We walked two miles to school at Oak Grove. When I was in fourth grade, the bus started picking us up. We had to walk 1/2 mile up the road to the mail box. When we walked to Oak Grove, we had two creeks to cross, and Goetz’s and Otto’s cows to worry about. We were so scared of them. We would walk miles out of our way if the cows were anywhere near our path. For some reason, they always chased us if they saw us. Our lives were never dull! If it rained and the creeks were up, we had to walk upstream about a mile before we could cross. We ate rabbit grass in the spring on the way home from school, and possum grapes, black hulls, persimmons and huckberries in the fall. Cleo and I were janitors at Oak Grove. We got_paid 10-15 dollars a month. We had to sweep the floors, clean blackboards and carry in fresh water each day. We would run all the way home then so we could listen to our soap opera “Just Plain Bill”. It came on the radio at 4:15 PM.
aunt lolly
Aunt Lolly’s Story (part 8)
One of the dumbest things I ever wanted to do was milk a cow. I would follow Mother and Daddy out to the barn and beg them to let me try to milk. When I was 12, they finally let me milk. I sat by the cow for an hour trying to get some milk out of her. Finally, she got tired of my efforts and just laid down with me sitting there. After that, I had to milk every day. Boy was I sorry I wanted so bad to learn.
Aunt Lolly’s Story (part 7)
I was ll years old in 1949 when we got electricity on the farm. We were so excited. Our older brothers and sisters had bought Mother a new Sunbeam mix-master. Mother was looking forward to using it. One summer day, Mother and Daddy had gone to town and the electricity came on. We ran all over the house turning on lights, then out to the smoke house and cellar to see if the lights worked. They all worked great. Then we ran out to the barn and tried all those lights. Everything worked fine. We were so thrilled! Cleo baked a cake and used Mother’s new mixer. When Mother got home she was so upset. She wanted to be the first one to use the mixer. The cake was good though. I didn’t have to fill coal oil lamps anymore after that. Electricity really changed our lives. Our older siblings bought us a radio and electric iron and refrigerator. We were “up town” now!! Every piece of laundry that was washed –we had to iron. Even the rags. Before electricity, we stood by the stove, summer and winter, so we could always keep a spare iron getting hot on the cook stove.
Aunt Lolly’s Story (part 6)
Beatrice was always singing and dancing around the kitchen. She liked to imitate Betty Hutton. I was eight_years old and I was walking through the kitchen when all of a sudden a big ole foot landed on top of my head. She was as surprised as I was.
Mother would have a song or poem for every occasion, idea, or word spoken. She was amazing. She taught us to sing. Cleo and I spent many, many, many hours at the sink washing and drying dishes. Cleo liked classical music. There was a program on the radio with that kind of music. I would get so mad at her for having to listen to it. She was always singing. If she sang a song I liked, I would sing with her. If I didn’t like it or if I was mad at her, I would sing off-key just to aggravate her. I discovered that I could make my singing off-key sound pretty, and I tried harder to make it sound good. That was how we began singing in harmony. Cleo sang soprano. I sang alto and when Naomi got older, she sang alto and I sang tenor. We sounded pretty good together. The Johnnie Boys were a country music group that played for our 4-H dances. They also had a radio show every morning on KWOS. We sang with them at one of our 4-H dances, and they invited us to sing with them on the radio. Mother and Daddy took us to Jeff City to the KWOS studios. It was fun.
Aunt Naomi’s Story (Part 32 )
I had a dress that Bea made for me. It was made out of a feed sack. In those days feed came in fabric sacks, which was recycled into clothing, etc. There was a “pig” brand stamped into the material. Bea made this dress to that the pig was inside the pocket. I loved that dress because it had the pig in the pocket. Being the last girl, when my clothes were outgrown, it was passed on to others who needed them. Cleo was going to give my “pig” dress to a neighbor girl and I remember becoming very upset. I don’t know what ever happened to it.
Margie made Lolly and I beautiful ruffled dresses out of dotted Swiss. Mine was pink, Lolly’s mint green. She gave me a pair of black patent Mary James (shoes) to wear with the dress. I had a pink straw had also. I wish I knew what happened to the hat. After being passed down to many nieces and to Tracy and Tiffany to play with, my pink dotted Swiss ruffled dress is still here in my bedroom on the wall.
Aunt Lolly’s Story (part 5)
My great ambition was to be a barber! I was about ll or 12 years old. I took our hair clippers outside one summer day and caught a cat. I held it in one arm and tried cutting its hair. I continued until all the cats were trimmed to my liking. One day I took my little brother Lloyd out to the smoke house, sat him in the high chair, covered him with a dish cloth, and started cutting his hair. (Mother and Daddy were gone to town.) I did such a good job of cutting his hair (I thought) and was so proud of myself. Mother and Daddy must have thought so too, because they didn’t yell at me or pass out from shock. Every other day I cut more and more off his head until he had a nice haircut like the other boys had. Bless his heart –he had to endure a lot. From that time on, I cut his hair till I left home.