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Kathy Hinkle has a wonderful 1915 Sears Roebuck catalog - #115 to be exact. 
In it is a picture of a “solid oak, leather upholstered, hair stuffed,
beautifully tufted Sleepy Hollow Rocker”. It will be sent to you “absolutely
free” ---- for $275.00 in profit sharing certificates.
Which brings up the question of what were “profit sharing certificates”? For
those of us who collected S & H (Sperry and Hutchinsons?) green stamps to
acquire our first electric toaster or silver teapot (gasp!) --- well, you get
the idea.
But $275.00 in 1915! (one profit sharing certificate was issued for every
dollar spent with Sears.)
For once, Rezzy wishes that being a computer nut was a personal characteristic.
Probably one of you who has gone willingly into the twenty-first century could
tell us:
What was the hourly rate for domestic help in 1915?
How much did a man's suit cost?
How much did a kitchen chair cost? (Bet a dollar would be a fair guess.)
Rezzy does know that the going rate for a doctor who delivered a healthy baby -
home delivery - was $15.00. And even then - in small towns - doctors were part
of the prosperous class.
That $275.00 you would have to spend for the freebie “Sleepy Hollow Rocker” is
a clear example of why the Sears Catalog was a wish book!
Enough speculation. Kathy's catalog seems to have been a special edition for
their own brand name
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photographic supplies. Pricey items! Here's an example: A Sears 4” X 5” box
camera - $1.78 Tourist's Field Glasses - $6.60 Gold filled spectacles - $1.85
You get the idea? Rezzy's guess is that most families would have saved “profit
sharing certificates” for a couple of years before they could put that “Sleepy
Hollow Rocker” in the back parlor!
For some of us at St. Simeon's breakfast is a favorite meal. Is it because it
heralds a new day? Hard to say.
The variety of expectations of breakfast is probably due to our childhood
patterns of eating. Certainly the French, the Germans, the English, the Dutch,
and the Americans have widely differing habits traditionally.
Think of the advantages of a Bed and Breakfast that advertised “Full English
Breakfast.” A generation ago staying there meant one's tourist dollar could be
stretched no end. Eat it at the last hour that it would be served and skip
lunch. Budget had to include only one other meal a day!
Closer to home, a New England breakfast served in a Tourist Home - back in the
30's of the last century - meant hot cereal, fish cakes or ham or bacon, eggs -
scrambled, fried, poached or coddled - and cake, cookies or pie. Homemade, of
course.
The Pennsylvania Dutch country matched that with fried mush or hotcakes as a
possibility. (How breakfast was served in the South or the Plains, or the West
was no part of Rezzy's experience ---anybody want to fill in those blanks? This
space is always available for your reminiscences, comments, and criticisms.)
Write REZZY DENT about
sights and sounds
you notice here
at Saint Simeon's!
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