As many readers know, your Westfield Historian is blessed to have her 94-year-old mother nearby, and she is still “as sharp as a tack.” As 94-year-old mothers who are also great-grandmothers are wont to do, Fran Anderson is busily sorting through her collections of memorabilia, discarding as much as possible, giving away items that may be of interest to the younger family members and still holding on to few items or “ephemera” that are too precious to yet let go.
One of the items located recently was a photocopy of a poem that was written by Billie Dibble, which she had given to my mother with the following note: “I wrote this when I couldn’t find anything suitable for ‘Toast to Daughters’ for Mother Daughter Banquet.” It was signed Billie Dibble, but there is no date anywhere on the sheet of paper, which appears to have been photocopied from three note-sheets laid side by side and numbered 1, 2, 3. Mother gave the poem to me, and we agreed that it would be another bit of history to share with the readers of both Dibble’s Dabbles and BeeLines. So please enjoy.
Home — With Young Folks, Feminine Gender
Noise
Toys
Eventually – boys
Wiggles
Giggles
Odd mittens
Stray kittens
Puppies
Guppies
Screen doors banging
Clothes — not hanging
Building blocks
Lines full of socks
Collections of rocks
Mending
Unending
Immunization shots
In package lots
Measles, chicken-pox and mumps
Cuts, bruises, egg-shaped bumps
A thousand nightly trips up-stairs
For tuck-in kisses and good-night prayers
Many an excited shout
When a tooth comes in or a tooth comes out
Nursery rhymes
Tooth-fairy dimes
Lucy Locket
Davey Crockett
Picking posies
Ring-around-rosies
Rub-a-dub-dub
Ring around tub
Trips to the zoo
Captain Kangaroo
Finger paints-modeling clay
Messy mud pies — paper mache’
Butterflies caught and butterflies freed
Shoes enough for a centipede
Kiddy-cars, skates, tricycles
Graduating into bicycles
(My Stars!
Soon they’ll want cars)
Shampooed and braided tresses
Playtime jeans and Sunday dresses
Dolls, balls, tops, boats
Lots of crinoline petticoats
Christmas and birthday celebrations
Always shared with our relations
Golden Rule
Sunday School
Sisterly bouts
Girl Scouts
Home work — wrong answers by dad
Report cards good — report cards bad
Learning music and other skills
And bills and bills and bills and bills
Squeaking clarinet – high school band
Parents too ancient to understand
I’ve mentioned only an occasional item
This thing could go on ad infinitum
Though we just can’t find words to suit you,
Our darling daughters, we salute you!
Marybelle Beigh is the current Public Historian for the Town and Village of Westfield. Her office is located at 3 East Main Street in Westfield, N.Y, 14787 — inside Parkview Ice Cream Parlor. Her scheduled office hours are Monday through Friday 9 to 11 a.m.; other hours by appointment.
Beigh can be reached at westfieldhistorian@fairpoint.net or by calling 326-2457 (office), 326-6171 (home) or 397-9254 (cell).
