Intro
Good day to all. I found 13-14 notebooks with my grandmother’s memoirs. I am attempting to compile them and get them out to the public. This is especially for all her family still living so everyone can share this priceless information.
If you are not from our family, read it anyway. It’s FUN.
I didn’t correct any of her memories. She spelled some words the way she knew them. She was in her 90s when she wrote these thoughts down.
Remember, just because you haven’t heard it, that doesn’t mean it’s not a word.
I added a few things in parentheses.
TB
She identifies herself in her first sentence. But be it known to all that read herein: Her name IS “Big Mamma”
My name is Annie Hickey and I’m anticke (guessing antique)
I’m 91 years old. I was born in 1913 and 13 is a bad luck number, so a lot of people think. I grew up in the depression years. I mean hard times. Nobody didn’t have much of anything and no place to put it. When I was a young girl we didn’t have a radio, tv, or even a bicycle.
But my sister just older than me could make the best playhouse any child would like. We would rake out the leaves and pick up pretty rocks and outline the house with them. We would make rooms like a den, bedroom, and a kitchen. We would get in mamma’s quilt scraps and make us bed spreads over flat rocks for a bed and table and stove. We would get mamma’s old snuff bottles and wash them out and get her cocoa and sugar and make us some snuff to dip.
And we would pick blackberries and wash them and get some sugar and get in mamma’s cream and put on them and they were so good. Kids these days don’t know how to make anything to play with. We used to make what we called stilks (stilts) or tom walkers.
Family History
My grandpa was Michael Hild. His wife, my grandma was Teresia Hinal Hild born April 20, 1844. She died September 27, 1892. Buried in the Catholic cemetery on Asher Ave. L. R. Ar. Our grandparents had nine children: Charley, Katy, Annie, John, Louis, Joe, Fanny, & George. Ella and Marie were by another wife, our step grandma. Ella was married to a soldier in WW1. She died a young woman, maybe small pox.
Mom and dad married February 8, 1898 in NLR. Mom’s mother died in February 1898. My mother and dad were courtin’ so my grandpa was going back to Indiana where he had worked at the depot in side work so my mother & dad got married. Grandpa’s name was Alvin Thornton Harrison, born October 20, 1856. Died February 1898.
(Big Mamma’s other notes say: Alvin Thornton Harrison was born 1854 and died January 17, 1926)(she states he was 71)
Grandma Harrison’s name was Adaline & born October 20, 1856 and died Feb. ? 1898.
My grandpa and grandma Harrison had my mother and sons but they both died as a baby and one lived to be 5. So, I never did know any of grandpa Harrisons family but him and my mother. Mama had an Aunt Barb that she wrote to as long as her aunt lived. She was mama’s aunt on Grandma’s family. (Harrison) My momma Emma Harrison was born in West Virginia February 8, 1878. Grandma named her Amy Aler and after she got older she had it changed to Emma J Hild. That was after she married. She didn’t like her name.
John Adolph Hild NLR & Emma J Harrison married March 21, 1898 (recorded March 29, 1898) by Dr. RL Cole. Witnesses: Charles F Morten and Alvin T Harrison.
1st child-Adolph Alvin Hild Feb 18, 1899
2nd-Fanny Mae April 8, 1901
3rd-Emma Louise September 21, 1903
4th-Mable ? November 26, 1904
5th-Walter William December 21, 1905
6th-Christina Florence July 1, 1908
7th-Mattie Marie February 3, 1911
8th-Annie Lilldia January 24, 1913
9th-baby boy still born November 1918
Fannie Mae died July 31, 1902
Emma Louise died Jan 31, 1904
Mable died November 30, 1904
Walter William died December 7, 1946
Adolph Alvin died June 16, 1964
John Adolph died May 6, 1961 (92)
Emma J died July 22, 1965 (87)
Walter died December 7, ????
Grandpa Michael Hild died 1931 (93)
Aunt Marie Hild died 1997—Her married name was Fluke (96)
Adolph A married but divorced Lois Phillips
Christina married Bill William Thompson August 15, 1932
Mattie Married Lloyd Goodson July 2, 1932
Annie married Gene Hickey August 23, 1931
Hild Family Records
Dad was born 1869 and Mom was born 1878
Teresia Machiel Hild, wife of M. Hild our granddad born April 20, 1844 – died September 27, 1892
Annie Schmidt (dad’s sister) wife of Adam Schmidt. She was born 1869 and died in 1956. When aunt Annie died uncle Adam married aunt Bertha.
Charlie Schmidt son of Annie S. born December 25, 1900 and died January 19, 1979. Had a brother Adolph? S.
Mama’s dad and mother my grandparents, Alvin Thornton Harrison born November 4, 1854 and died January 17, 1926.
Grandma Adaline Harrison born October 20, 1856 and died February ? 1898.
My dads parents, my grandparents: Michael Adolph Hild home town was Henna Maessa Austria Germany. Moved to U. S. about 1880? He died in 1931 at the age of 93 years.
Story of Annie (as she wrote it)
My grandpa came over from Auschwitz, (Auschwitz?) Germany with his family and with his brother and his family about 1880. His name is Micheal Hild. The name Hild was taken off of Hildenstine. I don’t know why they took it off. They came to the US across the Atlantic Ocean. The first boat sank and all drowned. They were late and missed the boat. They took the 2nd boat and arrived in America, maybe NY. I don’t know where they all lived before they got to Arkansas. Grandpa and his brother never stayed in touch so I don’t know much about them. Grandpa and family came in through Ohio and my dad was 11 when they came to the states. He was twelve when he got a job working for a man that had a store where he done some painting, gluing, and finishing tables, chairs, and everything. He also learned to read the Bible and newspaper.
My grandpa had a large family. They had ten children. My grandmother’s name was Terresia Hinal born April 20, 1844. I found her tomb stone at a cemetery on Asher Ave. L.R. Ark. My mother’s dad was Alvin Thornton Harrison. He was sent from Indiana to N.L.R. to work at a train depot. That is where my mother met my dad. Her name is Emma J. Harrison. But her mother’s name is Adaline Harrison. My grandmother was very sick and she died. My grandfather went back to Indiana where his sister lived and my dad and mom married.
My dad never had a car but he had a bicycle and he rode all over L.R. and N.L.R. When my oldest brother was born on February 18th, 1899, they named him Adolph Alvin. Then they had a little girl. Her name was Fannie Mae and she lived one- and one-half years and died with the flew and nemonia. (Pneumonia) And two more baby girls, Louise and Mable just new born. Emma died too.
Then they had a boy Walter W. born December 21st 1905. Then they had three more girls. Christina Francine, July 1st, 1908. Mattie Marie, February 3rd, 1911. Then they had a bad fire and lost their house and most all they had in the house in N.L.R. So they moved out of N.L.R. and moved out to the country and my dad bought some land and built a house. He was a good carpenter and they lived there until the government bought all the land now called Camp Robertson and they had a lot of men there to train for the army. Mamma had a neighbor there. she was an Indian lady and when she was a baby her parents gave her to some black people and they raised her so she married a black man. Everyone called them Aunt Jane and Uncle West. So that’s where I came in as this is my life. She was a midwife and she delivered me into this world. Of course all the kids wanted to know where mamma got me so Aunt Jane told them that she found me in an old hollow tree trunk so she couldn’t keep me to raise and give me to mamma. But I, like all the kids, loved Aunt Jane too. So she and mamma visited a lot.
Times was bad it was World War One. My mom said she would give us a snack before she would take us to see Aunt Jane and told us not to ask for any snack while we were there, We didn’t get there good till we would say “Aunt Jane, you got any jelly bread” and she always say “yes, I saved some just for you.”
Then smallpox broke out in the army base and we all had to be vaxstated for them. I wasn’t but about three but I can remember how sore my arm was.
Christina had to start school and we didn’t live too far from an old one room school house and she would walk to school and me and Mattie would follow her to where she would go to the gate and watch her till she would get so far we couldn’t see her anymore and she was gone. We would go back to the yard. We had an old well with a big lid over it and a board around it so it was safe for us kids. That’s where me and Mattie would play and if Mattie made me mad I would bite her. My mom would spank me but that didn’t keep Mattie’s fingers from hurting and after I growed up it would make me so mad if a kid would bite another, I couldn’t cope with it. I would all ways tell my own kids not to ever bite any other kid and that if they did the other one may bite your fingers off and I tryed to scare them not to bite.
My dad all ways had a good team of mules and wagon and sometimes he had a buggy and horse. I always liked to ride in the buggy.
My dad had to find another place to buy we had to move. He came across the river and through Little Rock and out west of town the agent found us a place so he loaded the wagon and started moving but the agent that found the house for us he took my mother and us girls in an old ford car. My mother was going to have a baby. The agent stopped in Little Rock and we got something to drink and snacks. I can’t remember what we eat but I was so young I thought it was great just to go in a café. My dad had the beds and all ready put together. We had good neighbors back then. people visited and enjoyed one another. Now people don’t know who lives next door.
My oldest brother thought he was going to have to go in the army. He was 18 but the war ended and he didn’t have to go. (WW1)
I wasn’t very old but I can remember we had a fire place and Adolph was cutting fire wood and cut his foot real bad. Back then people didn’t go to the hospital they didn’t have any way. They took care of them at home. My mother cleaned his foot and soaked it in a bucket of coal oil and wrapped his foot in some white feed sacks for banges. After we girls got older we told mom she was a good old Indian doctor. She had blood poison and a doctor told her to eat a lot of garlic and take one tablespoon of honey and one of vingar every day and one of water and it was good for your thinking.
My mom had a baby boy. The doctor came out to the house and the navel cord was around the baby’s neck and it was still born. Now a doctor can save a baby like that. The doctors are so much a head of learning things like that.
My dad wanted more room for his animals on and he found a place west of LR and sold our house and moved again. There was a railroad track next to our house and we girls could stand on the bank of a small hill or nole we called it and wave at the trains when they passed and they would blow the train whicle at us. But a lot of the men would come to our house and ask for something to eat. We called them ho-bows but mamma never turned one away. She would always have oat meal and biscuits and gravy left from breakfast and a coffee pot on the back of the old wood cook stove after all had gone to work and we would eat leftover breakfast to snack on for lunch.
Adolph my older brother went to work on a river boat and didn’t get to come home much. But Mattie took some kind of a bad fever she was bad. She was out of her head part of the time so mamma got Adolph to come home. She was sick a long time but findly the fever left her. Then my didn’t like it where we were living and moved closer to town but not in the city. It was a big old two story me and Mattie had one room just for our play house. There was a school close to where we lived and I started to school ½ a day. My teachers name was miss Youngblood. I thought that was an old name. I was six in January so I got to start in October. My dad worked all week and came home on Friday. The boys took the wagon and team to get him at the wagon yard they called this place. Dad would leave his bicycle there while he went home. Momma would send her groc. Order to him to get on the way home. She would always get a chunk of fat back she called the meat to cook her peas and dried beans in. sometimes would slice it and boil the salt out of it and fry some for breakfast and the grease made the best gravy. She made sweet milk gravy we called it.
They always had two milk cows. When we had a calf we had fresh milk. When it went dry the other one came in with a baby calf we had fresh milk and she saved cream to churn and made butter. They had chickens so we had fryers to eat. In the winter we had chicken and dressing or dumplings. My dad had big gardens and he raised irish potatoes spring and fall and sweet potatoes and turnips. He would dig a big hole, pull up the turnips leaving 3 or 4 inches of the tops, bury them in the hole, cover them with dirt and we had them all winter. Mom canned everything in half gallon fruit jars. She made perserves pear and strawberries and grape jelly enough to last all winter. We never had a lot of worldly goods, but we never went hungry. What we didn’t can the boys took to the wagon yard and sold them.
We had a plum thicket we made jelly and us girls would pick blackberries and mom would can them and make the best cobblers in the winter. We also would go out in the woods and pick up hickory nuts and walnuts by the sack full and that’s the kind a nuts we had in the winter time and crack and pick them out of the shell dry them and cook with and eat when we wanted them.
We had a Watkins man that came around and sold pain meds salve and vanilla chocolate and coconut we could buy.
Not too many people had cars then and if they did the man had to use it to go to work in. My dad didn’t like being too close to the city so the old house that he bought when we first moved from the army base was for rent so he rented it again. I think he was sorry he ever left there any way. In September we all started to school in Martindale school house. It was a large one room building. We three girls and my brother Walter went to school there. All the teenage boys and girls wore shoes and all of the small children went barefoot. Our teacher was Mr. Charlie Ray. He had 4 girls, Minnie, Glennie, Hazel and Ruby. She just had one leg she lost her leg in an accident. A team run away and wrecked the wagon. He one son Stanley. I had just went half year so I started out in the first grade so most of the ones were younger than me. I liked school. We had an old wood heater stove in the old Martindale school house but the school burned. But there was a building on the corner of the Jack Man road that belonged to Albert Prichard. He run a saw mill and said it was for the community to use when they wanted it so the Jr girls and boys went to school in it. Miss Ada White was our teacher and then Dorothy Protho was one too at different years. Someone wanted the building and we had to move again. There was a one room house by the Burlingame road and we started to school in it. Miss Anna Harmon was our teacher. I liked her a lot she even took me home with her one weekend. I think I must have been ten maybe. She stayed with the Lynn Marsh family across from the only gro. Store there was at the time, it was Mr. John Clark’s store.
My brother Walter went Holly Springs school and so did we girls. One room school house and the teacher was Mr. Shelby Marton and every morning he would read some from the bible and we would sing together. One song we sang was sweet hour of prayer. I still love to hear that song. Mr. Morton liked me as a kid and when school was out he went to Hot Springs and he sent me a postcard by mail. It had a 1 cent stamp on it that read “you did so well in school I hope you keep on studying” I still have that post card.
My dad bought ten acres of land and we moved in a house just off the main road where the youth home is at this time. we could walk over from where we lived and work on the land. We had to clear it off and it had a lot of young bushes and trees on it. we had a lot of trees but we got it all cleared off. The boys cut the trees and burned charcoal by the pond. This was the Lizzy Lawrence place. The boys would take the charcoal to the wagon yard and sell it. there was a big field with a fence and a place for the animals and a barn a small one. we called it the corn crib barn that’s just kids changing the names of things. On the other side of the field fence was a large hill we called it. I thought it was a mountain it was so big. We called it our sliding hill. All the kids that lived close come to play on it. there was a little branch at the bottom of the hill. We made us sleds and we would slide down that hill on them. We didn’t have no tvs no radios but we had sliding hill and we had more fun on that hill. There was one boy that come to play with us Jack Ives. He brought an old bicycle and tried to ride down that hill on it but guess what? He ended up sliding without a sled and bent up the bicycle and tore his pants. We all had a big laugh but he said it’s not funny these are my best pants. Then we were all sad for him. Well they moved to LR and my mother had some black checked cloth and she made him a new shirt. He was so glad to get that shirt. Back them days people didn’t have nothing and no place to put it.
Grandpa settled in Arkansas and my dad came on to Arkansas too. He worked in LR and NLR doing the same kind of work. That’s where he met my mother Emma Harrison. My mother was 20 yrs old. Her dad was Alvin (T or L) Harrison…last grandma died and he was going back to Indiana to work for the railroad. Grandma died and my dad and mother got married. Grandpa went back north and worked until he retired then he came to live with mom and dad which already had a large family. They had 2 boys and 3 girls that lived but we all happy together. When my dad moved the family from NLR to old Camp Pike and bought land and built a house. Then world war I started and the government took all the land and we had to move again. But I was 5 years old when we moved. I can remember my oldest sister Christina had started to school before we moved. Mattie my other sister wasn’t old enough to go to school yet so we would follow her to the fence then we came back and played by the well. It had a fence around it so we wouldn’t get hurt and if she made me mad I would bite her.
My two brothers were big teenagers. They would get out and visit the soldiers and there was an outbreak of the smallpox and a lot of the men died and we all had to be vaccinated. I was 3 then but I can remember what a bad sore arm I had for a long time. My aunt Eller married one of the soldiers and she died. I don’t know if that’s what killed her or not. But her sister Marie married and moved to Grand City, Mo. She never had any children and lived to be 97 yrs old.
This is my life (Continued)
My dad had to move off the government land so he came across the Ark. River and found a place in Pulaski County west of LR to a community called Martindale. It was a small barn and a bigger house that we moved out of. But we lived there till world war was over and Adolph my older brother was almost drafted but it ended and he didn’t have to leave. My dad worked in town. He didn’t have a car so my two brothers would take him to work on Sunday evening to the wagon yard and he had a place to rent to eat and to sleep and they would pick him up on Friday in the wagon and he would stop and buy groceries on the way home. Mamma would order a lot from Sears an Robuck catalog. But he would always bring us little girls a sack of candy.
Seems like we moved a lot when I was a kid. Someone bought the farm and we moved out to a little town called Siperist Junction (I have been told this is near Sardis) and a railroad was down the hill where we lived and we would wave at the trains and they would blow the whistle at us. And we had a lot of Hoe Bows that would come and want something to eat, but mamma never turned one away. She would make them sandwiches out of bread, butter, and fried potatoes or what she had left over from breakfast. She always had coffee too. Adolph was working on the river boat and Mattie took a bad fever and almost died and he came back home to see her.
We moved from there to LR to a big house called the Mason place. It was close to big school and I started to school at 7 yrs old. I just went half a day the other girls went all day. We moved from there to the old Brown place off 12th st. Then my dad rented the farm back where we lived in Martindale and we really liked the place. It had a big barn and we played in that old barn. It had hay in the winter time and we would pick peanuts off the vines and played hide and seek and kick the can and had lots of fun. We went to the Martindale school. It was a big one room and one teacher taught all the grades. He was mister Charley Ray. I don’t remember how many years he taught but I was 8 yrs old. Well the school house burned down. All the kids went different places. Some went to Holly Springs. There was a small house in Martindale community and I went there. My teacher was miss Anna Harmon. But we went to Holly Springs. Mr Shelby Martin was my teacher.
My dad bought the land where youth home is now 10 acres and built a house. 4 rooms with a hall in the middle (dog trot) and I was 13 when we moved in that house.
Terry add on: I was 13 when we moved into the house on Lockert lane, on the back of their old home place.
Then I went to the first Lawson school, and we had a school bus to ride. That was a blessing. We had to walk to the other schools. Our first bus driver was Mr. Polster. He drove a few yrs and then the Ewells, Mamnice and Dummy. Mr. Ewell drove for yrs. Mr. Holt was our princeable and he and Mrs. Anna Harmon married, they were my teachers. My sister Mattie quit school and went to work for them. We played basketball and was sure sorry to lose her she was a good player and I went on to school and went to Mabelvale High.
My dad always had 10-acre farm and the boys truck farmed sold green beans and veg. in LR and we had a big strawberry patch and we picked berries. On Sundays we went to church and would bring kids home with us to help pick the berries so we could all go back to the ballgame at Pritchard saw mill was and then Pritchard put a swimming pool in and we sure enjoyed that. There wasn’t but one Groc. Store in Martindale then and that was Mr. John Clark and he had a power plant and had lights at the store. Us kids would go down there and play at nights and play hide and seek and kick the can. We never had any tvs or radios back then. We lived in a small house where youth home is now and there was a big hill not far from where we lived and we kids would go over there and play. We made a path and made us some sleds and we would slide down that hill and there was a bunch of water down there below and we were going fast enough we would go through it too. We didn’t care to get wet it just cooled us off.
Later in years my daughter built a house not too far from where the big hill was I played on and she had 4 teenage boys that played on that same hill and where her youngest son (Garry) was told that his grandmother had played on that same hill he just couldn’t believe it could be.
But the 4 boys had a pony and they had a bag swing they played on all the time with the pony. And now this is far believe it or not, one day the boys were all at school and Marie their mother looked out the window and that pony had the swing in his front legs and running back and forward, she liked to never made them believe it till later some of them seen it too.
I was 16 yrs. old the first time I met Gene Hickey and I was in high school at the old Mabelvale high school. We met at a 4th of July picnic and they always had a dance floor and everyone just about went to them. There wasn’t much to do back then and about all the young people liked to dance and after the picnic was over they just kept the dance floor open and we would see each other to the dance and he wanted to take me home but I told him he would have to come meet my parents before I would let him take me home. My mom would kill me if I did. That was on Saturday night and Monday evening he came to my house and I didn’t know he was coming. I had my brother’s old overhauls on scrubbing the hall and porch. I looked a mess. Anyway he made a date with me and we went to the Arkansas state fair grounds that next week but she wanted my sister to double date and we all went together and had a ball. We dated for a long time. One Sunday evening we went to Pinnacle Mountain and clumb to the top and he gave me a beautiful watch and told me he loved me but didn’t make enough money to get married. We went together for a while longer and he ask his boss for a raise and was working at the dairy for Chick Reeves and he said Gene I don’t make enough money to give you a raise but uncle Quinnie Douglas needs a hand and he will hire you so he went to work and Mr. Douglas put him to work. One night everyone was in bed at home when we got home, and we went down the hall to the big back door steps and he set down and we talked and he pulled me down in his lap and ask me to marry him and I thought he was joking but he wasn’t and I said yes. I said you are joking and he said no I’m not joking and it was the year of 1931 right in the depressing and all the people didn’t have much money and all worked hard.
My friend gave me a little wedding shower and his boss where he did work give us a set of dishes. And we bought some pots and pans and a lot of little things and I had a hope chest, well then it was a dresser drawer and I made 12 dish clothes and some pillow cases and embroidered them. They were out of white feed sacks and I made sheets too. My mother had some quilt tops she had pieced and me and my 2 sisters and my mother quilted them and she gave me a Bible and 2 night gowns and Gene’s aunt Keller that had raised Gene after his mother died and he was 5 yrs. old when they took him. She gave us a quilt too. And another aunt had Gene’s mother’s iron skillet. People then didn’t think they could cook without one. and that’s what we started keeping house with.
We went to the old Kress store downtown and the other little things we needed like a water bucket, dish pan, dipper. We bought a oil cook stove, a little table and 4 chairs. I made me cabinets out of apple boxes and made curtains to hang over them. By that time we could get colored feed sacks with flowers and chicks on them and I made bed spreads and winder curtains out of them and that’s how we started out keeping house. Gene was the milk house man. He cleaned the milk house, washed the bottles, and also milked cows. I helped him in the milk house I rinsed bottles and all the cream they would not sell I churned and malted the butter to sell on the route and I would get a lb. of butter free and we got all the skim milk we wanted and 1 quart of sweet milk a day. All the buttermilk we could use that was most of what we lived on. I made good biscuits and we had them with gravy made out of skim milk. Gene uncle had a apple tree and his aunt made all the jelly and apple butter we needed. His uncle truck farmed and I helped them gather all the vegetables for the market so they give us all the vegetables we wanted to eat and can for winter and I would can like 3 bushels of green beans and canned some with little potatoes in them, we would buy eggs and fryers from them. Eggs .10 a dozen and fryers .25 each and that’s how we got through the depressing days. Every Sunday evening and Wednesday one of the men that milked would have a day off and Mr. Douglas would get me or Thelma one of the other men’s wives to milk. We would we would rotate every wed, and Sunday evening. He would give us .50 each evening to milk, we didn’t have no milk machine then, we done it all by hand. That .50 kept me in clothes then we could get a print dress at sterling for .50 and they were nice dresses.
Annie L. Hild married Joseph Eugene Hickey August 23, 1931.Their children are:
Charles Eugene July 29, 1932—married Charlotte Erwin. Daughter Carolyn March 25, 1950 married Kerry Luttrell two sons Brandon October 28, 1971 and Ken October 9, 1974. They divorced and she married Frank Butterfield and had Brian Casey. Carolyn is now married to Tim Kraeger.
Emma Marie March 27, 1036—married Ted Bryant. Sons Terry Gene November 24 married Carla, two daughters Amanda November 1 and Mikayla February 14. Larry Dean March 15. Jerry Wayne July 16 Married Wendy, two sons Cody Wayne October 19 and Caleb Buck March 9. Garry Dale August 9 married Shannon, son Matthew Cole July 23 and Emily Hope October 30.
Dewey Wayne January 26, 1939—married Harriett Lowe. Daughters Sandra, Sandi-daughter Cassie Houston–Thynia, Cindy (married a preacher Carl Steele) sons Andrew and Timothy–Sheyl, Sherri-Linda Ruth, Windie (Sherri couldn’t say Linda so she called her Windie)
Eddy Joe April 1, 1949—married Yvonne. Sons Joshua November 10 (Josh married Joyln) and Timothy November 15. (she left Joe and he Married Dee)
More random notes
Back when I was a young girl, every year in the summer there would be these old time picnics. They would have tubs of cold drinks you could buy for a nickel and hot dogs for a dime and we never had over 25 cents to spend. But they had games you could play and win something by hitting the bulls eye and lots of other things but they had a dance floor to sq dance and waltz on and I loved to dance. That’s when I met my husband (talk about that) He wanted to take me home but I told him my mother would have a fit. She always talked to us girls to never go anywhere with a stranger. They might run away with you and maybe even kill you. So he said “I’ll come and visit and meet your parents” and he did. And he made a date to take me to the fair. Gene worked at Chick Reeves dairy. He only made $10 a week, room and board, but that wasn’t bad back then.
I rode the 1st school bus to Lawson school. The bus driver was Mr. Polster.
The end (For now)
This is the most of it. I wanted to get as much as I have online before anymore of her kinfolks pass.
There are several more notebooks. To date, I have found 13, maybe 14 notebooks with her memoirs. They all have redundancies, but a new thought or two from each one.
I am going to finish reading every notebook and add any different stories she wrote down.
(Hopefully before I pass on)
TB