One Saturday our neighbor girl and a classmate went to a girls basketball game in town. The girls’ uniforms were big black wide-leg bloomer-type pants and blouses. So on Monday, at our one-room schoolhouse, at afternoon recess, these two eighth grade girls got all girls in a huddle and said, “All that wear black sateen bloomers can play, we will stuff our pleated skirts into our black bloomers and we will have uniforms.” So they went behind the board fence and tucked in their skirts and started their game. My sister and I could not play because we had gray flannel bloomers. We felt bad.
But the boys went in and told the teacher to go see what the girls were doing. So she went out and marched them into the schoolhouse and gave them a lecture that modest girls did not show their underwear. So they had to stay after school 20 minutes every night for two weeks. That was once my sister and I were glad we didn’t have black bloomers like the rest!
Mrs. Robert Armstrong
Early, Iowa
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.
