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Summer Jobs

One of my summer jobs was doing housework in Minocqua.. I was 16 at the time. Another sister, Esther, was working at a home just kitty-corner, and I depended on her to help me out since she was older. Even though I had told the lady I could cook, I knew very little about it. I did, however, know how to do the rest of the housework.

One of my first tasks was to bake sugar cookies. I had never baked rolled cookies before. In fact I had never done much, if any baking, since I had older sisters who did that. I had no end of trouble rolling out my cookies, so I kept adding more and more flour. They rolled out o.K. and I got them baked, but they were so hard, we couldn't even break them. The lady of the house decided they were inedible, and that we'd better give them to the dog. But they were so hard, even the dog wouldn't eat them.

Another time I baked a cake. I used a recipe that I had brought with me. It was called a Quick Cocoa Cake. All the ingredients were put in at one time and it just had to be beat up, so it was an easy recipe. When it baked, it raised so high in the middle that it had a big "hump" when it was done. This was easy to remedy by cutting off the "hump" to make it level and frosting it as usual. Having been taught to be frugal, I put this "hump" in the bread box, and would think of a way to dispose of it later. So later, I made a white sauce to ladle over the cake and we ate it as a pudding.

Having said that I could do some cooking, I was expected to make the meals. Not knowing what to make, or what to buy, I would stop at Esther's on the way to the store to ask her what I could make and what I had to shop for. With this help from her, I made it through the summer, and learned a lot about cooking.

The responsibility of doing the washing was also mine. Not knowing much about that either, I felt relieved to hear that the girl that worked here last summer had put light and dark clothes all together. At least I knew that wasn't right, so I did alright on that score.

It was a hard summer for me, but I learned a lot, and I could now see the reason why Mother sent me out to do housework.

Another summer I worked at a Boy's Camp in Sayner, Wisconsin. I was 18 at the time, and was head of the laundry, with one other girl working with me. All week we washed clothes. We had no dryers or other conveniences, so we hung up all the clothes. One day we washed sheets and pillowcases all day. Another day it was socks, and still another short pants, and so on. In our spare time, we washed and ironed uniforms for the kitchen crew for 35 cents apiece.

We had a day off once a week when all the boys would go on a picnic. After we had packed their picnic lunches, we were free to do as we pleased. Usually, we'd all pile into the camp truck and take off on a picnic of our own. One day we went to the Minocqua Fair. Shortly after arriving, I had a ride on the Tilt-a-Whirl. Before the ride was over, I was so sick that I had to go to my sister's, who worked nearby, to lie down. I stayed there all afternoon, barely able to go back to camp when it was time. So ended my day off for that week. Other weeks, however, were much more enjoyable. We went swimming in Crystal Lake, boating, fishing, or just went for a ride until we found a good place for a picnic.

Besides helping me to grow up, these jobs taught me how to work and to accept responsibility.