Little Emily Morgan Hendee was sent out to live with old Mrs. Wheeler when she was a young girl of 10 or 11 years old. Her mother was widowed and could not handle 11 children. She was greatly impressed with the self-sufficiency of the Wheelers and shared these memories of her life with them. I imagine they lived in or near Tama, IA.
Old Mrs. Wheeler used to spin and weave all of the material for her family's clothes. She had 7 boys, 1 two-year-old girl, herself and her husband and her loom was always clacking. She taught Emma how to weave and knit. She made Emma knit a pair of wool stockings but she could never wear the wool unless she wore underwear as it made the back of her knees sore.
The Wheelers raised all their own sheep and sheared them, taking the wool to Augusta where it was carded into hanks about 15 to 18 inches long and about as thick as thick as your middle finger. She would then put one on the spindle then take what she called her wheel boy, it was like a clothes pin without any hole in it and she'd start her wheel a going and that started the rest of it. Then she would draft out the wool with great experience. She would then rewind the wheel and that wound it up on her spindle and then she already had it on and she'd keep on the one piece, would make about three windings then she'd take another piece and splice it on. She kept on until she got a spindle full. She wove lindsey woolsey for herself, it was blue and white and very warm. She made Emma a jacket of it for helping her out. She averaged three dresses a year for herself.
The men wore blue jeans and she worked summer and winter on them. The men had one coat, vest and 2 pair of pants for good each year which they wore the year round. The old ones left over from other years were used for every day work clothes. She didn't put in her time on the house, she didn't have much in her house. It was plain and it didn't take her long to go through it. It was clean just the same. She had a place out in a shed where she wove blankets and they were warm. You didn't need much over you.
Besides raising their own sheep, they also raised chickens, ducks, geese, pigs and cows. They made their own butter from the cow's cream. They butchered their own meat and had lard from the pigs. Their wheat they took to the mill and had ground for flour. They raised their own buckwheat for buckwheat pancakes and made their own maple syrup and sugar. They didn't have white sugar very often in those days. They had brown and everything they ate, she baked herself. In the fall, she made pumpkin and apple butters enough to last all winter. She dried peaches, blackberries, apples, raspberries and hack berries. Everything she could get ahold of she dried, she even dried cherries to use like we use raisins. The berries were hung from the roof on string or cord or laid on the roof to dry. They bought only salt and a little coffee. They drank lots of sassafras tea, which they went out and gathered themselves. They were Pennsylvania Dutch people.
