Life Was Simpler Then

by Loula Grace Erdman

In this charming book of personal recollections, the author returns to her childhood in Western Missouri and re-creates the way of life as she then knew it. There is, for instance, an amusing section on the series of hired men who helped on the farm, followed by chapters on spring house cleaning, on family reunions, on church attendance, on the Chautaugua. It was a time when there was a second table for the children at dinner parties, when a helpful, omniscient Central was at the other end of the telephone wire, when harvesting was a neighborhood affair. It is only yesterday in a small American town.
These lively reminiscences are touched here and there with humor and pathos and everywhere with that nostalgia which springs from the near resemblance of the author's recollections to our own. of Miss Erdman's many successful books, Life Was Simpler Then is likely to be remembered most fondly—and longest.

186 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1963

About the author

ERDMAN, LOULA GRACE (1898–1976). Loula Grace Erdman, writer, daughter of August F. and Mollie (Maddox) Erdman, was born on June 8, 1898, near Alma, Lafayette County, Missouri. She attended Central Missouri State College (B.S., 1931) and Columbia University (M.A., 1941). She also studied at the University of Wisconsin, the University of Southern California, and West Texas State College. She subsequently moved to Texas and taught in the Amarillo public schools and at West Texas State College, where she eventually became novelist-in-residence and director of the Advanced Workshop in Creative Writing.

Erdman began writing in the 1930s, and by 1946 about fifty of her short stories and magazine articles had been published, as well as her first juvenile novel, Separate Star (1944), a book about career teaching. In 1946 she won the $10,000 Dodd, Mead-Redbook Award for The Years of the Locust (1947), a novel set in her native Missouri. In 1952 she received the American Girl-Dodd, Mead Award for The Wind Blows Free (1952), the first volume of a juvenile trilogy about a pioneer Panhandle family. She continued the story of the Pierce family in The Wide Horizon (1956) and The Good Land (1959). Room to Grow (1962), a novel about French immigrants who moved to the Panhandle via New Orleans, won her the Texas Institute of Letters Juvenile Award. She received both the Texas Institute of Letters Award and the Steck-Vaughn Award for A Bluebird Will Do (1973). Her other works include A Wonderful Thing and Other Stories (1940), Fair Is the Morning (1945), Lonely Passage (1948), The Edge of Time (1950), Three at the Wedding (1953), My Sky Is Blue (1953), The Far Journey (1955), Short Summer (1958), Many a Voyage (1960), The Man Who Told the Truth (1962), Life Was Simpler Then (1963), Another Spring (1966), Bright Sky (1969), A Time to Write (1969), and Save Weeping for the Night (1975).

Miss Erdman was a member of the Texas Institute of Letters, the Panhandle Penwomen, Delta Kappa Gamma, Kappa Delta Pi, and Phi Kappa Phi. As a career teacher who never considered abandoning teaching even after she gained recognition as a writer, she also belonged to the National Education Association and the Texas State Teachers Association.

Reviews

[Sarah Coller · Rating 3 out of 5]

While I enjoyed the nostalgic looks back into the author's childhood around the 19-teens, I failed to really feel drawn to her time as I have in similar stories like the Little House series. Her attitude seemed more of superiority than just proud to be of her generation and I found myself thinking it ironic that we look back at the early 1960s (when this was published) with the same feelings of "it was simpler then" as she did looking back on the turn of the century.

I found myself thinking things like, "different is not always wrong." It was just a little too much smug, "back in my day..." sort of talk and not enough gentle joy to make the reader see the beauty in the things she was remembering.

Last Passover season, a church friend posted this on Facebook: "Beware the leaven of nostalgia". I thought that was such a deep thing... Because we do that, right? We let nostalgia puff up as so much bigger and better than our current reality--- we choose to remember mainly the good times and we remember them as so much better than our "now" and we become bitter over things we can never get back. I think I would have liked to have felt more, "those times were great and so are these times" and a lot less, "those times were better and these times are lesser." Especially reading this over 60 years from publication --- if she thought it was bad then, she'd really struggle in 2025.

One especially redeeming chapter was the one talking about the books she read, including “much of Hawthorne”. Yes. Smart lady.

I purchased this at a bookshop in Hermiston, Oregon while visiting my mom in June 2023.

[Challis · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a slow-paced, back-in-the-day type book which depicted the simpler, sweeter days of her life growing up in Missouri. Her descriptions of everything from the relationships between people, the pond ice they stored every year in their ice house, the tricky, sticky process of making apple butter, to letting the hem out on their dresses and doing spring cleaning made you feel like you were there, drinking fresh lemonade with your nose freezing from the ice in the heat of summer, or cracking nuts together while reading books aloud by the fire in winter.
A thoroughly sweet and enjoyable journey back in time.

[Carmel Dickinson · Rating 5 out of 5]

I remember reading this book as a child and loving it

And, re-reading the book after all these years, it does not disappoint. It is sheer nostalgia for a country childhood in Missouri in the early 20th century.

[Cammie Jordan · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'd have actually rated this book a 3.5 instead. I thought I'd like it a lot more than I did.

The pictures on the front looked like the stories would be from an earlier time-period than the 1940's. Although some of her stories were cute, they seemed to be a bit rambling.

[Debbie Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a wonderful little book. It has been on the family bookshelf since I was small and I have read it multiple times over the years.

[Bonnie Dieffenbacher · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked this book, which was a memoir of a growing up in the midwest during what I think was the depression era although it never really said. A good read.

[Maria Blount · Rating 3 out of 5]

A short, simple compilation of a girls childhood in rural Missouri. Fascinating in a classical kind of way. Would recommend for a cozy winter read!

[Ann · Rating 3 out of 5]

Not my favorite of Erdman’s works, but good information about life in the early 20th century. A non-fiction memoir. She tells the stories in an interesting and humorous way.

[Jan · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is book that discusses "the olden days". It transported me back to similar stories my parents told me many years ago, even though we are from Pennsylvania and the author is from Missouri. These tales are from another time, told in an every-day, believable way - as if the author were sitting across from you drinking a nice cup of hot tea. I will give it to my aunt, who is 90, for Christmas. I know she will enjoy it.

[Elizabeth · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of my favorite nonfiction books. I reread at least 2 or 3 times a year. Having grown up on a farm myself, I can relate to many chapters in the book. But even if you haven't, the author describes things so beautifully you can feel as if you're there.

[Avis Black · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very good memoir about life in a farming community in the early 1900s. Thoroughly charming and likeable. It will appeal to those who enjoy Laura Ingalls Wilder's books.

[elizabeth johnson]

Charming and fun

This is a wonderful book for anyone who enjoys a good tale well told. Witty and sweet yet not at all cynical, it was a pleasure to read.