Hoein' the Short Rows Page: 8
xvi, 240 p. : ill., ports. ; 24 cm.View a full description of this book.
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fessionals should reach back in time and call them "sister."
But there is more: gifts of food, little surprises for the
children they knew, gifts for acquaintances; they were peace-
makers in family and community. The positive force which
emanated from High Toned Women made many of them eli-
gible for sainthood.
I do believe that the clan, High Toned, is universal and
occurs in all civilizations from pagan to Christian, from Africa
to South America, from Siberia to Australia, and represents a
kind of feminine category peculiar to every nationality on
earth. Somebody ought to fund a salary and give a professor-
ship, free research assistants, and living accommodations to
any writer who would hunt and write about the High Toned
Woman. (They did all that for James A. Michener and he
didn't even find out that there was such a creature in this
incomparable state.)
The status and importance of High Toned Women were
probably felt only in female domains. Males, as far as I could
tell, paid no attention to them unless perhaps a preacher had
to deal with them from time to time. There does not appear
to be a related category known as High Toned Men, for in-
stance. No one questioned a woman's role in male relation-
ships either. It was usually a woman-to-woman thing. How
women kept house may have been of some interest, but how
they performed in the bedroom was a question peculiar only
to 1970 and after, and by then High Toned Women were all
gone. Most men probably felt like Ernie Ford, knowing that
no High Toned Woman would make them walk the line-
maybe.
The decline of High Toned Women began with World
War II when women went to work and opened up a whole
new classification of types. Radio, which brought the voices
of the nation and the world into the living room, did no favor
for High Toned Women. Movies occasionally captured one or
two on film, but High Toned Women were always featured in
supporting roles, which is, perhaps, what High Toned Women
did best-support. Movies made of them merely Busy Bodies.
8 * ROACH
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Hoein' the Short Rows (Book)
Volume of Texas folklore, including folk arts and crafts, lime production, oil and petroleum, information about cockfighting, folk poetry, mysticism and other stories. The index begins on page 231.
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Texas Folklore Society. Hoein' the Short Rows, book, 1987; Dallas, Texas. (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metadc38855/m1/26/: accessed May 21, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Press.