The Rural Voice, 1996-12, Page 30A photograph from the Doon collection shows a Scottish farm family in front of their sparsely -decorated Christmas tree.
People are often
disappointed when
Elizabeth Hardin
tells them what a
Christmas on the farm
was like at the turn of the
century. From the
research she has done as
part of her work at Doon
Heritage Crossroads in
Kitchener, Hardin says a
farm Christmas in the
1900 to 1914 era was
"not the elaborate
Victorian Christmas
people picture."
A farm Christmas in western
Ontario, she says, was a much
simpler occasion with not as much
planning involved. It was a more
religious holiday with going to
church a big part of the observation
of this most holy of Christian
celebrations. In some cases, she says,
there is evidence of people visiting
churches of other denominations, a
Scottish Presbyterian family, for
instance, attending a Lutheran
church.
Farm families celebrated in a quiet way in
A turn -of -the -century
farm Christmas
By Keith Roulston
(Photographs courtesy Doon Heritage Crossroads)
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26 THE RURAL VOICE
Old Order Mennonites, at that
time, had different Sundays specified
on their church calender for different
meeting houses. Christmas was one
of those days and if the meeting
house was close enough to the farm,
the family would attend. If not, the
family would spend this solemn
occasion at home or with friends and
family.
On all farms, Hardin says, it
remained a day much like any other
with livestock to be fed, cows to be
milked and stables to be cleaned.
The focus of the
celebration was the family
and close friends. If the
weather was good, the
family might get out the
sleigh and go to visit
relatives or neighbours, she
says. "I don't get the sense
there were major open
houses of gala
celebrations," Hardin says.
If they couldn't get out to
visit, the new-fangled
invention of the telephone
might come into play for
those families fortunate enough to
have one. It would be a chance to talk
to neighbours or a rare occasion to
telephone family members at a
greater distance.
It was an era of making your own
amusement, she says. Music was
often a part of family celebrations. A
photograph of an Amulree family in
the Doon collection shows the family
gathered around the pump organ in
the parlour (it was a time when there
were many organ and piano factories
in Canada) with some members