Early Tumwater-
What was life like for pioneer children?

Pioneer children also had to work very hard. In those days children were supposed to be miniature adults, and they had to do the same chores as the grown-ups. Girls had to help their mothers cook, clean, make soap, sew clothes, spin yarn, knit and weave cloth, care for their little brothers and sisters, and make candles. Boys had to help build cabins and barns, work in the fields, take care of animals, and hunt for food. Both boys and girls had to haul drinking water from the river. They also had to learn their lessons, at first doing their schoolwork at home, with their parents as teachers. They used the Bible to learn to read, and practiced writing their letters with a stick in the dirt.

A member of the Tumwater Middle School Homesteader program, demonstrates a day in the life of a young pioneer woman at the Tumwater Pioneer Fair.

Even with all this work, pioneer children still managed to have some fun. They made their own toys, like whimmydiddles and cornhusk dolls, and roamed in the vast woods, hunting and fishing. They played many of the same games kids play today, like tug o’ war and hide and seek. Most pioneer youngsters didn’t have many books, so they read stories from the Bible. New Market children made friends with the Indian children that they met. Some people joked that their children could speak the Indian language before they could speak English.

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