July 08, 2022

"Reminiscences"

I have been reading the book presented in this Musing lately, and found the author's memories and literary images of her holidays and travel very interesting when juxtaposed with the scenes and commentary I was seeing on the news of this past 4th of July holiday weekend.  I wonder what it will be like for someone to read/see these modern day accounts of holiday travel in 100 or 200 years, and how different they will be?  I picked out a few quotes that really stood out for me.  I hope you enjoy this Musing.

Mary Janette Elmore, The Author

 Mary Janette Elmore, date unknown,
photograph courtesy of Gary Pitcock.

Mary Janette Elmore, born in 1832, and her brother, Samuel Edward Elmore, were the seventh generation of Elmores in Connecticut.

In 1636, Edward Elmore, the first ancestor to come to America, traveled with Rev. Thomas Hooker from Newton MA, to settle in Hartford and, in 1660, became owner of a “three-mile lot” of land on the east side of the Great River (now known as the Connecticut River).

Mary Janette's great-grandfather was the first to move inland, on a rise now known as Long Hill, in what would eventually become known as the town of South Windsor.

"As I look backward it seems as though this part of the world in which we lived was very quiet and still. We heard no rumbling of cars, no "steam-whistles" on cars, or factories, or mills...People did not seem to be so restless, so desirous of frequent changes, nor care to move about so quickly from one place to another.  There was not that hurry and rush in work and business that is so common now.  They seldom left home for long journeys unless business required it."-Mary Janette Elmore

This was where Mary Janette lived her entire life, attended her first school, and was later an active member of the Long Hill Missionary Circle, holding Sunday school in her dining room and high teas in her yard.

In her 80th year, 1911, Mary Janette wrote about her childhood and memories, which she called “Reminiscences,” and dedicated “this little record of our early days” to her brother. 

 Above text from "Images of America South Windsor", Lobdell,
above image courtesy of Gary Pitcock.

In 1976, the South Windsor Historical Society published the manuscript under the title “Long Hill.”

Learn more about the Elmore Family, and the Long Hill section of South Windsor during our program "Hidden in Plain Sight"  a bus tour of South Windsor.

 Mary Janette Elmore,  date unknown,
Photograph courtesy of Gary Pitcock.

"My first visit to the seashore ("salt-water", we used to say), was October 4, 1843, when father hired a light buggy of a carriage maker, and took Aunt Hannah and me to Guilford for a week's stay. The man charged only $1.50 for the wagon. I still remember the pleasant ride through so many towns sometimes by a stream of running water, near overhanging rocks, and again through pleasant woods or fertile meadows.”- Mary Janette Elmore

Sources used in this Musing:

*Elmore, Mary Janette, Long Hill South Windsor Connecticut "Reminiscences", South Windsor Historical Society Inc., 1976

*Lobdell, Claire, Images of America: South Windsor, Arcadia Publishing, 2017

*Notable South Windsor Women, Mary Janette Elmore, online exhibit curated by Friends of Wood Memorial Library & Museum, 2020, located on the FWMLM website.

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