Today’s column offers a bit of nostalgia for our older (and wiser!) citizens of Cheboygan County.

Seniors, do you remember the “THUNDER MUGS” that sat in almost every bedroom? It was porcelain or enamelware, and it always had a lid. This “sit-upon pot” was a lifesaver at night and on bitter cold nights.

We used everything. Old Sears and Roebuck and Montgomery Ward catalogues were recycled in the outhouse! A trip to the outhouse was always an adventure. Sometimes a snake slithered out of the cracks. Sometimes a bee arrived. The flies were so thick that their humming resembled a modern jet engine.

Were you one of the boys who tipped outhouses over on Halloween, just for fun? Or did you put a small car on a neighbor’s front porch? Just for fun? How do you suppose Mr. Allen’s cow appeared on Main Street, a mile from home? Mysterious events always happened on Halloween night!

Do you remember churning butter? The wooden churner raised and dropped a plunger until the fat settled out of the milk, leaving delicious buttermilk behind. We collected milk by hand. We could sit for hours on a stool milking cows (Herds were rather large and many families had a cow or two of their own). Milking was simple. Pull and squeeze one teat and then another. The warm milk reverberated as it hit the sides of the pail. The cats always received the first bowl.

In town, milkmen delivered milk to your porch. In winter, it would often freeze into slush. Sometimes frozen milk protruded out of the bottle. Milk was not homogenized. Cream floated on top. It could be carefully poured off into a small bowl, where it was whipped into a delicious topping for desserts. Sugar and vanilla were added to make a smacking good taste! Yum, yum!!!

Some things we would like to forget. There was no electricity. Lamp globes had to be cleaned of black soot before the kerosene lamps could be lit. When heat was needed, we would throw more wood in the stove.

Early radios always included static. Sometimes, the static crackled so loud Captain Midnight, and Amos and Andy, were completely drowned out.

We all walked to school. We carried bag lunches and sat on hard benches. We all drank water from a pail using the same dipper. If one person caught a disease, it quickly raged through all of us.

Some may remember riding in a Model T Ford. It was one of the first cars to be mass-produced. The early ones had to be cranked to get started. Sometimes the crank kicked back. That could be very painful. Many seniors also remember cars with rumble seats and running boards. They were very popular when they first came out.

Chicken and biscuits were a favorite meal. But first our brothers had to fill the wood box and haul a pail of water inside. Mom had to start the fire in the stove. Dad was responsible for catching the chicken. To prepare the chicken for cooking, dad had to chop off its head and then dip the chicken into boiling water so we could pull all the feathers off.

We liked eggs. Children were sent to the henhouse to collect them. If they didn’t find any, they had to search the barn and the yard. You see, chickens were very smart and could hide eggs in the most amazing places.

Back then, a barn was our version of a McDonalds’ or Burger King indoor play area, except it was better. One could jump into the hay mow from great heights. And we usually survived with just a few scratches. Barns were also a great place for games of hide and seek.

Washers and dryers were luxuries. We used Fels Naptha soap. Grandma rubbed it into clothes and then rubbed them on a scrub board. She then separated the clothes into tubs, one for soaking, a second for a final rinse, and a third which contained a ‘bluing agent” which was used to make white clothes whiter. (We kids could never figure out why something called “blue” was used to make clothes whiter!) Grandma used a thing-a-ma-jig called a “wringer,” which was basically two wooden rollers turned by a handle to “wring” water out of the clothes.

Those were the days! Life was simpler, but harder. Oh, and no cellphones. I doubt many people alive today would like to go back then to live!