Professor Sharon

Back in 2008, I wrote about my maternal grandmother just briefly in a posting  reflecting upon five daughters.

I’ve been thinking about her again.  One of my retirement projects is more time spent on the geneology work I’ve done over my  adult life.  I’ve collected bits and pieces, a few times hubby and I have traveled somewhere that we know a family member might have been to look up a grave marker and such.

Over these years, I’ve learned that my maternal grandmother – Margaret Gillett (then became Wickware) was the first of at least ten children born in 1896, married at twelve – yes twelve years of age – to a man who was 25 years old, and gave birth between 1914 and 1937 to twelve of her own children.  I knew her as she lived until 1971 when I was in high school.  She meant a great deal to me.  I could walk to her house – although at least a two hour walk sometimes depending upon where she lived – and I did that often to get a break from my own addled home life.

I was wondering today about winter in her childhood.  We’re having a harsh winter this year with deep, deep snow and bitter temperatures.  What was winter like when she was that young girl (at least that’s what we think a 12 year old is now), a new wife, having to cook and clean for a husband?  What did she cook?  And on what?  What kept the home warm?  I know from a few nice talks with her when I was a teenager that she always wanted to go to school.  She never did and was illiterate.

I have to reflect on how differently life is today:  we do tend to forget that, don’t we?  As cold as it is out today, the twelve year olds, at least here in New England, are enjoying a break from school, doing crafts, playing in the snow, watching movies:  they certainly aren’t working on keeping their homes warm and making dinner for a husband soon to come home from the factory.  Food for a cold winter day’s thought, don’t you agree?

Margaret Gillett Wickware b 1896

Here we are in 1954.