Friday, October 30, 2009

When Grandma Cooked

Here is a poem written by my Great Great Uncle Clifford Tremain.  I don't have a date for when he wrote it but I'm guessing 1950's, early 60's... reminiscing about his childhood. It was just found by a historian and published recently  in the Cambridge Advocate newspaper.
-HatsFineandFancy

When Grandma Cooked
When Grandma cooked for the threshing gang
In the days of long ago,
She didn’t have water hot and cold
Right at her elbow.

She carried the water from a spring
About half a mile away,
And didn’t join a bridge or social club
To pass the time away.

She had to split her own firewood
To make the kettle boil,
For there wasn’t any such thing
As electricity, gas or oil.

Now besides these little chores or tasks
That she had to do,
With one hand as she went past
She rocked the cradle too.

The vegetables must all be peeled
And ready for the pan,
For Grandma had never seen
The Modern old tin can.

Huge loaves of bread she had to bake
And pies and cookies too,
For it took an awful lot of grub
To feed that hungry crew.

A crock of butter she must churn
Besides the other fuss,
For in those days of do it yourself
There wasn’t any surplus.

She must go out and hunt the eggs
Before she made her cake,
And it would be superior
To any modern make.

And when the threshing had been done
And the gang had all been fed,
She would then the dishes wash
Without any modern dope,
 In a pan of suds made from
Good old home-made soap.

by Clifford Tremain, Hespeler Ontario

2 comments:

  1. Charlene T, Clifford Tremain is my Grandfather and I have both of his published books Tremaindous Tails 1 & 2 from which this was taken. MF, Hespeler, Ontario

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hey, we're related! Send me an email @ frontiergazette@ymail.com if you like, I'm the one who gets the emails :o)

    ReplyDelete

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