional rather nasty disagreements, which we settled when we next 
 met by never mentioning them, and going on as if nothing had hap- 
 pened. This I have since found to be about the only way to settle 
 disputes between friends. The more you try to prove which is in 
 the wrong, the less friendship there remains. Disputes among 
 really good people, or pepple who intend to do right, usually grow 
 out of some misunderstanding about something too trifling to jus- 
 tify discussion. 
 
 Uncle Daniel was the first of a number of relatives that came to 
 our home from Ireland in the early fifties. The next was my 
 cousin, Henry Wallace, whom we usually called "Little Henry," 
 because of his small stature ; then a second cousin, Gideon McHenry 
 — both of whom became citizens of the United States. My father 
 was a firm believer in the value of work, particularly of work on 
 the farm. Hence, after the first greetings were over, these young 
 men took their places in the ordinary farm work until an opening 
 should be provided thru which they could push their individual for- 
 tunes. I owe very much to Gideon McHenry. I think he was one 
 of the most sincere, faithful and conscientious men I have ever 
 known. He and I slept together, and I was much impressed with 
 the fact that no matter how cold the night, he always knelt at the 
 bedside and prayed before retiring. 
 
 Our home was also a favorite place with some cousins on my 
 mother's side. Hence there was no lack of company at our house 
 in the early fifties.
 
 The Whisky Rebellion 
 
 I ALLUDED in an earlier letter to the whisky rebellion, and 
 promised to tell you something of it. It may seem strange that 
 
 a connnunity composed largely' of Presbyterians should organ- 
 ize a whisky rebellion. This is not so surprising when we come to 
 know the facts. This rebellion occurred long before my time, dur- 
 ing Washington's first administration. At that time, the facihties 
 for transportation were very limited. There were no national 
 roads and no canals. It was not possible to freight produce over 
 the mountains, nor in any other way except by building boats of 
 some sort and floating it down the river, selling it at New Orleans. 
 The Continental money had become worthless thru depreciation, 
 and the phrase, "not worth a Continental," was common. State 
 banking systems had not been developed, and the only way money 
 could be obtained for produce was by floating the produce down 
 the river and exchanging it for Spanish coin. 
 
 The most convenient thing to float down the river was whisky, 
 because it had great value in small bulk ; and, besides, if the boat 
 struck a snag and sank, the whisky barrels could be thrown out 
 into the river and would still float ; whereas, even flour would be 
 damaged, and wheat ruined. Hence the farmers in that section 
 of Pennsylvania converted their surplus grain into whisky. Dis- 
 tilleries were common all thru the country. 
 
 The west, or what we then called "the Ohio," was then a wilder- 
 ness, inhabited by Indians. The goveniment, under Washington, 
 put a tax on the manufacture of whisky. Settlers who were de- 
 pendent on the proceeds of the sale of their whisky felt that tliis 
 was a violent invasion of their rights, and took up arms. When 
 the Civil War broke out, I had an interview with General Markle, 
 who was a general of militia. He told me that he was one of the 
 "whisky boys," the only one that I ever met, that I then knew; tho, 
 in fact, I had met several, who kept their connection with it very 
 quiet. He said it was one thing that he was most thoroly ashamed
 
 80 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 of, and told me about how many times they had changed command- 
 ers in marching eighteen miles. There was, in fact, but one battle 
 fought (in an adjoining county) ; and I do not know that there was 
 anybody killed in that battle, but there were several wounded. 
 General Washington sent troops into our neighborhood. My 
 grandfather used to tell me about keeping store and selling goods 
 to the troops, and he had in his house a piece of an exploded bomb- 
 shell. Whether it was exploded during the whisky rebellion or 
 during the march of Washington to the relief of Fort Duquesne 
 (now Pittsburgh), I do not remember. The expedition of "Mad 
 Anthony" Wayne against the Ohio Indians, by attracting the more 
 resolute and adventuresome, and giving promise of the opening up 
 of that country, did much to quell the rebellion. Farmers found 
 that the whisky tax, like the tea tax levied on the original colonies, 
 and against which they rebelled, did not amount to very much any- 
 how, and I believe it Avas shortly afterwards repealed. 
 
 You may be interested in knowing something about the feelings 
 of the people of my early day on the subject of temperance. Dis- 
 tilleries were found on the farms occasionally, and were plentiful at 
 convenient places along the streams. Every tavern had its bar. 
 You could get a gallon of whisky at any time for twenty-five cents. 
 Afterwards it was sold by the barrel as low as sixteen cents per gal- 
 lon. Taking an occasional dram, or even more than an occasional 
 one, did not shut a man out of good and respectable society. It 
 was common to take whisky to the harvest field in connection with 
 the "piece," or forenoon or afternoon lunch. It was common to 
 serve it at harvest time or threshing. I remember when my father 
 ceased to take it to the harvest field, and also when he ceased to 
 offer it to his friends. 
 
 1'he consequence of this cheap whisky was to make a drunkard 
 out of every person who was inclined that way ; while those not so 
 inclined abstained from everything except an occasional drink for 
 "good fellowship." There was always a bottle of it in our cup- 
 board, but we children never touched it unless it was given to us 
 when we were sick. In short, at that time persons with proper 
 religious training and convictions seldom used it to excess, tho they 
 did in earlier days. ' 
 
 The first temperance movement was the Washingtonian move- 
 ment, which occurred two or three years before I was born. Tem- 
 perance lecturers came around to the schoolhouses and persuaded 
 the people, old and young, to sign the pledge. Public sentiment 
 gradually turned against the use of liquor, and has continued ever 
 since. When the Civil War began, and a heavy revenue tax was
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 81 
 
 put on liquors, there was no opposition. It seemed the sensible 
 thing to compel vice to pay a large part of the taxes. I should 
 regard the restoration of the former conditions as one of the most 
 deplorable things that could possibly happen to the American 
 people. 
 
 My Uncle Andrew (my mother's youngest brother) told me 
 that he was present at her wedding; that the officiating minister, a 
 Scotchman who evidently was fond of a dram once in a while, when 
 referring, during the ceremony, to the wedding at Cana of Galilee, 
 began at once to denounce the Washingtonian movement, saying 
 that a class of people had grown up in those later days, who con- 
 demned the use of wine, which the Lord had commended by His ex- 
 ample. His miracle furnishing the wine for the wedding feast. This 
 minister evidently regarded this as an example of modern degen- 
 eracy, a sign that the world was growing worse! I have since 
 known, and still know, many of the descendants of this old preacher 
 — and, without exception, they are strong prohibitionists.
 
 My First Year From Home 
 
 IN my eighteenth year, after long and very serious considera- 
 tion, I made a profession of religion. During that summer, I 
 
 determined to devote myself to the gospel ministry. There 
 were a great many family discussions over that important decision. 
 My father, while not objecting, and, in fact, promising any aid that 
 I needed, was very much disappointed because I did not continue 
 on the farm. He was not a strong man. For a year or more, I 
 had taken the heavy end of the work, while he did the planning. 
 For a year or two, we had been tile draining a very considerable 
 area of wet land on our farm. My leaving home was therefore a 
 grievous financial and personal loss to my father. My Uncle 
 Daniel, who was to me very like an older brother, was very anxious 
 that I should become a lawyer. My mother wanted me to become 
 a minister, and if I had determined to become a lawyer, it would 
 almost have broken her heart, and my father would have given me 
 no assistance. 
 
 My profession determined, the next thing was to select the 
 school I should attend. I had at that time no education save that 
 of a fairly good rural school. My mother had a cousin whose 
 fad was education, and who had established what he called a college 
 in Noble county, Ohio, in a country so hilly that they used to say 
 they farmed both sides, and thirty miles from any national road, 
 and about twenty miles from the Ohio river. This cousin was a 
 character. He was a minister, a man of marked peculiarities, 
 having an inimitable drawl, and to whose mind education was the 
 all-important thing. M3' mother had a sister-in-law there, one of 
 my father's old and intimate friends had moved to that locality; 
 and so it was dcterminod that I should go to Sharon College. 
 
 I shall never forget my first long journe}' from home. I went 
 by stage 130 miles, leaving West Newton at four o'clock in the 
 morning, arriving in Washington, Pennsylvania, at noon, and at 
 Wheeling that night. I distinctly remember reading my chapter
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 83 
 
 in the Bible by a lamp-post in Wheeling. I took the stage and 
 traveled all night, uphill and downhill, the stage swinging from 
 one side to the other on the rough turnpike road, churning up my 
 stomach and bringing on a violent attack of seasickness, which, 
 however, was not more nauseous than the filthy conversation of a 
 couple of drovers who were my traveling companions. 
 
 We reached Washington, Ohio, at four o'clock in the morning. 
 I found every bed in the hotel full, as the court was in session. I 
 had some trouble in waking up the negro porter to ascertain that 
 fact, and, not feeling like eating breakfast, I started out to walk 
 the thirty miles to Sharon College. How I found that road, I am 
 sure I don't know; but after walking about six miles, and carrying 
 all my belongings in an old-fashioned carpet bag, I struck a log 
 farm house, with about forty big, black hogs, the biggest I had 
 ever seen and the most I had ever seen together, in the yard adjoin- 
 ing. A kind old lady welcomed me, saw I was in need of mother- 
 ing, made me some coffee and some elegant toast, following it up 
 with a substantial breakfast, after which I was able to reach 
 Sharon that evening. I have no recollection of having any din- 
 ner, but I did sometimes get a lift on a wagon. ^ 
 
 You may be sure I was glad to get among my folks. I found 
 that Sharon College was not much of a college, perhaps fifty or 
 sixty pupils from the common school grades up. There was a 
 chance to study arithmetic, algebra, English, the beginning of 
 Latin grammar, and the translation of passages of Scripture into 
 some sort of Latin — "dog Latin" we used to call it. I did not 
 think it worth while to stay the year out, but went home in the 
 spring. 
 
 Some incidents of my life in that school may amuse you. My 
 cousin was the president, but did no teaching. He lived a mile 
 out of town, and was a sort of agent for divoi-s and sinidry l)ooks 
 and publications. How thoroly impractical he was you will un- 
 derstand when I tell you that he asked me to go with him three 
 miles, one evening late in May, and carry home an old hive of bees. 
 When we reached there, we found that the bees were lying outside 
 by the handful; and it was with some difficulty that I persuaded 
 him that for us to carry them home, uphill and downhill, would be 
 [impracticable. I complained about the hilliness of the country, 
 and he informed me that the hills were the home of greatness, that 
 the Bible itself was written in a hilly country, and then quoted the 
 Psalm: "As round about Jerusalem the mountains stand alway." 
 
 I ran short of money toward spring, and my cousin persuaded 
 me and a classmate of mine, Joe Walters, who afterwards entered
 
 84 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 tlie ministry, that we could make a good deal of money if we would 
 sell a lot of his books, pamphlets and tracts on commission at the 
 county seat, Sarahsville. As the county court was in session that 
 week, he said the town w^ould be full, and many would be hungry 
 for something to read. He offered to furnish a team and buggy, 
 the books at cost price, and divide the profits. 
 
 We started at daylight, over about as miserable a road as 
 could be imagined, for the frost was going out of the ground. He 
 furnished us with large posters, with which he advised us to post 
 the town, and said that one of us should stay in the parlor of the 
 hotel to sell books to customers, and that the other should drum 
 them in. We made some paste, borrowed a brush, and billed the 
 town. Joe felt that he was the best man to drum them in, while I 
 was to stay at the hotel, waiting for the customers. Alas ! none 
 came. 
 
 On our way to Sarahsville, we had sold about 37 cents' worth 
 of pamphlets, not enough for our dinner and horse feed. So we 
 went without dinner and paid 121/^ cents for horse feed. I told 
 him that I did not think he was a very good hand at drumming 
 them in, and I Avould try it myself, which I did. I bumped into 
 everybody, and once struck four farmers who were very much 
 interested in some discussion. My cousin had convinced us that 
 the best seller would be "The Life of Charles Ball," an escaped 
 slave and fugitive. So I butted in, exhibiting a copy and telling 
 them of the wonderful escape and tribulations of this fugitive. 
 They paid no attention to me for a little bit ; but finally one of 
 them, a large, portly farmer, who would weigh two hundred or 
 over, said: 
 
 "Excuse me, gentlemen, till I settle this Yankee.'* 
 
 As I expatiated upon the adventures of Charles Ball, he said: 
 "Do you know if this Charles Ball is any relation to the Ball who 
 is in jail for murder.'"' 
 
 I was obliged to confess that I did not; but that knocked the 
 wind out of me. I went back to the hotel, and found that Joe had 
 not sold a cent's worth. Neither had I, so we concluded to give 
 it up as a bad job. 
 
 We were both ravenously hungry, and Joe, who was a Disciple, 
 said that he had an old Disciple friend on the way home, and that 
 probably he would give us supper. Before we struck him, how- 
 ever, I saw an old gentleman hoeing in a garden, and I attacked 
 him with Charles Ball. He looked at me a little bit and said: 
 
 "I am an old man. I am preparing for death ; and if you have
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 80 
 
 Boston's 'Future State' or Alleine's 'Alarm to the Unconverted', 
 I would like one of them." 
 
 I said I did not have them. 
 
 "Then have you Baxter's 'Saints' Rest'.?" 
 
 I said no. 
 
 "Then you have nothing that will suit me. You may pass on." 
 
 And we passed. We reached Joe's friend just before supper. 
 We had had a light breakfast and no dinner, were both young and 
 hungry as hounds. I remember some things distinctly that were 
 on that table — an enormous platter of boiled meat, a large dish 
 of old-fashioned hominy (prepared by boiling in lye water and 
 then washing off the lye and the hulls with it), and some bread, 
 butter and potatoes. There was also splendid coffee. It is need- 
 less to say that we did full justice to that repast. After staying 
 with the old friend till ten o'clock, we started home, and arrived at 
 two in the morning. Our total sales had been less than 50 cents, 
 our expenses 121^4 cents, and we considered it was not worth while 
 to divide, " The experience was worth more than the money. I 
 have never tried to sell books since. 
 
 In June, I bade good-bye to Sharon College, walked to Mari- 
 etta, where my mother had a second cousin, and took a steamboat 
 from there home. I remember that part of the way at least I rode 
 on a steamboat called the Diurnal, I suppose because it started out 
 every other day from one of the terminal points. I remember 
 that the feeding was fine and the company mixed; but judge of 
 my disgust with the slow speed when at a certain point I saw the 
 railroad paralleling the river. 
 
 My cousin, as I have remarked before, was a character. He 
 had married a lovely woman, who died while I was there. She had 
 three children, all girls. The first he named Jemimah, the second 
 Keziah, and the third Kercnhappuch, after Job's three daughters. 
 He married again shortly, and his second wife presented him with 
 twins, a boy and a girl. The boy he named Nero Lincoln and the 
 girl Nerina Hamlin. With all his peculiarities, he was a most 
 devout Christian. When the war broke out, he entered the army 
 as a private, rose to be chaplain, and made a great reputation in 
 his own church by his letters from the army. They were peculiar 
 in this respect — they told exactly what happened and in the plain- 
 est language, much after the style of Boswell Johnson. 
 
 After a while, some railroad presented him with five acres of 
 land in Missouri, on the condition that he build a college, which 
 he did, traveling over the country to secure needed funds, in a 
 buggy drawn by a pair of bronchos. Many years afterwards he
 
 86 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 drove another pair of bronehos to my mother's house. They 
 slipped on the icy pavement while he was hitching them, and my 
 mother gave him twenty-five dollars and told him to go and get his 
 horses shod — which I am quite sure he did not do. 
 
 His college, supplemented by preaching in vacancies in his 
 church, never made him a living. He insured his life in one of 
 those fraternal insurance companies which in those days offered 
 insurance far below cost. He finally took consumption. The as- 
 sessments became heavier as the assessed advanced in years. He 
 allowed his payments to be in default. A personal friend of his 
 notified me of the fact, saying he would soon be compelled to de- 
 clare his policy defaulted, that he could not live very long, and 
 asked me to carry it for him, which I did. I mention this because 
 I got a lesson in "cheap insurance." It cost me $11 a month, 
 sometimes $22 ; so that I was out about $1 50 in a little over a year, 
 carrying a policy of $2,000. I was glad, however, to be able to 
 turn it over to his wife, who richly deserved it.
 
 My Second Year From Home 
 
 I RETURN ED home and went to work on the farm. The weath- 
 er was warm, and it was pretty hard work, not having been ac- 
 customed to it for six months ; but my mother kindly sent me 
 out a "piece" about half -past ten, for the first day or two. 
 
 I was undecided where to go next. I thought of going to Jef- 
 ferson College, at Canonsburg, thirty miles from home; but was 
 satisfied that I was unprepared to enter even the freshman class. 
 My father had an old friend, James McYeal (which the neighbors 
 pronounced "Muckyale"), who had a son whom I knew fairly well, 
 tho several years older than myself. The families had been inti- 
 mate for many years, my father and Mr. McYeal having been eld- 
 ers in the same church, and sitting in adjoining pews. The son 
 had just graduated from an eastern college, but persuaded me to 
 attend a year or two at an academy, sometimes called a college, 
 in which he had received the main part of his education. This was 
 Geneva Hall, located at Northwood, a very small village some 
 three miles from Belle Center, and eight miles from Bellefontaine, 
 in Logan county, Ohio. 
 
 Not having as yet decided, I went there, going by rail to Crest- 
 line. On this journey, I had a very severe attack of seasickness, 
 or rather train-sickness, for in my later journeys on the ocean, I 
 have never been more than slightW seasick, and that only the first 
 time. Thinking to get over it, I ate no dinner, and for supper ate 
 some cakes that had caraway seeds in them, which I had bought 
 at Crestline. Singularly enough, I have never to this day been 
 able to enjoy eating anything with caraway seed in it. Mental 
 suggestion, of course. 
 
 I changed cars and went to Rushsylvania, and then walked 
 five miles thru the native woods to Northwood. When I describe 
 it, you will think it a queer town and a queer place for a college. 
 There were perhaps thirty or forty houses, the main buildings of 
 the college and female seminary, and three churches, all Covenant- 
 ers, and no others. None of the three Covenanter churches were 
 
 I
 
 88 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 in communion with each other. The first was the Old School, the 
 second the New School, and the third a "Steelite" church, the pas- 
 tor of which was a blind man named Peebles. The difference be- 
 tween the old and the new school was that the members of the new 
 would vote, which the members of the other would not. What was 
 the particular difference between the "Steelite" and the old and 
 new schools, 1 have never been able to understand. 
 
 It Avas distinctly a Covenanter community. The Covenanters 
 are the descendants of the old Scotch Covenanters or "Cameron- 
 ians," the strictest of the strict Presbyterians. The voice of joy 
 and praise from the "tabernacles of the righteous" was heard 
 *'duly and daily," morning and evening — a song, a lengthy pas- 
 sage from the Scriptures, and a long prayer. At the table, a 
 blessing was invariably asked, and as invariably thanks were re- 
 turned at the end of the meal. The sermons were such as I have 
 described as being the custom at my own home, only, if anything, 
 longer. There was no praj'er-meeting, but a meeting of the members 
 called "Society," for prayer and the discussion of religious topics. 
 The type of character of these people is something that is 
 rarely seen except in congregations of the same church that linger 
 here and there to this day. It seemed to me that every man had 
 what I called the "Covenanter head" ; and when you find a man 
 with the Covenanter head, you had better be careful about getting 
 into an argument with him; for he usually knows what he is talk- 
 ing about, and is apt to be as good a judge of stock as of theology. 
 It was not long before I ran up against what seemed to me 
 peculiar doctrines. When I inquired why they did not vote, I was 
 told that it was because they would not take the oath of allegiance. 
 When I asked why they would not take the oath of allegiance to 
 support the government, I was told that the government was ir- 
 religious, and, as one of the boys afterwards said in a debate, "in 
 league with hell," tho the elders would not put it that strong. In 
 other words, the government did not recognize specifically and 
 directly God as the Supreme Ruler and Jesus as the Supreme 
 Source of all authority. Many were the arguments I had, espe- 
 cially with the students, on this question. They would point to 
 the Morocco treaty, in which it was distinctly stated by the secre- 
 tary of state that the United States was not a Christian nation. 
 They would point to slavery (for remember that this was in the 
 winter of 1855-1856), and to the fact that both the political par- 
 ties were bound hand and foot to the slave interests. 
 
 Northwood was one of the stations on the "underground rail- 
 Way." There was a regular line of stations from Cincinnati to
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 89 
 
 Sandusky. Negroes were brought in covered wagons, covered 
 over with straw or corn stalks or bedding, to the station after 
 nightfall, and, after being bountifully fed, were carried on the next 
 night to the next "underground station." If any of the Covenanter 
 students were absent from Iheir classes, we generally knew where 
 they had gone, and asked no questions. When one of my chums, 
 who lived on a farm, came down to breakfast one winter morning, 
 he found nine runaway negroes getting an early breakfast. Thev 
 had arrived during the night, and would be hid till the next night, 
 and then taken on their way to freedom in Canada. 
 
 With some of the other boys, I boarded with a most excellent 
 old gentleman named Trumbull, half a mile out in the country. 
 He was a very curious compound of native Yankee and thoro- 
 bred Scotchman, having been reared in Vermont from Scotch or 
 Scotch-Irish Covenanter stock. He was not very much of a 
 farmer, but a great student of theology, and presented me almost 
 from the first some very knotty problems — for example: "Who 
 were the one hundred and forty-four thousand who stood with the 
 Lamb on Mount Sinai.''" He intimated to me that he thought 
 they were the Covenanters ! I told him that I thought if he would 
 read the passage thru carefully, that he would see that the major- 
 ity of the Covenanters would be excluded. (You will see why if 
 you read the passage.) He had a theory of the millenium which 
 I could never understand, but included in it was the idea that the 
 ponds, which abounded in that section, would be dried up; and it 
 would be something like the Garden of Eden restored. I could not 
 help but predict that the ponds would not be dried up, nor the 
 corduroy roads rendered comfortable for travel, unless there was 
 a vigorous use of the spade, both on the ditches and the roads. 
 
 My room-mate was an old friend who followed me from Penn- 
 sylvania — Dick Shaw. He, too, was aiming for the ministry; but 
 his educational career came to an untimely end in a very singular 
 way. A young farmer named Johnson had a peach orchard not 
 far from the house where we roomed. There were peaches in great 
 abundance. ^My friend Shaw and I rented the peach orchard for 
 our own eating for the season, or, rather, we paid 25 cents apiece 
 (or perhaps that amount for both ; I do not remember now). The 
 owner guaranteed the peaches to last six weeks. As a matter of 
 fact, they lasted but five weeks, but we did not ask for a rebate. 
 We were' to have all that we could eat or throw at each other, if 
 we had a mind to — but we must not give any to the other boys. 
 We went to that orchard "daily and duly," ate what we wanted, 
 threw them at each other when in that mood, brougiit home what 
 
 »
 
 90 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 we pleased; but, unfortunately, my friend caught the ague. I 
 had never seen a case of that kind before, and I was appalled when 
 he "took a shake," usually in the forenoon, and shook till the bed- 
 stead rattled. He was obliged to quit school and become a farmer. 
 He proved to be a most excellent one, however, and is living yet 
 (1911), all on account of that unfortunate renting of a peach 
 orchard. He did not know% nor did any of us, that malaria was 
 carried by mosquitoes, and that there are mosquitoes wherever 
 there are ponds in the summer-time. If he did not make a preach- 
 er, he made a first-class elder, which is almost as good. I had a 
 delightful visit with him in June, 1911. 
 
 Mr. Trumbull had a brother who was noted for long prayers 
 and long blessings at the table. The boys were told that Avhen the 
 bell rang during morning prayers, they would be excused. One 
 day his daughter knocked at my door and said : 
 
 "You need not come to dinner till fifteen minutes after the bell 
 rings." 
 
 I asked why. 
 
 "Well," she answered, "Uncle James is to be here. Mother 
 usually does not ask him to return thanks, because his blessing is 
 so long that she is afraid the things will get cold; but today she 
 is going to ask him to ask the blessing." 
 
 I waited fifteen minutes after the bell rang, and was in plenty 
 of time for the dinner. 
 
 I was intimate with one other family, that of Samuel P. John- 
 son, a farmer ; a man who, in type of mind, bent of character, age 
 and experience, was so nearl}' like John Brown, of Osawattamic, 
 that if I were to see their photographs today, I would not know 
 one from the other. He was more of a theologian than farmer, 
 and studied profoundly the problems of government and the his- 
 tory of churches from the standpoint of Calvinistic theology of 
 the strictest kind. T have the best of reason to believe that he 
 kept a station on the "underground railway." He was one of the 
 main supports of both the college and the female seminary. 
 
 I go into these details because the environment of a college, the 
 kind of people who support it, and the religious influences by which 
 it is surrounded are not the least important part of an education. 
 I have been glad ever since that I went to Geneva Hall, not merely 
 for the thoro character of the instruction — of which more here- 
 after — but because I was brought into close contact with a class of 
 people who, whatever may be their short-comings, were profound 
 thinkers, and did not hesitate to carry their convictions to their 
 proper conclusions so far as was humanly possible.
 
 The Small College 
 
 THE small college, whether in the nineteenth or the twentietli 
 century, has this great advantage over the large one, that the 
 pupils can get in closer touch with the professors. For obvious 
 reasons, the small denominational college can get a bigger man for 
 the same salary. If the small college has even one big man, the 
 student is likely to get more benefit from this than from an even 
 bigger man in a larger college, for the simple reason that it is 
 easier to get in touch with the best thing in the college, a Man. 
 In the larger school, almost the entire instruction must be given 
 by men of little reputation, men of whom the student has probably 
 never heard until he entered the classroom. He seldom gets very 
 close to the man of reputation connected with the school. 
 
 I was very fortunate. When I went to Geneva Hall, I was 
 thrown in close touch with some really big men. The biggest of 
 them was a man long since dead, named Doctor Sloan, then about 
 forty years of age. He was bred in tlie east, had evidently re- 
 ceived a very thoro training, and had moved in the very best 
 society. He was a thoro teacher, and took a lively personal in- 
 terest in every boy connected with the school. He knew how to 
 get work out of boys without formally requiring it of them. I re- 
 member very well the first day I met him. They were organizing 
 the classes at the beginning of the session. The class of which my 
 recollection is most Aivid was that in Tiatin, text-book, Caesar. I 
 knew a little Latin granmiar, but did not know that thoroly, and 
 one of the professors said that I could not keep up with the work 
 of that class. Fortunately, there seemed no place else to put me, 
 and Doctor Sloan said: "Put Wallace in ; he'll get thru all right." 
 I felt greatly encouraged by that. The first day the doctor sat 
 and looked at us a bit ; and, as I was at the end of the seat, he said: 
 
 "Wallace, what did you come here for.'"' 
 
 I stammered out, after a time: "To get an education." 
 
 "An education — what is an education.''"
 
 92 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 After he had, so to speak, chased me around the room v'ith 
 that sort of a prod, he said: "Well, what do you want with an 
 education?" Then, after a while: "How do you expect to get it?" 
 He wound up his examination of each one of us — for he treated us 
 all alike in order — with : "What do you want to do with an educa- 
 tion when you get it?" And that was the first day's recitation in 
 Caesar ! 
 
 I wondered what would come next. The next day, he simply 
 asked one of the boys to hand him a book, and motioned for us to 
 begin translating. If there was a wrong accent, he twisted a lock 
 of hair which hung behind his right ear; if a wrong quantity, he 
 frowned ; if a wrong pronunciation, he gave a peculiar stamp with 
 his right foot. W'e came in a little while to the third sentence in 
 the first book of Caesar. It went around the class, and nobody 
 could translate it. He simply handed back the book and said: 
 "That will do until tomorrow," and when we came back the next 
 day he began with that sentence. That was his method of teach- 
 ing Caesar. I do not know how the other boys felt about it, but I 
 made up my mind that I would have that lesson if I sat up all night 
 to get it; and I had it. Only in extremely difficult passages did 
 he give us any direct help. We had to get it ourselves. 
 
 Then he had us visit him in the evening, one or two at a time, 
 and talked with us about our parents and our aims in life. I was 
 a very awkward boy in those days, and not very particular about 
 my clothes. His wife, a very refined lady, and evidently accus- 
 tomed to the best society, one evening called my attention to this 
 and said I would succeed a great deal better if I would be more 
 particular about my appearance. He said: 
 
 "Well, that's all right. She is giving you good advice; but I 
 would advise you not to neglect your studies to take on polish. If 
 you master your studies, there will be something to polish, and that 
 will come by and by." 
 
 Then we had Doctor Milligan, who, I afterwards learned dur- 
 ing a long friendship lasting until his death, was only four or five 
 years older than myself. He was a most genial man, who knew 
 how to enlist the boys' sympathies, and was constantly pointing 
 them to higher things. Other professors we had — good ones, very 
 good drill-masters, who insisted on thoroness — but they failed to 
 grip me as did these two men. 
 
 The course of study was not an extensive one, nor nearly so 
 large nor so long as in the best high schools of the early part of the 
 twentieth century, and was mainly adapted to fitting men for a 
 professional life. Outside of the professions there was nothing 
 
 I
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 93 
 
 vocational about it. English grammar, composition, higher arith- 
 metic, algebra, plane and spherical geometry, trigonometry, Latin, 
 Greek and Hebrew — the latter in the senior year. These and 
 work in the literary societies were the main features of the educa- 
 cation we received in that school. The main object was to make 
 preachers ; and an unusually large number of the students became 
 preachers, and are sporting "D. D.'s" and "LL. D.'s" to this day. 
 
 Education was cheap in those days ; and perhaps it may be re- 
 garded from the modern viewpoint as rather cheap education in 
 itself. I do not think I ever paid as much as four doUars a week 
 for board and room — usually two and a half or three. The board 
 was usually good; and I wish I could enjoy now as hearty a break- 
 fast as I did at my first boarding-place, where they had splendid 
 "flapjacks," pancakes swimming in genuine maple syrup matle 
 on the farm. We had these nearly every morning, or else buck- 
 wheat cakes (home-grown), hot from the griddle, and plenty of 
 good butter, country-cured ham, and fresh eggs in season. 
 
 The rooms were bare, seldom carpeted. A wash bowl and a 
 pitcher served for all ablutions, and we invariably threw the dirty 
 water out of the window ; for there was no sewer, and this was the 
 easiest way of disposing of it. I shall never forget one incident 
 while I was at Jefferson College, two years afterwards, and room- 
 ing in the second story. I used rainwater which had a plentiful 
 supply of soot in it, being in a coal county, and when I threw the 
 dirty w-ater out of the window, as usual, it came squarely on top of 
 the bald head of my landlord, who happened to be passing under 
 that window^ at the time. I saw him after I had tipped the basin, 
 and began profuse apologies. He must have been a saint of a ripe 
 degree of grace; for he only looked up and, said: "Did I ever!" 
 I do not think, however, that he ever got rid of a suspicion that I 
 did it on purpose — which T did not. 
 
 The streets of the little village of Xorthwood were simply coun- 
 try roads poorly worked ; the sidewalks simply one oak board, 
 about a foot wide, on which men usually w alked alone, but on which 
 I observed that a boy and a girl could walk together and balance 
 fairly well. 
 
 I remember but one case of disciplining, involving, however, 
 two persons. There are cranks in colleges as well as elsewhere, 
 and we had one, a queer fellow, who wore in summer a hat of straw 
 with as wide a brim as the broadest of the ladies' hats in the year 
 1910. ' This brim was held up by a string on each side. In the 
 summer he went barefooted, and wore a gown of some sort which 
 reached down to his feet. He argued with the boys that it was 
 
 L
 
 94 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 wrong to take the life of any animal, even that of the most offen- 
 sive insect. He argued also that we should eat nothing that was 
 not grown in our own immediate environment. Hence, he ab- 
 jured tea, coffee, spices and sugar, except maple. He refused 
 to cut cither his hair or beard. He said he was fitting himself 
 as a missionary to Afghanistan; and we all wished he were there. 
 He made some slighting remarks about the girls with whom two 
 of the older boys were going, and naturally incurred their special 
 enmity. On election night, the fourth of November, 1856, these 
 boys waylaid him as he was passing thru a vacant room in the 
 college, which had not been swept that summer. There was a 
 struggle, and much hair and gore were found on the floor in the 
 morning. In taking off his long hair, which he had refused to 
 have cut, they also took some of his scalp with it. Of course, an 
 offense of this kind could not be overlooked, and the boys were 
 suspended : but they had no difficulty in entering another college 
 of the same grade, or a higher one, in the same classes. 
 
 Longfellow had made Hiawatha famous at that time, and many 
 were the sheets of paper spoiled by descriptions of this tragic scene 
 in Hiawatha style. I spoiled a number myself, but can only re- 
 member the beginning of one: "On the fourth night of November," 
 in which were references to the silvery moon, a sky overcast with 
 clouds, and untrodden snow, and stars- as they looked down upon 
 the scene. 
 
 There were few amusements as an outlet for the pent-up ener- 
 gies of students ; no baseball, no football, no tennis, no gymnasium. 
 There was an occasional visit with some one of the boys at his 
 home in the country, a visit to the nearest town, and a supper at 
 the hotel with some girl friend, a day's hunting for wild turkeys, 
 which were not numerous, and for squirrels, both the black and the 
 gray — these furnished about all the diversion we had. 
 
 Generally speaking, we were hard-working, earnest students. 
 The second year, I was in the habit of getting up at four o'clock, 
 which I would not like to do now. I studied till six, then had 
 breakfast and an hour's walk, if the roads were dry or frozen. 
 There were recitations in the forenoon, an hour«for dinner, some 
 recitations in the afternoon, an hour for supper, and then study 
 till ten. VVe made much of our literary societies, and fierce was 
 the rivalry between students for society as well as class honors. I 
 Avas once foolish enough to rejoice over the defeat of one of my 
 rivals by declaiming in my turn at "Woolsey's Lament," with 
 variations : "Adieu, a last adieu to all my greatness !" At the 
 next night he, with similar variations, declaimed something about
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story <Jo 
 
 Napoleon's decline, fall and banishment to Elba. It taught nic a 
 lesson, "not to rejoice when thy enemy falleth." I richly deserved 
 the unmerciful scoring I received. 
 
 I, with some of the other boys, had been on a sleigh-ride to a 
 little town called Roundhead. On the way home, our sleigh broke 
 down, and we borrowed a log chain from a farmer without asking 
 his consent, intending, of course, to return it. The farmer was 
 furious, and came to town the next day, demanding our arrest. 
 Of course we settled Avith the farmer ; but my friend, in his decla- 
 mation, told about being born of noble Scottish ancestry, and 
 when he came to the passage, "his flight from Moscow confirmed 
 his descent," substituted, "his flight from Roundhead"! I hap- 
 pened to be censor that evening, and managed to pay the highest 
 compliments to my castigator, much to the amusement of the bovs. 
 
 And yet, looking back over more than half a century, I feel 
 that I owe this fellow a good deal. He and I never did get along. 
 One day he said something particularly mean about me at the 
 boarding-house, which rankled even when the family were at wor- 
 ship ; and then and there it occured to me that I would take ad- 
 vantage of the fact that a room had been left vacant by one of 
 the students who had been suspended, and change my boarding 
 house, with this further advantage, that I would have a room to 
 myself. While there I became acquainted with a young lady nmch 
 older than myself, who was boarding at the same house, and thru 
 her, two years later, I had the opportunity of becoming acquainted 
 with the lady who became my wife. Thus do the most trifling 
 things, to which we pay no attention at the time, shape our destiny. 
 Some call it chance, some luck; I call it Providence. Just think 
 of what a difference it might have made in the Wallace famil}', if 
 I had not fallen out with this schoolmate over a trifling remark, 
 changed my boarding-place, and perhaps had remained an old 
 bachelor, or perchance married a less noble woman than your 
 great-grandmother ! 
 
 Last spring (1911), the American Magazine saw fit to publish 
 a sketch of my life. A few weeks afterward, I received a letter 
 from a professor in a college out in Utah, stating that he sup- 
 posed I was the same chap who took part in a chicken dinner in 
 the room of one of the students, the chickens for which had been 
 "borrowed" (like the log chain) from a farmer whom the boys 
 greatly disliked. He called my attention to the moot court which 
 was held on the college campus on a dark night, in which he says I 
 acted as judge, arraigned the culprits, sentenced them to deliver 
 to the farmer resolutions of regret that anyone connected with
 
 96 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 the college had been guilty of interfering with his feathered flock, 
 promising that it should never occur again, if the discipline of the 
 students could prevent it, and that they should pay him one dollar 
 — more than twice what two tough old hens were worth then. I 
 had really forgotten all about the moot court, but have an indis- 
 tinct recollection of the feast, the chickens for which I suspect were 
 feloniously purloined ! I presume that human nature in college 
 is now, and always will be, much as it was then and always has 
 been.
 
 My Third Year From Home 
 
 MY third year froin home was my second year at Geneva Hall. 
 College life flowed on much the same as the year before, with 
 this difference, that the discussions in the literary societies 
 and elsc>vhere took on a more distinctly political phase; for this was 
 the year 1856, when the great Republican party, which has been 
 in power most of the time since, first became a national organiza- 
 tion. For many years, the two great political parties had been 
 the Whig and the Democrat. The Democrats had been in power, 
 except for eight years, since 1832. The great leaders of both 
 parties at this date were pro-slavery partisans. There was an 
 anti-slavery element in both parties, but it was regarded by the 
 leaders of each as insurgent, and therefore dangerous, and li.ible, 
 if allowed to make headway, to disturb the repose and interfere 
 with business. The south was for the most part Democratic and 
 for free trade, or, more accurately, for a tariff for revenue only, 
 because it was almost purely agricultural, and sold its main crop, 
 cotton, in a foreign market, in which it had practicalh^ a monop- 
 oly. It wished to purchase supplies as cheaply as possible. The 
 north was mainly Whig, and advocated protection, because it con- 
 tained practically all the manufacturing plants of the nation, and 
 wished competition barred, or at least limited, by a protective tar- 
 iff which would enable it to put up the price of its goods. 
 
 The south was in the main pro-slavery, because it was believed 
 that cotton could not be grown without slave labor; while the north 
 had gotten rid of its slaves, mainly because it did not pay to keep 
 them. In the mountain regions of the south, and on the higher 
 and drier soils of the valleys, cotton growing was impossible. 
 Hence, these were the Whig strongholds, while Democracy flour- 
 ished in such states as Pennsylvania, where, at that time, the main 
 business was agriculture. The great business interests of the 
 north were friendly to the south, because they financed and handled 
 the cotton, whether for export or home manufacture.
 
 98 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 Among the better classes of both parties conscience slept, and 
 self-interest or supposed self-interest mainly regulated conduct. 
 This is the tendency of human nature in any and every age. In 
 various ways this sleeping conscience of the American people had 
 been aroused. I need not tell you of the events that led up to the 
 Missouri compromise, in 1820, by which all land in the Louisiana 
 purchase north of latitude 36 :30, except Missouri, was decreed 
 to be forever free from slavery ; nor of the acquisition of Texas for 
 the purpose of extending slavery ; nor of the territory given as 
 indemnity by Mexico, out of which we have carved California, 
 Nevada and Utah ; nor of the rush of northern people to California 
 on account of the discovery of gold, and of the Mormons to Utah ; 
 nor of the enactment of the fugitive slave law in 1850. You will 
 find all of that, and much more like it, in your school histories — 
 or at least ought to find it. I am not writing a history of any 
 sort, but am trying to tell you how things political looked to a 
 sophomore student in a strong anti-slavery locality in the years 
 1856 and 1857. 
 
 In the fifties, Stephen A. Douglas was the most potent force 
 in the United States senate. He had introduced and secured the 
 passage of the bill called the Nebraska-Kansas act, which re- 
 pealed the Missouri compromise and freed those states and all 
 other territory open to settlement to slavery, provided the bill was 
 enacted into law. This was the famous, plausible and seductive 
 doctrine of "squatter sovereignty." This aroused the public to 
 the danger, and the more so because Uncle Tom's Cabin (written 
 by Harriet Beecher Stowe in 1852, and of which 300,000 copies 
 were said to- have been sold the first year) had laid bare the condi- 
 tions in the slave-holding states, and had aroused the national 
 conscience. The fugitive slave law made every man a slave-catcher 
 — if his services were demanded by the United States marshal — 
 and imposed a fine of a thousand dollars and imprisonment on 
 every man who harbored, aided or abetted any runaway slave. 
 
 The Dred Scott decision, rendered by the circuit court of the 
 United States in 1857, confirmed the constitutionality of the fugi- 
 tive slave law, and stripped the fugitive of every right to liberty 
 in a free state. I quote from that decision, premising in the first 
 place that Dred Scott was a negro, the slave of an army officer 
 stationed in Missouri, who took him, in 1834, to Illinois, where 
 slavery was prohibited by the state law, and then to what is now 
 INIinnesota, where slavery was prohibited by the INIissouri compro- 
 mise. In 1838, the officer returned to -Missouri with Scott, where 
 the latter learned that a previous decision of the Missouri courts
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 99 
 
 made him a free man. In 1848, his master gave him a beating, 
 and he brought suit against him for assault and batter}-, and the 
 court gave him a verdict. In 18.5f2, the supreme court of the state 
 reversed the decision of the lower court. His master than sold 
 Scott to a citizen of New York ; and, on the ground that he and 
 his new owner were citizens of different states, he brought suit 
 against him for assault in the federal circuit court of Alissouri. 
 The case finally reached the supreme court, and that court de- 
 clared that Scott was not a cilizen of Missouri, and hence had no 
 standing in the federal courts ; that a slave was only a piece of 
 property, and the owner could take it wherever he desired in the 
 United States ; that no negro could be a citizen of the United 
 States ; that the Missouri compromise was unconstitutional ; and 
 that neither congress nor the territorial government could pro- 
 hibit slavery in the territories. With this statement of facts, we 
 can realize the force of the decision delivered by Chief Justice 
 Tawney : 
 
 "They (the negroes) had for more than a century tefore (the 
 adoption of the constitution) been regarded as beings of an infe- 
 rior order, and altogether unfit to associate with the white race, 
 either in social or political relations ; and so far inferior that they 
 had no right which the white man was bound to respect, and that 
 the negro might justly and lawfully be reduced to slavery for his 
 benefit." 
 
 You can see how this decision would stir up anti-slavery senti- 
 ment from one end of the country to the other; for, as a result, 
 no man, no matter what his social standing, wealth or culture might 
 be, knew when he was putting his life in jeopardy, and he would 
 lose all standing if he championed the cause of a slave. Wendell 
 Phillips, a man of the bluest blood, highest culture, and noblest 
 character, the greatest orator of his age, and certainly the greatest 
 I have ever heard, was regarded as a pariah and an outcast in cul- 
 tured Boston. There had been for years a few pronounced abo- 
 litionists. They were treated with as great contempt and scorn 
 as we would regard an anarchist in these opening days of the 
 twentieth century. [Ministers of the gospel in the aorth, who dared 
 preach, even on Thanksgiving Day or on a fast day, against the 
 evils of slavery, were very likely to create divisions in the church 
 and lose financial support, and were therefore in danger of losing 
 their pastoral charge. Solemn doctors of divinity in the south, 
 and some in the north, preached eh)quently on the text: "Cursed 
 be Canaan ; a ser\'ant of sefvants shall he be unto his brethren." 
 Any opposition to this fugitive slave law was regarded as a viola-
 
 100 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 tion of Paul's injunction to "obey the powers that be." The slave 
 was told to follow the example of Onesimus and return to his mas- 
 ter. Any assertion of "a higher law than the constitution" was 
 regarded as next to high treason against the government of the 
 United States. The letter of the constitution was worshiped as an 
 idol, while the spirit of it was disregarded when dealing with slav- 
 ery. You may think in reading this, that, we were in those days a 
 set of heathens ; but I beg to remind you that we were no worse, 
 taking into consideration our environment, than the people of any 
 other decade have been since that day. 
 
 Disregarding party names, there were three leading phases of 
 thought, and the masses swung backward and forward to one 
 or the other of the three. First there was the abolitionist, who 
 believed that slavery was wrong, a violation of fundamental human 
 rights, utterly at variance with the declaration of independence and 
 the spirit of the constitution. These demanded its immediate abo- 
 lition, as in utter violation of the laws of God and the fundamental 
 principles of just government. There was another class, who be- 
 lieved that slavery was right, a patriarchal institution in the main 
 beneficial to both master and slave ; and that the slave, if a human 
 being at all — which some questioned — was happiest in a state of 
 servitude. There was a third class who, while regarding the doc- 
 trine of squatter sovereignty as a violation of a sacred compact 
 (the INIissouri compromise) intended to be perpetual, regarded the 
 fugitive slave law as a law, and held that while it was a law it 
 should be obeyed. They believed that this law was utterly wrong, 
 and could not stand the test of time, nor even of the courts. They 
 were not willing to abolish slavery at once, but believed that event- 
 ually the nation could not be half slave and half free, but must be 
 one thing or the other. 
 
 The great leader of this last class was Abraham Lincoln, altho 
 in 1856 he was just beginning to appear as a great, potent moral 
 and political force, looming above the horizon in the west. 
 
 It is no wonder then that during this third year at college, the 
 questions discussed in the debating and literary societies and else- 
 where were such as these: Is the fugitive slave law constitutional.'' 
 If constitutional, should it be obeA^ed? Is the Dred Scott decision 
 binding on the Christian? Is there a higher law than the consti- 
 tution? Should slavery be abolished? and so on. It was often diffi- 
 cult in the societies to find students who would take the unpopular 
 side in these debates. Somebody was obliged to do so; and some- 
 of us learned in these discussions the tremendous handicap under 
 which a man works when he has to defend for the time being some-
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 101 
 
 thing in which he does not really believe. It compelled us, how- 
 ever, to study carefully what could be said on the other side — not 
 bad training for a college student. 
 
 It was while the public mind was seething with questions like 
 these that the Republican party, which governed the country from 
 Buchanan's administration until the two terms of Grover ClevchuuJ, 
 first became a national organization. Its first candidate was 
 John C. Fremont. I lacked six months of being old enough to 
 vote, and hence took less interest than 1 might otherwise have taken 
 — but, for some reason, his candidacy did not appeal to me nor to 
 my fellow students, probably for the following reasons : He was 
 born in the south, Charlestown, South Carolina. He had not been 
 identified with the anti-slavery movement, in which we were so 
 deeply interested. His career had been as an officer in the navy, 
 afterwards an explorer. Too much was said in the campaign about 
 his wife, Jessie Benton, a daughter of old Sam Benton, a noted 
 anti-slavery leader, as if his anti-slavery principles might have 
 been absorbed from association with her. I do not remember a 
 single political speech in that campaign, tho I do remember quite 
 clearly some of the campaign songs. Fremont polled a large vote, 
 however — 114 electoral votes to 174 for Buchanan; and had the 
 newly-formed Republican party pacified the old Whig element by 
 the promise of a protective tariff, their candidate might have been 
 elected. The hour had not yet come for the revolution that was 
 to follow. It takes more than one campaign to absorb a party 
 that has control of congress, of the executive, of the supreme court, 
 and of the postoffices.
 
 At Jefferson College 
 
 I SPENT the last part of June, July and a large part of August 
 working on the farm at home, and in the fall started for Jef- 
 ferson College, about thirty miles distant. Arriving at Pitts- 
 burgh on the way there, I was met at the station by my uncle. He 
 was pale and evidently greatly agitated, altho he was a very 
 strong, resolute and level-headed man. I said: 
 "Uncle, what is the matter?" 
 
 "The matter!" says he. "The Ohio Life and Trust Company 
 has failed !" 
 
 I could not then understand why the failure of any life and 
 trust company should agitate him so deeply, but was soon to learn. 
 This was the beginning of the great panic of '57, which swept over 
 the entire country, and from which it had scarcely recovered at 
 the beginning of the Civil War. Like all other panics, it was 
 caused by over-expansion, largely in speculation in land, railroad 
 stocks and in business : and this expansion was possible with the 
 miserable system of state banks, especially those of the west, that 
 were under no adequate supervision. There was at that time no 
 national bank system. Any number of men who pleased might 
 start a bank and issue currency, which, in Iowa, Indiana and Illi- 
 nois, went under the names of "wild-cat," "stump-tail," "red-dog," 
 etc. It was scarcely safe to keep the paper currency of these 
 western banks over night. 
 
 This same uncle of mine, when in Chicago at one time, had a 
 lot of this mone3\ He did not think it safe to take it home, so he 
 invested it in tickets on the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago 
 Railroad. As his business with the railroad grew, they gave hira 
 an annual pass, and years afterwards, when I was located at Rock 
 Island, he turned tlie tickets over to me, asking me, with my wife, 
 to ride them out in coming to visit him in Pittsburgh. I mention 
 this to show the improvement that has been made in the banking i 
 system, altho much improvement is still needed In order to prevent i 
 the recurrence of similar panics. ;
 
 Uncle Ilenry's Own Story 
 
 103 
 
 In those days you could walk from Pittsburgh to Canonsburg, 
 or you could go horseback or in a carriage, or take the stage, 
 which left Monongahela City in the morning. Nowadays you can 
 go by rail or by trolley car almost any hour in the day oV night. 
 As these roads follow the streams, you miss the splendid views 
 over the beautiful, rolling, fairly well wooded country which the 
 stage route on the turnpike disclosed from the high points. This 
 
 county is now densely popu- 
 lated — a great coal-produc- 
 ing, oil-producing and manu- 
 facturing district. The pop- 
 ulation was then almost en- 
 tirely rural, and its main 
 products were sheep, barley 
 and Presbyterians. The sheep 
 were of the old-fashioned, 
 wrinkled, merino type ; small, 
 poor in mutton quality, with 
 a skin so wrinkled that it was 
 almost large enough to cover 
 two sheep of its size and 
 weight. The wool was fine 
 and dense, and Washington 
 county had a reputation for 
 fine wool over the entire 
 country. Farmers in West- 
 moreland county could not 
 get v.ithin a cent or two of 
 the prices that were paid for 
 Washington county wool, even if they bought the sheep there 
 and had just moved them over the county line. Then, as now, 
 a comnmnity that co-operates in the production of any one thing, 
 and produces an article of superior quality, can get a price in 
 advance even of the actual value. 
 
 I do not know why they produced barley to such an extent, 
 unless the farmers, being a long distance from the railroad, could 
 put into a wagon more money's worth of barley than of corn. 
 Nowadays, we hear nothing in that county of barley nor of sheep; 
 for there are too many miners and too many dogs. Thus do 
 transportation facilities and the development of manufacturing 
 industries change the course of agriculture. 
 
 The county raised some Presbyterians because it was stocked 
 with Presbyterians from the start and could not help it. 
 
 Ilenry Wallace When a Student at Jefferson College
 
 104 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 Canonsburg, in 1857, was but a village, with a population of 
 say a thousand, whether more or less I really do not know. The 
 turnpike running thru Pittsburgh to Washington was the one 
 principal street. Another at right angles to it climbed "Sheep 
 Hill," on which the college buildings were located, which now house 
 Jefferson Academy, the remains of the college. Insignificant 
 buildings they would seem to you, if compared with the high schools 
 in Des Moines or any similar city. On this street was located 
 Olome Institute, a seminary for young ladies, or "Seminoles," as 
 we called them ; for this was before the days of co-education. The 
 boys might call one cAcning in the week, within certain hours, and 
 hold discreet communion with a fair damsel under proper super- 
 vision. On the turnpike was a building that had once been the 
 Theological Seminary of the Associate, now the United Presby- 
 terian Church ; and on the parallel street nearly opposite the sem- 
 inary was a boarding-house which we called "Fort Job." There 
 were no dormitories or boarding-houses belonging to the college or 
 to the fraternities. The students engaged rooms with board or 
 ■without, and, if without, took their meals with old Mother Hunt, 
 costing, as I recollect it, $2.25 a week. 
 
 Jefferson College was one of the early colleges of the then west, 
 founded in 1802, largely thru the influence of one Doctor McMil- 
 lan, a graduate of Princeton, which again had its foundation or 
 beginning in the famous "Log College" of Bucks County, Penn- 
 sylvania. The settlers of AVashington county, in which the college 
 was located, were for the most part Scotch and Scotch-Irish Pres- 
 byterians, who had always taken their church and their schools 
 with them, w hether they pioneered in the forest or on the prairie ; 
 and who also took up arms against the federal government because 
 it levied a small tax on the product, of the distillery. Their ances- 
 tors before them took up arms against Charles II because he levied 
 a tax of six-pence a barrel on beer. The transformation of their 
 descendants into a race of prohibitionists, with scarcely an excep- 
 tion, is one of the most striking evidences of the progress of moral 
 reforms. Jefferson College was therefore predestined, to use Pres- 
 byterian theologica.l language, to be a school controlled by Presby- 
 terian influence and attended largely by students with Presby- 
 terian ideas and leanings, I mention this because the moral in- 
 fluences behind a college are quite as important as the course of 
 study, or what is known as the curriculum. It is never safe to 
 educate a boy intellectually in advance of his moral education. 
 To have dispensed with chapel services, as has recently been done 
 in a Avestern university, because only a fraction of the students
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 105 
 
 attended, is something that never would have been thought of in 
 Jefferson. The students were all expected to attend chapel and to 
 take their seats by classes in the allotted parts of the hall. 
 
 Unfortunately, these good old Presbyterian folks made the 
 mistake of establishing a rival school called "Washington," only a 
 few miles distant — about four years later (1806) — two colleges 
 where but one was needed. Their descendants, singularly enough, 
 have ever since often made the mistake of establishing two rival 
 churches where there is need of but one. Fortunately, the two 
 colleges have since been united under the name of "Washington 
 and Jefferson," and it is one of the very best of the smaller colleges 
 in the United States. 
 
 As this was before the application of science to manufacturing, 
 which has crowded men into cities, and before the extension of rail- 
 roads and the opening up of the great trans-Mississippi country 
 had rendered it possible to feed them cheaply, the population of 
 the count}' was almost wholh' rural, and the students were mostly 
 from the farms, and from the farming sections where Presbyte- 
 rians predominated- — mostly from Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, 
 Illinois, what is now West \'irginia, Kentucky and Tennessee. The 
 southern element was very considerable, probably because at that 
 time there was no Presb3terian college of equal standing in the 
 South. The ages of the graduates ranged from twenty to thirty, 
 sometimes to thirty-two. The high standing of the college may 
 be seen from the fact that the classes grew in numbers from fresh- 
 man to senior, the freshman class averaging about thirty, while 
 the senic^r classes reached from fifty to seventy and over. 
 
 The college course would be regarded as meager nowadays, 
 and appliances still more so. Latin from Caesar thru Sallust, 
 Virgil, Cicero's Orations, Horace or Ovid ; Greek from Xenophon's 
 ^Memorabilia, Homer, Sophocles, Aeschylus ; mathematics from 
 geometry up to calculus, logarithms, etc. (Really, I have forgot- 
 ten all about them, even the names i); natural science, three big 
 volumes by Dr. Dionysius Lardner, of Trinity College, Dublin, 
 Ireland. In one of them he proved to his own entire satisfaction 
 that it was impossible to cross the Atlantic by steamship, because 
 no vessel could possibly carry enough coal for the voyage. ' To his 
 confusion, the first invoice of his books for use in an American 
 college came over in a steamship, and so we dubbed him "Doctor 
 Dionysius Gander." All this with no apparatus worth mention- 
 ing, and chemistry ditto. Then Ave had in the senior year, logic, 
 metaphysics, ethics, science of government, constitution of the 
 United States, Butler's Analogy, etc., for which no apparatus was
 
 106 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 necessary except a sound bodj^ and a clear head. It can readily 
 be seen that Jefferson College was not fitted especially to educate 
 farmers or scientists or engineers or pedagogs ; but to lay the 
 foundation for the future stud}^ of any of these branches of human 
 endeavor, as well as for law and medicine, but more especially 
 theology. It pointed the student to mental and moral achievement 
 rather than the conquest of natural forces or the amassing of 
 material things. 
 
 There were in Jefferson College at the time of which I write no 
 games or sports, no baseball nor football, with their factions and 
 leaders, nor athletic contests with other colleges, involving large 
 expense of time and money. I do not even remember if we had a 
 college yell. If we did, I have forgotten it. There was no hazing, 
 no "scraps" between sophomores and freshmen. In short, we were 
 gentlemen, coming mainly from farm homes where money was none 
 too plentiful, and with the sincere and earnest purpose of fitting 
 ourselves for the serious business of life. 
 
 A somewhat striking event of these years, but which affected 
 the students only in a financial way, however, was the great frost 
 or freeze which occurred on the night of the Fourth of July. On 
 the morning of the fifth, the ground was frozen about as it would 
 be at the time of the first snow. The season had been a very early 
 one. The corn on my father's place was knee-high ; he was culti- 
 vating it the third time. Wheat was in blossom. Over the whole 
 country from the Allegheny mountains to western Ohio, the frost 
 killed all the corn and all the wheat. My brother and I cut all the 
 wheat on twelve acres of land between noon and three o'clock. This 
 was a small patch that was protected by a grove of trees. 
 
 I was boarding at Mother Hunt's. She had given us rhubarb 
 sauce for breakfast, rhubarb pie for dinner, and rhubarb sauce for 
 supper; and the boys all rejoiced that Sabbath morning because 
 they knew the frost had killed all the rhubarb ! When the leaves 
 began to fall from the trees, however, and the sky assumed the ap- 
 pearance of Indian summer, when the people all over that section 
 began to dread famine, and many merchants put up the price of 
 flour from $5 a barrel to $10, we began to wonder as to the cer- 
 tainty of our remittances. Fortunately, railroads had reached 
 the wheat fields of Indiana ; and tho there was great loss, the coun- 
 try recovered. There were more buckwheat cakes eaten that win- 
 ter than ever before or since, I am sure ; for farmers, finding their 
 crops a failure, bought every bushel of buckwheat they could. In
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 107 
 
 fact, some men were smart enough to go directly where seed could 
 be purchased, and to sow a large acreage, and made more money 
 than they would have made from their other crops. The man who 
 knows how to take advantage of adversity and convert it into pros- 
 perity will succeed anywhere. 
 
 I 
 
 I
 
 Jefferson College — The Professors 
 
 THE two main and essential things about any college are the 
 students, which are the raw material, and the professors, 
 who are to shape and mold that raw material. Someone has 
 defined a college as a great teacher like Horace Mann, for example, 
 on one end of a log, and a bright student on the other. The build- 
 ing and equipment, however important they may be, are yet but 
 incidental to the main business of the college, the development of 
 the intellect and the character of the student. 
 
 In my last letter, I have described in broad, general terms the 
 students of the Jefferson of my day. I will now try to describe 
 the professors. Unlike the conditions now prevailing in the mod- 
 ern large college or university, our students came in direct per- 
 sonal contact with the president and the professors. There were 
 no assistant professors or tutors or student professors. Every 
 professor taught every day. They were few in number, as com- 
 pared with the modern college. I came in direct personal contact 
 with but five during the junior and senior years. There were one 
 or two more in the lower classes whom I knew but slightly. These 
 professors knew every member of their classes personally; knew 
 their habits of thought and of life, their personal peculiarities and 
 idiosyncrasies, and took a deep personal interest in each one of 
 them. 
 
 First let me introduce you to the president. Doctor Joseph 
 Alden — "Old Joe" we sometimes called him in his absence — an 
 eastern man, a lineal descendant of the celebrated Alden of the 
 Mayflower ; a little over medium height and weight ; neat in dress ; 
 a man of the highest and most finished culture, with a thin upper 
 lip and a pronounced under-jaw, which, when occasion required, 
 would come up w ith a snap. There was no nonsense about Doctor 
 Alden, no fooling when we came into his classes. You realized 
 very soon that you were there for business. He tolerated no slip- 
 shod methods of study, nor foggy thinking. Whether in meta-
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 109 
 
 physics or political economy, or anything else in his department, 
 you were expected to know not merely what was in the text-book, 
 but the subject itself. If we were studying Foster's Essay on 
 Decision of Character (a book well worth the reading of every 
 student), or Butler's Analogy, everyone was expected to know the 
 whole lesson and take up the subject where his predecessor in reci- 
 tation left off, and that on the spur of the moment. We had to 
 know the whole lesson, or we could not safely undertake to recite 
 any part of it. 
 
 I owe him a great deal for one lesson. He asked me to come 
 to his office, and began in a quick, earnest way, something as 
 follows : Wallace, there are some men who can think and can not 
 talk; and there are other men who can talk but can not think. I 
 want you to learn how to do both. Here is a subject (I have for- 
 gotten what it w^as) : come to me in two weeks with six definite 
 statements bearing upon that subject, in logical order. You must 
 promise me not to write a line or make a note, but have every point 
 definitely thought out and every word definitely in your mind, pre- 
 cisely as you intend to speak it. 
 
 I remember that when I came to my second proposition, he 
 said : "Wallace, that's not logical ; it has nothing to do with the 
 subject; go on to the next." It was a very severe drill; but to 
 this day I do not feel thoroly comfortable in addressing an audi- 
 ence unless I know every word that I intend to say, and in the 
 proper order, for the first five minues, and have the rest pretty 
 well in mind. I find by experience that if you can get e7i rapport 
 "with your audience in the first five minutes, and have your stakes 
 well set, you are pretty safe for the rest of the time. 
 
 The next in his impress on me was Professor Fraser, "Johnny" 
 Fraser we called him when he was not aroundi — a Scotchman. I 
 think he was an old bachelor, altho I do not really know. He was 
 a man of rather small stature, and of most excellent humor. He 
 was professor of mathematics and astronomy. As a drill-master 
 he was nowhere, but was a magnificent teacher for about fifteen 
 or twenty of the best mathematicians in the class. The rest of us 
 could follow him only at a distance. Unlike any other teacher of 
 mathematics I ever saw, he did nearly all the work on the black- 
 board himself. I can see him now, with a coat of some light ma- 
 terial, like as not out at the elbows or torn at the shoulders, stand- 
 ing before the class, discussing and expounding a proposition ; 
 and, if the least occasion offered, drifting off into poetry, phi- 
 losophy or the meaning of life, until we stood spellbound. He was 
 magnificent in repartee, and if any of the boys wanted to turn a
 
 110 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 joke on the professor, they were not likel}^ to try it a second time. 
 He was a Avonderful student in the line of poetry, philosophy, 
 metaphysics, the whole range of thought. In astronomy, he had 
 a theory that the heat of the sun was kept up by the constant drop- 
 ping into it of small planetary bodies : "Throwing rocks at the 
 sun to keep it warm," as one of the boys put it. He was not 
 sure but that there was some bit of real science back of the super- 
 stition about the control of the moon over the weather. 
 
 He liked to have the boys come to his room, to talk with them 
 about their aims and future life work, tell them the real meaning 
 of the plays of Shakespeare. The Midsummer Night's Dream, 
 as I remember it, was descriptive of the vagueness and elusiveness 
 of life. In fact, I think he believed there v/as a definite, precise 
 idea underneath each play, which must first be understood thru a 
 thoro study of the play itself, until we got the fundamental aim 
 and idea of the author ; and then the play must be further studied 
 for the purpose of showing how each particular passage and sec- 
 tion illustrated the meaning of the play. 
 
 He was very fond of talking to the boys. I remember one 
 Sabbath in the spring, when one of the boj's and I were taking a 
 walk, and standing on the bridge over Chartier's creek. The in- 
 sects were beginning to crawl out from between the boards ; and 
 the professor evidently knew what most of us knew, that the young 
 man with me was rather "soft" on a certain young lady. Pointing 
 to the insects, he said : "So, Mr. Jones, creep out young desires." 
 Once he read one of Spurgeon's sermons (The Great Reservoir), 
 to indicate the methods by which natural objects could be used in 
 marshaling and enforcing religious truth. I also remember an- 
 other from a great Scotch preacher of that date, John Caird. 
 
 I shall never forget our last recitation. It was an eloquent 
 appeal to the highest and best in us, if we would get the full mean- 
 ing of life; and he was evidently showing us the best in himself, 
 as, in fact, he always did. The bell rang for closing, but he talked 
 a couple of minutes longer, and when the lesson closed there was a 
 suspicious moisture in the eyes of all the students, and tears in 
 some of them. When the door opened, there stood a howling mob 
 of fifty or sixty juniors, and, as we passed out, they said: "Boo, 
 hoo ! Big seniors crying !" It is a wonder that their gibes did not 
 start trouble ; but we paid no attention, and passed down the stairs 
 with fitting senior dignity. 
 
 Professor Fraser did not benefit two-thirds of us very much 
 in the line of mathematics ; but in pointing out the possibilities of 
 life, the methods of right living, and in presenting to us a noble
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story Hi 
 
 ideal of Christian character, he taught us something far more 
 valuable than higher mathematics. 
 
 Our professor in Latin was Aaron Williams, a Presbyterian 
 preacher. ''Squills," we called him, tho why I never knew. He 
 had the orthodox Presbyterian ministerial face, with "mutton- 
 chop" whiskers, chin unduly sharp, wore glasses ; and in some way 
 could detect any nervousness on the part of any student, which he 
 evidently regarded as an indication that that student was not pre- 
 pared, and at once called on him. He was a regular Gradgrind, a 
 drill-master per se, and every sentence must be translated with 
 absolute accuracy. The construction must be brought out fully, 
 and the accent and pronunciation must be perfect. That was his 
 standard. Few of us came up to it ; but it was a grand thing to 
 have the ideal before us every lesson. The students respected 
 him, valued him highly, but did not love him. He was not a lov- 
 able man like "Johnny" Fraser or even Doctor Alden. 
 
 Our professor in natural science was a Scotch-Irishman named 
 Jones, who had a great deal of dry humor. I do not remember 
 whether he was married or not. Unljke Professor Williams, he 
 called the students as their names appeared on the roll. It was 
 but a short time before he found out the names of the good stu- 
 dents, and, evidently unconscious to himself, he called their names 
 with a falling accent, and paused as tho he expected something 
 from them, and little from the others whom he passed over so 
 lightly. This was somewhat annoying. For instance, in our class 
 he would read until he came to Cowan, and then he would go on 
 down to Guy, from Guy to ]\Ioderwell, and so on to the end of the 
 list. This had been his practice with all of his previous classes. 
 In the second class before ours there was a student named Brack 
 Downs, a man whose face, as Sidney Smith used to say, was a 
 "breach of the peace." He spoke with an inimitable drawl and a 
 drollness of manner that set everybody to laughing. The pro- 
 fessor was asking the class to give him some examples of the use 
 of emery powder. After he had passed Downs and dropped his 
 voice at some other favorite student. Downs, with his peculiar 
 drollery of voice and manner, said: 
 
 "Professor !" 
 
 "What is it, Mr. Downs?" 
 
 Of course the class knew what was coming, and all stamped, 
 raising all the dust there was on the uncarpetcd floor. Downs 
 gave another twist or two in his chair, and said: 
 
 "I had thought of answering that question," at which there 
 was more stamping, more dust and more laughter. 
 
 h
 
 112 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 "Well, Mr. Downs, give us some examples," 
 
 Then, after waiting the proper time, and making his usual 
 grimaces, Downs replied: 
 
 "Well, professor, there might be a great many examples 
 given." 
 
 More fun at the professor's expense. He then became impa- 
 tient, and said: 
 
 "Well, Mr. Downs, give us some examples." 
 
 Then, with another twist in his chair, and with his peculiar , 
 drawl. Downs answered: fl 
 
 "I don't think of any just now." 
 
 I never fully appreciated this incident until I had Downs make 
 an address to my own students, two years after. ■ 
 
 "Quam Proxime," as we called him, tho I do not know how the 
 name originated, was a really first-class teacher, with a great deal 
 of dry humor, and the boys were very fond of him. During my 
 junior or senior year (I forget which), two murders were com- 
 mitted, and in each case the murderer was named Jones, one being 
 a woman. Both were to ,be executed on the same day, one at 
 McKeesport, on the east, and the other at Washington, on the west 
 of us. The boys got together and drew up a petition for a holiday 
 on the Friday on which the executions Avere to take place. Pro- 
 fessor Jones read it carefully, and said: 
 
 "Why do you ask a holiday tomorrow.'"' 
 
 The leader answered : "To show our respect and sympathy 
 for the Jones family." 
 
 The professor took it very good-naturedly, but we did not get 
 a holiday. 
 
 I must not forget Professor Smith, dear old "Uncle Billy," 
 professor of Greek. He was an old man, and whether his name 
 was Schmidt or Smith, whether he was Pennsylvania Dutch, or 
 Scotch, or Irish, or just plain American, I never learned. He had 
 a very peculiar accent ; but whether he got it from the Pennsyl- 
 vania Dutch or from the study of German, or the English of some 
 of Dickens' characters, none of us ever knew. He was a man of 
 wonderful kindness of heart and sympathy for the boys ; but he 
 made the lessons so easy for us that we really did not have much 
 respect for his teaching. A student would need to be very consci- 
 entious to study his Greek very closely when reciting to Professor 
 Smith. 
 
 He called on us to translate in order ; and, as there were fifty- 
 seven of us, we translated onl}'^ three or four times in the term, and 
 always knew when our turn was coming. We parsed around in
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 11;J 
 
 order, and naturally only a few words during a lesson, I was 
 pretty well up in Greek, having, I believe, the highest standing in 
 the class. One of the other students, Loge Sample, who after- 
 wards devoted his whole life and fortune to preaching the gospel 
 in places where its sound had never been heard, in the mines and 
 in the camps of the Rocky Mountains, and among the mountaineers 
 in Tennessee, sat next to me. He had an exceedingly red face, 
 fiery red hair, and whiskers and a mustache a shade redder than 
 his hair. He knew nothing about Greek, and I generally helped 
 him thru when he had to translate or parse; but one day I was 
 busy with something else when the professor said : 
 
 "Mr. Sample, you may parse 'tupto'." 
 
 The verb "tupto," meaning to strike, is used in conjugating 
 Greek in the same manner as "to love" is in English. Sample 
 looked at the word for a moment, bit his mustache, as was his habit 
 when perplexed, and said: 
 
 "Well, it's a noun." 
 
 Uncle Billy answered : "Veil, yes, or, rather, it's a verb !" 
 
 He was so easy with the boys that the phrase, "Veil, yes, or, 
 rather," was in the most common kind of use. 
 
 We took a good many liberties with the dear old man, but one 
 day we took one too many. A paper was passed around the class, 
 agreeing that when "Cratty" Moderwell dropped his book on the 
 floor, the whole class was to rise as if the bell had rung and it was 
 time for dismissal. We all rose and marched toward the door; 
 but were appalled when Uncle Billy turned on us a look of utter 
 amazement, astonishment and grief. It was a habit with him 
 to say: "Gentlemen, I have been teaching here thirty-five years, 
 and never before had such disorder." But this day he said : 
 
 "Gentlemen, I have been teaching here thirty-six years, and I 
 never saw anything like this before." 
 
 We slunk back to our seats like whipped pups, but had a more 
 profound respect for the good old man than we had ever enter- 
 tained for him before; for we realized how deeply he was hurt. 
 He was undoubtedly a fine scholar, but a poor disciplinarian, and 
 had been retained many years after his usefulness as a teacher had 
 disappeared; but, none the less, we were all better for an acquaint- 
 ance with the good, kind old man. 
 
 I hope when you go to college, you will have the opportunity of 
 getting in as close touch with the really big men of your school as 
 we did at Jefferson. For, after all, much of the education of life 
 comes from getting in touch with men who are doing things worth 
 while and have grown great in the doing of them.
 
 College Societies and Fraternities 
 
 IX June last (1911), I invited three of my old classmates of fifty- 
 two years before, one who graduated in 1858, and another a 
 
 year or two afterwards, to be my guests for a week at my home. 
 Our discussions took a very wide range: Stories of college life, 
 theology (five of the six of us were preachers), personal religious 
 experience, politics, education, manners and customs, and what 
 not. Among other things, we discussed the influence that the par- 
 ticular professors had in molding our characters ; and they all 
 agreed with my own personal views as expressed in my last letter. 
 Then we discussed the particular elements of the education that we 
 received. We practical]}^ agreed that the best thing we got out of 
 our college life was personal contact with the professors ; that the 
 next best was the training we received in the literary societies ; and 
 the third the training that we received from rubbing up against 
 each other, on the campus, in the classes, and in the fraternities. 
 The training that we received in these various ways meant a great 
 deal. Compared with this, the actual information we acquired in 
 the classes was a negligible quantit3\ We have long since for- 
 gotten most of it, but the effects of the training have gone with us 
 thru life. 
 
 Jefferson College attached a great deal of importance to the 
 literary training in the societies. There were two societies, the 
 Franklin and the Philo. Each had an excellent library. Before 
 the fraternities came in, these were practically secret societies. 
 No Philo was allowed even in the Franklin library, much less in 
 the hall, and no "Frank" in the Philo. These societies held a con- 
 test once a year. They selected, after careful sifting and train- 
 ing in the societies, a debater, an orator, an essayist, and a de- 
 claimer ; and the persons in one society with whom those chosen in 
 the other must contend, were not known until the program was 
 given out. After the fraternities came in, the secrecy was in them 
 and not in the societies ; and great was the political wire-pulling
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 115 
 
 From lefi to right— A. T. Askeny, W. P. Johnston, W. D. Pattos, Hzm;v w allacb, 
 ■yv. C. Williamson, Stkphkn Phxlphs. 
 
 Five CoUese Classmates Who Spent a Week With Henry Wallace at HU Home is Des Moines 
 During the Summer of 1911. 
 
 on the part of each fraternity in order to secure places in the con- 
 test of the year, and win if possible. In fact, to win a debate in a 
 society was deemed by many a greater honor than to win first 
 honor in the class. I was a Sigma Chi, and, like all the rest of 
 them, worked with might and main to get Sigma Chis on the con- 
 test ; whether in my own society or in the Philo made comparatively 
 little difference. It was the fraternity that was striving for the 
 honor. 
 
 It always seemed to me that the different fraternities made 
 some distmction in the character of the men they sought. The 
 Betas aimed to secure men of high class standing and of high liter- 
 ary and social culture. Their numbers were less than those of 
 any other fraternity. The Phi Phis always seemed to me to aim 
 at efficiency. They were not so particular about literary qualifi- 
 cations nor about culture, as they were to get men who could do 
 whatever they wanted to do. The Deltas chose a slightly different 
 type of meni^ but, in a broad way, similar to the Phi Phis. The
 
 116 Uncle Henry's Own Story 
 
 Sigma Chis laid emphasis on high moral character and scholarship, 
 while the ''Skull and Bones," mainly from the south, made good 
 fellowship their sine qui non. Then we had what were known as 
 the Lops, but which afterwards organized into what was called the 
 Ouden Adalon, or No-Secret Secret Society. This, however, was 
 after my time. 
 
 Under these circumstances, the college lurnished admirable 
 training for politics ; for in each fraternity the aim was to make 
 combinations with other fraternities, and thus secure for its candi- 
 date the votes of as many Lops as possible. In the "Lop League," 
 as we called It, that Is, men who did not join any of the fraternities, 
 there was always a leader, and the point, of course, was to get the 
 influence of the leader for our candidates or combinations. As a 
 lesult of my experience and observation, I doubt the wisdom of the 
 young man or young woman In joining a college fraternity. The 
 fraternities niay be the means of great good, and they may be the 
 means of great evil. It all depends on the character of the fra- 
 ternity in general and of the local chapter In particular. I do not 
 wonder, however, that young people join them. It Is not very 
 pleasant to be regarded as a "Lop." It Is a great deal more pleas- 
 ant to be regarded as one of the select few. Even in the best, 
 liowevcr, it does not tend to promote that spirit of true altruism, 
 that desire to benefit men as men, that lies at the base of every 
 great character. If a student has the ability, and will get down to 
 real hard work ; If his manners are pleasant ; If he is well bred — 
 all the fraternities will want him, and he is quite as strong stand- 
 ing outside as he would be standing inside. I do not think the 
 fraternities are of much value In after life; nor do I think there 
 is much real value in any secret association, for that matter. If a 
 man or woman Is of the right sort, he Is not likely to need the help 
 of any secret association. 
 
 I regard the training that we received In the literary societies 
 as of the highest value. We there measured swords with each 
 other, and realized our merits and demerits, our strength and our 
 weaknesses. Some idea of the character of the topics we discussed 
 may be learned from a few which I remember. The subject for 
 debate In the contest of '59 v.as: "Can the unconditioned be cog- 
 nized or defined?" The subject chosen by one of the orators was : 
 "Faith and reason; their claims and conflicts." The subject of 
 one of my essays was : "Does the Essay on Man prove In itself that 
 Pope was an infidel?" The decision on an oration was contested 
 on the ground that the winner was guilty of plagiarism, and a trial 
 followed. It was claimed that the oration was plagiarized from an
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 117 
 
 essay written by a noted English author. The defendant proved 
 that he had never seen the essay, and never even knew of its exist- 
 ence. The opening sentence, however, was practically the same in 
 the oration and essay. He accounted for it in this way : He was 
 selected to fill a vacancy, the man originally chosen having been 
 ill for weeks with typhoid fever. He wrote to a friend, asking for 
 suggestions, and the friend suggested this subject, and gave him 
 the opening sentence as if it were his own. Of course he was ac- 
 quitted. 
 
 It is the hardest thing in the world to convict a man of plagiar- 
 ism, even if guilty. To illustrate: When I was a pastor in Daven- 
 port, it was whispered around that one of the preachers had pla- 
 giarized a sermon from Horace Bushnell. One day, when he and 
 I were out hunting, while we were sitting in a fence corner waiting 
 for a flock of prairie chickens to fly over, I told him of the charge. 
 He was greatly surprised, and said to me: 
 "You have Horace Buslmell's sermons.'"' 
 ^ I said I had. 
 
 "Then," he said, "when the ministerial association meets next 
 Monday morning, have a committee appointed. I will furnish you 
 with the text of my sermon, and you can furnish Horace Bushnell's 
 sermon. I will abide by the decision." 
 
 I found, as in the case of the college contest, that the opening 
 sentences were very similar, being a definition of the difference 
 between joy and happiness, a definition which I have often used 
 myself, and I confess I got it from Bushnell. You remember the 
 lines of Kipling: "When 'Omer smote his bloomin' lyre." I have 
 I forgotten the words, but the point of it all is that Homer borrowed 
 ; from those who went before him, Virgil from Homer, and Shake- 
 , speare from Virgil, and we have all been borrowing from Shake- 
 I speare. In other words, there is no patent on thoughts — the pat- 
 ent lying only in the particular expression.
 
 The Great Revival of 1858 
 
 IT surprised me very much when I went to Jefferson to find that 
 there was no excitement over the slave question. In fact, I can 
 
 not remember ever hearing it discussed. This was partly be- 
 cause there was no election then pending, partly because a large 
 percentage of the students were from the south, and perhaps an 
 equal number of northern students expecting to go south as soon 
 as they graduated. Hence that subject, great as was its impor- 
 tance, was tabooed. 
 
 A potent influence in promoting harmony and co-operation be- 
 tween the students, notwithstanding the difference of opinions on 
 public questions, was the revival of religion that swept over at 
 least that entire section of the nation, in 1858. It was not a gotten- 
 up revival. No plans nor preparations for it were made in ad- 
 vance. There was no special co-operation of the churches ; there 
 were no professional revivalists. It just came, like the wind that 
 "bloweth where it will, and thou hearest the voice thereof, but 
 knowest not whence it cometh, and whither it goeth ; so is every one 
 that is born of the Spirit." The prayer-meetings were by degrees 
 better attended, the churches better filled on the Sabbaths There 
 was a new note in the sermon, and also in the preaching. The 
 Bible when read seemed to have more power over the hearers. One 
 night at prayer-meeting, the leader read a chapter from one of 
 Paul's epistles. Walter Forsj'th, a freshman, arose in prayer, 
 beginning with deep emotion : "O Lord, we thank Thee for such a 
 man as Paul," and the whole audience was thrilled. One of the 
 most profane students at the college was heard praying in agony 
 aloud in his room, and a student in an adjoining room sai'd: "L. is 
 having a hard time of it." 
 
 The only special aid in the way of preaching, so far as I can 
 remember, was Doctor Plummer, of the Theological Seminary at 
 Allegheny, now North Pittsburgh. He was not a popular man — • 
 was suspected of southern leanings ; was rather tall and quite old,
 
 Uncle Henry's Own Story 119 
 
 as age went in those days — I imagine somewhere around seventy — 
 and quite venerable in appearance, wearing a long, gray beard. 
 His sermons, however, were most effective. One of the members 
 of our class, who apparently was not affected by the revival at the 
 time, but afterwards became a Christian, told me more than fifty 
 years afterward that he had never forgotten Doctor Plummer's 
 sermon on the passage, "Remember now thy Creator in the days of 
 thy youth, before the evil days come, and the years draw nigh 
 when thou shalt say, I have no pleasure in them." 
 
 One small group held a prayer-meeting all night. One of the 
 scoffers said: "Get that fact mentioned in the Pittsburgh papers.'^ 
 Ther-e were no bad after-results from this revival, so far as I ever 
 knew. Many of the students were converted. The most profane 
 man in the college entered the ministry, and has spent his life and 
 property preaching in mining camps and other spiritually desti- 
 tute places, always paying his own way. Others went as mission- 
 aries to the heathen, and others became ministers. 
 
 There were two churches just outside the town — an Associate 
 or Seccder church on the hill to the west, and a T^nion church on 
 the creek just east. These two denominations had been debating 
 with each other for half a century, trying to find out why they 
 stood apart. Thru the influence of this revival, these were welded 
 together all over the country, and formed the United Presbyterian 
 church. I have sometimes thought that this revival was a baptism 
 of the Holy Spirit to prepare our country for the baptism of blood 
 that came so soon afterward. 
 
 (End of Volume I)
 
 I
 
 Illllllllllll II II I II II I 1 1 1 1 
 
 3 1205 02529 5146 
 
 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FA( 
 
 D 000 974 260 2 
 
 THE LIBRARY 
 UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 Santa Barbara 
 
 THIS BOOK IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE 
 STAMPED BELOW. 
 
 Series 9482