Birthday Book

I came upon some little treasures that I have been studying in detail since my mother handed them to me a month or two ago. They are the “birthday books” that belonged to my grandmother, Audrey Polifka Larson, and her sister, my great aunt, LaVanche Polifka Solvie Gill. Perhaps you or your mother or grandmother had such a book. These little books are about 3” x 4”, sometimes made of leather or faux leather, bound just as a larger book.

Birthday books were very popular at the beginning of the 20th century. On the cover of the three books that belonged to LaVanche and Audrey were the titles, “The Girls Birthday Book,” “My Friend Birthday Book,” and “Favorite Poets Birthday Book.” The books are divided into the months of the year, with a small space after each day of each month, in which friends, relatives, and dinner or house guests would sign their name and in most cases, the year they were born. Very often notes and dates were written in at some point afterward indicating perhaps a death date, or a married name added to a girl who was single at the time she signed. In many cases, the date that the person signed the book was also recorded.

At the beginning of each month there is often a poem by a famous poet, with proverbs, poems, or Bible verses scattered throughout the book. I love the little proverbs for which that era famous, whether those little sayings greeted the children as they came into the school room each day, or they found their way to the pages of these little birthday books. Here are a few examples:
· People who talk much say nothing.
· Let not your tongue cut your throat.
· Dry bread at home is better than roast meat abroad.
· A man without reason is out of season.
· The secret of success is constancy of purpose.
· A place for everything, and everything in its place.
· Little brooks make great rivers.
· Business may be troublesome, but idleness is pernicious.
· Muddles at home make husbands roam.
· One lie begets another.
· Four things that never return: the spoken word, the sped arrow, the past life, and the neglected opportunity.
· An old fox is not caught in a trap.
· There is great distance between “said” and “done.”
· Glasses and lasses are brittle ware.
· Birds are entangled by their feet, women by their tongues :-)

I can remember very clearly these little books sitting in prominent places in both my grandmother’s and great aunt’s homes. In fact I, myself, signed these books in the January 27 spot. I had forgotten that, at some point in my teenage years, in loopy teenager handwriting, I had entered the name of my beloved big fat gray cat, “Benjamin Figaro Leaf (1972)” in the appropriate spot – April 20. I had later entered “77,” indicating the year that Benjamin went to kitty heaven. I can imagine my sweet Grandma Aud looking over my shoulder, or perhaps leafing through the book later, with an amused grin on her face realizing I had entered the family pet into her treasured birthday book. Grandma was no fan of pets of any sort, but as special as we were to her [and her to us], I know she didn’t mind and, in fact, probably got a charge out of it.

Though I don’t remember anything about the contents, I remember leafing through these little books as I grew up, looking for familiar names as only a person with my fixation on names and dates would enjoy. The fact that in LaVanche’s birthday book are also listed important family facts and dates, attests to the importance of her little birthday book. For example, she lists the names of her great grandparents, Anna and John Polifka (born in 1816 and 1809), the date they were married, and that the “came to America from River Rhine, Germany.” It is the type of information that one writes in important places, similar to what you might see in a Bible. Grandma Aud’s book lists, in the front, in her handwriting, her travels and the year she took those travels. She mentions a trip to Oregon in 1945 (no doubt to visit her sister, Myrtle), Montana in 1967, East Coast in 1971 (with our family; I remember it so well), a Ready reunion in Montana in 1979, etc. Clearly these birthday books were treasured by both of them.

What a thrill, now, to leaf through these books and see the handwritten signatures of so many of the people who I have gotten to know so well in the process of writing THE TENNEY QUILT. Mrs. Parks (Elizabeth), whom I learned was the “postmistress” of Tenney for a period of time, signed LaVanche’s book in beautiful writing, citing her birth year of 1864. Gertie Kapitan, one of my favorite Tenney women, though I never knew her personally, signed the book, as did several of the other women I highlighted in THE TENNEY QUILT: Linna Gordhamer, Marie Hadwick, Nellie Dalgarno Dopp, and others. I saw for, the first time in my memory, the signatures of my great grandparents, Helen and John P. Polifka. There is something about knowing that they had a pen in their hand and wrote the actual signatures that are in these books that is special to me. Yes, I am a sentimental, sappy fool, but what came to mind as I read these signatures, was a mental image of Lydia Kath running her fingers over the contours of the Tenney Quilt a month or so ago in Tenney, touching the embroidered signatures of her husband and other loved ones as she focused so intently. Such things have a way of transporting a person to another place and time.

I saw the Tenney names that have become so familiar; there were Jankes and Kuentzels. There were Waites and Hiatts and Gores and O’Laughlins. Who would have thought that seeing the name Ethel Roach would be such a kick? And there was Harry Pithey and Lois Wittman, who signed the book as a young, single woman, just as she was when she signed the Tenney Quilt. Jennie Waite, who appeared front and center on my favorite Tenney photo, appears, with her birth year, 1856, next to her signature. Myrtle Janke and Jack Richardson and Madge Dawson signed the birthday book. Jeanette Iler, my mother’s childhood friend, appears on the May 13th spot, along with Tenney farmer John (Jack) Glock. Lillie Scott, with 1878 next to her name, lived in the Tenney Church parsonage for a time, and signed Audrey’s birthday book, along with her twin offspring, Percy and Elsie. There are Vosses and Pitheys and Dopps.

What a treasure! I feel as though I know these people. Tenney has become very real throughout the process of writing the book and, even more so, through meeting and talking with so many of you who, like me, have a fond connection to Tenney. Keep in touch, and keep sharing those Tenney stories with me. I love to hear them.