This article was meant for the week after the 4th of July, but it kept getting pushed back by other topics.
As I looked through several files and other sources, I found few references to the 4th of July. I did come across a reference to an annual clambake in Marion, although it didn’t say where it was held.
What I did find was a letter written on July 4, 1880, to Frank Rounseville from his mother, Roxanna Rounseville. Pictured here is the family home. The letters Roxanna wrote were more like a journal that she kept for her son until he returned from his whaling voyage. She felt this would be a good way for him to catch up on what happened in town and with the family while he was away at sea.
July 4, 1880, was a Sunday. Back then, it meant it would be a quiet day with the “usual stir” on Monday, July 5. Other than the clambake, she doesn’t mention any other activities, but she did have a bit of a “stir” in her own home on July 3.
Two younger brothers, Allie and Horace, decided to play with some “firecrackers.” Allie got burned quite badly when he leaned too far forward to blow on one of them to make it burn faster. He singed his hair and burned his forehead but fortunately didn’t “put his eyes out.” (This is all conveyed in a seemingly calm way.) Horace also got into trouble when he decided to light his firecrackers in the stove.
The Rounseville household must have been quite exciting. It’s hard to discern from her writing how she felt about all those firecrackers in her kitchen. She does write, “You must ask them when you write if they don’t want you to bring them some firecrackers.” I’m assuming that was sarcasm.
By Connie Eshbach
