Our friends in Minnesota told us about a local baby born 17 lbs. +...they said they put shoes on him, handed him a lunchbox, and stuck him on the school bus. Neysa ----- Original Message ----- From: Darrell A. Martin To: [email protected] Sent: Saturday, February 12, 2011 7:10 PM Subject: Re: [VERMONT] Sherburne 12/11/1885 On 2/11/2011 9:16 PM, Ruth Barton wrote: > Sylvia, I don't wonder at your response, I had to read it several times > before I "got it." As others have already stated it is a rather oblique > birth announcement. There are several others in a similar vein. I don't > know whether they were trying to be cute or if the Victorian times caught > up with them and the "upper crust" didn't talk about crass things like > giving birth. > > Just a sign of the times, I guess. Ruth Ruth: I don't know about Victorian times; people shared a lot more of their personal lives than we do today. To me, the announcement was humorous because the baby was "big enough to be confused with a new hired man" at 9 pounds plus. (I was 9 pounds 3 ounces at birth, but somehow escaped the "hired man" label.) Reporters were certainly given more latitude in their phrasing in the 19th Century than we get in the mainstream media today. The Internet is a different story.... Darrell *************************************** List Guidelines: http://home.sprynet.com/~darrellm/list_rules.htm Visit the Gateway to Vermont Web Site: http://www.rootsweb.com/~vermont/ ------------------------------- To unsubscribe from the list, please send an email to [email protected] with the word 'unsubscribe' without the quotes in the subject and the body of the message

On 2/12/2011 6:47 PM, Neysa wrote: > Our friends in Minnesota told us about a local baby born 17 lbs. +...they said they put shoes on him, handed him a lunchbox, and stuck him on the school bus. > Neysa Neysa: He probably had to take the cigar out of his mouth to explain they wouldn't take him in kindergarten. Darrell