Memories of Blanche L. Dum and her niece Margaret Anne

The 19^th and 20^th century memories of Blanche Lightner Dum and her niece Margaret Anne “Peggy” provide personal glimpses of life in Landisburg and Carlisle. Blanche was born in 1886 to George Billow Dum/Thommen and his wife Annie Simons Spotts/Spatz, both born 1863. Thus, Blanche was a granddaughter of Samuel Spotts and his 2^nd wife Mary Jane Baker, and of John Dum and Mary Catherine Tressler/Dressler.¹ Blanche wrote of her knowledge of her mother’s preparations for marriage as follows:

“My mother’s preparation for housekeeping was interesting. The sheep were clipped … the wool … taken to the McAfee Woolen Mills where it was carded into long rolls. The rolls were taken across the road to Sally Briner who spun [the wool] into yarn … It was returned to the farmhouse of [Annie’s father Samuel in Alinda]. Mr. Kohler, the little weaver, came and dyed the yarn a beautiful shade in the wash house. Then it was hung in the yard to dry. When dry it was taken to the weaver’s home … and woven into a woolen carpet. The design [Mamma] chose was a bird’s eye pattern – garnet pile and cream. Ninety yards of beautiful carpet were finally returned to the [Samuel Spotts] farmhouse.²

“The grazing sheep also furnished … wool … [made into] a half dozen … woolen blankets. The wagon from Bixler Woolen Mills came to the door … the young bride [to be] received her warm blankets … Grandma (Mary Jane Baker Spotts) gave Mamma the feathers for her pillows.”³ The young couple, George and Annie, came over the mountain to be married (1885) by Rev. Norcross in the parsonage of Second Presbyterian Church then located on the east side of So. Hanover Street between South and Walnut Streets. When their children were adolescents, George and Annie moved their family to Carlisle in order to make it convenient for their children to attend Dickinson College. Daughter Blanche, who never married, taught in the Carlisle High School for at least 30 years and her sister Miriam for about 10 years; their brother Ray became a minister and eventually moved west due to the benefits of the climate for the tuberculosis he contracted in ministering to a church in NYC.

Margaret Anne “Peggy” is a daughter of the Miriam mentioned above. In her history of growing up in Carlisle along with brother Bob and their sister Carolyn, “Peggy” recounts her knowledge of their grandfather’s approach to building his home at 629 So. Hanover Street. “George [Billow Dum] thought electricity was ‘the coming thing’. Therefore, he had each room of the house wired for electricity as well as for gas lights. A glass shade surrounded each jet. Electric lights were installed at the center of the ceilings. Identical ‘combination’ chandeliers were in the center ceilings of the parlor and of the living room. Each had three individual gas jets turned upward, holding wide, fluted, cut glass frosted shades. In between each jet was a smaller electric light fixture facing downward with an identical but small shade.”⁴

Peggy’s grandfather George had owned a General Store in Landisburg. Moving to Carlisle in 1904, he for some time continued his lumber business in Perry County and established a coal business behind Metzger College near the train tracks in Carlisle. Some of his General Store clientele could not always purchase groceries with cash, offering logs and timber from their land as barter. George sold the wood to the Pennsylvania railroad for the ties in their tracks. This was his start in the timber business. He died before granddaughter Peggy was born. His widow died in 1938. Peggy and her siblings fondly recalled seeing their grandmother peel apples in one long continuous strand from her seat by the window near the kitchen stairs to the fruit cellar.

George Billow Dum’s daughter Blanche often helped with his affairs and enjoyed his recollections. Thus, she likely heard him speak of visiting the Grand Columbian Exposition of 1893, the 1^st World’s Fair. The fair was held in Chicago, Ill. Several friends accompanied George. During the train ride, George enjoyed food prepared by his wife long before coolers had been invented. On October 3^rd he wrote to his wife from a boarding house at nearby 6353 Dickey Street, Englewood, to say, “We arrived here at 2:45 P.M. … Joe Waggoner, Frank […], Joe Wilson & myself are rooming at the same house … tonight we are going to Buffalo Bill’s Show …” On October 6^th, George notes as others native to Pennsylvania did, that “The state of Pennsylvania has the best arranged building inside that I have been in … It is a building of which I am very proud … Perhaps I am a little partial … Annie, you never saw the like for people, there are 200,000 and over in the fair every day … you can look for me home on next Thursday evening.”⁵

George’s youngest child, Miriam, inspired other memories. Miriam’s children and neighborhood children knew well the fields of the Noble farm fronting So. Hanover Street near the Bedford estate diagonally across from their home.⁶ It was later occupied by a parking lot and the buildings of, for instance, Panera Bread and Walmart at the foot of what became an exit for Route 81. Miriam and the children referred to this area as “the Daisy Field”, a place of warm memories of when Miriam gathered the children together and sat in the field to make up or listen to her read stories.

“Milk,” as Peggy wrote, “was delivered daily to the front porch. When I was a small child in the early 1930’s, the Kruger dairy still delivered milk by horse and wagon.” At the rear of her home, the property adjoined that of the Robbins Florists greenhouses. The Robbins children became lifelong friends. The greenhouses flowers were often purchased for Miriam’s dining table. A neighbor, Mr. Beam, who lived on Bedford Street across from the Robbins family, was a bee-keeper who made honey available to the neighborhood.

“The iceman,” wrote Peggy “… came several times a week bringing ice for the icebox (precursor of the electric refrigerator). Housewives had a square cardboard sign with a specific amount – ten, twenty-five, fifty, or 100 pounds … If wanting ice, the sign was placed against the front window … Seeing this, the iceman chipped off the appropriate amount … In summer, children would swarm around the ice truck asking the iceman for free chips of ice. When that happed to us, we would scramble onto the back of the truck, take a chip of ice and suck on it until it was gone. In 1940, we purchased our first electric refrigerator … If you bought homemade ice cream from Reed’s Ice Cream Parlor as refreshments for a party or group, it was delivered shortly before you needed it and was packed with dry ice in a heavy canvas container shaped like a bucket.”

“During the Great Depression of the twentieth century … there was a hobo camp close to LeTort Spring not far from our area … Hobos did come to our houses in the neighborhood, wanting food and sometimes asking for work” … and from this a favorite family story arose of one hobo who leaned back in through the screened door from the back porch, empty plate in hand, and with a smile saying to the cook, Annie (Spotts) Dum (Peggy’s grandmother), “That wants for more…”, which he was promptly given.

Peggy recounts that in September 1937 her sister Carolyn, then about eleven years old, won an essay prize awarded by Joe the Motorist’s Friend on North Hanover Street. She proudly received a book.⁷

Proceeds from selling lemonade were modest but provided a treat. “Our profits were … divided [amongst us] or else we went to Billy Wolfe’s store on Bedford Street and bought penny candy for all of us to share.

“As we got older, another neighborhood business venture that lasted a couple of weeks or perhaps a month was a neighborhood newspaper, “The Ridge Street Reporter”. For this purpose, Peggy and Carolyn’s brother had purchased a secondhand duplicating machine … We also had Daddy’s old typewriter … The [neighborhood] boys went around selling subscriptions and getting ads in order to fund the newspaper. Of course, Robbins Florist Shop placed an ad. Lee Javitch did the most outstanding job of anybody in getting ads. His father [David Javitch, founder of Giant Foods] owned the Carlisle Food Market which was downtown. With Lee getting ads from not only his father but also downtown merchants, there was a better response than we ever envisioned or had hoped to get …”

“Subscriptions were sold for individual issues or for a year’s subscription. Our cousin Jeanne was the only person venturesome enough to purchase a whole year’s subscription”.⁸

“A ribbon mill”, wrote Peggy, “was not far away [at the corner of Ridge and Pitt Streets] and it blew a whistle … when it was time for employees to stop working.⁹ When playing during summer or after school in winter, [we] children could hear the four o’clock factory whistle and know it was time to go home for supper.” Peggy is a retired teacher.

^[1] A stained-glass window commemorating John and Mary Catherine (Tressler) Dum for their church in Elliottsburg was saved after the church was leveled by fire and is in the CCHS Museum collection.

^[2] The farmhouse sits on Waggoners Gap Road, Alinda, Perry County, PA.

^[3] From Blanche L. Dum’s essay “Education of Barbara Haines” as recounted in this author’s “Genealogies and Families According to the Marriage of George Billow Dum & Annie Simons Spotts”; page one; CCHS.

^[4] “A Few From 629”, Storehouse Publishing, 2005; page 10; CCHS.

^[5] His correspondence & souvenir book from the fair are at the Waidner-Spahr Library Archives, Dickinson College.

^[6] Home of Alonzo F. Bedford, owner of Bedford Shoe Company.

^[7] Carlisle Sentinel.

^[8] Jeanne was the daughter of Ray Spotts Dum/Dunn and his 1^st wife.

^[9] Later converted into Ribbon Mill Apartments.