JOY ALONG THE WAY: REMEMBERING WARMTH OF STOVE

What are folks talking about these days? The Inauguration? Speeches full of hope? John Ashcroft? Laura's beautiful ball gown? Arrivals of 1040s? Jesse Jackson? Yes, all of these. Most of all, though, they are talking about the high dollar amounts seen on utility bills. The amounts seemed to have slipped up on us when we were just walking along peacefully in Indian Summer weather. Had we looked up more discerningly we might have seen the limb-crouched wildcat, timing himself for the most deadly opportunity.

In spite of being warned this was going to happen, we went along, only half believing it, or, believing if such dire predictions did materialize, surely some relief organization would quickly come to the rescue, or at least an independent counsel would be appointed to study the situation. Small comfort this, when the temperature kept dropping and the winter wind whistled through icicle teeth/fangs, especially when we secretly know that before such organizations can come into operation mode, or special counsels could probably not get revved up until the snow drifts disappeared and pond ice cracked up.

Does anyone wonder how people kept warm before gas, oil, electricity, and thermostats came into our lives as heat producers? A little fellow of my acquaintance thought the thermostat, that little device in our hallways or other rooms, was the source of our heat. I assumed he had no fireplace in his home, nor had any experience with outside barbecues or camp fires. I felt sorry for him and would have liked to have told him about old-time stoves. "You see," I'd explain, "all houses used to be heated by fireplaces. Every room had a fireplace, a box-like construction along an outside wall. Three of the sides of the box remained on the outside of the wall. One side, left open, was on the inside wall. Dry logs were fed into the box from this open side and set on fire. Smoke went out through a chimney arising from the box top outside the wall."

My little visitor would, no doubt, have become restless and unattentive at my clumsy description, so I would have turned to stoves and old Ben Franklin. By this time my little "pupil" would have wandered off and I would be talking to myself. "You see, Mr. Franklin, living mostly in the cold New England states, probably was cold all winter long. Being so smart, I don't imagine it took him very long to figure out that if a person could get more heat from a four-sided construction rather than just the one as in a fireplace, why not bring that "box" inside?

"I can see old Ben sitting before his fireplace on a cold winter night, and making drawings of such a "box." Four sides would be of cast iron and a third side would be left open to shove in wood or coal and set it on fire. A pipe would be inserted on the top that would go up through the ceiling or into a flue to get the smoke out of the room. The top side would be flat so that one could set a teakettle on it or anything else that needed warming and so the stove was born."

It being a cold day, I continued to warm myself with memories of the fine old stoves that warmed me until I went away to college. One tends to forget about the daily removal of ashes and occasional polishing of the chrome.

It is only 53 days until spring!

REJOICE!

Jean Bell Mosley is an author and longtime resident of Cape Girardeau.