Life On The Farm Christmas at the Murdock’s

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Heber & Effie Murdock, my grandparents farm in Heber, Utah Taken from Memories on The Farm 1916-1930 Uncle Mort Mudock rememers Christmas:

“Dad never could put a Christmas tree up that didn’t fall down. We knew the tree was going to fall down so we’d be ready to grab our toys and run.

We had candles on the tree, then we graduated, they sent away to Sears and Roebuck for some lights that were like Santy Claus and bears and birds. You’d turn them on and they’d get real hot and smell, the paint would smell and we thought that was a part of the smells of Christmas.

 

One year our Grandfather Murdock said there was a war on (WWI) and there will be no Christmas, no presents for anybody that meant everybody.  And so Mother thought that was the law so we didn’t get any Christmas presents that year. When we went over to Grandfather Murdock’s, they all used to go over there to fight each Sunday, they’d fight all the time, anyway Edith and Marilyn and all the other grandchildren had toys. My mother just cried and said “boy I didn’t know a thing about it, but now you’ve got me all upset.”

Christmas in Heber 1924
The Murdock’s Christmas 1924

Aunt Mary Murdock Stroud: “Mother was never able to get anything for us until Christmas Eve and then Dad would take the wheat and go into town. This one Christmas all the dolls were gone except this one doll. It was put out by the Sewing Hut Doll Company. It was wooden and had a real hair wig but the wig was just nailed on it’s head and it wasn’t very pretty but he brought that home.  It didn’t have any clothes on. Mother stayed up all night making it’s little dress and it had a little high chair that it sat in.  She was real upset, she worried and worried about that doll, but I thought it was kinda pretty when I woke up Christmas morning.  Dad brought a box of Chocolates that had been in the store window. They had all turned white. We still wanted to eat them, but Mother didn’t think it was safe. Mother never liked Christmas, she thought it was a miserable time.”

 

Mort says: “One time I got a pair of skates. Now in those days you got the skates that clamped on and those things were the worst dog goned things.  They’d pull your heels off the sides of your shoes and everything else.  Mother thought she would get me a pair of skates that stayed on and she got this pair of skates that stayed on and all the guys all teased me and said they were girl skates but I didn’t care what they were, they stayed on and I thought boy I got these skates now I’m gonna have more fun that a picnic that day.  It was my mother, she took the skates and skated all day long. The ditch was frozen over and I watched her till she gave out, and then I finally got to skate.

 

Christmas would have been a little poorer if it wasn’t for our Grandmother Morton who lived down in Kaysville. She ran some sort of little confectionery and hamburger stand and she used to send us a Christmas box, we’d all get candy and toys and Mary got a doll, I think she was the only girl in Heber that got a Negro baby doll for Christmas.”

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