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Stepping back 100 years
Fashion show highlight of Reiman-Simmons Mother's Day Tea Party
The tables were set with elegant centerpieces and baskets filled with delicious sandwiches and salads Saturday afternoon at the Reiman-Simmons house, as mothers and daughters took their seats for the annual Mother's Day Tea Celebration. This year, with the addition of live entertainment, the Quincy Valley Historical Society moved the festivities to the lawn of the estate and served lunch and tea under a canopy.
The Garden Tea party guests enjoyed the spring-like weather with teacups warming their hands as QVHS volunteer Harriet Weber introduced the setting and the entertainment for the party. In a short history of the Reiman-Simmons House, Weber told the ladies that the Reimans, early Russian-German homesteaders, saved their money for 20 years before building their home in 1904. "It was a grand house for those days," Weber said. In order to accommodate more guests and the SageHens, a group of women interested in Grant County's agricultural past, the QVHS planned a larger function than in years past and moved the tea outside.
The SageHens, gearing up for Grant County's Centennial celebrations in 2009, performed an historic fashion show that featured women of Grant County during 1899 through 1919. Wearing period dress, carefully researched and stitched by Beverly Mayer, the SageHens strutted through under the canopy, taking guests back in time. Mayer, also in period costume, narrated the show with her own script.
Faye Mayer, a longtime resident of Sage Brush Flats and now Ephrata, commented that the show and storylines pleasantly brought her on a trip through memory lane. Like some of the other guests, Faye Mayer remembers many of the real women portrayed in Mayer's narration.
Among the women whose stories Meyer shared were a turn of the century homesteader, schoolteacher and restaurateur.
Included in the price of the ticket was entry to the Reiman-Simmons house to explore the School Days Exhibit. In addition to the First 100 Days of Quincy Schools artifacts, The Washington State Historical Society's traveling exhibit of early Washington schools is on display. Guests also browsed the Sagebrush Mercantile, the Reiman-Simmons House gift shop.
Guests lunched on Italian pressed sandwiches and pasta salads prepared by chef Ann Phelps. QVHS members served assorted teas, including a hot Earl Grey and a mint-infused iced tea.
Also in attendance was Soap Lake film-maker Kathy Keifer, who produced the Ava Award winning film, The Town in Our Heart, for Quincy's Centennial. Keifer and an assistant filmed the tea and historic fashion show and will add the piece to the Reiman-Simmons' collection of rich, historical artifacts and memorabilia.
"We had a phenomenal turnout and afternoon," said organizer Harriet Weber. "We are very pleased with the event."
