A great-grandmother certainly enjoyed the latest East Longview Hall Grandmothers’ Tea more than the first few times she attended approximately 60 years ago.
“Oh yes — I used to have to scrub the damn floor,” said 89-year-old Jean Harriman with a laugh. “In the old days you had to get down on your hands and knees and there would be a whole line of us scrubbing the floor and then they would wax it. Now they varnish it.
“I enjoy the tea a lot more now.”
Harriman estimates she has been to more than 50 of the annual grandmother’s tea since volunteering to scrub the floors. She was one of approximately 50 ladies attending the tea in the East Longview hall May 3. The annual event’s organizers have lost track, but they estimate they are at around the 90-year-mark that tea has been served in the spring to grandmothers.
Michelle Ritz has been attending the event for approximately 10 years. However, this year she went for the first time as a grandmother.
“I am here as a server, but I have waited all my life to be a grandmother — I’m excited about that,” said Ritz.
Her friend Sarah Hari, who grew up in the Hartell area, asked her to volunteer.
“I just came to help because we are part of the farming community through our business,” Ritz said. “It’s amazing it’s been around for 90 years. There were years we said we are too tired to do this and we say: ‘Let’s not do this.’ But when you know there hasn’t been one year missed since then (the start) that really motivates you.”
The tea has expanded its reach over the years. Residents from west of Cayley started making the trek when the Meadowbank Hall cancelled its annual tea. They don’t let geography get in the way. There were grandmas from across the Foothills at the May 3 tea. One of them was Cornelia Niemans who won the top prize with 38 great-grandchildren and grandchildren. She has been coming for 10 years.
“It’s nice that I get asked to come here every year,” said Niemans who was born in 1917. “I like it.”
Things have changed since Mother’s Day back in the 1930 and ’40s.
“It’s a lot more lively and everything,” Niemans said with the Christian Cowboys singing Tony Orlando and Dawn’s Knock Three Times in the background. “Back then we just might have a cup of tea and that was it.”
