are aware by the traditions of Puritanism which it was supposed the Yankees inherited. They recalled the story of how Bradford stopped Christmas revelers and sent them to work; they pictured Puritan children as forbidden to laugh and talk on the Sabbath day; and some may have heard the story of how Washington, while president, was once stopped by a Connecticut tithing man who must be informed why His Excellency fared forth on the Lord's Day instead of resting at his inn or attending public worship.[1]
Two remarks may be made on this point. First, while Puritanism unquestionably had a somber discipline, there was not lacking even among Puritans the play instinct which persisted in cropping out despite all efforts of the authorities at repression. Second, the nineteenth century Yankees register a wide departure from early Puritanism in their social proclivities, and the difference was particularly marked in the West. Even church services were modified to fit the needs of the less resolute souls. Music became an important feature and it was adapted more or less to special occasions.[2] Sunday Blue Laws were gradually relaxed, though never abandoned in principle. Well-to-do city people allowed themselves vacation trips, visits to watering places, and to scenic wonders like Niagara Falls.[3] In town and country alike dancing became an amusement of almost universal vogue, though protested by some religionists, and rural neighborhoods found bowling such a fascinating game for men and boys that the almanac maker thought well to caution his readers against over-indulgence therein.[4] Ball playing, picnicing, sleighing, coasting, skating were
- ↑ The story was printed in the Columbian Centinel, Boston, December, 1789.
- ↑ See Diary of Sarah Connell Ayer (Portland, Me., 1910), 227.
- ↑ See Almon Danforth Hodges and His Neighbors (Boston, 1909), 217-218.
- ↑ "At sun two hours high," says the Farmer's Almanack, 1815, "the day is finished and away goes men and boys to the bowling alley. Haying, hoeing, plowing, sowing all must give way to sport and toddy. Now this is no way for a farmer. It will do for the city lads to sport and relax in this way, and so there are proper times and seasons for farmers to take pleasure of this sort, for I agree that all work and no play makes Jack a dull boy."
