This phrase "red up the house" I'm sure sounds familiar to my siblings. A phrase my mom used all the time, when we needed to tidy up the house. She couldn't remember when she started using that phrase as her mother used it all the time when she was growing up in her home. My great grandmother was born in Washington County Pennsylvania, so that is most likely where it came from. The phrase was passed down for at least 4 generations. Interestingly enough my father was from the Amish and had grown up old order Amish and spoke the Pennsylvania Dutch and not my mom. My mom was raised in a Bible believing home and believed in the moving and gifting of the Holy Spirit. They were Pentecostal. My mom and dad had similar religious roots just a few generations apart.
17-year-old Helena Muffly wrote exactly 100 years ago today:
Saturday, August 17, 1912: We had to keep house today because Ma and Pa and the kid went to a reunion up at Muncy. Was working all morning a trying to get house red up somewhat.
Her middle-aged granddaughter’s comments 100 years later:
Grandma and her sister Ruth would have been home alone. The probably had to do both household and farm chores.
The kid refers to their 7-year-old brother, Jimmie
I think that “red up” is an old rural Pennsylvania (probably Pennsylvania Dutch) term that means tidy up.
When things are scattered around my house, I’ll say to my family, “We need to red up the house.”
Since we both grew up in central Pennsylvania he’d know exactly what I meant—though our children would roll their eyes.
(this is from the blog "A Hundred Years Ago" at
https://ahundredyearsago.com/2012/08/17/trying-to-red-up-the-house/
The lady that wrote the blog above thought "Red Up" was from Pennsylvania Dutch but according to this next article I read, it came from a Middle English term that was brought over to America's mid-lands by the Scotch Irish immigrants. My great grandmother that was born in Washington County Pennsylvania name was Margaret Gamble and she was born to Scotch Irish Immigrants. So that is where it came from. So amazing!
Reddy or not!
December 13th, 2007
Q: I spent 20 years in the Pennsylvania Dutch area of York-Lancaster, PA. Some old-time residents there consistently use the term “ret up” to mean clean up, as in “ret up the table” after dinner. Can tell me where this term originated?
A: The verbal phrase “redd up” (also seen as “red up,” “ret up,” and even “rid up”) has its roots in a Middle English verb redden, which meant to rescue or free from, or to clear. Today, “redd up” means to clear an area or make it tidy.
The terms “redd” and “redd up” came to the American Midlands with the many Scottish immigrants who settled there, according to The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (4th ed.).
The word “redd” is still used in Scotland (and Northern Ireland), the dictionary says, and it’s especially common in Pennsylvania in the expression “redd up.”
Anyone who lives in Pittsburgh is familiar with the term. The city’s annual campaign against litter is called “Let’s Redd Up Pittsburgh.”
But you don’t have to be from Pennsylvania to redd up. The residents of the Shetland Islands, off northern Scotland, call their annual cleanup “Da Voar Redd Up” (“The Spring Clean Up”).
