Flinch! Have you ever played it?

Saturday, January 31, 1925: It is a warm day. The warmth broke up the roads and the creeks are running. Yesterday was a very nice day also. We baked and Len & Ruby went to town in the afternoon. Mother washed a few pieces.

Thursday, Mother cut out two night dresses* and partly made them. I felt tough* that day. Wednesday was quite cold in the morning. We didn’t know what to do about coming home. Everyone thought it too cold to walk from Station. I was in a terrible way to know what to do. At last we bought tickets to Scales Mound, thought we might get a chance* home but didn’t. Then Len came up with some hogs. But I was afraid I couldn’t stand to ride in the wagon. So Mother and I went to Galena on the noon train. We didn’t know how we would get out from Galena to home but we met Aunt Annie right away. So we had a dandy chance out. We had so much time we even went up to the library. Uncle Edd brought us home.

Wednesday when we were still in Apple River we called on Emily Elbren* and Mr. Leathlain* in the afternoon. Sadie came down to invited us all up to supper so we all went. Had a fine supper. Played flinch* till after ten then had popcorn and went home.


* Night dresses are what we,today,call a woman’s nightgown.
* Tough, as Deb told us last time, means not to feel well.
* Chance means catch a ride, as in hitch hike.
* Elbren & Leathlain - I cannot find any documentation of either of these surnames
in Apple River or the Galena area, so am not sure of their actual identity.
* "Flinch is a card game, played with a custom deck, invented in 1901 by A.J. Patterson. This deck has 150 cards, consisting of ten sets numbered from one to fifteen. Some variations use a 144-card deck. It is based on "Spite and Malice". Rules of play;
• The cards are dealt face down.
• The first player turns over his top card and if it is a one it is put in the middle of the table; if it is not a one it is put face up so that everyone can see it.The second player takes his top card,and again if it is not a one it is put face up; and so forth for the rest of the players.
• The first player goes again: if his face-up card happens to be a two it can be placed in the middle, on top of the one; or, if the face-up card is either one more or one less than another player's face-up card, that card can be placed on top of the other player's card. For example, if the first player's face-up card is a seven, it can be placed on another player's six or eight. If the player is able to get rid of his face-up card in one of these ways, he turns up his next card and attempts to discard it using the same methods. He continues until he is unable to discard any more cards. Play then continues with the next player.
• Note that cards may be placed in the middle only in ascending order,starting at one and continuing to fifteen, whereas cards may be placed on other players' cards
in either ascending or descending order.
• The object of the game is to get rid of all one's cards.
• If the current player's turned-up card could be discarded, but the player fails to
notice this, other players may yell "Flinch!". Source: Wikipedia