By F.H. Jeter,
Extension Editor, N.C. State College, Raleigh, as published in the Charlotte Observer on Sept. 26, 1949
Thousands of rural homes in North Carolina are better homes
because daughters in those homes wanted them better. If you doubt that, visit
three homes in Piedmont North Carolina, or pick out one in your own
neighborhood.
There is Mildred Von Cannon of the little Bethel section of
Cabarrus County. Mildred joined her local 4-H Club about five years ago and
since that time has taken part in all of the usual club activities. She has
been especially interested in gardening, food conservation and room
improvement. She grows 35 different kinds of vegetables in the garden and
because of her efficiency as a gardener has won $15 in cash prizes. That’s not
all. She has earned a cash income of $757.15 from the sale of surplus
vegetables.
Rebecca Tucker, assistant home agent, says this work in the
garden has been especially noticeable because it is the only food supply
produced at the Von Cannon home. Mildred’s garden has added further to the
family food supply because she earned $9 in cash prizes for canned vegetables
displays and sold about $227.45 worth in addition to supplying canned material
for the family table in winter.
Any girls would be inspired by what this girl has done with
her room. She has used some of her hard-earned money to repaint the walls in
peach color with white woodwork. Her furniture consisted of an old iron
bedstead, an antiquated trunk, a chest of drawers, a washstand and an aladdin*
lamp.
She modernized her bed by sawing off the top half, padding
it, and covering it with blue plastic material. The old washstand was converted
into a dressing table, and a nail keg was made into a comfortable stool. The
old trunk also was padded and a pleated flounce added. Blue and peach-colored
feed sacks made up a pleated ruffle for the bed, and a peach-colored bedspread
was added. Smoothing irons became attractive book ends and the old lamp was
wired into an attractive electric study lamp.
The chest of drawers was renovated and blended into the blue
and peach-colored scheme of the room beautification plan, and the floors were
sanded and refinished in a honey tone. That bed-room is the envy of all other
girls in the Bethel neighborhood and Mildred is teaching them how to have
similar ones.
Another such farm girls is Jean Lytton, 16-year-old daughter
of Mr. and Mrs. Fred Lytton of Long Island, Route 1, Catawba County. Jean is a
member of the Sherrill’s Ford Club and her work over the past 5 years has
taught her how to have confidence in her ability to do things for herself.
This farm girl has not only done all of the regular things
that a girl learns to do on the farm, but she is one of the most successful
dairy calf club members in the county. She won a place on the Catawba County
Livestock Judging Team and thus became the only girl in the state-wide event
and Jean placed ninth as an individual, competing with boys from all over North
Carolina.
Jean is very feminine also. She likes to care for her little
18-month-old baby sister. She has been making all of her own clothes for some
years and she helps her mother to plan the family food supply as well as the
daily meals. She takes an active part in the annual dress revue contests, is an
officer in her local club, and attends the annual camps and the annual short
course at N.C. State College.
Jean live son a 100-acre farm where most of the land is devoted
to grain, feed crops, and pasture. The family milks eight cows and her father
owns two small country stores nearby. Jean clerks in the nearest one on
Saturday, and with her earnings, buys her own clothes, or rather she buys
material and makes most of her own clothes herself.
Marjorie Gilbert, assistant home agent in Catawba County,
says that Jean knows now that she can do things and she has won confidence in
her ability and resourcefulness.
Betty Wilson of Huntersville, Mecklenburg County, is another
active rural club girl who has learned to do for herself. Betty is the daughter
of Mr. and Mrs. Fletcher S. Wilson of Huntersville, Route 2, and is president
of her local Ramah Club. This past year, she won the county room improvement
contest against stiff competition.
It all started last March when Jarretts Paint Company of
Charlotte offered to give all the 4-H Club girls of Mecklenburg County a 20 per
cent discount on all the paint they bought for improving their bedrooms. In
addition, the company offered cash prizes of $100, $35, and $20 to the three
top winners. Maude Middleton, Mecklenburg assistant home agent, sayis that
under the terms of the contest the entire room was to be considered—that is the
walls, floors, window treatment, bed spread, room arrangement and the color
scheme.
Thirteen girls qualified for the county-wide event and their
rooms were judged on July 1. Judging was done by Mrs. J.C. Berryhill, president
of the Mecklenburg Home Demonstration Federation; Miss Betty Stough, home
economist with Duke Power Company; and Mrs. Hubert Fincher, teacher of home
economics in one of the local high schools.
Betty was awarded the first prize of $100. Her room was
carefully sealed with beaver board, and painted. The walls were colored in a
grey shade of blue. She hung ruffled, totted marquisette curtains, which she
made herself, at the windows. She fixed up the bed, renovated an old table into
a dressing table, hung appropriate pictures, refinished the floors and made one
of the most attractive rooms to be found in Mecklenburg County.
The Wilsons have just recently bought this farm and have
been busy with their own affairs. The work that Betty has done, however, taught
them all just what can be accomplished in improving and beautifying an old
farm.
The Milk Industry Foundation tells an interesting story
about good milk in Russia. The story was prepared by Gorge Agudov, a Russian
displaced person, who at one time as an Agricultural Engineer, with the rating
of a Major in the Russian Army. This engineer gives some interesting
observations for the benefit of those who wish to bask in the “high and
blessed” security of communist controls.
“It is next to impossible to buy a glass of fresh milk in
the Soviet Union,” he says. Milk is sold in the State stores where it is dipped
out of a bucket or metal can by means of a dipper. Refrigerated trucks and
railway freight cars almost unknown. The major went on to say, “When a small
milk truck drives up to the door of my house here in a small American community
and leaves me cool, fresh milk in a sealed bottle, with cream floating on the
top, I drink it with great pleasure.”
“The pleasure is soured only by memories of when I stood
with a kettle in my hand, literally several hours in a queue, in one of the
central cities of the Soviet Union, to get milk for a sick friend. The milk I
got in a State milk store came from an old battered milk can, dipped out with a
rusty, half-liter dipper. I carried it home as quickly as I could, fearing that
it would sour.”
“Only a few receiving points and some distribution centers
in the large cities pasteurize their milk. Delivery of milk to the consumer is
thus a major problem, a problem which cannot be solved in the near future.”
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*Lehman’s still sells Aladdin lamps. To see what they look
like, go to http://www.lehmans.com/store/Lights___Aladdin___Aladdin_Lamps?Args=
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