6 Things Every South Carolina Grandmother Kept in Her Purse

A grandmother’s purse always seemed to have exactly what you needed.

South Carolinians who dug through one as a kid may be surprised how long some of those items have been around.

Here’s a peek at what she might have carried, and where it came from.

1. Church Fans

Church fans were a purse staple for many grandmothers, and you might have borrowed a fan yourself.

If you wonder how long fans stayed in fashion, the Charleston Museum says hand fans were extremely popular from the 1700s into the 1900s.

The fans it describes range from a stiffened palmetto frond to an elaborate carved and lithographed work of art.

Feather fans were often called church fans.

Major Horace Hann Sams of Beaufort made a fan of 16 turkey feathers in the mid-1800s.

Charlotte Boykin Gammage used pine needles from her home in Camden for the handle of one fan.

That was only the handle.

2. Safety Pins

If you ever needed a safety pin in a hurry, many grandmothers’ purses were a good bet.

If you’ve ever wondered where the safety pin came from, Walter Hunt designed it to settle a debt, according to the Smithsonian’s magazine.

A debt started it.

3. Juicy Fruit Gum

Juicy Fruit sat in many grandmothers’ purses, and a stick might have been yours for the asking.

You can trace Juicy Fruit to the early 1890s.

William Wrigley Jr. started his business in Chicago and developed the brand the next year, according to company history posted with a Smithsonian collection record.

The company took its chewing gum brands off the civilian market during World War II and kept filling orders for U.S. troops, rather than sell an inferior product under war rationing.

The collection also includes a red Juicy Fruit tin designed to hang against a wall, with a basket on the bottom front to hold the gum.

4. Life Savers Mints

Many grandmothers kept Life Savers in their purse, and you might remember being offered a mint.

Clarence Crane of Cleveland invented Life Savers in 1912, according to the Gouverneur Museum.

He got the idea from a druggist’s pill-making machine.

If you’ve wondered about the hole, Crane punched it in the middle.

Crane offered to sell the business to Edward Noble for $2,900 in 1913.

5. Kleenex Tissues

A pack of Kleenex went into many grandmothers' purses, and you might remember getting a tissue from the pack.

Kleenex dates to 1924, according to a company history of Kimberly-Clark.

A survey found consumers preferred it as a disposable handkerchief, the way you use a tissue today.

Nationwide advertisements promoting that use began in 1930.

Sales doubled within a year of those ads.

6. Coin Purses

Some grandmothers kept a coin purse inside the purse, and you might remember digging for change.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art has an American coin purse from 1830 to 1850 made of silk, glass and metal.

If you picture a coin purse from the 1800s, it was more often crocheted than knitted.

The construction of this purse is unusual for that reason.

What's likely the owner's name appears on the frame.

It came in 2009 from the Brooklyn Museum, which received it in 1930 from Margaret S. Bedell.

She collected American and European beaded bags.

Tennessee Church Fans

A church fan in a Tennessee grandmother's purse might have shown Black families, cultural icons or religious figures, the Tennessee State Museum says.

If you flip a Tennessee church fan over, you may find information from local Black businesses on the back.

A Smithsonian church fan from Knoxville, Tennessee, dates to the 1970s and has an advertisement for Reed's Mortuary on the back.

Fans like it were an effective advertising medium.

On one side, you'd see Martin Luther King Jr., John Kennedy and Robert Kennedy under the title “Freedom Fighters.”