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Carolyn Mulford

Carolyn Mulford

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  • Show Me Mysteries
    • Series Overview
    • Show Me The Murder
      • Show Me the Murder Chapter One
      • Discussion Topics for Show Me The Murder
      • Ordering Information
      • Excerpts from Reviews
    • Show Me the Deadly Deer
      • Show Me the Deadly Deer: Chapter One
      • Discussion Topics for Show Me The Deadly Deer
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      • Excerpts from Reviews
    • Show Me the Gold
      • Show Me the Gold Chapter One
      • Show Me the Gold Discussion Questions
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      • Reviews
    • Show Me the Ashes
      • Show Me the Ashes: Chapter One
      • Show Me the Ashes: Discussion Topics
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    • Show Me the Sinister Snowman
      • Show Me the Sinister Snowman – Chapter One
      • Show Me the Sinister Snowman: Discussion Questions
      • Show Me the Sinister Snowman: Order Information
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  • The Feedsack Dress
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    • Historical Background
    • Chapter 1: The Feedsack Dress
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    • The Feedsack Dress Blog
  • Thunder Beneath My Feet
    • Thunder Beneath My Feet
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    • Chapter One: Thunder Beneath My Feet
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    • Blog: Historicals
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      • “An Aura of Death”
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Celebrating July 4th by Making Ice Cream

Carolyn Mulford Posted on July 3, 2025 by CarolynJuly 3, 2025

In the 19040s, we celebrated July 4th by making ice cream. My mother saved extra milk, cream, and eggs to mix and heat with the junket, sugar, and vanilla.  She started soon after breakfast because the mix needed to set.

Meanwhile my father cleaned up the green-painted wood freezer keg, and my younger sister and I brought a panful of cattle salt from the barn. Then the three of us took the pickup to the ice house in town to buy a 50-pound block of ice.

My father used ice tongs to carry the ice to the pickup and, once home, to the cement slab at the bottom of the back porch steps. He split the block with an axe, placed half in a gunny sack, and broke it and then a smaller chunk into small pieces with the flat of the axe. The leftover went into the seldom used icebox.

By then the magic mix was ready in the tall can holding the paddle that churned the mix. My parents attached the end of the paddle protruding from the top of the can to the crank-driven turning mechanism resting across the keg’s top. He lifted the keg into a tin dishpan to catch the salty water that would ooze through the keg’s small, round holes.

I turned the crank, easy at that stage, while he poured alternating layers of ice and salt around the can. Then my father cranked, and my sister and I took turns standing on the keg to hold it down. The crank’s movement challenged our balance and sometimes made us jump off. We also occasionally stuck a finger into the drainage holes to clear them. When he had to add ice and salt, I cranked, using both hands as the mix hardened—and salivating in anticipation of the delicious treat. We knew the ice cream was ready when even he had trouble turning the crank.

He removed the cranking mechanism, took off the lid, and held down the can while my mother pulled out the paddle, placing its bottom in a bowl held by my mother. He replaced the lid and packed ice over the top while we went inside to clean off the paddle—our only tastes until after dinner with a few guests. Then my mother dipped generous portions of the ice cream from the can, and each person added chocolate syrup, fresh fruit, or chocolate cake to taste. We ate most of the ice cream then, and finished it before time to milk.

When darkness first fell, my sisters and I challenged the lightning bugs with our sparklers. Then we headed for the fairgrounds with sweaters to watch the fireworks.

—Carolyn Mulford

Posted in Historicals, The Feedsack Dress, Young Adult | 2 Replies

4-H and Sewing in the 1940s

Carolyn Mulford Posted on June 30, 2025 by CarolynJune 30, 2025

4-H came to my rural community about two years after World War II ended. We had no other youth organizations available, so 4-H, led by two wonderful (female and male) county Extension agents, made a huge impact on us children—and our parents.

As I recall, the whole community met at New Hope School (grades one through eight) to hear the agents describe the program and recruit adult volunteers to lead projects teaching practical skills ranging from sewing to raising calves. Then all the dozen or so kids nine or older signed up, elected officers (an unfamiliar task), and took the pamphlets home to choose their projects. Being only eight, I envied my older sister and listened closely to discussions there and at home.

My mother studied the materials thoroughly, for volunteer leaders had to master and teach the standards 4-H set for each project. A former teacher, she had been making our clothing for years, but she felt that she needed the guidance the pamphlets and the agent provided. I later realized that 4-H educated parents as well as children.

By my ninth birthday, I had memorized the 4-H pledge, learned basic parliamentary procedure (a boon forever), and reconciled myself to tackling cooking and sewing projects rather raising a calf. I didn’t mind making biscuits and cakes, but I preferred to leave the sewing to my big sister, who loved it. The first year was basic: threading and operating our treadle sewing machine, using paper patterns to cut cloth, sewing straight seams in such items as tea towels and pillow slips. To my dismay, my mother made me redo everything until it was perfect.

The second year the project got harder. I came to hate sewing. I liked going to the feedstore and choosing the sacks for my practice rounds of shorts, blouses, and skirts, but the summer heat turned cutting and fitting and putting in and taking out imperfect seams into torture. I suffered through five summers of sewing projects. I earned blue ribbons at the fair for blouses with button holes and dresses with zippers and for judging others’ work. The successes didn’t compensate for the time robbed from reading and playing outdoors.

4-H taught me many other useful skills, including how to give a demonstration, how to speak in public, how to work with a group, and how to do well a job I didn’t like.

And I’ve never forgotten the pledge: I pledge my Head to clearer thinking, my Heart to greater loyalty, my Hands to larger service, and my Health to better living for my club, my community, and my country.

—Carolyn Mulford

Posted in Historicals, The Feedsack Dress

I Am a River

Carolyn Mulford Posted on April 19, 2025 by CarolynApril 19, 2025

Each week I lunch with a group of friends and discuss a topic. Last time the coordinator posed this question: What is the shape of your life? The answers included a rectangle, a vase, a cloud, and an octagon. Usually I wing it, but this time I wrote my response.

The Shape of My Life

I am a river,

Birthed in a puddle,

Nourished by rain,

Pushed to overflow

And grow broader

And deeper.

 

Springs and creeks fed my flow.

Widening waters gathered force,

Thrusting me against unyielding barriers

And cascading me over rocky falls.

 

Other streams joined my journey,

Enriching my waters,

Sharing my dreams,

Bringing me love and joy,

Allowing me to give.

 

Now levees restrict my passage,

Compelling my waters to slow

And grow shallow,

Directing me into the desert.

—Carolyn Mulford

Posted in Uncategorized

Where to Find My Books

Carolyn Mulford Posted on April 1, 2025 by CarolynApril 1, 2025

While only one of my books, Show Me the Sinister Snowman, continues to be published in print and electronic editions, several of my novels are available from online sellers. Most of the copies are used, but columbiabooksonline.com, my supportive local bookstore, has a small stock of new Show Me hardbacks and paperbacks.

I also have a few copies of all my novels except The Feedsack Dress, my historical children’s book, and Show Me the Murder, the first in my mystery series featuring a former spy returning   home and solving crimes with old friends. Fortunately e-editions still exist. Barnes and Noble carries The Feedsack Dress ($2.99), and Amazon offers Show Me theMurder ($3.99).

A search of used-book sites, such as abebooks.com, may turn up copies of all my books—even the nonfiction ones that are so old they must have come from estate sales.

You may still find my novels at your local library or ask it to borrow these for you through the interlibrary loan program.

I’ve no new books to announce, so I hope readers will continue to enjoy the old ones.

—Carolyn Mulford

Posted in Mysteries, The Feedsack Dress, Uncategorized

Looking Forward 60 Years Ago

Carolyn Mulford Posted on February 28, 2025 by CarolynFebruary 28, 2025

Reminders of my attempts to start my writing career arrived last Christmas. A friend, Joyce Campbell, sent me letters I had written to her while we were serving as Peace Corps Volunteers (teaching English) in Ethiopia from September 1962 to July 1964 and in the months after we returned home (Chattanooga, Tennessee, for her and Kirksville, Missouri, for me) after traveling through Europe.

On December 21, 1964, I wrote, “Has anything turned up for you yet? People don’t seem terribly impressed with Peace Corps experience for job qualifications it seems to me. I’m going down to the University Placement Bureau [University of Missouri School of Journalism] after New Year’s, I guess, and see what pedestrian ‘good experience’ job they can turn up. I may go to N.Y. and go down magazine row if nothing shows up fairly soon, but I think jobhunting will be pretty futile until I’ve had some journalistic experience—big frog in little pond first. Are you considering teaching again?”

On January 5, 1965, I replied to her letter expressing distress about the open racism all around her, and common in my town. I suggested she go elsewhere for grad school. I also reported on friends seeking jobs in D.C.: “A friend said agencies are getting a little tired of all the ex P.C. applicants.”

On January 24, I wrote about giving talks on my Peace Corps experience, attempting to write a short story, and reading books on writing fiction. I’d applied, without success, for a job in Hallmark’s public relations department in Kansas City and turned down a job teaching journalism and freshman comp at Northeast Missouri State Teachers College, where I’d earned my B.A. and B.S. in Education.

I was determined to stay in journalism. “It occurred me that a possibility for both of us is McGraw-Hill. They are working on a lot of textbooks for overseas markets. I’m not particularly hep on that, but they also publish a number of trade magazines.”

We agreed that that we shouldn’t rush decisions. “I keep thinking that never again will I have free time and free board & should let jobhunting take its course and try to do some real writing.”

A month later I expressed my frustration with my attempts at writing articles on the P.C. experience and a short story. (I wouldn’t have a short story published until the 21st century.) I have absolutely no memory of this story, but below is my description. It reflects the language and attitudes of the time and my accurate appraisal of my skills.

“The short story is about a teacher told to make sure her Negro pupils have prominent parts in the Christmas program so that everyone can see how liberal the school is. She gets in trouble when she has a Negro Joseph and a white Mary. The theme of the story as it stands now is really the necessity of compromise and gradual progress. The solution is weak because it is a happy coincidence instead of an actual solving of a dilemma, but this is also a theme in that sometimes there is no solution.”

Later in the letter, I responded to one of her comments. “You said idealism is out of style. I think a lot of people are theoretically idealistic. They are the ones who think we have done a wonderful thing [serving in the Peace Corps] and may even imagine themselves doing it for a couple of minutes.”

My last letter in the series was dated March 18, 1965. I congratulated her on finding a job. (Soon she joined a special grad program on teaching in disadvantaged neighborhoods in Cleveland.) I had sent 10 letters to selected magazines and was planning a trip to D.C., where I could stay with a good friend from college, while seeking a job in person.

In May 1965, the combination of letters and appearing in person netted me an editorial job at the NEA Journal, then a top monthly published by the National Education Association. My Peace Corps teaching experience proved a plus, and it didn’t hurt that the renowned editor, Mildred Sandison Fenner, came from northwest Missouri.

This wonderful first job taught me an immense amount about writing, editing, and organizing a magazine. I was on my way.

Carolyn Mulford

Posted in Writing

Mid-Continent Earthquakes, Past and Future

Carolyn Mulford Posted on December 16, 2024 by CarolynDecember 16, 2024

About 2:30 a.m. December 16, 1811, an earthquake threw people in New Madrid, Missouri Territory, out of bed and crumbled brick houses and cabin chimneys, forced the Mississippi River to run backward and change course, disturbed sleep along most of the East Coast, and toppled dishes from shelves in the White House.

That marked the beginning of some of the most powerful, prolonged quakes the United States has experienced. These weren’t the first in the New Madrid Seismic Zone, which is centered near where Missouri, Arkansas, Tennessee, and Kentucky come together. Geologists and other scientists have found indications that powerful quakes—rating 7 or higher on the Richter scale—have occurred there periodically for roughly 4,500 years.

Scores of small quakes—many in the 1.5 to 2.5 range—still pester area residents each year.

Geologists expect more big ones to come, estimating a 10% chance that will be within the next 50 years. The area between St. Louis and Memphis is likely to be the hardest hit, but right now the spread and range of the next disastrous earthquakes can’t be predicted any more precisely than the time.

Scientific research on the past and the possible future of the seismic zone continues. The quakes are not just an academic interest. In 2011, an expert panel concluded the zone “is at significant risk for damaging earthquakes that must be accounted for in urban planning and development.”

 My characters in Thunder Beneath My Feet had little information on what was happening elsewhere or what to expect as dozens of big quakes and aftershocks and hundreds of tremors hit New Madrid on an unpredictable schedule for weeks on end. Many people there, and elsewhere, thought the world was ending. For hundreds, it did.

I relished researching the unique historical events and creating characters representing the thriving, diverse (Spanish, French, American, Indigenous) community in the frontier riverport. For months, they faced daily terrors, and so will a much larger population when the next big ones hit.

Each fall preparedness groups in the area hold Great Shakeout Earthquake Drills. They recommend these three steps if you feel a quake begin.

  1. Drop onto your hands and knees so you won’t fall down and can crawl to any nearby shelter.
  2. Cover your head and neck with one arm and hand to protect you as you crawl under a table, desk, or anything else that will protect you from falling objects. If you have no shelter nearby, crawl to an interior wall, preferably a corner.
  3. Hold on to your shelter but be ready to move if it gives way.

Happy anniversary.

—Carolyn Mulford

Posted in Historicals, News, Thunder Beneath My Feet

The Turkey That Bullied Me

Carolyn Mulford Posted on November 26, 2024 by CarolynNovember 26, 2024

I grew up with animals as friends, the first being our dog Roamer. He and I wandered around the yard, the barnyard, and the garden. Roamer barked at squirrels and chased rabbits from our vegetables. He made me ponder one of life’s great puzzles: Is it okay to sympathize with Peter Rabbit in the story but condemn him when your own carrots are at risk?

Roamer knew not to chase our chickens or cows or pigs, and he joined me in playing with an orphaned lamb and the kittens whose parents kept the barn free of mice.

What he didn’t do was defend me when my parents set a new turkey loose by the corncrib at the back of the barnyard. I first encountered the turkey when I went to the two-hole outhouse next door to the corncrib. It peeked out from the back of the corncrib and, head bobbing, ignored my friendly greeting.

Roamer stared at the big bird and casually walked a little closer to the house.

When I came out, the bird didn’t show himself. I took several steps and heard the whishing of flapping wings and saw a turkey as tall as I was rushing after me. I ran, but the turkey had momentum and managed to slap me with its wings before I could pick up speed.

Roamer barked but didn’t advance. Still it was enough to discourage the turkey and allow me to escape. That time. People say turkeys are dumb, but that one quickly learned to rush at me from hiding. It realized it had nothing to fear from me, Roamer, or even my big sister, who was only slightly taller than the turkey.

My father urged us to face the bully, and we armed ourselves with sticks to swing and corncobs to throw. Mostly we just barreled out of the outhouse door and ran like crazy. My sister and I both suffered wing beatings and beak peckings.

Then my mother took action. I don’t remember, but I think my father helped catch the free-range turkey and button an old sweater over its body to hold down its wings. It attempted to attack me any time I invaded its territory, but now I could outrun it.

Then came Thanksgiving, the first one I remember. We ate that mean turkey. It was tough. For years after that we ate an old hen with dumplings and noodles at Thanksgiving.

—Carolyn Mulford

Posted in Uncategorized

How Editors Stay in Style

Carolyn Mulford Posted on September 30, 2024 by CarolynSeptember 30, 2024

If you’re an editor, you know the importance of the new 1192-page 18th edition of the Chicago Manual of Style. Since the University of Chicago Press published the first edition in 1906, other book publishers, many periodicals, and now electronic publications have accepted Chicago as the primary guide.

Even publishers who write their own style manuals, or settle for a pamphlet on which Chicago guidelines they don’t accept, study the latest edition to adjust editorial styles.

Without style manuals, we would rely on writers’ personal preferences and editors’ memories to be consistent on thousands of disputed questions. The two most common may be which  numbers to write out and whether to use the serial comma. Most newspaper style manuals, for example, digress from Chicago in writing out numbers up to 10 (versus through one hundred) and in omitting the comma before and in a series (e.g., apples, oranges and bananas) unless it’s required for clarity.

IMHO, whatever the style manual, clarity should supersede consistency.

 Chicago’s editors do extensive research and consultation on trends. The 18th, for example, reaffirms some old wavering choices (e.g., capitalizing the first word in a complete sentence following a colon) and identifies spelling preferences for new terms (e.g., omitting the hyphens in ebooks and esports).

Hyphenation is a major headache, and the manual devotes more than a dozen pages to multiple examples of pesky hyphens. Through several editions, I’ve referred to that advice more than any other.

Some changes reflect social attitudes, including preferred ways to refer to individuals or groups. In an earlier edition, editors recommended accepting they as a singular (standard centuries ago then abandoned in formal writing) but withdrew it because of protests. The 18th edition cautiously gives they as an option for referring to a person whose gender is unknown. Stay tuned.

Another change is capitalizing Indigenous, considered a parallel to Black and White. (Some style manuals favor lower case for all three.) In recent decades I‘ve seen editors move from Indian to Native American or the name of a particular tribe (e.g., Navajo) to American Indian.

 The 18th also updates production sections, including advice for self-publishers on such basics as choosing fonts and margins and such new problems as preparing notes for an audio book. AI receives attention (e.g., citing AI-generated images).

To read more information on changes in all sections, go to https://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/help-tools/what-s-new.html. If you want to buy the 18th, shop around for the best price. The list price is $75, but you may find a better deal from the publisher or an online bookseller. If you plan to use the manual in an editorial office or don’t lift weights, consider the online edition.

—Carolyn Mulford

Posted in Basic Tools, Resources, Uncategorized, Writing

In Praise of “Said”

Carolyn Mulford Posted on September 1, 2024 by CarolynSeptember 1, 2024

When I began the transition from nonfiction to fiction, writing dialogue seemed easy. Then my critique readers pointed out my lack of skill in using tags, the words that identify the speaker. In general, tags precede (Mary said, “You’re late. Get going.”), lie within, (“You’re late,” Mary said. “Get going.”), or follow the dialogue (“You’re late. Get going,” Mary said.).

 Even if only two people are talking, readers need reminders of which one’s speaking after a few exchanges. The writer fails if the reader has to go back to figure out who’s saying what. Rule of thumb: When the reader pauses, the writer loses.

If the dialogue stands strong, the reader may need only a quick, direct ID. The top choice is the speaker’s name (or a stand-in for it) and said. At first I doubted this, thinking that verb too common and dull. Later I realized that much of the value of said comes from its being inobtrusive and neutral.

Guard against replacing “said” with a vocalization—e.g., shouted, screamed, muttered, murmured, hissed, growled—that doesn’t fit the situation just because you seek a synonym. I may run a search to catch an overuse of any of those words. In an entire novel, you may need to rewrite if anyone mutters or shouts more than five or six times. An exception would be using some manner of speaking, such as murmuring, to portray a character.

Writers often turn to asked and exclaimed for variety. Fine, but be careful. As an editor, I object to the redundancy of asked plus a question mark and exclaimed plus an exclamation point. For example, Mary asked, “What did he want?”

Another handy tag is the listener’s name in the dialogue, as in, “John, you know I’ll never agree to that.” Limit that ploy to two times in an exchange.

Tags often serve as much more than IDs. They can reveal character, show action, and emphasize setting. Instead of Mary said, tell the reader what Mary did or how, when, where, or why she did it. For example, Mary stood on tiptoe to peer over the stone wall. “The bedroom light’s on, but I don’t see anyone.”

  Another function is to clarify what the reader can’t determine from the words on the page. If the character says, “I’d never do that,” is he being sarcastic or earnest or deceitful? Sometimes the most efficient way to convey that is through the scorned adverb, e.g., said hotly.

Partly to avoid adverbs, we lean on a dozen or so handy verbs, such as smile, grin, laugh, giggle, and chortle. When is the last time you chortled? In my drafts, I search for a surplus of such verbs and phrases, including nod, shrug, raise an eyebrow, glance, study, stare, turn away, lean back/forward. Know thyself and search accordingly.

Tags become critical in the difficult scenes with several speakers. Such scenes present multiple technical challenges: differentiating the speakers, establishing their physical positions in relation to each other, and focusing on plot amidst multiple reactions. Sometimes writers block out crowded scenes the way a stage director would before writing them.

A common place for such scenes is around a table. Readers soon tune out if the characters do nothing but sip, stir, chew, bite, and gobble. Work to come up with multipurpose tags that emphasize character or advance plot. For example, John cut his pancake into precise one-inch squares. “The medical examiner didn’t find any breakfast in the stomach.”

 If you get stuck, fall back on said, at least in the first draft. Most of the time that short, efficient word does the job.

 —Carolyn Mulford

Posted in Basic Tools, Writing

Why I Write Short Stories

Carolyn Mulford Posted on August 1, 2024 by CarolynAugust 1, 2024

For years I wrote and edited commercial newsletters. I got tired of the short form, limited content, and demands for accuracy and objectivity. So in my early sixties I revived my dormant goal of writing novels.

Switching from nonfiction to fiction and from 600 to 90,000 words forced me to learn new skills, activate a different part of my brain, and face the financial reality that fiction doesn’t pay well or soon. For the next 10 years, as I served my fiction apprenticeship, my earnings came almost  exclusively from my freelance editorial work.

In spare hours, I concentrated on learning to write mysteries. I struggled with pacing and planting clues, but I loved having 30 or so chapters in which to develop characters and explore situations. I had no desire to write short stories.

Then I needed a fiction credit to cite in the query letter to sell my first mystery. The Chesapeake chapter of Sisters in Crime announced open submissions for a short story anthology. If I could come up with a good short story, I could claim status as a mystery writer.

Easier said than done. The short story is a demanding form. In roughly 3,000 words you have to profile at least one compelling character, intrigue with plot, enhance action with setting, and end with a surprising but believable twist. To me, doing all this all depends on having a good idea, one that’s a gold nugget rather than a gold mine.

The best short story writers, including one of my early critique partners, think and write this way. I don’t, but a debate with my critique group on the reality of courage during crisis prompted me to create a notably timid woman. Circumstances force her to outwit and disarm a dangerous man to save her daughter’s life. The story worked, and I became a published mystery writer.

Another practical reason for writing short stories: They can help keep your name before fans and introduce you to others between novels, which generally come out about a year apart. I managed, with difficulty, to write a few short stories for other anthologies between my novels.

I’m not sure these helped my small career, but they challenged me to accomplish a lot in a few words. I rewrote and rewrote and rewrote. As in poetry, every word must contribute to the whole.

The stories for anthologies also gave me a way to test characters and settings that I might carry over into novels. I just read an old story that I had considered turning into a mystery series. Then my Show Me series took off, and I forgot about the other idea.

I still like it. I’m considering returning to the main characters and the setting, but this time for a series of linked short stories. These days writing 3,000 rather than 90,000 words appeals to me.

—Carolyn Mulford

Posted in Writing | Tagged Writing

Advice to My Younger Self

Carolyn Mulford Posted on May 9, 2024 by CarolynMay 9, 2024

What message would you give your younger self?

I didn’t want to answer that question, the topic for conversation at a recent lunch. My naïve teenage self knew little of life beyond my farming community, and the whole world has changed incredibly since then. Specific advice from my work as a writer or my griefs and gratifications as an adult would have meant little to me then.

Reluctantly I dredged up five general observations that might have helped me 70 years ago.

  1. Life is a learning process. Growth doesn’t stop in our twenties, or even fifties. You never know enough to consider your education complete. Respect the past, live in the present, anticipate the future.
  2. You will go places and do things you can’t imagine—and not do things you take for granted will be part of your future.
  3. Don’t let fear stop you from pursuing opportunities in both your professional and your personal life.
  4. Friends will become as close as family. You will enjoy and value family members more as an adult, but you will share the most with those you choose to embed in your life.
  5. A life without failure lacks adventure. If you try only those games or jobs or relationships in which you’re sure to succeed, you stunt your growth.

And my advice to myself on my 85th birthday: It ain’t over ’til it’s over.

—Carolyn Mulford

Posted in Uncategorized

My One-Room School

Carolyn Mulford Posted on April 30, 2024 by CarolynApril 30, 2024

In the 1940s, my sisters and I sometimes wore feedsack dresses, blouses, and skirts to the one-room school a half mile from our farm. Our family had a history there. My grandmother’s family had donated the land for the school, my father had received his eight years of education there, and my mother had met him while teaching there and spending her summers taking undergraduate courses.

On a typical day, we rushed to school to play a few minutes before the teacher rang the handbell at 8:55 for our 9 o’clock start. In mild weather, the dozen or so pupils in grades one through eight said the Pledge of Allegiance outside facing the flag.

We seated ourselves at old wood-and-metal double desks with the youngest children in the front rows. Each desktop had a hole for an inkwell, but the bottles of ink for our little-used fountain pens usually went onto the open shelf underneath with our few books, Big Chief tablets, pencils, and crayons.

The teacher had a big wood desk up front. Blackboards filled the back wall, and rolled-up maps of the world and the United States could be pulled down when needed. Big casement windows lined the north and south sides of the room. The left front corner hosted the World Book Encyclopedia and the pencil sharpener. An upright piano occupied the right front corner. In the back were a coal stove, coat hooks, and two metal cabinets containing textbooks and recreational reading.

Classes began with the first graders going to the teacher’s desk to read aloud from Dick and Jane books. The rest of us studied for our lessons to come, each class taking its turn with the teacher until the first recess. In that 15 minutes we raced to the outhouses (one for boys, one for girls) at the edge of the schoolyard, pumped water for a drink from the well beside the school, and enjoyed minutes on the swings, see-saw, or slide.

Then we returned inside for arithmetic, usually checking problems we’d completed on paper and working others on the blackboard. To cut down on the number of classes, the teacher taught fifth grade and seventh grade one year and sixth grade and eighth grade the next—except for arithmetic. That had to be studied in sequence.

Other major subjects were spelling, history, science, and geography. When a school program, such as a pie supper, was coming up, we adde music—mostly singing or playing little flutes called Tonettes or such rhythm band instruments as sticks, blocks of wood covered in sandpaper, bells, a triangle, and a drum.

Precisely at noon we ate lunch, typically soup from a thermos or a bologna or peanut butter sandwich, a piece of fruit, and cookies. In good weather we played outdoor games that kids of all ages could play, including group tag, May I, andy (ante) over, and baseball. In bad weather we often played jacks (using up to 40) or pick-up sticks on the teacher’s desk.

At 1 p.m., we took our seats, and the teacher read a chapter from a novel. In first grade I was spellbound by The Adventures of Tom Sawyer. Mark Twain remains one of my favorite writers.

We all looked forward to Friday afternoons. We cleaned the school and then chose teams for contests—finding places on the maps, working arithmetic problems on the blackboard, and holding a railroad spelling bee. In the last, a team captain spells railroad, and the other captain spells a word beginning with the final letter (d). The team members take turns spelling words beginning with the last letter of the last word spelled. Little kids could compete with the older ones by spelling simple words, especially ones that ended in x. Failure to think of a word or to spell it correctly eliminated the speller. The team with the last speller standing won.

The day ended at 4 p.m. No one stuck around to play. We all had chores—gathering eggs, pumping water, shelling corn, feeding animals—waiting for us at home.

The one-room schools in my county closed in the early 1950s right after my younger sister graduated from the eighth grade. With the school population dwindling and resources limited, the schools were no longer economically viable. From then on, the country kids rode school buses to schools in town.

Some schoolhouses survived a few years as community centers, private homes, or storage space for hay. Today you’re no more likely to see a one-room school than you are a feedsack dress.

—Carolyn Mulford

Posted in Historicals, The Feedsack Dress

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Celebrating July 4th by Making Ice Cream

Carolyn Mulford Posted on July 3, 2025 by CarolynJuly 3, 2025

In the 19040s, we celebrated July 4th by making ice cream. My mother saved extra milk, cream, and eggs to mix and heat with the junket, sugar, and vanilla.  She started soon after breakfast because the mix needed to set. Meanwhile my father cleaned up the green-painted wood freezer keg, and my younger sister and I brought a panful of cattle salt from the barn. Then the three of us took the pickup to the ice house in town to buy a 50-pound block of ice. My father used ice tongs to carry the ice to the pickup and, once … Continue reading →

Posted in Historicals, The Feedsack Dress, Young Adult | 2 Replies

4-H and Sewing in the 1940s

Carolyn Mulford Posted on June 30, 2025 by CarolynJune 30, 2025

4-H came to my rural community about two years after World War II ended. We had no other youth organizations available, so 4-H, led by two wonderful (female and male) county Extension agents, made a huge impact on us children—and our parents. As I recall, the whole community met at New Hope School (grades one through eight) to hear the agents describe the program and recruit adult volunteers to lead projects teaching practical skills ranging from sewing to raising calves. Then all the dozen or so kids nine or older signed up, elected officers (an unfamiliar task), and took the … Continue reading →

Posted in Historicals, The Feedsack Dress

I Am a River

Carolyn Mulford Posted on April 19, 2025 by CarolynApril 19, 2025

Each week I lunch with a group of friends and discuss a topic. Last time the coordinator posed this question: What is the shape of your life? The answers included a rectangle, a vase, a cloud, and an octagon. Usually I wing it, but this time I wrote my response. The Shape of My Life I am a river, Birthed in a puddle, Nourished by rain, Pushed to overflow And grow broader And deeper.   Springs and creeks fed my flow. Widening waters gathered force, Thrusting me against unyielding barriers And cascading me over rocky falls.   Other streams joined … Continue reading →

Posted in Uncategorized

Where to Find My Books

Carolyn Mulford Posted on April 1, 2025 by CarolynApril 1, 2025

While only one of my books, Show Me the Sinister Snowman, continues to be published in print and electronic editions, several of my novels are available from online sellers. Most of the copies are used, but columbiabooksonline.com, my supportive local bookstore, has a small stock of new Show Me hardbacks and paperbacks. I also have a few copies of all my novels except The Feedsack Dress, my historical children’s book, and Show Me the Murder, the first in my mystery series featuring a former spy returning   home and solving crimes with old friends. Fortunately e-editions still exist. Barnes and Noble … Continue reading →

Posted in Mysteries, The Feedsack Dress, Uncategorized

Looking Forward 60 Years Ago

Carolyn Mulford Posted on February 28, 2025 by CarolynFebruary 28, 2025

Reminders of my attempts to start my writing career arrived last Christmas. A friend, Joyce Campbell, sent me letters I had written to her while we were serving as Peace Corps Volunteers (teaching English) in Ethiopia from September 1962 to July 1964 and in the months after we returned home (Chattanooga, Tennessee, for her and Kirksville, Missouri, for me) after traveling through Europe. On December 21, 1964, I wrote, “Has anything turned up for you yet? People don’t seem terribly impressed with Peace Corps experience for job qualifications it seems to me. I’m going down to the University Placement Bureau … Continue reading →

Posted in Writing

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