The Children of Lula Bell and Charles Frey
I'd like to tell you a story of the children of a woman with TB. So you can understand how remarkable these children were, we won't place them in any time or era. Just think about them as being in the time that you grew up, whenever it was…
We find these 3, Leila Maude, Gladys and Opal, when they were children in Ford, Kansas. Everyone knows that Kansas is the Central U.S.A., and that people in this area are the "good, decent and honest folk' in our nation" and we like to think they represent what is great about all our people, but consider what we are about to hear…
These girls, age eleven, eight, and two, had just lost their mother. She died of TB, a lung disease, which was incurable at the time she died. One might relate it to other diseases today. It was highly contagious and people feared not only it's victims but the family that was left because who knew what germ was lurking in their breath or hiding in their clothing. So the officials of the city heard through the doctor that a family traveling through town (they were in a covered wagon) had experienced a death of the mother of the family and that she had died of TB, known then as Galloping Consumption.
As was the normal procedure, the officials went to the site of the wagon and tent they lived in on their journey and explained that because she died of TB, it would be necessary according to the law to burn all their possessions. Now, I'm sure they didn't have many possessions, but possibly, there were normal things such as dishes, linens, clothes, a fiddle from a grandparent, a few toys, quilts, crocheted hand work, and because both parents were musical and could each play any instrument, they could have acquired, there was a guitar, banjo, and the all important piano. This woman with TB was a music teacher before they left Arkansas. The father had owned a small grocery store. When she was diagnosed with a lung disease, the doctor advised them to go to Colorado for her health as he had heard the mountain air could make her well. When they started their trip they took a wagon rather than the train because they wanted to take these personal belongings, especially the piano, with them.
At the start of the journey, there were five girls with one on the way. Early in the journey, Annie Lafayette was kicked in the head by one of the horses. She died after several weeks of delirium. The father would stop as they traveled through and they would live in the tent while he worked to make money to continue their trip. He worked in Oklahoma in an oil field until Opal was born, then after the mother and baby were strong enough to continue, they moved on, camping on the banks of the Cimmaron River for several weeks, fishing and hunting for food.
Two of the girls, Le'mon and Wilma, died of the lung disease on the way. The mother was getting weaker daily and Leila Maude became the cook and nurse to her mother with the help of her younger sister, Gladys. Opal was beginning to toddle and required their constant surveillance. A memory, passed down by Leila Maude, of her mother was that she became too weak to brush her hair and Leila Maude would brush it for her and plait it and wind it on top of her head. When she sat for her hair to be brushed, it would reach the floor. This fascinated me as a child hearing this story. Can you imagine hair that long?
Finally when they reached the area of Ford, Kansas outside of town, they camped to work in the wheat harvest as it was early September. Oh, by the way, there was another character in the story. He was the younger brother of this mother. His story had been sad, too. His father died young of smallpox epidemic in LA. and two years later, his mother died. This young man was called, Uncle Jess by the three younger sisters. He was now about 23 years old and unmarried. He was 13 years old when he was orphaned and he lived with his sister and brother-in- law. He was always very special to his nieces and stayed in contact until he died just short of 100 years old.
One of Leila Maude's favorite stories about Uncle Jess occurred when she was about five years old. her father and uncle Jess were cleaning their guns. When they finished, they carelessly laid them on the table and proceeded to do another job of cleaning the well. Uncle Jess lowered his brother-in-law down into the well to start the process of boiling the debris from the well. Five year old Leila Maude picked up the gun and fired it. As in a comedy, the bullet went through the well side and cut the rope dropping her dad to the bottom of the well…Fortunately, it wasn't deep and he was not injured physically, but his pride was hurt. In and angry blast, he told Jess to get him out of the well so he could spank Leila Maude but Uncle Jess said, "No, it was your fault, not hers. I'm going to town and I'll be back when you cool off and can promise not to spank Leila Maude." So he went to town for about an hour and when he returned, he got his brother-in-law out of the well.
It seems Uncle Jess was helping the family get to Colorado when they stopped in Ford, Kansas to look for work. The next day was cut short as the mother's health was deteriorating so that they couldn't leave her. Finally on the 14th of September, she died. They bought a lot in a lovely, but beautiful cemetery over looking the town of Ford. It is located in a hilly area of Kansas with a road running through the edge of it slightly curved and meandering with a few scrub trees. When I visited the spot, I felt it was a peaceful resting place for one whose life had seen such turmoil and loss…
Returning to our story, we have to understand that this family now has lost the mother and three girls and is left with a 33 year old widower and a 23 year old uncle and three little girls. There is nothing but their spirit.
I'm sure the towns people pitched in when they heard of their plight but it would have been meager if at all…Plans were made…The father located an older couple who had a one room apartment to rent and installed 11 year old Leila Maude and 9 year old Gladys in this place to stay during the week. Now because they valued education while on this trip, they had seen to it that the older girls attended school where ever they happened to camp; so with a promise from the old couple to see that the girls were awakened every day to go to school and that they would be tucked in at night, the two men took 2 year old Opal and went to a wheat farm to work. The farmer's wife agreed to look after Opal during the week. Leila Maude and Gladys were their own cooks and I'm sure they had learned quiet a lot from their mother's instructions when they had to take over before she died.
There weren't too many incidents other than the confession from Gladys in later years that they slipped out the window one night and went to a traveling show (there were no movies). This way of life continued until December with little excitement. The men began to save enough money to think about riding the train back to Arkansas and family. Things were setting in pretty well until Leila Maude and a black school mate had a disagreement and Leila Maude dunked the other girls pig tail in the ink well on her desk. The other girl slapped Leila Maude. Of course, since the family were totally Southern, and not mentally accepting of being in school with a black girl, the situation was blown out of proportion and the father made a decision immediately to go home to Arkansas where they wouldn't have to deal with racial problems. So this family came home to Howard Co. Arkansas. They rode the train to Ozan, AK. where an uncle of the girls met them with a wagon and team and transported them to the waiting arms of family.
An old maid aunt, sister of the father of these 3 girls, moved in and raised them until they were pretty big girls. She was good and kind, but had very Puritan ideas. Aunt Opal once told that they overheard Aunt Betty say that all "that a woman had to do was brush against her husband's britches leg and she would have a baby"…It seems that these girls were mortally afraid of getting too near a boy's britches leg until they were grown. You see, there wasn't TV or sex education in schools. So one had a limited knowledge of most things. In spite of all of this, these three women grew into beautiful, lovely, kind, considerate and emotionally mature adults. They married, had children, lived through deaths and separations, economic deprivations and were praised and honored by friends and family at their deaths. They didn't end up emotional cripples, murderers, thieves, etc. To the contrary, they made their homes open for anyone, they took care of sick and dying friends and family…They were care givers.
So what would happen if this would have occurred in 1996 or even when you were growing into an adult? Today, they might have been called migrant workers. The children would have suffered in many ways. Classmates would have laughed at them because they lived in a tent and when they were left while the father and uncle worked, the welfare would have been called and a report of neglect, etc. would been given. Chances are the children would have been removed from their father and placed in a foster home. When the gun was fired, the father would have been arrested as a inattentive father. When the 2 school girls, black and white, had a confrontation someone would have sued or perhaps worse, an idiot who wasn't even part of the confrontation would take a gun to school…isn't that correct?
My purpose for this story is too honor the 3 wonderful mothers, aunts, grandmothers, and half sisters who are no longer with us. The other reason is to point out to everyone that people have always had the same passions, problems and mistakes and somehow we grow into pretty decent people when we know we are tough. My grandfather was the father in this story. He was a stern disciplinarian but a caring man. My memories of him after he remarried and had a second family included watermelons, music and a little "hot toddy" and vitamins he would make us take when we visited him in Beaumont, Texas. Perhaps if we will take a lesson from this family and teach our children to endure hardships and always love them without conditions, the world would improve.
Information provided by Annette Harwell Parker, 1996
I'd like to tell you a story of the children of a woman with TB. So you can understand how remarkable these children were, we won't place them in any time or era. Just think about them as being in the time that you grew up, whenever it was…
We find these 3, Leila Maude, Gladys and Opal, when they were children in Ford, Kansas. Everyone knows that Kansas is the Central U.S.A., and that people in this area are the "good, decent and honest folk' in our nation" and we like to think they represent what is great about all our people, but consider what we are about to hear…
These girls, age eleven, eight, and two, had just lost their mother. She died of TB, a lung disease, which was incurable at the time she died. One might relate it to other diseases today. It was highly contagious and people feared not only it's victims but the family that was left because who knew what germ was lurking in their breath or hiding in their clothing. So the officials of the city heard through the doctor that a family traveling through town (they were in a covered wagon) had experienced a death of the mother of the family and that she had died of TB, known then as Galloping Consumption.
As was the normal procedure, the officials went to the site of the wagon and tent they lived in on their journey and explained that because she died of TB, it would be necessary according to the law to burn all their possessions. Now, I'm sure they didn't have many possessions, but possibly, there were normal things such as dishes, linens, clothes, a fiddle from a grandparent, a few toys, quilts, crocheted hand work, and because both parents were musical and could each play any instrument, they could have acquired, there was a guitar, banjo, and the all important piano. This woman with TB was a music teacher before they left Arkansas. The father had owned a small grocery store. When she was diagnosed with a lung disease, the doctor advised them to go to Colorado for her health as he had heard the mountain air could make her well. When they started their trip they took a wagon rather than the train because they wanted to take these personal belongings, especially the piano, with them.
At the start of the journey, there were five girls with one on the way. Early in the journey, Annie Lafayette was kicked in the head by one of the horses. She died after several weeks of delirium. The father would stop as they traveled through and they would live in the tent while he worked to make money to continue their trip. He worked in Oklahoma in an oil field until Opal was born, then after the mother and baby were strong enough to continue, they moved on, camping on the banks of the Cimmaron River for several weeks, fishing and hunting for food.
Two of the girls, Le'mon and Wilma, died of the lung disease on the way. The mother was getting weaker daily and Leila Maude became the cook and nurse to her mother with the help of her younger sister, Gladys. Opal was beginning to toddle and required their constant surveillance. A memory, passed down by Leila Maude, of her mother was that she became too weak to brush her hair and Leila Maude would brush it for her and plait it and wind it on top of her head. When she sat for her hair to be brushed, it would reach the floor. This fascinated me as a child hearing this story. Can you imagine hair that long?
Finally when they reached the area of Ford, Kansas outside of town, they camped to work in the wheat harvest as it was early September. Oh, by the way, there was another character in the story. He was the younger brother of this mother. His story had been sad, too. His father died young of smallpox epidemic in LA. and two years later, his mother died. This young man was called, Uncle Jess by the three younger sisters. He was now about 23 years old and unmarried. He was 13 years old when he was orphaned and he lived with his sister and brother-in- law. He was always very special to his nieces and stayed in contact until he died just short of 100 years old.
One of Leila Maude's favorite stories about Uncle Jess occurred when she was about five years old. her father and uncle Jess were cleaning their guns. When they finished, they carelessly laid them on the table and proceeded to do another job of cleaning the well. Uncle Jess lowered his brother-in-law down into the well to start the process of boiling the debris from the well. Five year old Leila Maude picked up the gun and fired it. As in a comedy, the bullet went through the well side and cut the rope dropping her dad to the bottom of the well…Fortunately, it wasn't deep and he was not injured physically, but his pride was hurt. In and angry blast, he told Jess to get him out of the well so he could spank Leila Maude but Uncle Jess said, "No, it was your fault, not hers. I'm going to town and I'll be back when you cool off and can promise not to spank Leila Maude." So he went to town for about an hour and when he returned, he got his brother-in-law out of the well.
It seems Uncle Jess was helping the family get to Colorado when they stopped in Ford, Kansas to look for work. The next day was cut short as the mother's health was deteriorating so that they couldn't leave her. Finally on the 14th of September, she died. They bought a lot in a lovely, but beautiful cemetery over looking the town of Ford. It is located in a hilly area of Kansas with a road running through the edge of it slightly curved and meandering with a few scrub trees. When I visited the spot, I felt it was a peaceful resting place for one whose life had seen such turmoil and loss…
Returning to our story, we have to understand that this family now has lost the mother and three girls and is left with a 33 year old widower and a 23 year old uncle and three little girls. There is nothing but their spirit.
I'm sure the towns people pitched in when they heard of their plight but it would have been meager if at all…Plans were made…The father located an older couple who had a one room apartment to rent and installed 11 year old Leila Maude and 9 year old Gladys in this place to stay during the week. Now because they valued education while on this trip, they had seen to it that the older girls attended school where ever they happened to camp; so with a promise from the old couple to see that the girls were awakened every day to go to school and that they would be tucked in at night, the two men took 2 year old Opal and went to a wheat farm to work. The farmer's wife agreed to look after Opal during the week. Leila Maude and Gladys were their own cooks and I'm sure they had learned quiet a lot from their mother's instructions when they had to take over before she died.
There weren't too many incidents other than the confession from Gladys in later years that they slipped out the window one night and went to a traveling show (there were no movies). This way of life continued until December with little excitement. The men began to save enough money to think about riding the train back to Arkansas and family. Things were setting in pretty well until Leila Maude and a black school mate had a disagreement and Leila Maude dunked the other girls pig tail in the ink well on her desk. The other girl slapped Leila Maude. Of course, since the family were totally Southern, and not mentally accepting of being in school with a black girl, the situation was blown out of proportion and the father made a decision immediately to go home to Arkansas where they wouldn't have to deal with racial problems. So this family came home to Howard Co. Arkansas. They rode the train to Ozan, AK. where an uncle of the girls met them with a wagon and team and transported them to the waiting arms of family.
An old maid aunt, sister of the father of these 3 girls, moved in and raised them until they were pretty big girls. She was good and kind, but had very Puritan ideas. Aunt Opal once told that they overheard Aunt Betty say that all "that a woman had to do was brush against her husband's britches leg and she would have a baby"…It seems that these girls were mortally afraid of getting too near a boy's britches leg until they were grown. You see, there wasn't TV or sex education in schools. So one had a limited knowledge of most things. In spite of all of this, these three women grew into beautiful, lovely, kind, considerate and emotionally mature adults. They married, had children, lived through deaths and separations, economic deprivations and were praised and honored by friends and family at their deaths. They didn't end up emotional cripples, murderers, thieves, etc. To the contrary, they made their homes open for anyone, they took care of sick and dying friends and family…They were care givers.
So what would happen if this would have occurred in 1996 or even when you were growing into an adult? Today, they might have been called migrant workers. The children would have suffered in many ways. Classmates would have laughed at them because they lived in a tent and when they were left while the father and uncle worked, the welfare would have been called and a report of neglect, etc. would been given. Chances are the children would have been removed from their father and placed in a foster home. When the gun was fired, the father would have been arrested as a inattentive father. When the 2 school girls, black and white, had a confrontation someone would have sued or perhaps worse, an idiot who wasn't even part of the confrontation would take a gun to school…isn't that correct?
My purpose for this story is too honor the 3 wonderful mothers, aunts, grandmothers, and half sisters who are no longer with us. The other reason is to point out to everyone that people have always had the same passions, problems and mistakes and somehow we grow into pretty decent people when we know we are tough. My grandfather was the father in this story. He was a stern disciplinarian but a caring man. My memories of him after he remarried and had a second family included watermelons, music and a little "hot toddy" and vitamins he would make us take when we visited him in Beaumont, Texas. Perhaps if we will take a lesson from this family and teach our children to endure hardships and always love them without conditions, the world would improve.
Information provided by Annette Harwell Parker, 1996
The Children of Lula Bell and Charles Frey
I'd like to tell you a story of the children of a woman with TB. So you can understand how remarkable these children were, we won't place them in any time or era. Just think about them as being in the time that you grew up, whenever it was…
We find these 3, Leila Maude, Gladys and Opal, when they were children in Ford, Kansas. Everyone knows that Kansas is the Central U.S.A., and that people in this area are the "good, decent and honest folk' in our nation" and we like to think they represent what is great about all our people, but consider what we are about to hear…
These girls, age eleven, eight, and two, had just lost their mother. She died of TB, a lung disease, which was incurable at the time she died. One might relate it to other diseases today. It was highly contagious and people feared not only it's victims but the family that was left because who knew what germ was lurking in their breath or hiding in their clothing. So the officials of the city heard through the doctor that a family traveling through town (they were in a covered wagon) had experienced a death of the mother of the family and that she had died of TB, known then as Galloping Consumption.
As was the normal procedure, the officials went to the site of the wagon and tent they lived in on their journey and explained that because she died of TB, it would be necessary according to the law to burn all their possessions. Now, I'm sure they didn't have many possessions, but possibly, there were normal things such as dishes, linens, clothes, a fiddle from a grandparent, a few toys, quilts, crocheted hand work, and because both parents were musical and could each play any instrument, they could have acquired, there was a guitar, banjo, and the all important piano. This woman with TB was a music teacher before they left Arkansas. The father had owned a small grocery store. When she was diagnosed with a lung disease, the doctor advised them to go to Colorado for her health as he had heard the mountain air could make her well. When they started their trip they took a wagon rather than the train because they wanted to take these personal belongings, especially the piano, with them.
At the start of the journey, there were five girls with one on the way. Early in the journey, Annie Lafayette was kicked in the head by one of the horses. She died after several weeks of delirium. The father would stop as they traveled through and they would live in the tent while he worked to make money to continue their trip. He worked in Oklahoma in an oil field until Opal was born, then after the mother and baby were strong enough to continue, they moved on, camping on the banks of the Cimmaron River for several weeks, fishing and hunting for food.
Two of the girls, Le'mon and Wilma, died of the lung disease on the way. The mother was getting weaker daily and Leila Maude became the cook and nurse to her mother with the help of her younger sister, Gladys. Opal was beginning to toddle and required their constant surveillance. A memory, passed down by Leila Maude, of her mother was that she became too weak to brush her hair and Leila Maude would brush it for her and plait it and wind it on top of her head. When she sat for her hair to be brushed, it would reach the floor. This fascinated me as a child hearing this story. Can you imagine hair that long?
Finally when they reached the area of Ford, Kansas outside of town, they camped to work in the wheat harvest as it was early September. Oh, by the way, there was another character in the story. He was the younger brother of this mother. His story had been sad, too. His father died young of smallpox epidemic in LA. and two years later, his mother died. This young man was called, Uncle Jess by the three younger sisters. He was now about 23 years old and unmarried. He was 13 years old when he was orphaned and he lived with his sister and brother-in- law. He was always very special to his nieces and stayed in contact until he died just short of 100 years old.
One of Leila Maude's favorite stories about Uncle Jess occurred when she was about five years old. her father and uncle Jess were cleaning their guns. When they finished, they carelessly laid them on the table and proceeded to do another job of cleaning the well. Uncle Jess lowered his brother-in-law down into the well to start the process of boiling the debris from the well. Five year old Leila Maude picked up the gun and fired it. As in a comedy, the bullet went through the well side and cut the rope dropping her dad to the bottom of the well…Fortunately, it wasn't deep and he was not injured physically, but his pride was hurt. In and angry blast, he told Jess to get him out of the well so he could spank Leila Maude but Uncle Jess said, "No, it was your fault, not hers. I'm going to town and I'll be back when you cool off and can promise not to spank Leila Maude." So he went to town for about an hour and when he returned, he got his brother-in-law out of the well.
It seems Uncle Jess was helping the family get to Colorado when they stopped in Ford, Kansas to look for work. The next day was cut short as the mother's health was deteriorating so that they couldn't leave her. Finally on the 14th of September, she died. They bought a lot in a lovely, but beautiful cemetery over looking the town of Ford. It is located in a hilly area of Kansas with a road running through the edge of it slightly curved and meandering with a few scrub trees. When I visited the spot, I felt it was a peaceful resting place for one whose life had seen such turmoil and loss…
Returning to our story, we have to understand that this family now has lost the mother and three girls and is left with a 33 year old widower and a 23 year old uncle and three little girls. There is nothing but their spirit.
I'm sure the towns people pitched in when they heard of their plight but it would have been meager if at all…Plans were made…The father located an older couple who had a one room apartment to rent and installed 11 year old Leila Maude and 9 year old Gladys in this place to stay during the week. Now because they valued education while on this trip, they had seen to it that the older girls attended school where ever they happened to camp; so with a promise from the old couple to see that the girls were awakened every day to go to school and that they would be tucked in at night, the two men took 2 year old Opal and went to a wheat farm to work. The farmer's wife agreed to look after Opal during the week. Leila Maude and Gladys were their own cooks and I'm sure they had learned quiet a lot from their mother's instructions when they had to take over before she died.
There weren't too many incidents other than the confession from Gladys in later years that they slipped out the window one night and went to a traveling show (there were no movies). This way of life continued until December with little excitement. The men began to save enough money to think about riding the train back to Arkansas and family. Things were setting in pretty well until Leila Maude and a black school mate had a disagreement and Leila Maude dunked the other girls pig tail in the ink well on her desk. The other girl slapped Leila Maude. Of course, since the family were totally Southern, and not mentally accepting of being in school with a black girl, the situation was blown out of proportion and the father made a decision immediately to go home to Arkansas where they wouldn't have to deal with racial problems. So this family came home to Howard Co. Arkansas. They rode the train to Ozan, AK. where an uncle of the girls met them with a wagon and team and transported them to the waiting arms of family.
An old maid aunt, sister of the father of these 3 girls, moved in and raised them until they were pretty big girls. She was good and kind, but had very Puritan ideas. Aunt Opal once told that they overheard Aunt Betty say that all "that a woman had to do was brush against her husband's britches leg and she would have a baby"…It seems that these girls were mortally afraid of getting too near a boy's britches leg until they were grown. You see, there wasn't TV or sex education in schools. So one had a limited knowledge of most things. In spite of all of this, these three women grew into beautiful, lovely, kind, considerate and emotionally mature adults. They married, had children, lived through deaths and separations, economic deprivations and were praised and honored by friends and family at their deaths. They didn't end up emotional cripples, murderers, thieves, etc. To the contrary, they made their homes open for anyone, they took care of sick and dying friends and family…They were care givers.
So what would happen if this would have occurred in 1996 or even when you were growing into an adult? Today, they might have been called migrant workers. The children would have suffered in many ways. Classmates would have laughed at them because they lived in a tent and when they were left while the father and uncle worked, the welfare would have been called and a report of neglect, etc. would been given. Chances are the children would have been removed from their father and placed in a foster home. When the gun was fired, the father would have been arrested as a inattentive father. When the 2 school girls, black and white, had a confrontation someone would have sued or perhaps worse, an idiot who wasn't even part of the confrontation would take a gun to school…isn't that correct?
My purpose for this story is too honor the 3 wonderful mothers, aunts, grandmothers, and half sisters who are no longer with us. The other reason is to point out to everyone that people have always had the same passions, problems and mistakes and somehow we grow into pretty decent people when we know we are tough. My grandfather was the father in this story. He was a stern disciplinarian but a caring man. My memories of him after he remarried and had a second family included watermelons, music and a little "hot toddy" and vitamins he would make us take when we visited him in Beaumont, Texas. Perhaps if we will take a lesson from this family and teach our children to endure hardships and always love them without conditions, the world would improve.
Information provided by Annette Harwell Parker, 1996
I'd like to tell you a story of the children of a woman with TB. So you can understand how remarkable these children were, we won't place them in any time or era. Just think about them as being in the time that you grew up, whenever it was…
We find these 3, Leila Maude, Gladys and Opal, when they were children in Ford, Kansas. Everyone knows that Kansas is the Central U.S.A., and that people in this area are the "good, decent and honest folk' in our nation" and we like to think they represent what is great about all our people, but consider what we are about to hear…
These girls, age eleven, eight, and two, had just lost their mother. She died of TB, a lung disease, which was incurable at the time she died. One might relate it to other diseases today. It was highly contagious and people feared not only it's victims but the family that was left because who knew what germ was lurking in their breath or hiding in their clothing. So the officials of the city heard through the doctor that a family traveling through town (they were in a covered wagon) had experienced a death of the mother of the family and that she had died of TB, known then as Galloping Consumption.
As was the normal procedure, the officials went to the site of the wagon and tent they lived in on their journey and explained that because she died of TB, it would be necessary according to the law to burn all their possessions. Now, I'm sure they didn't have many possessions, but possibly, there were normal things such as dishes, linens, clothes, a fiddle from a grandparent, a few toys, quilts, crocheted hand work, and because both parents were musical and could each play any instrument, they could have acquired, there was a guitar, banjo, and the all important piano. This woman with TB was a music teacher before they left Arkansas. The father had owned a small grocery store. When she was diagnosed with a lung disease, the doctor advised them to go to Colorado for her health as he had heard the mountain air could make her well. When they started their trip they took a wagon rather than the train because they wanted to take these personal belongings, especially the piano, with them.
At the start of the journey, there were five girls with one on the way. Early in the journey, Annie Lafayette was kicked in the head by one of the horses. She died after several weeks of delirium. The father would stop as they traveled through and they would live in the tent while he worked to make money to continue their trip. He worked in Oklahoma in an oil field until Opal was born, then after the mother and baby were strong enough to continue, they moved on, camping on the banks of the Cimmaron River for several weeks, fishing and hunting for food.
Two of the girls, Le'mon and Wilma, died of the lung disease on the way. The mother was getting weaker daily and Leila Maude became the cook and nurse to her mother with the help of her younger sister, Gladys. Opal was beginning to toddle and required their constant surveillance. A memory, passed down by Leila Maude, of her mother was that she became too weak to brush her hair and Leila Maude would brush it for her and plait it and wind it on top of her head. When she sat for her hair to be brushed, it would reach the floor. This fascinated me as a child hearing this story. Can you imagine hair that long?
Finally when they reached the area of Ford, Kansas outside of town, they camped to work in the wheat harvest as it was early September. Oh, by the way, there was another character in the story. He was the younger brother of this mother. His story had been sad, too. His father died young of smallpox epidemic in LA. and two years later, his mother died. This young man was called, Uncle Jess by the three younger sisters. He was now about 23 years old and unmarried. He was 13 years old when he was orphaned and he lived with his sister and brother-in- law. He was always very special to his nieces and stayed in contact until he died just short of 100 years old.
One of Leila Maude's favorite stories about Uncle Jess occurred when she was about five years old. her father and uncle Jess were cleaning their guns. When they finished, they carelessly laid them on the table and proceeded to do another job of cleaning the well. Uncle Jess lowered his brother-in-law down into the well to start the process of boiling the debris from the well. Five year old Leila Maude picked up the gun and fired it. As in a comedy, the bullet went through the well side and cut the rope dropping her dad to the bottom of the well…Fortunately, it wasn't deep and he was not injured physically, but his pride was hurt. In and angry blast, he told Jess to get him out of the well so he could spank Leila Maude but Uncle Jess said, "No, it was your fault, not hers. I'm going to town and I'll be back when you cool off and can promise not to spank Leila Maude." So he went to town for about an hour and when he returned, he got his brother-in-law out of the well.
It seems Uncle Jess was helping the family get to Colorado when they stopped in Ford, Kansas to look for work. The next day was cut short as the mother's health was deteriorating so that they couldn't leave her. Finally on the 14th of September, she died. They bought a lot in a lovely, but beautiful cemetery over looking the town of Ford. It is located in a hilly area of Kansas with a road running through the edge of it slightly curved and meandering with a few scrub trees. When I visited the spot, I felt it was a peaceful resting place for one whose life had seen such turmoil and loss…
Returning to our story, we have to understand that this family now has lost the mother and three girls and is left with a 33 year old widower and a 23 year old uncle and three little girls. There is nothing but their spirit.
I'm sure the towns people pitched in when they heard of their plight but it would have been meager if at all…Plans were made…The father located an older couple who had a one room apartment to rent and installed 11 year old Leila Maude and 9 year old Gladys in this place to stay during the week. Now because they valued education while on this trip, they had seen to it that the older girls attended school where ever they happened to camp; so with a promise from the old couple to see that the girls were awakened every day to go to school and that they would be tucked in at night, the two men took 2 year old Opal and went to a wheat farm to work. The farmer's wife agreed to look after Opal during the week. Leila Maude and Gladys were their own cooks and I'm sure they had learned quiet a lot from their mother's instructions when they had to take over before she died.
There weren't too many incidents other than the confession from Gladys in later years that they slipped out the window one night and went to a traveling show (there were no movies). This way of life continued until December with little excitement. The men began to save enough money to think about riding the train back to Arkansas and family. Things were setting in pretty well until Leila Maude and a black school mate had a disagreement and Leila Maude dunked the other girls pig tail in the ink well on her desk. The other girl slapped Leila Maude. Of course, since the family were totally Southern, and not mentally accepting of being in school with a black girl, the situation was blown out of proportion and the father made a decision immediately to go home to Arkansas where they wouldn't have to deal with racial problems. So this family came home to Howard Co. Arkansas. They rode the train to Ozan, AK. where an uncle of the girls met them with a wagon and team and transported them to the waiting arms of family.
An old maid aunt, sister of the father of these 3 girls, moved in and raised them until they were pretty big girls. She was good and kind, but had very Puritan ideas. Aunt Opal once told that they overheard Aunt Betty say that all "that a woman had to do was brush against her husband's britches leg and she would have a baby"…It seems that these girls were mortally afraid of getting too near a boy's britches leg until they were grown. You see, there wasn't TV or sex education in schools. So one had a limited knowledge of most things. In spite of all of this, these three women grew into beautiful, lovely, kind, considerate and emotionally mature adults. They married, had children, lived through deaths and separations, economic deprivations and were praised and honored by friends and family at their deaths. They didn't end up emotional cripples, murderers, thieves, etc. To the contrary, they made their homes open for anyone, they took care of sick and dying friends and family…They were care givers.
So what would happen if this would have occurred in 1996 or even when you were growing into an adult? Today, they might have been called migrant workers. The children would have suffered in many ways. Classmates would have laughed at them because they lived in a tent and when they were left while the father and uncle worked, the welfare would have been called and a report of neglect, etc. would been given. Chances are the children would have been removed from their father and placed in a foster home. When the gun was fired, the father would have been arrested as a inattentive father. When the 2 school girls, black and white, had a confrontation someone would have sued or perhaps worse, an idiot who wasn't even part of the confrontation would take a gun to school…isn't that correct?
My purpose for this story is too honor the 3 wonderful mothers, aunts, grandmothers, and half sisters who are no longer with us. The other reason is to point out to everyone that people have always had the same passions, problems and mistakes and somehow we grow into pretty decent people when we know we are tough. My grandfather was the father in this story. He was a stern disciplinarian but a caring man. My memories of him after he remarried and had a second family included watermelons, music and a little "hot toddy" and vitamins he would make us take when we visited him in Beaumont, Texas. Perhaps if we will take a lesson from this family and teach our children to endure hardships and always love them without conditions, the world would improve.
Information provided by Annette Harwell Parker, 1996
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