In Which We Discuss Hitty: Her First Hundred Years
Written by Rachel Field, illustrated by Dorothy Lathrop

HITTY Her First Hundred Years

Week of August 16, 2010

LAST REMARKS:

Chapter 17 ends with Hitty having been purchased at auction in Maine by the Old Gentleman. She has traveled to New York to an Antique Shop on Eighth Street “again”.
(This must be fairly close to her previous home with the Van Rensselaer family on Washington Square. Hitty tells us about Isabella Van Rensselaer leaving her home on New Year’s to visit a friend in the “wilds of Twenty-third Street.” They made it beyond Sixteenth Street before being accosted by thugs. Hitty also mentions the merchants were located on Fourteenth Street.)

Hitty was purchased by the Old Gentleman for Miss Hunter, owner of the antique shop. She was very happy with the purchase. Hitty saw the gentleman many more times. He obviously became very attached to Hitty because on his buying trips, he would always bring back a small gift for her. Sometimes, to play a trick on the Old Gentleman, Miss Hunter would hide Hitty and tell him that she has been sold. She has a high price on Hitty so one has to assume that she really doesn’t want to sell her. Maybe Miss Hunter is in love with the old man and as Hitty is very special to both of them she will never sell Hitty.

If Hitty were sold at auction for $51.00, one can only wonder at how much of a price Miss Hunter put on her at the antique shop!  Maybe she truly hoped Hitty would not sell.

Hitty makes many friends of the customers. They all come by to see her. Each customer coming into the shop fills Hitty with interest and suspense for “who knows but this may be the one fated to carry me away to further adventures.” Hitty is apparently ready to move on and discover new things. She is so excited about the noise of an airplane that she falls off her bench to see just what it is. Imagine her surprise.

This story definitely needs to continue on. We can’t leave Hitty in the Antique Shop forever!!

From Hitty Timeline:

We can't know how long Hitty spent in the Antique Shop, nor how long it took her to write her memoirs. But I do believe, from casual remarks dropped about her being over one hundred years old, that it was probably 1929, and that Hitty was probably made anytime in the winters of 1820-1828. This is, of course, merely my opinion.