Little Heathens: Hard Times and High Spirits on an Iowa Farm During the Great Depression [Hardcover]

Mildred Armstrong Kalish (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 29, 2007

I tell of a time, a place, and a way of life long gone. For many years I have had the urge to describe that treasure trove, lest it vanish forever. So, partly in response to the basic human instinct to share feelings and experiences, and partly for the sheer joy and excitement of it all, I report on my early life. It was quite a romp.

So begins Mildred Kalish’s story of growing up on her grandparents’ Iowa farm during the depths of the Great Depression. With her father banished from the household for mysterious transgressions, five-year-old Mildred and her family could easily have been overwhelmed by the challenge of simply trying to survive. This, however, is not a tale of suffering.

Kalish counts herself among the lucky of that era. She had caring grandparents who possessed—and valiantly tried to impose—all the pioneer virtues of their forebears, teachers who inspired and befriended her, and a barnyard full of animals ready to be tamed and loved. She and her siblings and their cousins from the farm across the way played as hard as they worked, running barefoot through the fields, as free and wild as they dared.

Filled with recipes and how-tos for everything from catching and skinning a rabbit to preparing homemade skin and hair beautifiers, apple cream pie, and the world’s best head cheese (start by scrubbing the head of the pig until it is pink and clean), Little Heathens portrays a world of hardship and hard work tempered by simple rewards. There was the unsurpassed flavor of tender new dandelion greens harvested as soon as the snow melted; the taste of crystal clear marble-sized balls of honey robbed from a bumblebee nest; the sweet smell from the body of a lamb sleeping on sun-warmed grass; and the magical quality of oat shocking under the light of a full harvest moon.

Little Heathens offers a loving but realistic portrait of a “hearty-handshake Methodist” family that gave its members a remarkable legacy of kinship, kindness, and remembered pleasures. Recounted in a luminous narrative filled with tenderness and humor, Kalish’s memoir of her childhood shows how the right stuff can make even the bleakest of times seem like “quite a romp.”

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Kalish's memoir of her Iowa childhood, set against the backdrop of the Depression, captures a vanished way of traditional living and a specific moment in American history in a story both illuminating and memorable. Kalish lived with her siblings, mother and grandparents-seven in all-both in a town home and, in warmer weather, out on a farm. The lifestyle was frugal in the extreme: "The only things my grandparents spent money on were tea, coffee, sugar, salt, white flour, cloth and kerosene." But in spite of the austere conditions, Kalish's memories are mostly happy ones: keeping the farm and home going, caring for animals, cooking elaborate multi-course meals and washing the large family's laundry once a week, by hand. Here, too, are stories of gossiping in the kitchen, digging a hole to China with the "Big Kids" and making head cheese at butchering time. Kalish skillfully rises above bitterness and sentiment, giving her memoir a clear-eyed narrative voice that puts to fine use a lifetime of careful observation: "Observing the abundance of life around us was just so naturally a part of our days on the farm that it became a habit." Simple, detailed and honest, this is a refreshing and informative read for anyone interested in the struggles of average Americans in the thick of the Great Depression.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Bookmarks Magazine

One of the most endearing qualities of octogenarian Mildred Armstrong Kalish’s Little Heathens is that it runs counter to what the memoir, sadly, has too frequently become—self-indulgent, self-promoting gossip. Despite circumstances that could easily have left her embittered, Kalish, a retired English professor, recalls her formative years fondly. Through simple, honest prose punctuated with "her old pagan rhythms" (New York Times Book Review) and a host of memorable examples, Kalish performs her greatest feat, which is to make some of us under 80 just the slightest bit envious—crazy to say, but such is human nature—that we never experienced the Depression-era challenges and triumphs so lovingly recounted.
Copyright © 2004 Phillips & Nelson Media, Inc.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 304 pages
• Publisher: Bantam; 1 edition (May 29, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0553804952
• ISBN-13: 978-0553804959
• Product Dimensions: 5.7 x 0.8 x 8.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (143 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #274,365 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #70 in Books > Professional & Technical > Professional Science > Agricultural Sciences > History

More About the Author

I was born on a farm near Garrison, Iowa, in Benton County on St. Patrick's Day in 1922.
My growing up was influenced by The Great Depression, by the self-reliance and work ethic of my mother's parents- themselves descendants of pioneers- who never quite made it into the 20th Century and by the remarkable challenges and the inestimable rewards of living a rural life where we children were expected to accept responsibilities beyond the ordinary.
From early on, I was eager to be self-supporting and independent.The summer I became thirteen I became the companion , cook and caretaker of a retired missionary; I served as a hired girl on two local farms; I earned an Elementary Teacher's Certificate from Iowa Stte Teacher's College at Cedar Falls.
I accepted the position as Governess in Yonkers, N.Y.
Joining the The United States Coast Guard Women's Reserve, I was sent for Radio Training to Miami University at Oxford, Ohio and on graduation I served at the Headquarters of the 5th Naval District in Norfolk, Virginia where I met and married fellow radio operator Harry Kalish.
Thanks to the G.I. Bill, we both furthered our education at the State University of Iowa.
We have 2 sons, 2 daughters-in-law (par excellence) amd 4 grandchildren.
I am an Emeritus Professor of English retired from Suffolk County Community College on Long Island. I have taught at the State University of Iowa at Iowa City, The State University of Missouri at Columbia, and at Adelphi in Garden City, NY.
My husband and I are residents of a retirement community in Cupertino, California.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

102 of 108 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars This book is a winner, July 8, 2007

By 

Schmerguls "schmerguls" (Sioux City, Ia USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Little Heathens: Hard Times and High Spirits on an Iowa Farm During the Great Depression (Hardcover)

This is an entrancing memoir of days now long gone, but vivid in the minds of those who lived them. While I lived on an Iowa farm in western Iowa rather than eastern Iowa, and was a boy, and was about six years younger than the author, this book recalled so much of what it was like that reading it was sn unmitigated delight. The author recognizes "the all-too-human tendency to gloss over the bad and glorify, or at least magnify, the good" when recalling one's childhood, but it sure makes greater reading to read of one's appreciated childhood than it does to read of one who looks back thereon in bitterness. Thus this book beats, e.g., Angela's Ashes by a mile in enjoyable reading.

60 of 63 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Depression Modern, June 8, 2007

By 

Peter Passell - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Little Heathens: Hard Times and High Spirits on an Iowa Farm During the Great Depression (Hardcover)

Little Heathens, the memoir of an Iowa farm childhood, is a marvelously vivid encounter with an iconic way of life that has largely gone the way of the elm tree. The author Mildred Kalish, valedictorian of her high school class back in 1940, turns a sharp, remarkably objective eye on those descendents of the pioneers, "more 19th century than 20th," who raised her to live off the land through Iowa's "fierce blizzards" and some of America's worst times.

But this is not Little-House-on-the-Prairie. Yes, Kalish can rustle up the poignant details of honey gathering and head-cheese making. She can tell you how to domesticate raccoons and explain the proper use of beets to draw boils. What's unique here, though, is Kalish's portrait of an austere people whose Puritan tradition frowned on joy, prohibited affection in word or touch, "built character" with an open bible and homilies that dotted their days.

Fortunately, while Kalish grew up hearing that "whistling girls and crowing hens will always come to some bad end," such warnings never dampened the spirits of the "little heathens" -- as her grandmother called the farm's children. Eight decades later she has brought those stern sepia-toned faces back to full color through their words (from "Oh my soul" to "shit from shinola"), their ideals ("better to wear out than rust out"), and their deepest pleasures ("the kinship of souls that is created when everyone gathers in the kitchen to prepare a meal"). Reading Little Heathens, you become part of that lovely kinship for a while.

30 of 33 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars THE GOOD OLD DAYS remembered, August 26, 2007

By 

Anne Salazar "inveterate reader" (Huntington Beach, CA United States) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Little Heathens: Hard Times and High Spirits on an Iowa Farm During the Great Depression (Hardcover)

I loved every word of this book! The author grew up fresh and innocent and kind and loving in a very difficult, but pure, time in our history. In this too-short book she goes into all aspects of that life -- the fun, the harships, the extended family, the recipes, schooling, holidays, etc. I would really love another book or two by her, fleshing out some of these chapters. I would especially love a cookbook. I loved the short chapters on their animals and pets! I would like more on her school studies and friends. And more old photos.

After reading this book, I fervently wished I could know Mildred Armstrong Kalish. She is obviously a smart and sweet lady, appearing to be very much like my beloved grandmother who was raised in Kansas a few years prior to the time of which this author writes. It is amazing to think what changes she has been through, what changes our country has been through! I hope I don't sound too old when I say that I miss the good ole days, even though I wasn't fortunate enough to have lived through them. I miss the excitement over even the smallest things (birth of an animal, fresh-baked foods) and the simple but important teachings of her ever-present family. I would like more details about the members of her family and herself after she left town and began other adventures -- in the military, teaching, marriage and family, cars, television, etc. HOW this country has changed! Please read this book to re-connect with our roots. It is enlightening and funny and interesting and always educational and entertaining. And everyone today knows how we love our entertainment!