The Author
Dayton A. Williams was born in 1874 and grew up on his family’s farm in Lyme Township, Huron County, Ohio. Huron and adjacent Erie County comprise the Firelands, an area set aside for residents of Connecticut after the burning of an area there by the British in 1779. In 1899 he graduated from Kenyon College, where he captained the last football team to beat Ohio State. He then headed for the Pacific Northwest where he lived until his death in 1968 at 92 years of age. During his working years he ran a construction company, specializing in road building.
The Letters:
are his first-person memories of the daily life on a farm in the late 1800’s. Written for his nephew’s family almost fifty years after he left the farm, Dayton Williams’ letters include essays on Decoration Day at the country church and on Christmas celebrations at the church in town. He remembers peddlers, tramps, boyhood inventions for easing farm work and descriptions of the farm machinery of his day, some in the form of a quiz for those who thought they “were up on the farmer business.” He includes detailed descriptions and drawings of the flail and the apple cider press.
The Editor
Anne Southworth McFarland, a grandniece of Dayton Williams, began her own correspondence with him when she was just a kid on the farm with a pony. She became a law librarian, okay with her Uncle Date who lent her the money to go to library school. She’s published a number of op-ed essays and has a novel about law school on the web (Nothing but the Truth). She’s active in community networking and contributes a regular column called “Networking on the Night Shift” to the Community Technology Review. Her pro bono legal work is acting as a Guardian ad Litem for abused and neglected children in the Juvenile Court of Cuyahoga County, Ohio (Cleveland).
To Order
A Farm in The Firelands of Ohio
Memories of the Post-Civil War Period
By Dayton A. Williams
Call (216)225-1829
or fax (216)932-0964
or e-mail nextfriend@roadrunner.com
Price: $19.95 US
Shipping: $2.95
ISBN: 0-9747937-0-1