Sepia Saturday 90: Francis Leda Stratton

Falling Out

The Sepia Saturday theme this week is little girls, Spain, or holidays. I've always wanted to go to Spain but haven't yet made it.  So, I'm picking up on the theme of girls with these two young girls who appear to have been captured for all eternity in the middle of an argument.

Frances Leda "Auntie Leda" Stratton (1878-1973) is on the right with an unknown friend. This expression must have been invaluable in controlling her first grade classes!  No doubt, they also hung their heads in contrition.

"Everyone knew her as Auntie Leda and remembered her fondly as their first grade teacher.  'Come, come, little folks,' she'd say, clapping her hands briskly, "do be quiet for me now."  The children almost always would.

Small and wiry, she never tired.  Was one secret of her patience her constant knitting?  She never dropped a stitch while closely eyeing the blackboard and her pupils.  Generations later, newcomers to the town objected to the practice.  Former students who recalled their kind teacher with the clicking needles and large class were annoyed by the criticism.

Miss Stratton taught until she was 84.  Her record of 63 years of continuous teaching stood as a national record.  When applying for social security in 1963, she discovered that she was still listed as "Baby Stratton" in the Lee records.  The town clerk then added her name, Frances Leda.  (Her birth in 1878 was premature, and for weeks her parents had feared to name her.)

Until she was 90 Auntie Leda shopped downstreet, a birdlike figure who darted in and out of the supermarket aisles, chatting with her former pupils.  She had cared for at least 2,200 children."

Sources:
Consolati, Florence.  See all the People.  Lee: self-published, 1978.

This is just one of several photos posted as part of Sepia Saturday.  See Sepia Saturday and click on the links to other blogs to see more.

Sepia Saturday 89: Asa Manchester, Buckeye Plumbing and Heating

Picking up on the thread of store fronts, I selected this photograph of Buckeye Plumbing & Heating with Asa Manchester standing in the far left of the picture. This is a restoration of a badly damaged photograph. The lower left corner was almost entirely missing and the photograph was badly faded.

Based on Asa's estimated age in the photograph (about 30ish) and a 1902-03 Dayton Directory listing for Buckeye Plumbing and Heating, I suspect this photo was taken ca 1900. The identities of the two other gentlemen in the photograph are unknown. One possibility is J. Volney Russell, manager of Buckeye Plumbing in 1902.

This is my first contribution to Sepia Saturday having just learned about it today!  I hope to have larger pictures and links to online catalogs up and running soon.