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Show New Year Calk ; Were All the Ran lnU.S.in 1900 The custom of making short on New Years' Day was in :d swing in the United States an the turn of the century. 1 12 Newspapers carried column! rf 'at home' notices specifying S".3 hours during which visitors be received. Hosts and hostel ir having duly received, closed 3"s open house to become guestf ""' somebody else's. j i 'Open House' on New Year's 5 was introduced into America ' the Dutch who settled in : '' Amsterdam. Friends were ac v tomed to dropping in to offer r compliments of the day and ' freshments centered around h "'" made snacks, plus the host's orite concoction of punch. The custom grew with the c: try, finally attaining the new; . per announcement stage, with ; r eventual time-table and scurryH e from one 'open house' to ariK.il; It was inevitable that some pis Ik' after a succession of nine or punch bowls, sometimes err: rassed their tenth or eleventh h ess; and receptions sometimes u 1 'crashed' by, total strangers ten n ed by the possibility of free pu: e Perhaps it is just as well 5 the publicly announced New V reception is no longer a h it If only a small percentage of n dwellers inserted 'at home' not 11 in. their favorite metropolitan nc " papers, what colossal editi r would result, what headaches r everybody, from the swarr. 1 linotype operators to the stag; '' ing newsboys. |