Indian Summer - That Magical Time of the Year

Excerpts from "Just Thoughts of a Plain Country Woman"  November 7, 1946.

"There comes a times in every autumn when the nights are chill and clear, the days still, crisp, and golden with purple mists and all nature seems to be resting or waiting. These are signs of "Indian Summer,"  not a season, but definitely a pause in nature called by

the American pioneers, "Indian Summer," because they thought the peculiar purple haze was caused by the Indians burning prairies.

Scientists scorn the lovely traditions and superstitions surrounding

Indian Summer both here and in England and France where it is called St. Martin's Summer; in Germany, where these serene days are known as Old Wives' Summer and in South America where it is named St. John's Summer.

These cold scholars who presented such explanations as "stagnated

high-pressure areas," "collected and suspended smoke" or "minute

floating particles of dead vegetation" are the same ones who say Jack Frost has nothing to do with leaves changing color, or set about scientifically telling how, when frost bites the leaves, it actually kills them instead of painting them. They tell what makes the aspens, hickory, birch, locust, pawpaw, and poplar turn to gold

while other chemicals, sugar, light and drought produce the gorgeous flags of summer. 

 

Nevertheless, "when all the homesick Injuns come back to play and their spirits march

along and dance in the sunlight, that's what makes that kind o' haze. That smoky smell is the campfires a-burnin' and their pipes a-goin'.

"Jever notice how the leaves turn red 'bout this time o' year? That's

.when an old Injun spirit gits tired dancin' an' goes up an' squats on a leaf to rest. An' ever once in a while a leaf gives way under some old fat Injun ghost an' comes floatin' down to the ground. 

 

See, here's one now.  See how red it is? That's war paint rubbed off'n Injun ghost sure's you're born!"  .

"Purty soon all the Injuns'll go marchin' away again, back to the

'happy huntin' ground, but next year you'll see 'em troopin' back -- the sky jest hazy with 'em and their campfires smolderin' away jest like they are now." "

 

Notes added by Dr. Kathleen Morrow - When I was very small and walked or drove with my grandmother the leaves fell and she would say, "See! Did you see that ol' Injun just fall down?"  I would rush to pick up particularly large leaf and examine it carefully for any signs of "an o' Injun".  Then she would say, "Well, he was too quick for you.  You'll have to catch the leaf next time before he gets away." 

 

I can only find one source for the piece quoted.  Published in the Enderby Press and Walker's Weekly, November 2, 1916  located in British Columbia, Canada.  I am assuming that she used the piece in literature classes with her students during her early teaching years following her graduation from The University of Chicago in 1917.