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—Lancaster Farming, Saturday, October 7, 1972
Mrs. Harold Fry
By Mrs Charles McSparran
Farm Feature Writer
This is National 4-H Week 0 H
Benson, Goldfield, lowa, *s
credited with starting the 4-H
Club in 1906 He was inspired to
use the 4-H clover as represen
ting head, hands, heart and
health
Even prior to 1906,'in the early
1900’s, seed corn was given to
boys in lowa to grow and the boys
put on demonstrations This
movement caught on until today
four million young people in the
United States belong to 4-H.
Lancaster County has 2,534
members.
Many people have contributed
very much to the 4-H clubs in
Lancaster County. Victor
Longenecker, Elizabethtown
RD3, has served 39 years as a 4-H
leader. Mrs. Harold R (Dorothy
V.) Fry, Stevens RDI, has the
Mrs. Dorothy V. Fry, Stevens RDI, with her recipe book
“Recipes From The Caribbean and Latin America" stands in
front of a set of book shelves with a dried arrangement of
grasses in a cork covered vase and two pieces of drift wood
resembling a duck sitting on a log. A polished stone is used
for the duck’s eye. Goats beard and a Norwegian troll
complete the arrangement.
longest service record as a
woman 4-H leader.
Mrs Fry was honored Tuesday
night at the 4-H Leadership
Banquet held at the Farm and
Home Center by receiving a 30-
year certificate and the ruby
clover award.
She became 4-H leader for the
Lincoln Community Club m the
spring of 1942. There were bet
ween 35 and 40 children in the
club The boys and girls had corn,
tobacco, baby chicks, home
gardens and flowers Mrs Fry
says “Indoor gardens are my
speciality in the community
club ”
Mrs Fry started the Jolly
Caterers 4-H Cooking Club in the
early i9so’s She now has
daughters of her former 4-H Club
members m the club There were
24 girls in the club this year Mrs
Fry always has the club meet at
her home Her husband tore down
a barn around 1947 and built an
outside picnic pavilion, including
a fireplace, with materials from
the barn The girls use it for tne
cooking club. They also use her
kitchen to cook the food.
The girls are usually in the club
about five years. They take one
phase of cooking each year.
Courses they have been taking
are “It’s Fun To Bake”, “Tasty
Snacks”, “Meal Time Magic”,
‘ ‘Meats and Vegetables ,
A Tribute to a Dedicated 4-H Leader
and fruits. In “Free Lance” they
can prepare what they want to.
The Jolly Caterers have an
organization meeting, followed
by six cooking meetings. They
eat at 7 p m. The Club is divided
into four groups. One group plans
for the next meeting. The Servers
and Go-Between set the tables.
The Clean-Up Crew washes the
dishes and the Cookers come
early enough to have the meal
cooked by 7 p.m. Sometimes the
girls are given home work to do.
They must prepare a food at
home and bring it to the meeting.
They usually have a Mother
and Daughter meal at Mt. Airy
Fire Hall and they prepare the
meal and put on a program Their
roundups are held at Lincoln
Lutheran Church and sponsored
by Farm Women Society 3 on the
third Saturday of August
Achievement Day is held in
August at the Farm and Home
Center Here the girls enter
something on their own.
The Community Club made a
float and it competed with other
youth organizations in the
Ephrata Fair parade. They also
had an exhibit at the fair.
Mrs. Fry says “I always en
joyed the Exchange Trips I was
a chaperone. There were two or
three adult chaperones for the
bus load of 24 4-H members. I
went to Kendall County, HI. and
•• • •
For Today, The Easy Way”,
“Foreign Cookery” and “Free
Lance.”
In “It’s Fun To Bake” they
learn to make muffins, cookies
and a plain cake. In “Tasty
Snacks” they make such things
as pizza, cookies, sandwiches,
beverages and homemade
candies. In “Meal Time Magic”
they make yeast breads. In
“Meats and Vegetables” they
stress food values, balanced
meals and attractive meals. Last
year they had “Foreign
Cookery” and learned to make
French, Italian and German
dishes. This year they took
“Meals For Today, The Easy
Way.” In this they learned to add
certain ingredients to prepared
and boxed foods to make easy
meals. This wasn’t so popular
among farm families where they
have their own meats, vegetables
Essex County, Mass. I also went
for a winter weekend to
Syracuse, N Y I barely made it
home because of a blizzard and
had to leave my car in Lancaster.
A few of the 4-H members had to
stay in Lancaster until their
roads were opened ” 4-H
members have to be 14 years or
over to go
Mrs. Fry coached 4-H plays
together with Mrs. John Herr of
Mount Joy. She also trained
county-wide flower identification
teams to go to Penn State. These
young people not only had to
identify all the flowers but had to
be able to spell the names
correctly. They chose about
three to go, and one year had the
champion, Ada Louise Kreider of
Lincoln.
Dorothy has actually been
involved in 4-H work for 45 years
because she was in a 4-H sewing
club that met at old Clay School
when Miss Anne Forbes was in
The Lancaster County Ex
tension Office. She learned to
darn expertly which has always
been a help to her. She also
learned to make aprons and a
complete set of undies without
patterns. She was a 1931
representative to Penn State Club
Week.
Dorothy is the daughter of
William D. Eberly, Ephrata. She
has two sisters and one brother.
Her mother died when the
children were quite small so
Dorothy was raised by her
grandparents, Mr. and Mrs. Ezra
Keller. They lived between
Lincoln and Clay, on a 108 acre
farm where they raised beef
cattle. Dorothy did just about
anything around the farm. Her
grandmother taught her to cook.
She cooked for threshers when
she was nine years old. Her
grandmother taught her many
fundamentals in measurements,
etc., which she never forgot.
She and her husband live on a
12 acre farm on Kleinfeltersville
Road, near Hopeland in clay
Township. They keep six sheep
and a few chickens. The meadow
is used to pasture the sheep and a
neighbor uses the balance of the
land to grow alfalfa. The Frys
also have two Araucana chikens
that lay green eggs and some
Siamese cats. Harold has worked
some twenty years for Wohlsen
Construction Company, Lan
caster.
Although the Frys have no
children of their own, Mrs. Fry
has worked extensively with
many children. She has been a
Mrs. Harold R. Fry, Ephrata Library Coordinator, holds an
antique pottery vase filled with dried grasses. In background
is an attractive bulletin board arrangement to interest young
readers at the Lincoln Elementary School. She used cloth
cut-outs of butterflies, dried grass with green paper leaves
plus a straw rooster. The slogan “Let The Reading Bug Grab
You" is accentuated with a big bug.
public school teacher for 39
years, having taught 28 years in
the classroom and 11 years m the
library She graduated from a
two year course at Millersville in
1933. She worked one year at
Thompson’s Shirt Factory, now
owned by Shore and Son at
Brownstown. She met her
husband there. She started
teaching in 1934 at Fairview
grade school, Clay Township.
She later taught at Fetters, Clay,
Warwick and again at Clay grade
school. When Clay was changed
to a graded elementary school
she taught the sixth grade. Mrs.
Fry still prefers the one room
school to the graded school.
She took a Sabbatical leave in
1961 and 1962 and received her
Bachelor’s degree at Millersville
State College. She went to Drexel
in the summer and evenings and
received her Master’s degree in
1967. She specialized in library
work.
Mrs. Fry became librarian for
the whole Ephrata Elementary
area but for the past three years
she has been library co-ordinator
also for the Senior and Junior
High Schools. She spends two
days at Clay Elementary School,
two at Lincoln Elementary and
Friday doing co-ordinating work.
She has trained 13 student
teachers m the library program
at the Lincoln School. There are
three librarians now on the
Elementary staff. She sees 750
children every week. She says
“It makes you feel sad to lose this
close relationship with the
children.” Her knowledge of
classroom books has helped her
tremendously with library skills.
Also her 4-H work has given her
insight into identification of
plants. She is often called upon to
identify plants.
She loves to read. She
organized 32 teachers in a
reading class. Each buy a 1972
book, fiction or non-fiction, and
puts it in the club. They keep a
book two weeks, then pass it on.
When a book has made its rounds
it is returned to the owner.
Mrs. Fry belongs to the
American Library Association,
Pennsylvania Library
Association and Lancaster
County Librarians. She is a
member of Delta Kappa Gamma
Chi Chapter. She belongs to
Ephrata Hospital Auxiliary. She
and Harold are members of Zion
United Church Of Christ, Lincoln.
She works with Percy Clark of
Lancaster as a recruiter for
Drexel Alumni, to get students to
go there. She talks on cooking
and does book reviews for
women’s groups for fun. She tells
stones for Retarded Children’s
Day Camp. She will speak to a
church group this fall on “How To
Choose A Good Book.”
She went at least three times to
speak in the new Senate Office
Building, Washington, D. C. Miss
Marjory Hendricks, owner of the
Water Gate Inn, asked her to talk
on “Home Butchering," “Wild
Natural Things You Can Eat”
and she talked in Pennsylvania
Dutch for the Pennsylvania
Society when there were crowds
of 200 to 250 people. One time she
couldn’t go so she sent the
Hammer Creek Mennonite
Sewing Circle and they quilted
there. The Water Gate Inn has
now been torn down to make way
for the Kennedy Cultural Center.
Mrs. Fry went to Europe two
years ago on a six week’s tour
relating to children’s literature.
Twenty-six people went onthis
tour of Spain, Greece, Austria,
Norway, Sweden, Denmark and
Iceland, studying mythology.
This tour was an extension course
with Oklahoma State University.
Mrs. Della Thomas, professor
of Children’s Literature with the
University, went with them.
Mrs. Fry was a Girl Scout
Leader for Hopeland Troop,
Rolling Hills Neighborhood, in
the Lititz area for 20 years but
had to give it up when she
became librarian.
Mrs. Fry is occupied many
evenings and Saturdays with
going to meetings, getting books,
and various things, yet she and
her husband do many things
together. They like to go to sales
to buy antiques, pressed glass
and compotes with lids on. They
lost a lot of paneled thistle glass
and antique furniture when their
home burned in 1945. They
replaced their house with a Cape
Cod stlye house which has lots of
alcoves to store things in.
They travel quite a bit and buy
antiques here and there. They
went to Far Away Inn, a country
inn near Elkins, West Virginia.
Mrs. Fry says “I love to go to
Vermont.” Of course there are
many antique shops there. Last
summer they went to Salt Lake
City, Utah.
They have flowers blooming
continuously around their home.
They also gather weeds and dry
them. They make dried
arrangements. When Mt. Airy
Fire Company Auxiliary serves
meals they do the decorating.
They use fresh flowers such as
tulips, lilacs, annuals, dried
weeds, gourds and pumpkins.
They have a vegetable garden
and both work in it. She canned a
lot of tomatoes and string beans
and made raspberry jelly. She
froze sugar peas and tomato
juice.
Harold has a rock tumbler
which is run by electricity and
uses various abrasives to polish
stones. Mrs. Fry says “I like
junky rings.” He makes rings,
pins, necklaces and bracelets
from the stones he polishes. He
does this strictly as a hobby.
One of Mrs. Fry’s hobbies is
designing and making wall
hangingswhich she uses mostly at
school. To make these she buys
material with scenes, butterflies,
animals and what have you, then
she appliques them. She likes to
qulit, to do crewel embroidery
and she can crochet.
She makes animals of papier
mache. She collects drift wood to
use for decorating. Her supply
closet has all kinds of materials
for decorating. She has trophy
cabinets at both Clay and Lincoln
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