Putting Our Eggs in One Basket

On the homestead or farm in years past, there was often not much ready cash on hand.  Credit was usually needed until fall crops came in and accumulated bills could be paid.  For many, the only income for grocery purchases throughout the year was the “egg and butter money”.

Eggs produced by the family chicken flock could usually be sold to the town storekeeper for cash that could then be used to purchase sugar, coffee or other staples.  Delivering the delicate and valuable eggs from farm to store was often a challenge with the vehicles and rough roads of the day.

This month’s artifact offered one solution to that problem.  The “Humpty Dumpty” egg crate, complete with 15 dozen individual padded compartments for the eggs, sturdy wooden sides and a carrying handle, apparently did the trick.

The case is 14” high, by 12-1/2” square, and made from wood slats joined together at the corners with long wire pins.  The pins extend through the top where they’re bent over and can be turned to secure the wood-slate lid with its carrying handle.  (In actual use, however, experience likely advised tying the lid on with a cord, since the bent pins appear less than effective in keeping the lid on the crate when picked up by the handle.)  Five layers of dimpled fiber sheets and vertical interlocking cardboard dividers enveloped and cushioned each egg inside.

As with many items in our collection, the donor of this crate is unknown to us.  Its authenticity, however, is attested to by the minor remnants of straw and broken egg shell found within the layers.  

Stenciled on one side slat is  REG US PAT OFF   “HUMPTY DUMPTY”.  Embossed on the other side is  MADE BY OWOSSO MFG CO. OWOSSO, MICH & BENTON, ARK.  Research indicates that it was probably manufactured in the late 1800’s.

Photographs

Old photographs make up an important part of the Museum’s historic collection.  Photos are especially appealing because they can contain lots of visual information about a place from a bygone time that we can compare with today.  Old photos also often provoke vivid memories and inspire animated discussions among folks who were contemporaries of the photographer.

With today’s technology it’s relatively easy to copy old photos and preserve the images in digital form for safe-keeping and to make copies for display.  Of particular interest to a small museum like ours is that photos and their wealth of information take up relatively little space!

Our photo inventory includes several family collections that show people and scenes around the Valley, as well as many taken by commercial photographers who signed the front of their photos.  Many contain images associated with early Colony activities, farming scenes and the early days of downtown Palmer.

One collection of early Valley photos was donated by a Palmer resident after he purchased them at a garage sale in Casa Grande, Arizona.  How they got that far from home is a mystery.

Numerous photos are donated by someone living Outside whose folks lived here in the early days.  From time to time someone will share a family album by allowing us to copy their photos.  These are particularly valuable as often the names, dates and places in the images are identified. Of course we have many photos without names and dates, like some taken by visiting “GI’s” during the war that somehow wound up in our care.  

The Museum welcomes additional donations of historic photos of the Valley.  If folks don’t want to part with their photos, we’ll gladly arrange to have copies made for our collection and return the originals along with a digital file copy for the owner.

Corona #3

Traveling salesmen, college students and British army clerks once took delight in the handy little machine we find in our Museum collection this month.  The compact portable “Corona #3” typewriter served them all.  As the dependable forerunner of Smith-Corona office typewriters that would become famous throughout this country in later years, this little “#3” had added features that made it especially attractive to folks on the move.  Its aluminum frame was lighter than most at 9-3/4 lbs. and it could be folded up and carried in a small case.

Although perhaps not well known now, the “Corona #3” was one of the most successful typewriters in history.  Patented on February 8, 1910, over 600,000 of them were sold between 1914 and 1941.  The British Army purchased many for use during World War I. 

Pica type is produced with the pretty standard arrangement of letter keys in three banks, but each key also combines numbers and other necessary marks.  Each type bar head has three characters on it—lower case at the top, upper case in the middle and a number or mark at the bottom.  The “CAP” key on the keyboard raises the carriage mechanism slightly so the middle, upper case character strikes the page.  The “FIG” key raises the carriage even higher so the bottom, figure character, makes contact.

Perhaps its most unique feature is that the whole carriage mechanism folds down over the keyboard, reducing its dimensions from 9-3/4” x 11-5/8” x 6-3/4” to 9” x 11-5/8” x 3-7/8”.    

Our “Corona #3”, manufactured in 1918, was donated to the Museum by Slim Hayes, a longtime Valley resident.  Although we don’t have the carrying case originally supplied with the machine, it is still a valuable and interesting part of our collection.

The Daily Grind

Before there were gourmet latte shops and drive-up espresso stands, getting ones morning  caffeine was both simpler and more complicated.

Even in more recent years when blended coffees became available, pre-packaged, vacuum packed, both "regular" and "caffeine-free", the hardest thing about creating a good cup of coffee at home was often making up one's mind on what kind.

One faced no such quandary long ago when a sack of coffee beans at the local country store was often folks' only source. Choices might have been "dark" or "light", or more likely, "coffee" or "no coffee". To fill an order, the store proprietor scooped beans from the burlap sack, placed them in a large ornate grinder at the end of the counter, turned the handle a few times and presented the customer with a paper bag of fresh grounds.

What "country store" or lodge once housed the coffee grinder in our Museum's collection we don't know, but it's identified as a "#9 Enterprise 'Country Store' model", manufactured by the Enterprise Mfg. Co. of Philadelphia and patented on July 12, 1898. Its cast iron body and 18-1/2" diameter wheels are painted red and decorated with ornate decals. A white porcelain knob facilitated opening the top cover to pour in roasted beans, and a similar knob allowed extraction of a wooden tray below containing the ground product after the turned wheels activated grinding teeth midway inside the housing.

When new, the top cover sported a small gold cast iron eagle. While our grinder has only one handle, it's likely there were handles on both large wheels. 

August Artifact: Harness Horse

One object currently on display at the Museum that often elicits the question, “What’s that?” is a device not commonly seen since the horse and buggy days.  In times past, when “horsepower” really meant “horse power”, a wide array of leather straps, snaps, buckles, rings and hooks were used to connect horses to the machines they were to pull.  Teams of two, four, six or more horses pulling plows, hay binders, logging chains and freight wagons would be connected together, and to the equipment, by yards of leather rigging.  Constant strain and wear on the harnesses meant almost constant need for their repair.

When repairs were required, the farmer or teamster would turn to his “Harness Horse” or “Harness Vise” to ease the chore.  He’d sit astraddle the seat facing the vertical wooden jaws.  One jaw is stationary while the other is hinged.  The moveable jaw has a leather strap attached which passes through a slot in the stationary jaw and descends to a foot peddle below.  When the operator depressed the peddle with his foot, the strap drew the vise jaws together.  The peddle was then hooked on a toothed metal bracket below to hold the jaws tight. 

By capturing his broken harness between the vise jaws, the farmer was better able to hold the straps straight so patches could be sewn on, new adjustment holes punched, or broken hardware replaced.  The “Harness Horse” may not have pulled a plow, but it made it possible to keep a real horse harnessed up to do so.