Comments on: She Had a Question, 1912 (4)

By: The Other Clark

The Other Clark — Sun, 31 Jul 2011 22:52:35 +0000

What? Catherine Hurst wasn’t real. I’m shattered.

BTW, the best line in this post is “…if one has a good set of natural teeth…”

By: Ardis E. Parshall

Ardis E. Parshall — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 17:43:40 +0000

Kent, Catherine Hurst ran this column from 1909 through 1921. There are other Q&A columns in the YWJ and in other church periodicals -- Joseph Fielding Smith's "Answers to Gospel Questions" in the Improvement Era, for instance -- but none of them have the charm and plain common sense of Catherine Hurst. The columns from 1897, for instance, sounds didactic and flowery and even patronizing, to my ears. One of these days Real Soon Now I need to write up a short biography of the real woman behind the Catherine Hurst pseudonym.

By: jk

jk — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 17:34:13 +0000

The 2nd response to “Mabel” — ‘Hardly’. The sheer, cool mystery of that single word is endlessly intriguing.

By: Kent Larsen

Kent Larsen — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 17:11:40 +0000

Ardis, do these continue for the length of the YWJ’s run? Is there anything similar in the other Church publications?

I wonder if the advice changed much over time. You would think there would be some change over the 32-year span of the YWJ.

By: kevinf

kevinf — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 17:04:44 +0000

Ms. Hurst got these two questions wrong:

(1) Is it right for a girl to correspond with a boy she has never seen?
(2) Is there such a thing as witchcraft existing at the present time? – S.C.E.

The correct answer is, strangely the same:
(1) See “Internet” entry in Wikipedia
(2) See “Internet” entry in Wikipedia

By: Anne (U.K.)

Anne (U.K.) — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 16:14:37 +0000

‘Without noise or suction’. Love it!

By: Ardis E. Parshall

Ardis E. Parshall — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 16:13:29 +0000

Ha!

By: J. Stapley

J. Stapley — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 16:11:54 +0000

In my minds eye, I like to think that there is a Jewish publication somewhere, where someone has written in asking whether krab is kosher.

By: Ardis E. Parshall

Ardis E. Parshall — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 15:57:25 +0000

Didja notice that the linked ad for Koffee-et was published in the very year of this query?

By: J. Stapley

J. Stapley — Fri, 29 Jul 2011 15:38:43 +0000

Koffe-et!