October 31, 1963
Thursday, fair but cool. I cleaned house all through, did some ironing. Help Marlene Mayo in the afternoon while her folks called on Bea Kepper at Ellis Hospital. Lorraine called asked about Earl etc.
Comment: Marlene Mayo was the preacher's wife, not sure who Bea Kepper is....Halloween....there was no such thing as trick or treating for us kids on the hill. The distances between the houses was too great and our folks were not the greatest supporters of this "pagan" holiday.
However, there were Halloween parties at the parsonage where we dunked for apples, had pumpkin pie, and played some games.
Along the line of tricks and deviltry, there were also "horn in's" where the newly married couple were subjected to a late-night visit by a group of their friends with all sorts of noisemakers, shotguns, firecrackers, and car and truck horns. The "horn in" usually started with several shotgun blasts under the couple's bedroom window and after they were appropriately awakened, they invited the whole bunch in for refreshments. In the meantime, some of the revelers were stringing toilet paper through the trees or other rather minor acts of vandalism. Most of the acts were not serious and were supposed to be humorous. Not so for a "horning" described by Socrates Hubbard for his brother Lorenzo. I can't help thinking that these incidents involved something other than a simple wedding custom........these events seem particularly violent and vindictive with the household literally being under siege....
"We pass over several years. I am nine years old or nearly nine Lorenzo is married and is expected home. He dos not come when expected but a lot of riaters calling themselves horners came and the first thing I know in the ded of night was the defning discharge of musketrey and the blowing of hornes the rateling of pans the ringing of bells with all the diabolicle noises that could be amagoned. Paul grabed his cloths and ran to Fathers and mothers room l followed in my night shirt half frightened to death. The whole familey dressed and sat about the fire Father would go down and throw water on them when they came up to fire. After a while they with drew to get dry and then on they came again. they were led by one Dock Norwood. I got so sleepy that during the last salley I slipt. These hornings at wedings were common in that countrey at that time. I have known them to tare or breake every glass out of a house."
"A few weeks after Lorenzo did come with his wife and the Diabolical crew gathered again there names was got this time and they were prossicuted. And each one was fined. Sometime the next summer Lorenzo came down on a visit that night this same vile crew went into a field of rye that had just been cut and put in shocks they thrashed out every shiefe on the ground and then unbound it and scattered it. from there they went into our garden pull up corne and everything they could get at. from there they went into the corne field pulled a wide road to the midel of the field then tore up an half acre or more and made a road out the other side of the feald. They also tore down a large amount of fence. It took a long time to write things up agane."
And again, here is another recounting of a one. "Like a bachelor party gone bad"
Comment: Life goes on...and on this day in history: "Black Tuesday hits Wall Street as investors trade 16,410,030 shares on the New York Stock Exchange in a single day. Billions of dollars were lost, wiping out thousands of investors, and stock tickers ran hours behind because the machinery could not handle the tremendous volume of trading. In the aftermath of Black Tuesday, America and the rest of the industrialized world spiraled downward into the Great Depression." Mom was 16 years old and just had her 16th birthday party two days before.....
Comment: Carol must be doing a project in Homemaking Class. I took a homemaking class and learned how to iron shirts and press pants and used these skills in the Army to make some money. I charged a buck to iron a shirt or steam press a uniform using a wet cloth but this was only feasible "stateside" because the "houseboys" in the Far East would do all the laundry, shine all the brass, polish the shoes and boots and keep you in "inspection" shape for five bucks a month. I was "outsourced" before the term was coined......
Inventor and businesswoman, Wethersfield's Sophia Woodhouse (1799-1883) was one of the first female entrepreneurs of the Greater Hartford area. Plying her trade during the early 19 th century, Woodhouse developed an innovative technique for treating, drying and braiding spear grass to make high quality bonnets. She patented her design in 1821, and quickly developed a cottage industry for her hats, which won awards and acclaim.
Comment: Apparently in the throes of "Indian Summer"..here is one sinister etymology of 'Indian summer' from Wikipedia: "the term originated from raids on European colonies by Indian war parties; these raids usually ended in late autumn (due to snow-covered ground), hence summer-like weather in the late fall and mid-winter was an Indian Summer, a time raiding parties could be expected".....so back about 250 years ago in the hills, a time of nice weather was definitely a mixed blessing at best......
The 
