In the fall of 1932, my date and I, and another couple, went to an old-fashioned charivari (shivaree) of our friends who had just been married.
After a lengthy time of yelling, beating old tubs and pans with sticks, making the usual noises made at charivaris, my girlfriend and I went to the outhouse to flip some gravel out of my shoes – flip they did! One shoe flipped down the toilet seat hole!
My girlfriend went to get our boyfriends and they retrieved the shoe, took it to the pond and washed it thoroughly!
I accepted the wet, still “highly perfumed” shoe with a red face and total embarrassment!
Now, after fifty-plus years later whenever I see my old boyfriend and his lovely wife, he winks at me, then glances down to my feet!
Mary Tate
Springfield, Missouri
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.
