Happy Times for Pioneer Children: by Eli Day

Eli Azariah Day
One of Mt. Pleasant's First School Teachers

Those were happy days for me! Going to school, learning my lessons, going herding barefooted on stormy days, carrying fire in a torch made of cedar bark, for we had no matches in the sixties to speak of, playing on the hard ground, gathering the cows at night, and trudging along behind, barefooted and weary, sore feet, cracked and bleeding, washing those poor sore feet at night in warm bran water, greasing them with a healing salve made of equal parts of rosin, beeswax and mutton tallow. And when the stone bruised our feet, curing them with fresh barnyard poultices. Not very pleasing to the nose, but the most efficacious remedy for taking out inflammation and blood poisoning that I have yet discovered, even in these days of learned doctors. When herding in the fields in spring or fall we often caught the big green frog, took the hind legs only and skinned, roasted, and ate them. It was said that frogs hind legs in those days were a great delicacy in France. I know they are tender, juicy and tasty when rightly prepared.

We also played two kinds of jacks, using smooth rounded pebbles for jack stones. Right jacks and hundreds, we called the games. Hundreds was the simplest, tossing the five jacks gently, we caught what we could on the back of our hand, tossed again and caught them in the palm of the hand. If we missed catching all in the palm we were out, then using one of the caught stones for a taw, tossing it up, picking up the missed jacks one at a time without a miss until all were regained. One hundred, or five hundred thus gained was the game. Slaps and pinches were the penalty for losing the game. The hand of the looser was placed upon the ground, the winner tossed up his taw, slapped the other's hand as many times as agreed upon, but if he missed his taw, the other returned as many slaps as were made misses. Pinches were similar, pinching the hand instead of slapping it. Though a good player, I did not like the penalty game. Right Jack is rather too long to describe here.

What did we do on the hard ground? In the early spring we dug segoes and Indian carrots and other roots to eat. We played Indian, sometimes scaring some of the uninitiated by a pretended Indian raid. We picked gum from the pitch pines, and in the fall gathered pine cones from those pines from which we got the pine nuts. We went swimming in Sanpitch, we fished, we got mud throwers, small willows some three feet long on the small end of which we put a piece of sticky clay about the size of a common marble which we could throw after much practice with a great speed and considerable accuracy. When going home we would often carry a good lump of clay along to throw from our mud throwers at the cows that might get off to the side of the herd to wander away. A scorching mud dob or two would generally bring her back. In the fall of the year we often gleaned potatoes and roasted them to eat. Sometimes, the larger boys got the smaller ones to fight, which I never liked, and they went home with scratched and bruised faces, minus some hair also. Mischief and fun were the main diversions.


Father often sent two of us boys to herd on his grassy willow land along Sanpitch. At such times we spent much of our time moulding cattle, horses, and sheep from clay. We found a layer of clay at the edge of the water in one of the banks of Sanpitch. It was splendid for clay moulding, and we made from it whole herds of animals, which we kept in corrals we made out of willows. From this clay we made horns, tails, legs, for it was pliable and tenacious, and I thought we made many beautiful horns, and tails and limbs of it for our numerous herds. Other times we fenced in farms and gardens and decorated our gardens with flowers and shrubs. My brother Edwin seemed best at this. But I was proud of the horns I made for my cattle and sheep. I wish I could make you feel the pleasure I had in this pleasant pastime. Sometimes wrestling, racing and gymnastics were our pastime. Also, when weary from these strenuous efforts, we would sit around and tell stories, and I was one of the best at this pastime.