Highland County Historical Society celebrates 50th anniversary, Part XIII

By Pamela Nickell
H.C. Historical Society

We – humorously, if not a bit disparagingly – have been known to call it the “infamous green book” and offer it for sale at a seriously low price. Amazon.com calls it a “scarce antiquarian book” and offers a paperback facsimile of the original for $19.95.

Amazon further states that it is a culturally important work and that they have copied it and made it available as part of their commitment toward protecting, preserving and promoting the world’s literature in affordable, high-quality, modern editions that are true to the originals.

The book? “Farm Life and Christian Citizenship” by Eliza Jane Pulse Scott, published by Jennings and Graham in 1914.

So what could explain the difference in opinion above? Supply and demand, partly. Amazon knows the book to be scarce. The HCHS has had, for decades, literally boxes of them – straight from the publisher, many unpacked, in absolutely perfect condition. Another thing we must admit is the knowledge and lack thereof of its value in historic importance.

I bought copies of this book for each of my children and myself in our early days here. Several attempts at reading mine resulted in laying it down after a short time. It did not capture my concentration.

Not until I came back on the Board of Trustees did I determine to see it through. And, this time around, I find it absolutely fascinating. The author uses very long, often flowery, complicated sentences but once you get into the flow of that, you anticipate it and look forward to the next description.

One walks through the fields and along the creeks with her. Equally so with all her experiences. She writes with great reverence of her folks, her times, her county, her rural life, her faith and her belief in temperance.

The book is not under copyright so I will quote here. “We did not have nice pavements, as city children now have, but terribly muddy and bad roads in winter, except when frozen or covered with snow. We had nearly a mile to go to our school through rain, mud or snow but we all wore thick, homemade stockings and socks (and O, how fast and beautifully mothers and the older sisters could knit them!) and very heavy calf-skin shoes; and as we never had a snow-plow to go before us the snow had become packed, the girls would sometimes draw heavy hose over their shoes and the boys would have on high-topped boots, and thus equipped, we considered it good fun to go wading right over the unbroken roads; and we never saw as deep a snow as we would have liked to have seen.”

Eliza Jane Pulse Scott wrote in detail and conviction of life in Highland County from the 1830s through the first decade of the 1900s from personal experience and stories told to her by her grandparents.

Should you get to read this book, a treasure in our attic, you will have experienced life then, too.