Here is my early memory of the
outhouse.
The day I wasn’t alone! Back in the
1930’s a trip to the outhouse in seasonable weather served a dual purpose.
There I would slip into a dream world of my own, thoroughly enjoying flipping
through the pages of the Sears Roebuck and Montgomery
Ward catalogs, viewing the
fashionable shoes. Yes, someday when I grew up among my possessions
would be a pair of shiny shoes of every obtainable color. As I sat covering the
round hole in the board seat, a glimpse of reality flickered back as my eyes
dropped to the corner of the floor, and a moment of panic and fear struck .There
lay a curled up huge snake! I screamed and ran out the door with the round
impression on my backside and memories of that moment of fear. The sound of
shrieking laughter in the distance came from my younger brother. If I could
have caught him he might have had a few bruises and felt lucky not to be like
the snake – dead.
Viola Gallentine
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.