During the depression era, each summer after I started school when the season was about to begin mother would make me these new cotton dresses and some slips out of flour sacks. Mondays were always wash days, so there was no arguing as to what I was going to wear – only one dress was left in the closet of which the walls were a curtain surrounding the clothes. By spring usually the shoe soles were getting holes in them, but taking them to a shoe repair would be an unnecessary expense so a piece of cardboard was cut and placed inside the shoe and replaced as necessary until a new pair of shoes was a real necessity.
Mabel Nyland
Norton, Kansas
Back in 1955 a call went out from the editors of the then Capper’s Weekly asking for readers to send in articles on true pioneers. Hundreds of letters came pouring in from early settlers and their children, many now in their 80s and 90s, and from grandchildren of settlers, all with tales to tell. So many articles were received that a decision was made to create a book, and in 1956, the first My Folks title – My Folks Came in a Covered Wagon – hit the shelves. Nine other books have since been published in the My Folks series, all filled to the brim with true tales from Capper’s readers, and we are proud to make those stories available to our growing online community.
