Harriet (DYE) FOLTZ as told by Harriet (BECK) PRICE:

I was named for my Great Grandmother, Harriett DYE. My mother told me the first time she saw me, she noticed my eyebrows were just like hers, so she named me for her. From the tintype of Harriett you can see this, but there the resemblance ends. I have always been interested in her and her story. I only wish I had asked more questions of my Grandmother and Mother. But will have to be content with the scraps and pieces they told me. She lived in Pennsylvania and came from a fairly well-off family, I imagine from the stories of her going to finishing school. There she learned to roll a perfectly round pie crust in three moves of the rolling pin. She learned to ride and was an excellent horsewoman. After she met and married William Henry FOLTZ, they went by covered wagon to the wild country of Ohio. She took along her favorite mare and a black walnut - marble- topped dresser among all the things needed to start a new life in the wilderness. The first Sunday after they were settled, she wore her best silk dress to church and noticed everyone else had on plain cotton or homespun. When she came home she packed away all her silks and satins and never wore them again. She was always kind and thoughtful, always ready to help with an illness or the birth of a child. One time when was returning home from such a visit late in the evening when she heard the howling of a pack of timber wolves. It was winter and they were hungry. It was fast getting dark. She urged her horse faster though the mare didn’t need much urging with the sound of the wolves getting louder. Grandmother Harriett thanked the Lord that she was riding her jumper as there were three fences to cross and if she had to stop and open gates the wolves would have her. The mare sailed over the fences and they reached home safely.

She and William had five children - Ida [born 1864], Emma [born 1866], Earl [born 1869], Clyde [born 1871] and Keefer [born 1875]. After Keefer was born Harriett became ill and lingered for a year before she died at 39 [on July 21, 1882, Ringgold County, Iowa]. They said it was a stomach complaint and she took chamomile for it. The doctor said her death was caused by eating tomatoes when she was taking the chamomile, it ate the lining of her stomach. Tomatoes were still distrusted at that time and still called love apples. Now we know that Chamomile is mercury and that is what ate her stomach lining.

NOTE: William Henry FOLTZ, the son of Samuel (1802-1884) and Elizabeth (KEIFER) FOLTZ (1803-?), was born on February 7, 1840, Ohio. He died on August 8, 1909, Kellerton, Ringgoltd County, Iowa, at the age of 69. William did not remarry after Harriet's death.