I Was Spanked As A Teen
How Grandma Was Spanked
It seems to me that the severity of home punishments become more benign with the generations. I spanked my girls very lightly, so it was almost a joke. My Mom spanked me and my sisters with a hairbrush until we could not sit down. Mom's dad spanked her with a switch until she was bleeding. I used to wonder how Grandma was punished. When she was quite old she told me her own mom's method of keeping discipline.
I remember I was visiting Grandma when I was a teenager, and complaining that Mom still pulled our panties down and spanked us with the brush. Grandma laughed sympathetically and said it was part of growing up, but she also mentioned that when she was a girl she really got it from her mom, my great-grandmother.
Grandma was born in 1901 right around the time Queen Victoria died and President McKinley was shot. Like myself and my Mom, Grandma was raised a country girl and remembered when she used to ride to town on a horse and wagon. She and her brothers and sisters lived on a farm with their Mom and Dad. She went to school in a one-room schoolhouse that is still there, except it is a private residence now.
Like many parents from rural stock, her mom believed in the value of corporal punishment, This was considered good parenting, and the more severe the spanking the more it was shown how much their parents loved them. Her mom had a special instrument that she devised from a wide leather belt. With a straight razor she cut the flat strap down into strips, essentially making a sort of cat-o'-nine-tails. Obviously this was not the "Mutiny on the Bounty" type of cat that cut into the skin and developed scars, but I'm sure it hurt like the very devil! And of course, according to tradition, it was always applied to the bare bottom.
When it was Grandma's turn to be whipped, her mom always led her by the ear into their big farm kitchen and made her place a sturdy wooden chair in the middle of the room. If any siblings wanted to watch the spanking they could do so. The girl had to hoist herself over the back of the chair and lie there with her maxi-skirted bottom raised high.
Clothing back then, especially girls' clothing, was somewhat complicated. They didn't wear elastic, so all clothing was kept in place with drawstrings and buttons. Grandma's skirts and petticoats were held up by drawing a ribbon or string tight around the waist and tying it in place with a bow knot, like tying a shoelace. When Grandma was over the chair her mom began lifting first the long skirt, then the three or four white lace-trimmed petticoats over her back. This exposed the girl's long white bloomers, the seat of which was held closed with buttons. Her mom then undid the buttons so the seat formed a pair of flaps that opened to either side, very convenient when having to use the bathroom! Opening these flaps beautifully exposed the round cheeks of the bare behind, which was now a perfect target for the makeshift whip that was about to be applied to the naked skin.
Grandma remembered one whipping she got in 1912, about the time the Titanic went down. Her mom began to lay on the multi-lash strap across Grandma's exposed heinie while she howled her lungs out. She told me she still remembered how the lash whistled through the air before it made a loud snap across her cheeks. She thought the whipping would never end. She implored her mom to have mercy, that the weeping girl had learned her lesson, and promised to amend her behavior in future. I think Grandma had neglected to do her chores, which on a working farm was a serious offense. My sisters and I were also spanked for not doing chores, so some offenses never change!
After the whipping, Grandma still lay over the chair while her mom wrung out a cold washcloth and applied it to the livid welts that decorated her poor hind end. Then she dropped the girl's petticoats back down into place and allowed her to rise up and go to her room to think about her offense.
If her crime had been serious, Grandma was made to hold up her petticoats with her armpits and take down her cotton stockings. Then her Mom would march her to the kitchen corner and make her kneel on a handful of hard split peas that Great-Grandma had strewn over the floor. With her bloomers open, her bare whipped behind on full display, and her bare knees getting embedded with the dried peas, Grandma's time in the corner was probably interminable!
Grandma didn't tell me if her mom buttoned up her bloomers afterward, or left them open to Grandma's own devices. After such a whipping, I'm sure Grandma was in no hurry to pull up her bloomers over that burning hind end.
I was surprised that Grandma opened up to me by telling me the story of her own spankings. But I think she mentioned it to let me know that, by comparison, the hairbrush wasn't too bad--even though it took us days to sit down again!
It seems to me that the severity of home punishments become more benign with the generations. I spanked my girls very lightly, so it was almost a joke. My Mom spanked me and my sisters with a hairbrush until we could not sit down. Mom's dad spanked her with a switch until she was bleeding. I used to wonder how Grandma was punished. When she was quite old she told me her own mom's method of keeping discipline.
I remember I was visiting Grandma when I was a teenager, and complaining that Mom still pulled our panties down and spanked us with the brush. Grandma laughed sympathetically and said it was part of growing up, but she also mentioned that when she was a girl she really got it from her mom, my great-grandmother.
Grandma was born in 1901 right around the time Queen Victoria died and President McKinley was shot. Like myself and my Mom, Grandma was raised a country girl and remembered when she used to ride to town on a horse and wagon. She and her brothers and sisters lived on a farm with their Mom and Dad. She went to school in a one-room schoolhouse that is still there, except it is a private residence now.
Like many parents from rural stock, her mom believed in the value of corporal punishment, This was considered good parenting, and the more severe the spanking the more it was shown how much their parents loved them. Her mom had a special instrument that she devised from a wide leather belt. With a straight razor she cut the flat strap down into strips, essentially making a sort of cat-o'-nine-tails. Obviously this was not the "Mutiny on the Bounty" type of cat that cut into the skin and developed scars, but I'm sure it hurt like the very devil! And of course, according to tradition, it was always applied to the bare bottom.
When it was Grandma's turn to be whipped, her mom always led her by the ear into their big farm kitchen and made her place a sturdy wooden chair in the middle of the room. If any siblings wanted to watch the spanking they could do so. The girl had to hoist herself over the back of the chair and lie there with her maxi-skirted bottom raised high.
Clothing back then, especially girls' clothing, was somewhat complicated. They didn't wear elastic, so all clothing was kept in place with drawstrings and buttons. Grandma's skirts and petticoats were held up by drawing a ribbon or string tight around the waist and tying it in place with a bow knot, like tying a shoelace. When Grandma was over the chair her mom began lifting first the long skirt, then the three or four white lace-trimmed petticoats over her back. This exposed the girl's long white bloomers, the seat of which was held closed with buttons. Her mom then undid the buttons so the seat formed a pair of flaps that opened to either side, very convenient when having to use the bathroom! Opening these flaps beautifully exposed the round cheeks of the bare behind, which was now a perfect target for the makeshift whip that was about to be applied to the naked skin.
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Grandma remembered one whipping she got in 1912, about the time the Titanic went down. Her mom began to lay on the multi-lash strap across Grandma's exposed heinie while she howled her lungs out. She told me she still remembered how the lash whistled through the air before it made a loud snap across her cheeks. She thought the whipping would never end. She implored her mom to have mercy, that the weeping girl had learned her lesson, and promised to amend her behavior in future. I think Grandma had neglected to do her chores, which on a working farm was a serious offense. My sisters and I were also spanked for not doing chores, so some offenses never change!
After the whipping, Grandma still lay over the chair while her mom wrung out a cold washcloth and applied it to the livid welts that decorated her poor hind end. Then she dropped the girl's petticoats back down into place and allowed her to rise up and go to her room to think about her offense.
If her crime had been serious, Grandma was made to hold up her petticoats with her armpits and take down her cotton stockings. Then her Mom would march her to the kitchen corner and make her kneel on a handful of hard split peas that Great-Grandma had strewn over the floor. With her bloomers open, her bare whipped behind on full display, and her bare knees getting embedded with the dried peas, Grandma's time in the corner was probably interminable!
[image/video - please log in to see this content]
Grandma didn't tell me if her mom buttoned up her bloomers afterward, or left them open to Grandma's own devices. After such a whipping, I'm sure Grandma was in no hurry to pull up her bloomers over that burning hind end.
I was surprised that Grandma opened up to me by telling me the story of her own spankings. But I think she mentioned it to let me know that, by comparison, the hairbrush wasn't too bad--even though it took us days to sit down again!
