Carrollton Patriot Newspaper
16 Feb 1922
"Disgrace" Is '22 Viewpoint
Friend Bradshaw: The picture of the old "Sky Scraper" school
building in a recent issue of the Patriot takes me back some
fifty years. I did not start to school the first year that
building
was used, but soon after viz. 1872. Miss Lizzie Fenner was my
first teacher.
"Pride of Carrollton" -- Well, perhaps the application was
excusable then, but now with all due respect to those who could
have conceived of such a monstrosity of a building for school
purposes, that "Disgrace to Carrollton" would be more
appropriate.
The building was a veritable firetrap, with those long draughty
halls, long and seemingly endless stairways; detrimental to the
high school girls who had to climb and keep on climbing until
they finally reached the old high school room. There was no
adequate way of heating the building; the immense cast iron
stoves they used were big as hogsheads, and had large sheet iron
drums up on top. These stoves had a wonderful appetite for
coal--surely they were the largest stoves ever made.
Imagine having to carry all the coal up those many flights of
stairs that these monster stoves required? Is it a very great
wonder that a former janitor, driven to desperation, would set
fire to and destroy such a nuisance?
According to the law, this
janitor committed a crime, but from every humane standpoint he,
unintentionally no doubt, conferred an everlasting benefit to
posterity.
It is no doubt the only way the community would ever have gotten
rid of that very unsuitable school building for many, many
years. At the time it was destroyed, I remember many though that
the punishment given the janitor was too light. I wonder what
they think about it now?
Transcribed 19 Aug 2003 by Grace Karr Gettings
23 Feb 1922
First sewing machine here
The first sewing machine in Greene county was bought in St.
Louis by Thomas Black, hauled up from there in wagon, and placed
in his home, the old Black homestead, now owned and occupied by
his son, Robert T. Black. This was in the year 1855. The machine
was a Wheeler & Wilson of very primitive type, having a curved
needle, and both threads being unwound from the original spools,
one into a disc bobbin, the other onto a specially made spool,
placed in the rear of the arm, tensioned by a thumb screw, and
moving up and down the same as the needle at the other end of
the arm.
While this machine proved a valuable asset in a large family,
no one ever learned to operate it successfully except Mrs.
Black, for it had as many tantrums as any broncho ever had, or
as the most primitive flivver. No parts and no needles could be
obtained nearer than St. Louis. No one knew anything about it
from experience, and no adjustment rules came with it. But David
Hartwell, Charles Eldred, William Ward, Henry Black and others
were quite interested in the new invention, and realized the
possibilities of the sewing machine. They gave valuable
assistance in taming it, and although it never quite quit it’s
“bucking”, it was used for many years. Its original cost was
$126 in St. Louis.
06 Apr 1922
Wire Binder Came in 1878
“Anuther Oldtimer,” in fixing the date of the grain binder’s
first appearance in this county, probably meant 1878 when he
wrote 1887. Mrs. Mary Mungall calls attention to the evident
error and gives her first recollection of the wire binder:
“In the harvest time of 1878, Keller Heist, who lived where
Clark Thomas now lives, went to town and hired a gang of men to
bind wheat after the reaper. When he went to the field with the
men, they refused to work for less than three dollars a day. He
told them to get into the wagon and took them back to town.
Henry Sieverling telegraphed for a Walter A. Wood wire binder
which arrived a few days later. Wm. H. Sieverling, then in this
‘teens, and another man shocked all the wheat. They changed
teams on the binder every two hours, and kept it going
constantly.
“The wire binder did the work satisfactorily, but the wire
proved a nuisance. In plowing the ground afterward the
ploughshare was continually running into pieces of wire and had
to be taken to the shop every day. Small pieces of wire got
mixed up with the wheat and made it very undesirable for
milling.
“At that time (1878) there were quite a number of reapers in the
vicinity, but there were also two headers in use that I know of.
One belonged to John Hobson, the other to W. D. Thomas, and that
season they headed wheat for several farmers in the
neighborhood. The following year, 1879, quite a number of Walter
A. Wood twine binders were ordered, three of them coming to
Centerville. Keller Heist and Elisha Eldred each bought one, and
John W. Black and James Mungall bought one in partnership, the
latter afterward buying his partner’s interest.”
