Thanksgiving Memories~ by Esther Lowery Meyer

~The W.H. Lowery Family in1913~ Thanksgiving Memories

This is a written account of Thanksgiving Memories by my husband's great-Aunt Esther Lowery Meyer. The Lowery family was one of the founding families of Quincy, Washington and my husband's great-Aunts were remarkable women. My husband's maternal Grandmother is the young woman, third from the right, her name is Anna. Esther , the author of this short piece is the first on the right.

~ The W.H. Lowery Family in 1918~ (Esther is the 2nd from the right, my husbands' great-grandparents' Lowery are on the far left and far right of the back row.)

It was now November and Thanksgiving would soon be here. My mother made celebration of any day that could possibly be considered a holiday. Each month had it's special day in addition to the family birthdays. Even on Arbor Day she read us stories and poems about the day and once or twice we even planted a tree. Christmas was probably the most important day but Thanksgiving was a close second. My grandparents had come from New England so mother tried to observe the traditions of the day as her parents had done. We had recently moved from North Dakota and lived for a year with Uncle Jim at Davenport , Washington while Dad looked for a place to settle and get a house built. We had come the previous March to Quincy, in the Columbia Basin, where that land had just been opened up to homesteaders. The house was not yet finished though it had flooring and siding except the east end which was of temporary board and batten construction. Inside we looked up to the rafters overhead. The walls had grey building paper tacked between studs as insulation. Mother decided to invite our nearest neighbors whose name was 'Black' to Thanksgiving dinner. Besides the parents there was a girl my age and a boy, older. Finally the day came and Mother was up early, cooking, cleaning, and arranging the table. She got out her damask tablecloth, the drawnwork tray cloth which would hold the platter of meat in front of the host. Scattered over the table were crocheted and embroidered doilies to set dishes and goodies on. Yes, quite a change from our everyday table covered with white oilcloth. I doubt that any turkeys were available in the newly settled and sparsely populated area, and anyway, the price would have been prohibitive. The "piece de Resistance" this day was a big, fat, rooster, roasted nice and brown, stuffed with Mother's sage dressing and accompanied by plenty of good brown gravy. There would be a mound of mashed potatoes, home-baked bread, home-churned butter and an assortment of jams and jellies. The relishes might be green tomato sweet pickles, chow chow and pickled beets if the summer garden had been productive. Creamed onions and glazed parsnips were holiday dinner favorites. Salads had not yet come into popular use. No greens would have been available at that time of year. I do not remember what we had for dessert, but there surely would have been pie-apple perhaps, or custard, or maybe pumpkin, which could have been made from squash or carrots. Mother made ceremony of a company dinner, assigning each guest to a seat even though the supply of chairs had to be eked out with apple boxes or wooden packing crates. Dad always carved the meat, never mind that he had to do it with the kitchen butcher knife. The company arrived and soon Mother announced that dinner was ready. Mrs. Black immediately sat in the nearest chair, saying "oh, some nice light bread, I don't know when I last had some", reached across the table, speared a slice with her fork and put it on her plate. These people were from the south where they could not use yeast and only made quick breads. Their behavior at table was their custom, we learned. Dishes of food were not passed, but everyone was on their own. Mother was slightly taken aback, but quickly recovered and seated the rest of the company. After Dad asked the blessing he began to carve the rooster, asking each guest if he preferred dark or light meat and putting it on each plate as it was passed to him.

~The W.H. Lowery Family in 1919 ~

The dinner proceeded smoothly, everyone ate his fill. Then the children went out to play games. Being 7 years old at the time I do not remember what the games were, but I was happy to have a playmate my age. I do remember how very cold my feet got. When evening came all agreed it had been a good holiday. The Blacks turned out to be kind and helpful neighbors. Over the years we had many meals and visits at their house or ours. Each family doing things their own way. Mrs. Black's baking powder biscuits were always delicious. They remained good friends until they moved away. I copied this Thanksgiving account as it written. I met Great Aunt Esther and her husband, Uncle Luther Meyer and my husband and I were guests in their home at least twice in the early years of our marriage. They were hard-working farmers until an old age, and as I stated earlier, remarkable people...the kind of people that founded this great nation. May your Thanksgiving be one of giving thanks where it is due, to God, to our families, and to those who have sacrificed that we may be so abundantly blessed!

Hannah Dustin, 1697 ~ Kidnapped & Escaped

~Hubby and I toured New England a few years ago, a gift to ourselves in celebration of 35 years of marriage. I have lived in New England but he had never been east of Texas. So we had 10 days of fall driving from Boston to north Vermont...beautiful time of the year and being from Washington state, where written history does not go too much farther than a century and a half, why, we were visiting sites of America's ancient history! ( as far as the history books take you ) Imagine our delight when we came upon a statue of one of Hubby's relatives in Haverhill, Massachusetts ! We had read the family history...pretty exciting stuff...but did not imagine we would see a statue in honor of Hannah Dustin! Here ( above ) is a picture of it . When we viewed it the weather was beautiful and the leaves were just beginning to show the bright fall coloring New England is famous for. (I have pictures of my own somewhere) ~"Hannah Emerson Dustin , her husband Thomas, and their nine children were living in Haverhill, Massachusetts , in 1697, when Abenaki Indians attacked the town. Hannah, her one day old baby, and her nurse, Mary Neff, were captured and forced to march into the wilderness.( The other 7 children were rescued by their father, Thomas Dustin, illustration above) Early in the forced march, the Indians took Hannahs' baby daughter from the mother's arms and killed the infant by smashing her head against a tree. ~Hannah and Mary were forced to travel with an Indian family group northwards, during which time they were joined by Samuel Lennardson, a 14 year old white captive. ~The Indians and their captives stopped at an island on the Merrimack River near what is now Boscawen , New Hampshire. When the Indians fell asleep, Hannah seized a tomahawk. She and her two co-captives killed 10 Indians. A young Indian boy and woman escaped. Hannah then scalped them as proof of the deed. ~The former captives jumped into a canoe, taking the scalps with them. They traveled down the river only at night and after several days arrived in Haverhill." a re-telling from 'Eastman's Online Geneology Newsletter, by Dick Eastman "Hannah became famous in the nineteenth century when her story was retold by Henry David Thoreau and then was written into many genealogical histories. In the 1870's a statue of Hannah was placed in the Haverhill town square, and another of her was erected on the island in New Hampshire where the killings and scalpings took place." Above is a garrison house Thomas Dustin built , one of several built in Haverhill to protect the community from further Indian raids.....and "When Hannah Dustin was taken by the Indians, she had been the mother of 12 children, four had died previously, the father saved seven, the twelfth child , a baby of six days was killed by the Indians. After Mrs. Dustin's return from captivity, a thirteenth , named Lydia, was born. The eight children lived to grow up, all married , and left large families of boys and girls, consequently a numerous posterity is scattered not only throughout New England but from the Atlantic to the Pacific Coast." fr. THE GRANITE MONTHLY, a New Hampshire Magazine. Guess my Hubby and his family are proof of that! ~There are many interesting people related to Hannah. Hannah's mother was related to Daniel Webster. Hannah, who gave thanks to God for her and her children's deliverance, was the sister to a notorious woman , Elizabeth Emerson ,who was condemned in front of a huge crowd in Boston by Cotton Mather , and was hung that day in June, 1693 , for the murder of her illegitimate twin newborn babies. So one sister had honors heaped upon her, the other was the scourge of Boston...