"Grandmother"

When your pioneer grandmother and mine as young mothers, set out for new frontiers in the canvas-covered wagon, they carried with them high courage, a little iron stove and a hand mill.

And Grandmother certainly had need for them all. For courage meant something more to her than fighting off Indians--more than facing long, cold winters and days of loneliness, grasshoppers and crop failure. It meant getting up long before daybreak to crack the ice from the water pail for breakfast gruel, keeping up the courage of the family, with a crisp white ruffle for the window, or a new birthday dress for sister cut down to size from one of Mommy's old one and making cheery Christmas out of practically nothing.

But, hardest of all was to keep the family fed., no corner grocery store for her. Sometimes when she wanted to bake her bread, she found the grain damp, causing the mill to clog. But, day after day the little mill kept grinding and the little stove kept going. Somehow Grandmother knew these trials and worries were just part of progress, that the future would bring better ways.

After the first harvest the grist miller would relieve her task of grinding flour each day.The railway brought more people and household goods and news of our growing nation, of fashions and news from back home. But the best news to Grandmother and her pioneer neighbors was improvement of farm machinery and improved ways of milling wheat. And one startling invention after another brought better living. So the new methods of milling their Spring wheat gave them means to buy the new and better things.

Grandmother is a little old lady now, and as she sits enjoying her afternoon coffee and sandwich she remembers her little iron stove and the tiny hand mill. Seeing her bag of flour in the cupboard, with its familiar "XXXX" on the label, and now the word "enriched, she thinks. "What a long way we pioneers have come together-and what an exciting future lies ahead".

We know the pioneer woman had more hardships than are mentioned here. The illness and deaths they endured, probably made them the strongest. I always think of them in there little log home, with a roaring fire, sitting down to a meager meal all tired out from the hard day they had. I also think that those little families were more loving toward each other. The reason I think this is because today we have more to occupy our life, I don't mean we do not still love one another. When was the last time you told someone you loved them and meant it? Have a nice Thanksgiving and I found this story in an old, old Pillsbury Diamond Anniversary Recipes (75 years).