PREFACE
The average home to-day has conveniences to meet the demands of comfortable living. The heating and lighting are good. In nearly every home may be found a living room where the family assembles for rest and recreation. Here they read, sew, chat, and discuss the news. Similar scenes occurred in the colonial days, but in quite a different room. The kitchen took the place of our modern living room. The life of the colonists centered in it, for in the kitchen was the fireplace, often the one source of heat in the whole house. Its warmth and cheer and its use as a place for cooking made it the heart of the home. Here it was that the family interests and activities were centered; all the family group collected here to share the joys and sorrows of life.
HOW THE STORY CAME TO BE WRITTEN
A Father came into the Newark Museum to ask help of the educational adviser.
“I cannot get my children interested in their ancestors,” said he. “They don’t feel any pride in being descended from a lady who came over in the Mayflower. They say, ‘Oh, Charlie’s uncle came over in a private yacht, and Mike’s brother is going over in an aeroplane.’ What shall I do? If we were living at the old homestead, I could show them the hole in the shutter through which the Indian shot their great-uncle, and the oven by the fireside where their great-grandmother cooked for the continental soldiers, and the wedding dress of their grandmother. But the old place was sold, and everything is scattered.”
“Bring your children to the Museum,” said the educational adviser. “We will show them colonial costumes and candle-molds and Indian arrows.”
“I’ll try it,” said the father, “but it won’t be the same.”
Then came a teacher.
“I wish,” said she, “that I could make history alive to my pupils. They don’t care how many men were killed in the battle of Monmouth, or what the date was when Washington crossed the Delaware.”
“We will send you some dolls in colonial costume and an old wool-carder,” said the educational adviser.