Teacher’s autograph albums full of notes from ‘dear friends’

Roberta McKern

Among the more unexpected finds at the East Linn Museum are two small autograph albums and a photocopy of a third.

Some of us might remember having such collections as young ladies in grade school. Boys may have owned them, too, but most often it seemed to be the girls. Sometimes these albums came with fancy covers, or with different-colored pages: yellow, peach, lavender and light robin’s-egg blue.

What to write became the question. It had to be profound to live in memory. Likely, “Roses are red, violets are blue” came to mind, but “Skunk cabbage stinks, and so do you” had to be discarded. That was something a boy would write, maybe.

Recalling rhymes heard in passing like one repeated by a grandfather to a new boy in his backyard, “What’s my name? Puddin’ Tame. Ask me again and I’ll tell you the same,” wouldn’t do, either. Nor would “Apple core, Baltimore. Who’s your friend, forevermore?” followed by pelting the “friend” with the gnawed-on core.

We needed to examine the little booklets, taking inspiration from writers of well over 100 years ago. But where did they get rhymes that smacked of Sunday school with a whiff of morality and immortality?

The albums’ ages may surprise us, because the earliest is from the late 1890s while the other two are both from the first decade of the 20th century: the 1900s to 1910. Just like later autograph albums, these were brought to school for fellow pupils to sign, although one belonged to a teacher.

We know less about the oldest than about the later two. That one belonged to Laura Colbert of Brownsville. Covered in red velvet with worn gold script on the front, “Autograph Album” has the fewest entries. Nor is there any mention of Laura in the museum files.

The other album on view in the main room is well-filled because it belonged to a young teacher, Edna Robnett, who, as seen from the entries, taught from 1905 to 1909. Of the pioneer Crawfordsville Robnett family, she taught in Brownsville, Crawfordsville and Molalla.

Considering the autographs’ dates, we surmise that she’d bring her book to class after the new year, when she and her students were better-acquainted. According to museum files, she married George Slavens of Crawfordsville and worked as a telephone operator in the “Hello Central” days after teaching in Oregon and Montana.

Mabel Hazel Ames possessed the one album we know most about because her only grandchild, Wilma (Carney) Peterson, collected family material into “John T. and Hester Ames: Their Sweet Home, Oregon Friends and Neighbors,” where the album was reproduced, along with photographs, postcards and some family records Mabel had saved.

John T. Ames had been among the children of Lowell and Anna Keesler Ames when the family first homesteaded in the Sweet Home area in 1852, and he had filed a land claim. In 1887, he married his younger cousin, Hester Ann Ames. Together, they had three children: two sons and a daughter, Mabel. She was born in 1897 and John T. died just about one year later.

In August 1890, Hester married John T’s younger brother, Andrew, but by that December she was once again widowed. She moved to Lents, Oregon, near Portland, in 1909, to be closer to a sister.

This marked the end of Mabel’s schooling among the Sweet Home children whose autographs she saved.

School was often tenuous then. The eighth grade generally ended schooling for many children; for some, even that was unobtainable. Others were kept home to work on the family farm or put out to work at a time when child labor was not uncommon.

Under such circumstances, to have an autograph album signed by SMs, or “school mates,” helped retain memories of childhood for Mabel Ames and Laura Colbert. With Edna Robnett, she could recall children she’d taught and influenced.

Autograph albums then were important enough to call up their own etiquette, as well as become examples of penmanship. To write from “Dear Friend” to “Sincerely, your friend” on an unlined 4-by-7-inch page with a stick pen that had to be continually dipped into ink without blotting was quite a challenge.

In the future. the writer could be judged not only by how neatly and perfectly the penmanship appeared, but also by what was written.

Examining examples from the albums, we see that punctuation was often more alleged than evident, while rhyming lines were the major mark of poetry.

Writing definitely was a downhill battle for some. Once lines began skidding down a page, they didn’t stop. We can wonder where the rhymes came from. Perhaps from greeting cards, or maybe, like “Apple core, Baltimore,” they traveled from person to person or perhaps there were directions suggesting what to write.

Certainly, friendship was promoted and friend, an often-repeated keyword, from “Dear Friend” to “Sincerely, Your Friend” – in other words, from beginning to end.

We will look at some of the albums’ prose and poetics by looking at an entry in Laura Colbert’s.

In 1893, F. M. Booker wrote: “I haven’t known you long/But find you good and true/And in a time of need/A friend I’ll be to you.” By missing a letter, Ella Booker added interest to the thought: “May your life be happy and free of care/As the flowers of May that loom everywhere.” We might ask, “What flowers were those looming toward the Maypole?”

Earlier, in 1891, Hattie Dearmond added a note of mortality with “Remember me when this you see/Tho miles apart we chance to be/And if the grave be first my lot/Remember me when I am not.” More reassuring is this 1893 word from Lizzie Templeton: “Dear Laura, Of all that is near/Thou art the nearest/Of all that is dear/Thou art the dearest.”

The use of “thou” underlined the nobility of phrases, “thee,” “thou” and “they” reflecting, among other things, that 19th century admiration of when knighthood flowered and, presumably, well-made armor did not clink. Boys often were considered plucky lads, and girls, bashful maidens.

Something of the latter can be seen on the cover of Edna Robnett’s album, with two large roses and two medallions. Each medallion frames a portrait of a pretty girl, one with outsized poppies in her hair, the other with daisies in hers, a look reminiscent of renowned French stage actress Sarah Bernhardt, who toured America now and then.

Although the verses may be addressed to “Dear Mrs. Robnett” or “Dear Teacher,” the sentiments remain similar in her book. However, they are enlivened now and then when a male student has his say.

For example, in 1904 Fred Wright of Brownsville wrote, “When you get old and cannot see/Put on your specs and think of me.” And what about the advice offered by Edna’s friend, Greta Wolfe? “Take care of thy words, my darling/For words are terrible things/Like bees they may bring morn’s fresh honey,/Like bees they may have terrible stings.”

Norma Henderson wrote more cheerfully, “With fair skies above you and kind friends to love you/May the blessings from Heaven come showering down.”

The vision of blessings from heaven out of fair skies was also shared by another student, Cecil Sawyer. Such duplication feeds our curiosity of how these pieces of sentiment were being passed around.

Also, we might wonder about a student who writes for his teacher, “To be a good woman is the noblest work of God. Your friend, Ralph Windom.” Is he passing on advice or offering praise?

And there was always a George Kendig, who penned, “I thought and thought in vain. At last I thought I’d write my name.” Joy Slavens of Crawfordsville, a possible future in-law of Dear Teacher, took the “Roses are red” tack when she wrote, “Roses are red, violets blue and so are you.” While Bessie, a Molalla girl, came to the point in 1906: “Forget me not/Forget me never/Not even when Mollala’s mud is dried up forever.” In 1904, Molalla’s Mabel Sloan wrote, “Remember me early/Remember me late/Remember me at the golden gate.” Your scholar, Pearle Toliver.

The same rhyme was written for Mabel Ames by a fellow schoolmate, Orpha Lawrence.

Mabel also received a “roses are red” verse from Alan Casebeer: “Roses are red and violets are sweet sugar and so are you.” Because she was just a fellow student, some who wrote to her felt more at ease than did Edna Robnett’s pupils, who were addressing their teacher. At least two were cousins who may have just been asked for autographs. From “Pete” came “Dear Mabel, Please don’t say I’m writing a fable/When I say I’m writing all that I am able.” And a Salem cousin, Nina Arnold, reminded, “When in the kitchen washing dishes/Think of me and all good wishes.”

Dear Mabel seemed to be in line for advice, too. Miss May Rowell offered “Always remember and bear in mind/That a true boy is hard to find. When you find one kind and gay, Hang onto his coat tails night and day.” To this Frank Davis added, “When you get married and live upstairs; For petty sakes, don’t put on airs.”

Two of Mabel’s teachers signed her book: Lena Hinrichs in 1907 and Callie M. Bigbee in 1908. As teachers, they no doubt felt the need to moralize. Hinrichs recited, “Not enjoyment and not sorrow/Is our destiny and end of way; That each tomorrow find us farther than today.” Bigbee added, “Be good, sweet maid, and let who will be clever. Do noble deeds the whole day long and thus make life, death and that vast forever one grand, sweet song.”

Mrs. Bigbee would have a long career as a revered Sweet Home teacher and promoter of literacy. Both she and her husband taught here and their three sons made considerable names for themselves playing baseball.

She’s mentioned in “Profiles of Progress,” Roy Elliott’s book on the city, as is one last schoolmate of Mabel’s: Opal Russell, who became Elliott’s wife. She wrote for Mabel, “My Dear Little Friend, Last in your albums/Last in your thoughts/First to be remembered/And last to be forgot.”

Opal (Russell) Elliott became the first girl to graduate from Sweet Home High School in the first graduating class, along with two boys.

When Mabel Ames moved to Lents, Oregon, with her mother and brothers, she was 12, and her album may represent one of her last years of schooling, marking the end of her childhood.

In Lents, her mother and brothers built the home in which Hester (Ames) Ames would live out her life. She died in 1932, and Mabel and her husband, William Carney, then continued living in the house until their deaths in the 1980s. Perhaps in her later years, reading over her autograph album entries helped Mabel remember her childhood.

For now, looking at these three collections, which belonged, respectively, to Laura Colbert, Edna Robnett and Mabel Ames, gives us an insight into childhood’s social side back in the late 1890s and early 1900s.

Maybe those of us who had our own albums before such things disappeared can wonder what’s written in ours, at least for those of us whose books have disappeared forever and have been forgotten. Would we find the same rhymes? Were we as concerned about morality and mortality?

The world changes, and as a trip to the East Linn Museum shows, we need reminding now and then of how great those changes can become.

We will have our annual yard sale from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. Saturday, July 9. It’s our big fundraiser, and we are grateful to those who donate and participate.

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