On the south side of a white frame house in the shade of a maple tree, young twin sisters step back into the 19th Century.
They roll up their sleeves and begin to wash clothes with only a bar of lye soap, a washboard, a tub full of cold water and a clothes wringer.
``They made their own soap with animal fat, which is pretty gross,`` says 10-year-old Kelly Morin, as she grabs a bar of golden-yellow soap and begins to rub it against the corrugated metal.
Kelly takes a white cloth from her identical twin, Karen. She places it in the cold water and begins rubbing it on the washboard. In the 19th Century, young girls would have washed the family laundry in water their mothers boiled over a fire.
``They put in stains, so we can wash it,`` Kelly says of the Naper Settlement`s adults who have trained the girls to work and play as children did a hundred years ago.
As the soap disperses like gray clouds in the clear water, Kelly twists soapy water from the cloth; she then rinses it in a bucket of clear water.
``If the clothes are soapy when they are dry, they are stiff like your hair if you don`t get the soap out,`` she says while stooping over the bucket.
She then places the cloth between the two rollers of the wringer, while Karen turns the crank. Kelly explains that the space between the rollers can be adjusted according the thickness of the material. Karen takes the wrung cloth, runs to the front yard and hangs it on the white picket fence that encloses the yard of the Murray House, which was built in 1842.
``I see you`re doing the wash,`` calls a man who is visiting the Naper Settlement.
Karen and Kelly are two of about 65 Naperville youngsters who work as junior interpreters at the Naper Settlement, 201 W. Porter Ave. The Naper Settlement is what its curators call a living history museum. The 12-acre museum contains 17 restored or replicated Naperville buildings that were used at some time during the city`s 150-year history.
The junior interpreters program is the collective brainchild of Carole Krucoff, the museum`s director of education and public programs; Susan Chemler, a former elementary school teacher, who now volunteers for and consults on education programs at the museum; and Lea Matthias and Barbara Khant, both of whom are lead interpreters and are paid, Krucoff said.
Krucoff, who joined the Naper Settlement`s staff in October, 1988, from the Chicago Historical Society, said she asked Khant, Matthias and Chemler to consider how they could best best integrate children into the museum. Krucoff`s motivation was provided by a former colleague from Chicago who visited Naper Settlement.
``She said, `You have a village, but you have no children in it,```
Krucoff explained. The interpreters program did have children, but they functioned more in adults roles than they did as children.
By early spring, the Krucoff sent out invitations to all of Naperville Community Unit School District 203`s 4th and 5th graders, asking them and their families to participate in the program.
``We were literally deluged with phone calls,`` Krucoff said. Some of the most promising junior interpreters turned out to be the children who called the museum on their own, she said.
But many interested children were weeded out when they learned that participation required them to attend four training sessions and volunteer two times a month during the museum`s open hours: 1:30-4:30 p.m. Wednesday, Saturday and Sunday from May through October, Krucoff said.
``We trained them in 19th Century skills, particularly games, because that`s what children would be doing, games and chores,`` said Khant as she sat on the concrete steps of the museum`s Meeting House, dressed in a 1890s-style blue woolen skirt and a white, high-collar blouse accented with a cameo brooch and a gold pocket watch. A crocheted shawl was drapped over her shoulders and straw hat with flowers sat atop of her head.
``Juniors are children, because people in the 19th Century had a lot of children. People in a small town would have numerous children roaming about,`` she said.
The adult interpreters program stations people in the various restored settlement buildings. These adults tell visitors about the life that might have been lived during that earlier time.
Some of the buildings include a blacksmith shop, where Chuck Morin, the twins` father, volunteers, a fire house, a stone carver`s shop and a print shop, as well as homes and a chapel.
Among the activities children engage in at Naper Settlement are building fires with flint and steel, cooking stew, learning various stitchery skills and washing. They also play 19th-Century games such as jacks with wooden balls and card games, said Khant, who acts as one of the settlement`s supervisors.
As the season winds to a close, Krucoff said the program has been a big hit. Her assessment is based on responses to a mid-season evaluation form sent to parents and children in the junior interpreters program.