2. My Mama

After a couple of years as teacher of her home school, Mama was elected to teach a larger country school in Whitley County, many miles to the south, where she boarded around in her pupils’ homes.

Then she made the adventure of accepting a teaching position “in the far West,” in the then small village of Watseka, Illinois. Returning, after two or three years, she again taught in Whitley County, faithfully attending the summer Teachers’ Institute at the County seat, Columbia City.

One day, in July of 1876, when Mama was twenty-nine, she volunteered to help the hard-pressed County Superintendent in grading the examination papers, for she had come to idolize this genial widower who always had a warm smile for her—and had given her a rating with the young hopefuls by publicly calling her “Jennie.” I can imagine the flush on her cheek and the quick bounding of her heart when he singled her out for this conferment of distinction. He was prompt to accept her proffered help.

When the Institute was over, Superintendent Douglas married Jennie at the old Cassel home and took her back with him to Columbia City and his houseful of children.

As I reported to you earlier, Mama, as a schoolteacher, was a self-confident and successful disciplinarian; but the new position to which she had been elected, as stepmother to a group of youngsters who had been largely on their own and doing whatever they pleased for a couple of years, was a task for which she was unprepared.

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