"The Egg And I" by Betty MacDonald Quiz

Answer: Betty's brother Cleve brought Bob home to spend the weekend.

Betty met Bob Heskett (Don MacDonald was Betty's second husband) when her brother Cleve brought him home to spend the weekend. Bob was thirteen years older than Betty, and they were instantly attracted to one another. They dated a short time, then married on July 10th, 1926. Betty was eighteen, and Bob was thirty one.

Answer: He was an insurance salesman.

While on their honeymoon, Bob talked mostly of insurance. But upon their return to Seattle, he began to talk to Betty about a chicken ranch that was for sale, and told her that he always wanted to go into the chicken business. When asked what she thought about it, her answer was, "I knew how to make mayonnaise and mitre sheet corners and light candles for dinner, so, chickens or insurance, I could hold up my end. That's what I thought. That's what a lot of women think when their husbands become dewy-eyed at the sight of their breakfast eggs and start making plans for taking the life savings and plunging into the chicken business!"

Answer: On the Olympic Peninsula

Betty never mentions Chimacum, always referring to it as "Town". It was a long, tortuous drive from the ranch to get to "Town". Betty writes, "Everyone drove as if he were going to a fire and on the wrong side of the road, and we were warned of approaching corners by the anguished screams of tires and brakes. Bob is an excellent driver, but he was hard put to it to hold his own when a logging truck carrying three of the largest stand of Douglas fir in the world came winging around a curve and we had to leap to the bank and scurry for the woods to avoid being smashed into oblivion by the playful trailer.

The driver leaned out and grinned and waved at us and then went careening off down the road."

Answer: The Kettles and the Hicks

Maw and Paw Kettle lived four miles down the road from Betty and Bob. Mr. Kettle was very lazy and always going from ranch to ranch borrowing things and begging the ranchers to help with his chores. (His favorite line was, "The boys won't help and Maw and I can't do it all alone!") Maw was very hard working, but not very clean. She once told Betty, "When I was first married, I was neat and clean and tried to keep my house and kids clean, but Paw's an awful lazy old (censored) and it was fight, fight, fight all the time...I finally give it up. I says to myself, 'I can't make Paw change and be neat, so I'll have to change and be dirty!'"

The Hicks, who lived five miles down the road in the opposite direction, were exceptionally neat and clean. Betty wrote, "It made me feel that one pine needle carelessly tracked in by me would create a panic!"

Answer: He sawed off a piece of the water tank support leg.

Paw needed a foot long piece of two by four for their apple bin, but was too lazy to go to "Town" to buy one, so he took it from the water tank support. It caused the water tower to collapse on the milk house roof! When confronted by Maw, he said, "I thought the other leg would hold her all right! How'd I know the bugger'd collapse?" One of his sons yelled, "Hey Paw! You dropped something!" and told Maw, "I knowed what would happen when I seen the old fool sawin'!"

Answer: A very dirty suit of long underwear

Mrs. Weatherby's home was an absolute mess! Betty wrote that the kitchen sink was so cluttered with dirty dishes, pans, bottles and cans that it was only recognizable from the dripping faucet! They tried to eat the fruitcake, but couldn't, so they made the excuse that they had to leave.

Sadly, we learn later that Mrs. Weatherby had a very abusive alcoholic husband who, as Betty wrote, "Beat her unconscious every Saturday night." Poor Mrs. Weatherby!

Answer: The lazy neighbor set the barn on fire to get rid of the mounds of manure.

Lazy Paw Kettle does it again! He claimed the barn burst into flame by spontaneous combustion, but it was later revealed that he set the barn on fire to relieve the manure situation. (He once admitted to setting the grass on fire to avoid mowing it and burned off the front porch!) The fire came dangerously close to Bob's and Betty's ranch, but the ranchers in the area were able to keep it away, and then rain put it out.

Answer: Four years

In 1931, after four years of living on the ranch with no running water, no electricity, no phone and putting up with Bob's abuse, Betty decided she had enough. She took her two daughters, Anne and Joan, and returned to Seattle to live with her family.

She was granted a divorce and awarded twenty dollars a month child support, but Bob never payed it, claiming that since she lived with her family and had a job, she didn't need his help! Also, by his own choice, he never saw his daughters again.

Answer: It was her sister Mary.

Mary was always getting ideas for Betty to do things that she probably wouldn't have thought of herself. Betty submitted the manuscript to J. B. Lippincott Company, but they instantly returned it, saying that "Nobody wants to read about abusive husbands. We'll publish it if you can make Bob 'more likeable'." Betty then revised the manuscript, and it was published in 1945. It went on to become a best seller, and in 1947 the movie was made starring Claudette Colbert and Fred MacMurray.

Betty went on to write three more autobiographical books: "The Plague And I", "Anybody Can Do Anything" and "Onions In The Stew". She also wrote six children's books: "Mrs. Piggle Wiggle", "Mrs. Piggle Wiggle's Magic", "Mrs. Piggle Wiggle's Farm", "Hello, Mrs. Piggle Wiggle", "Happy Birthday, Mrs. Piggle Wiggle" and "Nancy And Plum".

Answer: The Kettles

The Kettles, whose real name was Bishop, sued Betty for libel, but only AFTER the movie was released and the "Ma and Pa Kettle" sequels began to be filmed. Betty testified that the Kettles were a compilation of numerous ranch families in the area, as well as people she had known in Seattle.

The court awarded them $100,000, plus an undisclosed amount for each time "The Egg And I" and "Ma and Pa Kettle" sequels were shown in theaters or later aired on television. It was referred to by the MacDonald family as "The Kettle's Million Dollar Egg".