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Adelia M. Hoyt memoir and photographs
Page 7
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UNFOLDING YEARS 7 We all loved books. I am told that I could read fairly well at four. Our supply of reading matter was exceedingly limited. Our home library, as I recall, consisted of the Bible, Pilgrim's Progress, a History of the Wold, Milton's Paradise Lost, a volume of Scott's Poems, and Tupper's Proverbial Philosophy. Before my sight had failed too much I had read Pilgrim's Progress and learned much from the History of the World, fascinated by its colored maps. To keep me from using my eyes too much my parents and sister Emma formed the habit of reading aloud, and this proved a great source of pleasure to us all for many, many years. We had our weekly paper, the Cedar Falls Gazette, a few magazines, and borrowed books. My people were Baptists and belonged to the church in Cedar Falls, which we attended regularly. We read many books from the Sunday School library. In this way I became acquainted with Louisa M. Alcott's Little Women, Eight Cousins, Rose in Bloom, all the Pansy Books, as well as E. P. Roe's Opening a Chestnut Burr, and many others. We exchanged current magazines with the neighbors, but the greatest thrill of all I found in the New York Ledger which one of our neighbors took and loaned to us. How I reveled in the stories of Mrs. Southworth,Harriet Lewis and Sylvanus Cobb! I do not think my father exactly approved of this sort of literature, but he did not seek to impose his taste on us; and I know that in the long run it did us no harm. Personally, I am sure it stimulated my imagination, broadened my rather narrow outlook on life, and enabled me the better to recognize and appraise good literature when I found it later on. I suppose we were poor, but I at least never realized it because I never felt the need of anything I did not have. Father was always in debt, there were crop failures, and there were my doctor's bills. My parents worked hard and no doubt they missed many of the comforts they had "back east," but in our home we had godliness, cleanliness and love. We raised much of our food and sold butter and eggs to buy our
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UNFOLDING YEARS 7 We all loved books. I am told that I could read fairly well at four. Our supply of reading matter was exceedingly limited. Our home library, as I recall, consisted of the Bible, Pilgrim's Progress, a History of the Wold, Milton's Paradise Lost, a volume of Scott's Poems, and Tupper's Proverbial Philosophy. Before my sight had failed too much I had read Pilgrim's Progress and learned much from the History of the World, fascinated by its colored maps. To keep me from using my eyes too much my parents and sister Emma formed the habit of reading aloud, and this proved a great source of pleasure to us all for many, many years. We had our weekly paper, the Cedar Falls Gazette, a few magazines, and borrowed books. My people were Baptists and belonged to the church in Cedar Falls, which we attended regularly. We read many books from the Sunday School library. In this way I became acquainted with Louisa M. Alcott's Little Women, Eight Cousins, Rose in Bloom, all the Pansy Books, as well as E. P. Roe's Opening a Chestnut Burr, and many others. We exchanged current magazines with the neighbors, but the greatest thrill of all I found in the New York Ledger which one of our neighbors took and loaned to us. How I reveled in the stories of Mrs. Southworth,Harriet Lewis and Sylvanus Cobb! I do not think my father exactly approved of this sort of literature, but he did not seek to impose his taste on us; and I know that in the long run it did us no harm. Personally, I am sure it stimulated my imagination, broadened my rather narrow outlook on life, and enabled me the better to recognize and appraise good literature when I found it later on. I suppose we were poor, but I at least never realized it because I never felt the need of anything I did not have. Father was always in debt, there were crop failures, and there were my doctor's bills. My parents worked hard and no doubt they missed many of the comforts they had "back east," but in our home we had godliness, cleanliness and love. We raised much of our food and sold butter and eggs to buy our
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