Sorted by date Results 26 - 50 of 123
Betty A. Jones, a Flomaton native, always dreamed of her poems and stories being told in a song. In high school, Betty wrote a song that gave her the idea to be a country music songwriter. A country song has to be written as a story so as to be sung in three minutes or less. Betty wrote her song, but needed a melody writer. She found that melody writer in her friend Joffrey Tullis, another Flomaton native. In the mid 1970's, Betty felt her time was right for making her dream of being a country music songwriter come true. The song was called,...
Dear Friends, This being the first article for 2020, I want to tell you all some things I have planned for the New Year. First, I must tell you this is ending a complete two years of writing for The Tri-City Ledger under BYGONE TIMES. I never in a million years would have guessed I would write my memories for anyone but my children and grandchildren. That was my hobby for many years. I privately wrote stories with the intention of leaving my old yellow legal pads filled with information so my offspring would know what life I had lived and why...
11 years ago, on December 28th, we two innocents stood before Judge Jean Kirkland in the courthouse in Brewton, Alabama and vowed to love, honor and obey (ouch) each other until death and taxes came due. All he owned was a car and the monthly payment. Together we owned only our names and trust in each other and have tried really hard to keep them both good. So, with $500.00 dollars we head over to New Orleans (a.k.a. ‘Sin City’) to share a "lavish" two-day honeymoon. We were due back really soon to continue our factory jobs at Escambia Che...
I would give anything to take y'all back in time with me to experience Christmas in the poor house. You will need to play along and imagine here. The smells of Washington Delicious apples, Lake Wells oranges, Mama's traditional Christmas cake frosted with icing made with apple chunks and orange slices stewed down in sugar with the peelings still on. Vanilla and egg whites cooked until the frosting was thickened to a smooth concoction. Lort! Our breakfast table was laden with a platters of fried yard eggs, ham, bacon and sausage patties and link...
Escambia County Bank of Flomaton hosted a celebration for Customer Appreciation last Friday. I was invited to sell my book alongside the Alger Sullivan Historical Society group who were selling books; all things historical and local. So, the doors opened for business and the gathering of area folks who enjoyed refreshments and reconnected with friends and family. WPFL 105.1 Radio brought news, announcements and live interviews with many that shared their memories and talents from days current and bygone. The coveted historical calendars were...
I don't do drugs for recreation. I have had drugs done to me. So, my first experience with the magic of drugs was when I gave birth to my first baby. A little girl that had made my life miserable for nine months with having me puke and eat tons of stuff. Peanut butter right out of the jars, pickled peaches and the juices that dripped off my elbow, gallons of Coca-Cola from small bottles that had to be filled with slivers of ice; just anything that didn't bite me first got dibs on being eaten. I ate. She rumped around and caused me to cry and ea...
Somebody moved away and gave Daddy a turkey and a few old laying hens that never laid, but eventually made some good Sunday dumplings. My parents never ask for handouts (we had self-pride), but a hand-me-down turkey wasn't the same as a public dole turkey. Daddy accepted the gift and thought he would make a good centerpiece for our Thanksgiving table. Anyway, as to the turkey, he became known as "that sapsucker." ***Credit to Humpy for that phrase. He called undesirables "sapsucker."*** It was in late summer/early fall that Daddy came home...
So here I sit this day pondering on what my offspring really feel about me as a Mom. In all honesty it doesn't matter now because they turned out as awesome humans, so I must have been okay, RIGHT? From the moment I felt the first flutter of life I was elated and crying at the same time. They both caused me to get fat and fatter. They caused me to eat everything in the kitchen and from all the Tom Thumbs that sold Little Debbies and wash-downs of Tab. Calories were high on my doctor’s attention. Tabs would take care of the calories, RIGHT? I sp...
In my childhood days, the month of November brought busy work and fun times to this country girl. To say November was the best month would be a stretch, but let me explain myself. Before the busy-ness of November, October had us harvesting our crop of sweet potatoes. Daddy and Mama had prepared a place to "bank" our potatoes for keeping them through the winter months and have some for starters for our crop the next year. The banked potatoes were piled in a trench that Daddy had made for the base of the bank. About four feet wide and 10 feet...
I have never written or talked much about my Mama, but today I honor her memory with this story. This is my memory and opinion. Older siblings have more memory than I, younger siblings have a more dim memory, but we all shared Mama. She was gone too soon. Mama was gone less than one month after her 49th birthday. Born in 1910 to a share cropper family, she lived close to the edge of owning nothing until she married my Daddy. Mama had survived a bout with rheumatic fever at age 6 that left her with a weakened and scarred heart. She suffered...
Our radio was dialed to any local radio station during the day for news, farm & market reports, and country music. Saturday nights the dial was set on WSM Clear Channel 650, for the Grand Old Opry. That was the time for Daddy and Mama to enjoy their evening of music. We listened also. Lordy, I loved listening to Earnest Tubb singing, "Walking The Floor Over You." THEN. WLAC 1510 AM GALLATIN, TENNESSEE...circa 1956-59. Our old Zenith dialed to Randy's Record Shop at Gallatin, Tennessee. 50,000 watts of Clear Channel. Monday through Friday, 9:00...
I walk out to stand on the back porch to feel a long-awaited difference. I feel the promise that was made in the beginning. I feel the sweet caress of Fall’s cooling. It may be a bit late this year but, I knew it would come eventually. It always does. I stand still to allow myself the beauty of what is all around me. The visual, the physical and the spiritual. The visual is watching Black Cat stare down a little green frog that sits on the edge of the rain barrel supports. The lone hand of banana hanging in our clump. The neighbor’s calf sta...
Today at around 8:15 and a bump, I became Armenthia "Minnie" Simmons Smith, my Grandma. I use computer glasses to avoid the head tilting thing. Usually I place my spectacles/bifocals on the desk while I'm on checking Facebook to see what others are posting and how many LIKES I may have gotten on some inane remark. You all do that, so own it. Now, I got up to start my Monday morning chores and took off the computer glasses, looked around to find my RX glasses--no such luck. I looked on the kitchen table, in the bathroom, on the night stand in my...
Sunday afternoons were for playing and sharing time with friends that lived within walking distance to us Smiths. After church and after the dishes were washed, we usually headed out to spend quality time at the house of whomever was on our radar for a good time of playing, or have some over to play at our house. We enjoyed playing at others’ houses because things were more interesting and less restrictive away from home. Buddy and I shared a brother and sister pair that lived south of us. The Murphys lived on a dirt road behind the Allen Smith...
23 was a big year for the Crews family. Our precious Peggy had started "Candy Garden" at Lacoochee Elementary in Pasco County, Florida. She was filling up her head with letters, numbers & colors while being shoved into the wrong bus line and having her pregnant mama close to a nervous breakdown. This caused a blubbering confrontation with the school Principal, the teachers, the school nurse and both janitors. The little darling announced to her favorite teacher’s aide that her mama would need a whole seat for herself if she volunteered to g...
OK, y'all know I'm just not into football. Never understood the game, but attended many during my high school years. My main interest was the socializing and watching all the excitement. I jumped up to scream when others did; didn't know if it was a score or if they were screaming at the Ref. I loved the halftime show; seeing the cheerleaders go over to the visitor’s side and fain interest in chatting up the opposition, only to come back to the home side-shaking pom poms, giggling and throwing slurs at those "knobby-knee capped, bucked t...
Most folk who know me, know I love flowers. Old-fashioned flowers like ones found around long-abandoned home places and sad, old Plantation places and along the red clay ditches in middle gut Alabama. Flowers like Gladiola, Morning Glory, Easter Lilies, Seven Sisters Roses and Spider Lilies. To be fair, I have to put Crepe Myrtle in the mix. Although it is a shrub with blooms, it gets left behind and dragged down into those ditches by road graders and rains; only to take root and cling to life...
Lamar and I set out to Center, Texas for a looksee. Lamar (The CEO) has talked for years about going to Center to find the reason why his Granddaddy Joseph Holland, founder of Hollandtown, Florida went to Center circa 1915-1919. Why he didn't move there is still unknown. He knows from family lore that it was at the suggestion of a friend to move there, buy some land and raise cattle. If Granddaddy Joe was planning to complete that venture, his plans were cut short due to his unfortunate death in April of that year (1919). He died from injuries...
My Mama and Daddy were old school rounded to the highest power. We answered with, "yes sir and no sir and thank you ma'am and please." No short cuts, otherwise…So this being the day the Lord gave us to be glad in it, I'm sharing a Sunday lesson on honoring thy Father and Mother and leaving the last piece for Mr. Manners. So, it was Sunday, the day for being on time for Sunday School and Church and hosting the Preacher for dinner. Dinner being the mid-day meal, this day being Sunday and feeding the Preacher called for FRIED CHICKEN and f...
We camped. It was cheap and fun. During the Oil Embargo of 1973-74 we had saved enough money to take a trip to Colorado. In his military days Lamar had been stationed at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs and always wanted to show me the place that inspired him to go to college. He had been an airman assigned to the motor pool and drove those big, old coach buses that shuttled the cadets to concerts and the ski areas. He saw how a fellow with a degree had the upper hand and he wanted some of that. Once honorably discharged, he wooed me,...
The only name I ever knew him by was, Cannonball. He must have been old, or so it seemed. He didn't hold a job. He rambled about the neighborhood looking for someone to talk to. He lived in a little shack trailer with a built-on lean-to. Nighttime showed a dim light in the greasy, grime coated windows. The trailer sat underneath ancient live oaks that had allowed a buildup of green moss growing in streaks down the sides. Resurrection fern grew on the roof. When the rains came it stood regal, tall, green and beautiful. Dry spells caused it to la...
My personal axis has finally been knocked off. Reading an article posted by a friend telling us about how the millennials are refusing things from us old folks that we think are important. We spent the better years of our lives struggling financially to collect things, only to now find the offspring simply won't take possession of ‘em. "What is wrong with you all?" "Don't have room for it. Besides who wants to spend their life polishing silver when we can use plastic?" Point taken…still hurts. Three years of home economics wasted on cho...
Long weekends and Good Friday always bring up a memory. When a Good Friday memory floats to the top, it ain't flotsam and jetsam, it's a good 'un. So, I'm sharing, just how it should be. Right? Good Friday 1962 was the beginning of Easter weekend and a long weekend for B shift of Chemstrand. I had been invited to take a weekend ride up to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania with three girlfriends. All of us were B shift, area 3, tire yarn, doff crew. We were single, employed, and free to do as we pleased. We did, but hit bumps along while finding our...
I don't remember when I became aware of that far-off-from-Barnett Crossroads, Alabama place, but I knew I needed to see it. The need to "SEE ROCK CITY" way up in Tennessee somewhere stayed on my list of things to do and see. "Bucket list" hadn't entered the lexicon of this little country girl at that time. On top of a mountain near Chattanooga, I planned to tour the “ROCK CITY GARDEN,” “RIDE THE INCLINE,” “SEE SEVEN STATES” and go deep underground at “RUBY FALLS.” I knew that Blue Star Highway # 31 running from Mobile to Chicago went th...
Barnett Crossroads, Alabama. Sometime late in the 1940's. In the days of my early childhood some special experiences stand out more vividly than others. I'll share one. The scene is at the southeast corner of the crossing. The old store still sat then at the northeast corner. If I have my facts correct, the owners back to the beginning of this important place was builder A. D. Kelly, then Ollie Ingram, and followed by Clyde Hawkins. Last owners were Riley & Annie Barnett who moved the store across the road to the southeast corner where this...
