The people in the Old South did things I can not understand. No wonder ladies fainted. I do not think I ever went to a church with air conditioning as a kid. We were used to the heat and our dress showed that. My late mom was born in 1904 and she never, ever got hot. I did not understand that then and sure do not today. We are spoiled today—go from an ac house, to an ac car and every building has ac. That was why we were given fans with a funeral home ad on one side! When I was growing up, there were only 3 Catholic families in town that I can remember. There may have been more that I did not know about.
I don’t understand how my grandmother and her sisters could run a pressure-cooker in an unairconditioned kitchen in the summer and not die. When I was a teenager and spend summers at the farm in Missouri, Grandma would get up at night and shut off the air conditioner because it was “too cold,” and then Dad would get up and turn it back on.
They handed out fans at the Eagle Scout ceremony we attended last Sunday! They said, “Mint Hill Historical Society.” We’d just come from Mass, so I was in my church outfit, including nylons and a hat, but some non-Scouts were in shorts. My oldest son and #2 daughter went home right after the ceremony, because they were “too hot,” but the rest of the people stuck it out. It was only in the 80s.