Lydia Maria was born to Susannah and Convers Francis on February 11, 1802 in Medford, Massachusetts. Lydia went to a local school for girls, and later to a women’s seminary. When her mother died, Lydia went to live with her older sister where she studied to be a teacher. After teaching at a seminary for one year, Lydia started her own school in 1824. In 1826, she founded the Juvenile Miscellany, the first monthly periodical for children published in the United States.
She continued teaching school until 1828, when she married David Lee Child, a lawyer, and moved to Boston.
Lydia Maria Child continued as editor of Juvenile Miscellany until 1834, and also wrote several novels, poetry, and instruction manuals for mothers and housewives. As her and her husband’s interest in the anti-slavery cause grew, she also began writing numerous essays and books on this topic as well as the topics of women’s rights and Native American rights. She was one of the earliest American women to earn a living from her writing.
Lydia Maria Child’s best known work was a poem called “The New-England Boy’s Song About Thanksgiving Day” which was written in 1844 and published in Flowers for Children, Part II. It is better known as “Over the River and Through the Wood”, and was written to celebrate the author’s childhood memories of visiting her grandparents’ house on Thanksgiving. The original poem had 12 stanzas, but most are not known today.
Over the river, and through the wood,
To Grandfather’s house we go;
The horse knows the way
To carry the sleigh
Through the white and drifted snow.Over the river, and through the wood,
To Grandfather’s house away!
We would not stop
For doll or top,
For ‘t is Thanksgiving Day.Over the river, and through the wood,
Oh, how the wind does blow!
It stings the toes,
And bites the nose,
As over the ground we go.Over the river, and through the wood,
With a clear blue winter sky,
The dogs do bark,
And children hark,
As we go jingling by.Over the river, and through the wood,
To have a first-rate play —
Hear the bells ring
Ting a ling ding,
Hurra for Thanksgiving day!Over the river, and through the wood —
No matter for winds that blow;
Or if we get
The sleigh upset
Into a bank of snow.Over the river, and through the wood,
To see little John and Ann;
We will kiss them all,
And play snowball,
And stay as long as we can.Over the river, and through the wood,
Trot fast my dapple gray!
Spring over the ground,
Like a hunting-hound,
For ‘t is Thanksgiving day!Over the river, and through the wood,
And straight through the barnyard gate;
We seem to go
Extremely slow,
It is so hard to wait.Over the river, and through the wood —
Old Jowler hears our bells;
He shakes his pow,
With a loud bow-wow,
And thus the news he tells.Over the river, and through the wood —
When Grandmother sees us come,
She will say, Oh dear,
The children are here,
Bring a pie for every one.Over the river, and through the wood —
Now Grandmother’s cap I spy!
Hurra for the fun!
Is the pudding done?
Hurra for the pumpkin pie!
Child died at the age of 78, on October 20, 1880, at her home in Massachusetts.
Activities:
Read:
A version of “Over the River and Through the Wood”
Recite and/or memorize the poem:
Record what you learn about Lydia Maria Child on:
Lydia Maria Child Notebook Page
Practice handwriting skills with:
Over the River Manuscript Copywork
Over the River Cursive Copywork
Analyze “Over the River” using:
Extend your Tea Time with:
A unit study from HSS’s Thanksgiving Connections Page
For a tea time treat make:
Pumpkin Spice Tea and pudding. Choose a recipe from Lydia Maria Child’s “The American Frugal Housewife” published in 1832.
BAKED INDIAN PUDDING.
Indian pudding is good baked. Scald a quart of milk (skimmed milk will do,) and stir in seven table spoonfuls of sifted Indian meal, a tea-spoonful of salt, a tea-cupful of molasses, and a great spoonful of ginger, or sifted cinnamon. Baked three or four hours. If you want whey, you must be sure and pour in a little cold milk, after it is all mixed.
BOILED INDIAN PUDDING.
Indian pudding should be boiled four or five hours. Sifted Indian meal and warm milk should be stirred together pretty stiff. A little salt, and two or three great spoonfuls of molasses, added; a spoonful of ginger, if you like that spice. Boil it in a tight covered pan, or a very thick cloth; if the water gets in, it will ruin it. Leave plenty of room; for Indian swells very much. The milk with which you mix it should be merely warm; if it be scalding, the pudding will break to pieces. Some people chop sweet suet fine, and warm in the milk; others warm thin slices of sweet apple to be stirred into the pudding. Water will answer instead of milk.
BREAD PUDDING.
A nice pudding may be made of bits of bread. They should be crumbled and soaked in milk over night. In the morning, beat up three eggs with it, add a little salt, tie it up in a bag, or in a pan that will exclude every drop of water, and boil it little more than an hour. No puddings should be put into the pot, till the water boils. Bread prepared in the same way makes good plum-puddings. Milk enough to make it quite soft; four eggs; a little cinnamon; a spoonful of rose-water, or lemon-brandy, if you have it; a tea-cupful of molasses, or sugar to your taste, if you prefer it; a few dry, clean raisins, sprinkled in, and stirred up thoroughly, is all that is necessary. It should bake or boil two hours.
CUSTARD PUDDINGS.
Custard puddings sufficiently good for common use can be made with five eggs to a quart of milk, sweetened with brown sugar, and spiced with cinnamon, or nutmeg, and very little salt. It is well to boil your milk, and set it away till it gets cold. Boiling milk enriches it so much, that boiled skim-milk is about as good as new milk. A little cinnamon, or lemon peel, or peach leaves, if you do not dislike the taste, boiled in the milk, and afterwards strained from it, give a pleasant flavor. Bake fifteen or twenty minutes.
RICE PUDDINGS.
If you want a common rice pudding to retain its flavor, do not soak it, or put it in to boil when the water is cold. Wash it, tie it in a bag, leave plenty of room for it to swell, throw it in when the water boils, and let it boil about an hour and a half. The same sauce answers for all these kinds of puddings. If you have rice left cold, break it up in a little warm milk, pour custard over it, and bake it as long as you should custard. It makes very good puddings and pies.
BIRD’S NEST PUDDING.
If you wish to make what is called ‘bird’s nest puddings,’ prepare your custard,–take eight or ten pleasant apples, pare them, and dig out the core, but leave them whole, set them in a pudding dish, pour your custard over them, and bake them about thirty minutes.
APPLE PUDDING.
A plain, unexpensive apple pudding may be made by rolling out a bit of common pie-crust, and filling it full of quartered apples; tied up in a bag, and boiled an hour and a half; if the apples are sweet, it will take two hours; for acid things cook easily. Some people like little dumplings, made by rolling up one apple, pared and cored, in a piece of crust, and tying them up in spots all over the bag. These do not need to be boiled more than an hour: three quarters is enough, if the
apples are tender. Take sweet, or pleasant flavored apples, pare them, and bore out the core, without cutting the apple in two Pill up the holes with washed rice, boil them in a bag, tied very tight, an hour, or hour and a half. Each apple should be tied up separately, in different corners of
the pudding bag.
Happy Thanksgiving, y’all!
