"Well and faithfully done. Enter into My joy.” ~ Aunt Kate

As I imagine Aunt Kate 

sitting at her table writing her stories.
But her dress wouldn't have so much sparkle.

Dear Reader's, 

I am going to finish this story tonight. I know it has been a long read but I hope it has given you a taste of what it would have been like to live in Aunt Kates day and time. 

Chapter 19

I am thankful to be able to write that I had no failures in the fifteen years that I was there. The "not so bright" were worked with until they were able to pass on with there class. The second year I was there I had a ninth grade in addition to the regular eight grades. And I often wondered how I did it, but thankfully I did. 

At the close of my last year in Eureka, I went to Stockton and applied for the Lammersville District School in San Joaquin County. 

I shall always appreciate the favorable recommendation that the Superintendent of schools gave me. And another thing which will always make my heart feel grateful is the remembrance of the kind reception given to me by the trustees of Lammersville and their gracious wives. I wonder if they realize how much their warm welcome meant to me a stranger.

Lammersville, like Eureka, is a one room school, and has all the grades. When I first came here, the homes in the district were owned by the families occupying them. Now those people are no longer here and practically all of the places are rented for different periods of times, as dairy farms, thus making a floating population in this district. 

As in Eureka, I had a receiving class at the beginning of each year and a graduating class at the close. Out of the fifteen graduating classes that went from Lammersville, there were but two pupils that had been mine through all of the grades. 

While teaching at Lammersville, I boarded three years with a family in the district, and the other twelve years in Tracy, which is about four miles from Lammersville. I rode to and fro on the high school bus traveling around the country in morning for miles and miles before I reached my school. And then four miles back home in the evening. I enjoyed the ride and the new faces that came aboard at the beginning of each new year to take the places of the departing group. 

Conclusion

Those thirty one years that I spent in the school room were very busy years. I almost always had a large school, the attendance hardly ever fell below thirty pupils and several years reaching forty five. It meant work, patience, enthusiasm, diplomacy, and then victory. I cannot describe feeling of exaltation in my soul when after months of trying, the boy of long ago, recognized his first printed word. And when Freda, a few years later, could find the word "come" among a page full of other words, it was a glorious feeling to know I had accomplished something that had seemed, to all who knew her, impossible. For all of these opportunities of the past, I am truly thankful today. 

I entered the school room in 1907 at the age of forty six. I had raised a family who were now all old enough not to need my care in the same way that they had required when they were younger. I ended my teaching career in 1938 at the age of seventy seven. I have written this account of my life at the request of my friends who say that it is inspirational. To me it doesn't seem so. It has been doing my best from day to day with the best of my ability and in the most part trying to avoid feeling sorry for myself. There are thousands of other women who have done and are still doing Life's Work as it comes to their hands. 

I do not say that my work is finished. No one's work is ever done until the call comes to close Life's book. When that call comes for me I hope to be able to say in the words of the old hymn, "I have fought my way through. I have finished the work Thou dids't give me to do." May my ears not be too dull to hear the blest words, "Well and faithfully done. Enter into My joy.”

Daniel Hackett Pillsbury and Bridget Delia Curley were my Great Great Grandparents and the first Pillsbury's in California. 

Love,
Grammy T.

The last time I saw her she was reading the Bible to her father.~Aunt kate

Niece and nephews of Aunt Kate celebrating their Irish

Chapter 18 (cont.)

Another pupil at Glen Ellen, a girl, was born feeble minded. I taught her to read, write and spell, and when she left my school, she could write a very interesting letter. The last I heard of her was that she was caring for some of the younger children of the institution, washing and dressing them in the mornings and reading to them and putting them to bed at night. I know how happy that must make her. The last time I saw her, ten or twelve years ago, she was reading the Bible to her father. 


Another pupil, a bright boy, was stricken with infantile paralysis in the first part of his forth grade year. His parents moved into a house quit near to where I lived, and when he was able to stand it, they carried him across the street to my place and during the years he finished the fourth, fifth and sixth grades. When he reached the seventh grade he was able, with the aid of a cane, by starting his journey by seven thirty o'clock, to arrive at the school house in time for school. 


There were others who were handicapped in other ways, by poverty, home conditions, by a low order of mentality, and on account of these circumstances they were persecuted by their more fortunate school mates. This I was able to stop very easily. There were some pupils in the school with very good dispositions and by appealing to their sense of kindness and fair play, they were brought to see how very cruel they had been and were willing and eager to make amends. 

"The little children had come, baby teeth shining, and faces glowing"~Aunt Kate

Aunt kate

I know it is hard to have the time to read a long page. I am going to split Chapter 18 so that you can read it faster. 

Chapter 18

Leaving this home place was not easy. This part of the country had been my home since 1875. In the Eureka District I had passed the greater part of my school life and a number of my school mates were still living here. Here I had been married and my children born. In this place I have known about the joys and sorrows that usually enter into any one persons life. The people had been as my own people for so long a time that it was hard to part with them. 

During the fifteen years of my school teaching here, at the beginning of the term those trusting little children had come, baby teeth shining, and faces glowing, and had gone on from one grade to the next until they had graduated, and had known no other teacher. For fifteen years at the beginning of every term a beginner's class, at it's close a graduating class. What a glorious opportunity I had for doing good. 

During those years I had more to do for the handicapped children than falls to the lot of many teachers. There was a boy who was sent to me, and as I see it now, if God hadn't been with me every minute of the time, I could never had done anything for him. As it was I took him through the grades to the sixth, when his parents moved away. He is now a man thirty seven years of age, and anyone not knowing his history would think he never could be anyway but normal. 

(to be continued)

You were so awesome Aunt Kate, I love you!!

Love,
Grammy T.