But life was not all labor. There was now and then a wonderful ball at Big Rapids, then a booming lumber town. When it was impossible to get any sort of a team to make the journey, they went down the river on a raft, taking their party dresses in trunks. As balls, like other good things in pioneer experience, were all too rare, it was the custom to make the most of each occasion by changing one's costume at midnight, and thus starting off with fresh enthusiasm to dance the "money musk" and the "Virginia reel" in the small hours.
"Our costumes in those days had at least the spice of originality," said Miss Shaw with a reminiscent smile. "I well remember a certain gay ball gown of my own, made of bedroom chintz; and the home-tailored trousers of my gallant swain, whose economical mother had employed flour sacks, on which the local firm-name and the guarantee, '96 pounds,' appeared indelibly imprinted. A blue flannel shirt and a festive yellow sash completed his interesting outfit."
When Anna Shaw was fifteen she began to teach in the little log schoolhouse of the settlement for two dollars a week and "board round." The day's work often meant a walk of from three to six miles, a trip to the woods for fuel, the making of the wood fire and the partial drying of rain-soaked clothes, before instruction began. Then imagine the child of fifteen teaching fifteen children of assorted ages and dispositions out of fifteen different "reading books," most of which she had herself supplied. "I remember that one little girl read from a hymn-book, while another had an almanac," she said.
As there was no money for such luxuries as education until the dog-tax had been collected, the young teacher received one bright spring day the dazzling sum of twenty-six dollars for the entire term of thirteen weeks. In the spending of this wealth, spring and youth carried the day. Joan of Arc and the preaching in the woods were for the time forgotten; she longed above everything else to have some of the pretty things that all girls love. Making a pilgrimage to a real shop, she bought her first real party dress—a splendid creation of rich magenta color, elaborately decorated with black braid.
Perhaps she regretted all too soon the rashness of this expenditure, for the next year brought hard times. War had been declared, and Lincoln's call for troops had taken all the able-bodied men of the community. "When news came that Fort Sumter had been fired on," said Miss Shaw, "our men were threshing. I remember seeing a man ride up on horseback, shouting out Lincoln's demand for troops and explaining that a regiment was being formed at Big Rapids. Before he had finished speaking the men on the machine had leaped to the ground and rushed off to enlist, my brother Jack, who had recently joined us, among them."
Anna Shaw was now the chief support of the little home in the wilderness, and the pitiful sum earned by teaching had to be eked out by boarding the workers from the lumber-camps and taking in sewing, in order to pay the taxes and meet the bare necessities of life. With calico selling for fifty cents a yard, coffee for a dollar a pound, and everything else in proportion, one cannot but marvel how the women and children managed to exist. They struggled along, with hearts heavy with anxiety for loved ones on the battle-fields, to do as best they could the work of the men—gathering in the crops, grinding the corn, and caring for the cattle—in addition to the homekeeping tasks of the daily round. It takes, perhaps, more courage and endurance to be a faithful member of the home army than it does to march into battle with bands playing and colors flying.
When, at the end of the war, the return of the father and brothers freed her from the responsibility for the upkeep of the home, Anna Shaw determined upon a bold step. Realizing that years must pass before she could save enough from her earnings as country school-teacher to go to college, she went to live with a married sister in Big Rapids and entered as a pupil in the high school there. The preceptress, Miss Lucy Foot, who was a college graduate and a woman of unusual strength of character, took a lively interest in the new student and encouraged her ambition to preach by putting her in the classes in public speaking and debating.
"I vividly remember my first recitation in public," said Miss Shaw. "I was so overcome by the impressiveness of the audience and the occasion, and so appalled at my own boldness in standing there, that I sank in a faint on the platform. Sympathetic classmates carried me out and revived me, after which they naturally assumed that the entertainment I furnished was over for the evening. I, however, felt that if I let that failure stand against me I could never afterward speak in public; and within ten minutes, notwithstanding the protests of my friends, I was back in the hall and beginning my recitation a second time. The audience gave me its eager attention. Possibly it hoped to see me topple off the platform again, but nothing of the sort occurred. I went through the recitation with self-possession and received some friendly applause at the end."
After this maiden speech, the young girl appeared frequently in public, now in school debates, now in amateur theatricals. It was as if the Fates had her case particularly in hand at this time, for everything seemed to further the secret longing that had possessed her ever since the days when she had preached to the trees in the forest.
There was a growing sentiment in favor of licensing women to preach in the Methodist Church, and Dr. Peck, the presiding elder of the Big Rapids district, who was chief among the advocates of the movement, was anxious to present the first woman candidate for the ministry. Meeting the alert, ardent young student at the home of her teacher, Dr. Peck took pains to draw her into conversation. Soon she was talking freely, with eager animation, and her questioner was listening with interest, nodding approval now and then. Then an amazing thing happened. Dr. Peck looked at her smilingly and asked in an off-hand manner: