Copyright USGenNet Inc., 2016 All Rights Reserved USGenNet Data Repository Please read USGenNet Copyright Statement on this page: Transcribed and submitted by Linda Talbott for the USGenNet Data Repository http://www.us-data.org/ =========================================================================== Formatted by USGenNet Data Repository Chief Archivist, Linda Talbott All of the above information must remain when copied or downloaded. =========================================================================== The Petoskey Record October 11, 1893 FARMER BELCHER'S IDEAS I'm a plain, old-fashioned man, an' my wife is jest the same, She was Sary Ann Delaney, an' John Belcher is my name; We live to Tredick's Corner, our house is on the right, Jest as you pass by Wheeler's mill, where the meetin' house's in sight. I farm it for a livin' as my father did before - Though my great-gran'ther I've heern said he kept a grocery store. An' Sary Ann an' I have raised two girls an' seven boys, An' I expect we've had our share of sorrers, cares, an' joys. I ain't an eddicated man, I went to deecstrick school, An' though I ain't so larned as some, I ain't a pesky fool; I used to be a Dimmycrat, but now I don't jest know How do I stand on pollyticks, they've got 'em mixed up so. I read the papers regular, though my glasses ain't quite right - I calkerlate that sense they's bought I've changed some in my sight - An' I've read about the 'lectric roads that run cars everywhere With lightnin' harnessed to a wire that's strung up in the air. The tellyphone that talks to folks a hundred miles away - An' they can hear you plain as day, an' know jest what you say. An' Sary Ann says she believes that's a news- paper lie, An' she don't take no stock in it, an' some that way am I. The funnygraft, so they tell me, will take the words you say An' roll 'em up, kinder preserved, canned up, an put away. For futur' use, an' when you feel as if you'd like to bring Them old time conversations back you jest un- roll the thing. There's bicycles, they're teterin' things - I never tried but one; Before I had got done with it I'd nigh 'bout got undone! I tore my pants, an' scratched my face, an' stood upon my head, An' Sary Ann came runnin' out and picked me up for dead! The light the stores with lightnin' now, an' dwellin'-houses, too. You turn a little button an' that's all you have to do; An' I expect the thunderbolts'll be hitched up right soon To take us off on pleasure-trips, skylarkin' to the moon. The weather's made to order now in Washing- ton, I'm told, They grind it out by steam, and turn it loose on to the world; An' if this spring's a sample of the kind of work they do, I'd rather have my weather made by the good old-fashioned crew. Well, things move on; I s'pose they will, an' what's to be will be. But taller dips an' kerysene is good enough for me; An' I don't want tellyphone a ringin' round my head, Or funnygrafts to can my talk till after I am dead. An' Tredick's Corner ain't no place for 'lectric cars to come; They'd skeer the horses half to death with their eternal hum! An' when I go to meetin' on the holy Sabbath day I'll hitch old strip-faced Billy up to the good old-fashioned shay. ==========================================================================