My grandmother, Lina Dreher, was sixteen when she kept this diary. She worked as a store clerk in the family bakery/ice cream parlor. In this excerpt, she mentions visiting the grave of sibling Em (now deceased from tuberculosis). She also mentions her surviving sisters: Helen, Hattie, Mary, Tillie, and brother, Joe. She refers to her mother as Mamie and her dad as the old gent.

August 3rd

Went to the crematory today to put the dove there (Tillie and Mamie forgot it) and also to get the keys. Talk about your hard luck. Why it certainly does come in bunches. Here is a synopsis of ours; Em dead, Mama ailing, this week Hattie and Joe out of work, Tillie just feeling better and the old gent cranky!

August 4th

One day, Helen got a hold of Mrs. Wachenfeld’s cat and she said to it, “Gee, you’re twenty years old and no good for anything, and whatever you eat, you vomit. Em had to die and she was only twenty. We ought to kill you or something!”

August 6th

I guess I never ate so much [ice] cream in my life as I do since we are in business. Why I think nothing of eating two or three sundaes a day! And I can see myself getting fatter. I wonder how much I weigh; must be at least 125 lbs.

August 8th

Still reading The Wandering Jew.

Got notice from the Board of Health to put a screen door in the bakery and to put netting in the store windows. They’re after us every week almost because they are located only a few doors away from us.

August 9th

Worked as usual. Closed the store at 12 o’clock and got home sometime later. Took in $41.90 and last Saturday, $47.32. You can already notice the increase. 

August 11th

The Old Town Church has open air meetings composed of songs and lectures every Sunday, and this day when everyone was so nicely seated, it started to pour! You ought to see the scramble the people made trying to get inside of the church. (These lectures are illustrated by lantern slides).

August 12th  

We’re having awful trouble with little red ants lately. When we put sweet things in the windows they are swarmed with ants in no time.

August 13th

Today after I went home leaving Mary and Tillie alone [in the bakery], this is what happened:

Mary asked Tillie to get her a book from the library on Tillie’s card. Tillie wouldn’t do so. “If you want a book, get it yourself, you can have my card.” After a little hesitation, Mary at last went.

Tillie began to get anxious for Mary was gone very long. At length, Tillie got angry. She thought Mary was picking out too long, but this is what happened:

Mary was so busy picking out her book that she didn’t take notice of what was going on around her. At last she chose a book and took it to the desk, and to her surprise, no one was there. She looked all around and seeing she was all alone, she got frightened. She knew she was locked in!

She tried the door. It was locked. She tried the windows. There were all locked. She went downstairs into the basement. That door was locked. She spied the telephone and thought, “I’ll call the bakery.” But she couldn’t remember the number. She thought of calling the police, but she first tried the windows once more. She found one that opened. It was about eight feet from the ground. Leaving the book and Tillie’s card behind, she jumped and came home!

To be continued…