-
Title
-
Book 04, Diary of J.P. D’Ooge from 1892 March to 1893 June
-
Creator
-
Electa Jane (Jennie) Pease D'Ooge
-
Description
-
"Jennie Pease D’Ooge’s March 1892 to June 1893 diary chronicles her daily life in Ypsilanti, Michigan, local visits to Ann Arbor and Detroit, and summers in Charlevoix. She and her husband, Benjamin L. D'Ooge, co-parent their three children, with support from a hired domestic servant, Jennie’s sister and father in Ann Arbor, and neighbors. Their daughters Ida and Helen attend kindergarten and have playdates with neighborhood friends, and their son Leonard learns to walk and talk. Jennie notes that it is challenging to keep more than a basic record of events and activities in her diary, because the children demand so much of her time and attention.
This fourth volume is the first in which Jennie does not give birth to a child. Hashes appear to mark when Jennie is “sick,” i.e. having a menstrual period. In late October 1892, following about two months of feeling tired and unwell, she is “taken sick” and must call for the doctor. Beyond this acute episode, Jennie regularly reports fatigue, backaches, and “bilious” headaches, perhaps migraines, among other ailments. She treats herself and her children with homeopathic remedies, and her knowledge is such that a friend nicknames her “Dr. D’Ooge” and comes to her when the doctor is unavailable.
While Jennie tries to minimize her church and club responsibilities and delegate work to others, she remains active in numerous organizations. Her activities include: fundraising for the First Congregational Church’s new parsonage, teaching the Sunday School infant class, attending and presenting on musical topics at Sappho Club meetings, and giving papers to the Young Woman’s Missionary Society. Jennie finds little time to read during this time period, but she frequently attends academic lectures, musical and theatrical performances, teas, picnics, and dinner parties. She and Ben become close friends with the new pastor of their church and his wife, Bastian and Helen Smits, and spend many evenings playing Logomachy, a word game created in the 1880s. The two couples consider purchasing a yacht together in Charlevoix.
Diary entries and accounting ledgers in the back of the book reveal much about Jennie’s personal finances, her attitudes toward women’s economic autonomy, and how she and her husband view their respective roles within the household. Ben pays Jennie an allowance, which she feels she “at least” earns through her household work. Additionally, she maintains her own investments, collects interest on cash she has loaned her husband and others, and receives more than $1500 from her maternal grandfather’s estate. Following disagreements with Jennie and Ben over her behavior, Lillie Nicholson, the D’Ooges’ domestic servant from the Industrial School for Girls in Adrian, quits. For the time Jennie is without a “girl,” Ben pays her $2.50 a week to either hire someone to do household chores or to do them herself. Jennie records these payments and expenses carefully in her diary. The additional work is taxing on her body and she is relieved to welcome back a previous servant girl, Flora Cattermole. The D’Ooges are having the kitchen and bathroom of their rented house at 423 Ballard Street plumbed for hot water, which Jennie anticipates will save steps and labor.
Friends returning from Europe give Jennie accounts of being quarantined due to the 1892 cholera outbreak in Hamburg. She remarks upon the historic second inauguration of President Grover Cleveland in March 1893. On April 12, 1893, Ypsilanti is struck by a cyclone. The D’Ooges’ neighborhood is spared, but for months the “cyclone district” remains a point of interest for visitors. The World’s Columbian Exposition, or World’s Fair, opens in Chicago on May 1, 1893, and Jennie and Ben, along with many in their circle, make plans to attend during the summer."
-
Date Span
-
1892 March to 1893 June
-
Original Object Type
-
Bound Journal
-
Subject
-
Ann Arbor (Mich.); Art and recreation; Baking; Books and reading; Budgets, Personal; Card games; Charlevoix (Mich.); Child rearing; Childhood; Children; Church entertainments; Clothing and dress; College teachers; Community and college; Congregational churches; Cooking; Detroit (Mich.); Diaries; Dinners and dining; Discretionary income; Dutch Americans; Early childhood education; Etiquette; Extended families; Families; Family recreation; Fatherhood; Female friendship; First Congregational Church (Ypsilanti, Mich.); Food; Friendship; Gifts; Home economics; Home economics--Accounting; Homeopathy; Horse-drawn vehicles; House cleaning; Household employees; Indoor games; Infants; Interior decoration; Interurban railroads; Kindergarten; Laundry; Local transit; Mackinac Island (Mich. : Island); Manners and customs; Marriage; Medicine; Menstrual cycle; Menstruation; Michigan State Normal School; Michigan, Lake; Missions; Motherhood; Music; Musical recreation; Neighborliness; Outdoor recreation; Pandemics; Parenthood; Parenting; Parents; Play; Printed ephemera; Railroad travel; Recreation; Sewing; Shopping; Social life and customs; Societies and clubs; Streetcar lines; Sunday schools; Theater; Universities and colleges -- Faculty; University of Michigan; University towns; University women; Unpaid labor; Women in missionary work; Young families; Ypsilanti (Mich.)
-
Collection Location
-
Book 4
-
Cataloger
-
Alexis Braun Marks, Katie Delahoyde, Luis Pena
-
Relation
-
04.JD
-
Rights
-
This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. In addition, no permission is required from the rights-holder(s) for educational uses. For other uses, you need to obtain permission from the owner, Eastern Michigan University Archives (lib_archives@emich.edu).
-
This Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights. You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. In addition, no permission is required from the rights-holder(s) for educational uses. For other uses, you need to obtain permission from the owner, Eastern Michigan University Archives (lib_archives@emich.edu).
