Part One: End of an Era – Was the Mauve Decade Really the Gay Nineties?
Annabelle woke up on a hot July morning in 1899. Even at four o’clock in the morning she could feel the air beginning to burn up. Although she dreaded getting up, she knew if mister and misses Supra woke up and she did not have breakfast ready, she would be beaten, at best. Seeing as she was unmarried at the age of twenty-two and already three years out of primary school, she realized that she would never find another job, not being a woman. But that would all change once she was accepted at the Columbia Female College in South Carolina. (Drahos) That is, she hoped to be accepted. Annabelle had been saving every extra penny for nearly seven years now. Four years tuition at two hundred dollars a year. (Derks, 20)
There had been a lot of things she could have spent that money on in seven years. Food, clothes, a show now and then, any one of those could have earned her a husband by now. After all a good corset was only a dollar from Warner’s, Dongola button shoes were just a dollar fifty and a nice skirt would only set her back two and a half dollars. (Derks, 18) Of course, that was only two weeks’ wages. Two more weeks she would have to work scrubbing pots, cooking, cleaning, and babysitting, all for the horrid Supra’s. Besides, she had had many an offer from suitors before, the first coming when she was only fourteen and shortly after her parents died. He mother Eva from tuberculosis and her father Frank from influenza, sadly only weeks apart from one another. (Drahos) But she wasn’t alone.
Down the road her friend Mary Ann lost the only parent she had left, her father Jacob. She had been smarter than the other girl, many said. While Annabelle struggled to find a way to make it without selling herself as a house maid, Mary Ann settled for Robert Pirrot, a man fifteen years her senior. At thirteen years old she had become a step mother and unpaid servant. Annabelle thought nothing of it, that was the way a woman’s life was to be in the nineteenth century. Only her teacher thought any differently. She urged Annabelle to finish school and give herself a chance to become an individual. The woman even went as far as to allow her to attend school for free. Unfortunately the actual cost was devastating to the child. Many days she went hungry with no money to feed herself and nary a way to earn any. The woman child simply worked for a place to lay her head at night. Soon she discovered the Supras and worked out a plan. She would work before and after school and on the weekends the seven months school was in session. The other five Annabelle was to work every waking moment. This allowed her to not only earn a meager living, but also to finish school and have a stable home, though the price she paid was high. Mr. Supra was a violent mans who drank often. As Annabelle was not only young but also beautiful, he often took his emotions out on her. Many times she hoped that he would come home angry instead of drunk.
Partly because of her dire circumstance and partly because of her teacher’s kindness, she had decided to leave for college and become a teacher herself. Many girls both married and maiden had discovered that this was their only choice if they wished to lead an educated life, which was close to outlawed to women in 1899. (Drahos) That fall Annabelle finally had enough money to send her tuition, application, and her most inner dreams away to the Columbia Female College, whose main course was titled “Curricula on University Plan.” (Derks, 20) If accepted, she would then be allowed to take the teacher’s entrance exam at Grange Hall. (Drahos) With no family and no savings left, the exhausted soul waited for the response.
Six long weeks passed with Annabelle walking two miles each Saturday as she ran errands for Mrs. Supra in town. Each time she would stop at the post office and listen to the town gossip while anxiously checking to see if she had any mail. (Drahos) Finally, the second Saturday of September she found a letter waiting for her. With shaking hands she looked at the thing, sparse envelope. She carefully turned the package over, realizing that this small object held her entire future within. Slowly, she opened the letter. Inside was a solitary piece of parchment paper. She instantly realized the news had to be bad, of course they wouldn’t waste paper to tell her what a fool she was. Of course they would not accept her, she was not worthy. As she unfolded the paper, tears fell down her cheeks and several horrid questions flashed through her mind. Would all her dreams be crushed? Would she have to be a “free” slave for the rest of her life? Would she have to marry some stranger just to have any existence at all? Or could she in fact become something more? Would she be afforded the opportunity to soar above her circumstances?
Part Two: Life in This World – Are We Really Better Now?
I hope I’ve left you with some questions. I hope you can look and see some of Annabelle in yourselves, regardless of your stature or sex. Florence Wyse VandenBelt, a woman born in a small town called Empire in 1892 said, “During the passing years many changes have occurred, but I prefer to cling to my happy memories of the Empire of long ago.” (Drahos) In this essay I was to compare and contrast 1899 and 2007. I began this task by showing you what a young woman’s life would have been like in 1899. She was my age, and thought a lot like I do. But she lived a hundred and eight years ago. This woman’s circumstances are not much different from what many face today. Now I’d like to show you the year 1899 in review.
First, a few facts… Interesting births from the year include; Al Capone, Humphrey Bogart, Charles Best (co-discoverer of insulin), Alfred Butts (inventor of Scrabble©), Fred Astaire, E.B. White, and Ernest Hemingway, just to name a few. Inventions were a thing of the year, too. Aspirin was patented, as was the first lawn mower. The first US body shop was opened in Boston. A “refrigerating machine” was patented, and Carnation© made its first can of evaporated milk. (“Timeline”) In Saint Louis, Missouri a motor-driven vacuum (Kane) and the bicycle were both patented, as was the wooden golf tee. The first auto parts store was opened, also in Saint Louis. Meanwhile, in Italy the Fiat Company© opened its doors. (“Timeline)
Politics were not to be outdone in 1899. A peace treaty was signed between the US and Spain, ending the Spanish-American war. (Encyclopedia) Then again, only two days before that, the Philippine Insurrection began. The plague was covered up in San Francisco, to acknowledge its presence was a felony. But the plague also arrived in Hawaii that year. The Gideon Society began placing bibles in hotel rooms. A murder happened in Manhattan, the first vehicular homicide ever, by an “electric” taxi. Winston Churchill was captured twice while reporting for the Morning Post. An epidemic killed twelve thousand African Americans and eighteen thousand Caucasian Americans. One hundred and nineteen thousand more Africans barely lived through the Boer War, enslaved by the first concentration camp on record, owned and run by the British. Churchill reported on this also, of course. (“Timeline”)
All hope was not to be lost, though. The arts and humanities had a busy year in 1899, too. Lynn Riggs wrote what would later become the musical Oklahoma. Gustav Klimt painted the beautiful Nude Veritas. Rudyard Kipling wrote The White Man’s Burden while H.G. Wells authored When the Sleeper Wakes. Sir Arthur Evan discovered the awe inspiring Minoan civilization on the island of Crete and the great Monet painted the first of his Lily Pond series. (“Timeline”)
I believe that all of these advancements, what I prefer to call leaps of humanity, owe a great deal of servitude to the circumstances in which they were created. To write a novel about human suffering, on must suffer then soar above that suffering. To paint beauty and awe, one must acknowledge ugliness and sorrow. To create wonderment, one must know utter despair first. These are the human contrasts in the nude. I also believe that these two years, 1899 and 2007, are alike much in the way that human suffering is and was ever present for all to see. But, unlike in 1899, we of the year 2007 do not make the best of the worst. We choose to wallow in our despair, suffering and ugliness. Thinking only of ourselves, we fall into the pit of self agony. We choose to rescue those that must rescue themselves. Today, to know suffering is nothing, but to understand that suffering, to rise above it, that is the miracle.
Meanwhile, Annabelle not only fought her surroundings, she changed them. She knew if she wanted a better life, she would have to build it for herself. No one would come to her rescue; no one would guide her along the path. But she would become the first lady of her family to graduate college. More than that, she was the first woman in the still small town of Pleasant Plains, Arkansas to own her own successful business. She didn’t marry until 1906, and she did so on her own terms. (Fine) Annabelle Rojetshave’ is more than a story; she is an inspiration to men and women alike for a new generation of survivors.
Derks, Scott. The Value of a Dollar: Prices and Incomes in the United States, 1860-2004. Millerton: 2004. 14-20
Drahos, Marta Hepler. “Family: Marriage, Work Disease and Ice Skating.” Travers City Record Eagle. 21 Feb. 1999, sec D: 2+
Encyclopedia of American Facts and Dates, The. New York City: 1997. 384.
Fine, Kayla. “Annabelle the Great: An Interview with the Family of a Legend.” Anne Arundel College Observer. 11 Nov. 2005, sec. B: 3.
Kane, Joseph Nathan. Famous First Facts. USA: 1981. 805
“Timeline 1989-1899.’ Timelines of History. 2007. Timelines of History. 15 Feb. 2007.
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