New Fangled Machine

Since I've been thoroughly enjoying the Little House book series for the past few weeks, I decided that my first post on my new blog would be some excerpts from the first few chapters of "Little Town On The Prairie".   I'm working on a few projects now (well, maybe more than a few), and once I'm done, I'll post them.

One evening at supper, Pa asked, "How would you like to work in town, Laura?"
"A job? For a girl? In town?" Ma said "Why, what kind of job-" Then quickly she said "No, Charles, I won't have Laura working out in a hotel among all kinds of strangers."
"Who said such a thing?" Pa demanded. "No girl of ours'll do that, not while I'm alive and kicking."
"Of course not," Ma apologized. "You took me so by surprise. What other kind of work can there be? and Laura not old enough to teach school yet."
No one could imagine what work there could be fora girl in town, if it wasn't working as a hired girl in the hotel.
"Make shirts?" said Ma.
"Yes. So many men are baching on their claims around here...haven't got any womenfolks to do their sewing...He's got a machine to sew the shirts!"
Ma was interested. "A sewing machine. Is it like that picture we saw in the Inter-Ocean? How does it work?"
"About like I figured it would," Pa answered. "You work the pedal with your feet and that works the wheel and turns the needle up and down. There's a little contraption underneath the needle that's wound full of thread, too... It goes like greased lightening, and makes as neat a seam as you'd want to see."
"I wonder how much it costs," said Ma.
"Way too much for ordinary folks," said Pa.
"Yes, of course," Ma said. Laura knew she was thinking how much work such a machine would save, but even if they could afford it, it would be foolish to buy one for family sewing.
"...I told her you're a good sewer, and she wants you to come in and help her...she'll pay a good willing worker twenty-five cents a day and dinner."


"How did you like your first day of working for pay, Half-Pint?" Pa asked her. "You make out all right?"
"I think so," she answered. "Mrs. White spoke well of my buttonholes."