Eminent Homemaker
County: Sully
Adeline McArthur Reynolds, a native South Dakotan, was born in 1897 just a mile and a half from where she and her husband farmed and still live, northeast of Blunt in Sully County. They have four children and five grandchildren. Arthur, the eldest of their children, farms the home place, Helen (David) Trumble is a homemaker in Pierre, Mary is a registered nurse in Sioux Falls and George works with a flying service in Pierre.
Reynolds has taken part in the activities of numerous local organizations. She has belonged to the Blain Progress Extension Club for 33 years, served as leader of a 4-H club for seven years and was chairman of the county 4-H leaders association. For seven years she served on the county fair board and 18 years on the Extension board where she was chairman for several years.
She has helped with a number of charity fund drives and has been a member of the Hospital Auxiliary and the American Legion Auxiliary. She is a member of the Presbyterian Church and has served for two years as president of the Women’s Association.
Alert to current happenings, Reynolds reads widely. She enjoys historical readings, belongs to a book club and claims Browning as her favorite poet. She keeps a scrapbook of the family and collects old books. She has written material for local papers and some day she hopes to write a short story, but wants first to write something for her children about their grandparents.
Reynolds passed a teaching exam after three years of high school, and taught rural school in Buffalo Township from 1917 until the school was closed the next fall during the flu epidemic. In 1921 she received the A. B. degree in English from Huron College. She taught high school two years each in Wolsey and Harrold.
In June 1926, she married Reynolds, who also has been a rural school teacher. They moved to the home place that November.
She has faith in youth—“They’ll meet a situation when they come to it. We hear a lot about juvenile delinquency, but this is over balanced by the fine things so many young people are doing.”
Her philosophy is to have high standards and do your best.