"Valentine's Day double red letter day in Grace's youth" from the February 13, 1979 Door County Advocate
By Grace Samuelson
Valentine's Day double red letter day in Grace's youth
In my young days, Valentine's day was a double red-letter day. I recall going down to the little store on Cedar street to pick out as many valentines as my hoarded pennies could buy. We looked askance at the "penny dreadfuls", which we weren't allowed to buy and which we hoped never to receive. Foolscapsized pages, like the colored funnies, with caricatures and insulting comments.
The huge lacy ones in the heart-shaped boxes always went to the prettiest and most popular girls in school. We sent our valentines to our friends, carrying our bundles wrapped carefully so no one could read the names before we dropped them into the boxes which the best students, and sometimes, "teacher's pets" had decorated. We could slip into other school rooms to drop our neighbor's cards: Lucille and Esther Johnson, Harriet Johnson, Babe Klinkenberg, Vera and Verna. Sometimes we actually got valentines in the mail, and oh, how we yearned to get the most valentines in the room! Valentine parties were fun, and a committee often appointed us to bring treats for after the program.
One Valentine box stands out in my mind. The year when I got the mumps and couldn't go back to Carlsville to teach for two weeks. I made the most of my get-well time by making the fanciest box I could contrive. When my children were small they spent days making valentines, and we had valentine cakes, cookies, and Jello. In Greendale our children and their friends exchanged valentine cookies and candy. And now, some of my most treasured keepsakes are the home-made, and later the "boughten" valentines our grandchildren sent. A sweetheart day — a day to remember.
I came upon a February issue of "Needlecraft" magazine — Feb. 1930. The newsstand price was 10 cents, but if you subscribed it cost 50 cents a year. Fifty interesting pages for the housewife (we weren't called homemakers then). The cover showed a girl of the 1880 era seated before her dressing table, at work on a piece of crewel for her hope-chest. (They used to be called dower-boxes). Embroidery, crocheting, knitting, applique and other woman-crafts weren't the only things in the magazine. Feature articles, "Food Facts for Home Folks", with discussion as to what and how to serve for holiday parties, and the importance of nutrition. Anne Pierce wrote: "This is an especially poor month in the market, and too good in the doctor's office. So the home caterer needs to redouble her efforts to provide the few fresh vegetables, fruits and salads available, in new and attractive forms, utilizing the dried and canned foods liberally to supplement the market products." Recipes followed.
The advertising in the Needlecraft Magazine interested me very much. Most of their advertisers are still advertising 49 years later, though in a different style. There were Campbell soups, Quaker oats, Lux, Ivory soap (it still floats) fels Naptha, P & G soap, Singer sewing machines, Shredded Wheat, Knox gelatin, Listerine, 20 mule-team Borax, Scot's emulsion; and then mail order houses: Herrschners, Hamilton, National Bellas Hess. And there were seed companies who promised you a set of dishes if you sold 30 packages of seed. Another suggested you send for 10 free packages of seed; just enclose 10 cents for packing and mailing. (Ten cents will only buy a stamp for a card now!) Larkin Club tells us, "Belong to a club and win premiums every month." A cosmetic concern coaxes: "Give us a name for our new shampoo, and you may win one thousand dollars."
The fashions were those we wore just after the market crash. Straightline, long-waisted dresses; the latest with godets, circular skirts, irregular hems. Cloche hats; everyone wore hats those days. A page of patterns for housedresses and aprons, labeled becoming, and essentially smart. No slacks; you could wear overalls if you worked in the orchard or out in the garden, but a lady never went out in public wearing them. My grandmother would have fainted from shock if she had seen this grandma wearing a pants suit. And where people saw her!
Needlecraft's method of getting subscribers was to offer prizes. You could earn 10 growing, thriving rosebushes if you sent in two subscriptions. Or, cameras, glad bulbs, sets of dishes; the list was almost endless. There were poems liberally sprinkled throughout the book. I have many in my old time scrap book. If you enjoyed home-making, every issue was a Valentine!
Life is full of changes, but we learn from each. In pre-war days, and in depression days we did "fancy work," hooked rugs from old clothes we cut in strips after dyeing; make needlepoint and cross stitch pictures or pillow tops to beautify our hand-me-down furniture. Now the crafts are back, and macrame, bargello, crewel and crochet hold their own. Our mothers exchanged "receipts". Now, with microwave ovens, some cookbooks are passe. We depend on meteorologist for weather forecasts, but we still enjoy the old time almanacs, zodiac readings and horoscopes. Basics never change. The house may look different, but it's a HOME if there's love. For everything there is a season, and winter brings Valentine Day.
Courtesy of the Door County Library Newspaper Archive
[This is earlier than the Feb. 1930 Needlecraft, but gives an idea of what the magazine was like: https://costumes.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/Needlecraft-Magazine-July-1925.pdf]
Articles by Grace Samuelson:
https://doorcounty.substack.com/t/grace-samuelson