Las Sabinas, Volume 4, Number 1, July 1978 Page: 17
This periodical is part of the collection entitled: Las Sabinas History Journal and was provided to The Portal to Texas History by the Orange County Historical Society.
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settled down and the biddies came to sleep under her protecting
wings. Little heads peeped out with an air of confidence and
the mother hen assured them they were safe by softly clucking
to them.
A generation ago the drudgery of the farm wife was such as
to cause her to have a shorter life. She put in about 16 hours
of work each day, winter and summer, caring for her family and
their needs.
In fact, the women of the cities had it just about as bad,
unless they were fortunate enough to have means for hiring maids
and yardmen, and there were not too many in those days that did.
Among the duties of the farm wife of years gone by was the
weekly wash day when she had to wash all the clothes for the
family. This was a full day's chore standing over a hot wash
pot, scrubbing clothes on a scrub board and hanging out the wash
to dry. The water needed for the job had to be drawn from wells
that were often 50 feet deep, and when the farm wife followed
this drudgery she soon had calloused hands, stooped shoulders
and a tired back, along with being tired all over her body.
Night was her only relief even though she fixed a big supper for
the family, saw that the children were bathed in an old wash
tub and prepared them all for bed - only to rise before daylight
to get her fire started in an old wood burning stove to prepare
a breakfast of handground coffee, fresh eggs, home cured bacon
or ham, biscuits, almost saucer size, and fresh butter that was
kept in a small churn or other container partially immersed in
the cool water of the farm well.17.
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Orange County Historical Society (Tex.). Las Sabinas, Volume 4, Number 1, July 1978, periodical, January 1978; Orange, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth255383/m1/25/?q=%22%22~1: accessed July 17, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu.; crediting Orange County Historical Society.