Category: Cotton Patch

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Prejudice – Cotton Patch

The hard labor that characterized the daily routine of slaves, was often relieved by the singing of songs that revealed their inner struggles. Many of these songs, that we also loved and sang, described the bleakness and harshness of their lives, but most of them revealed hope in something better to come.

As we sang, we didn’t realize the significance of such songs as “Carry Me Back to Ole Virginny”, “Old Folks at Home”, and “My Old Kentucky Home” which speak about longings to be reunited with families that slavery had separated. Neither could we feel the pain that inspired such songs as “Uncle Ned”, “Massa’s in the Cold Ground”, and “Ole Black Joe.” According to the words of the song, ‘Ned’ was a good, hard worker who had died and was going to be sorely missed by his ‘Massa’. The sad feelings experienced by slaves at the death of a kind and gentle master are verbalized in the song about Massa in the cold ground, and ‘Joe’ describes how the vigor that he felt in his younger days has turned to sadness because so many of his family and friends have died and he is left all alone. He ‘hears’ them gently calling to him, and his desire is contained in the words, “I’m coming, I’m coming , for my head is bending low; I hear the gentle voices calling, “Old Black Joe.”

Besides the sad, everyday work songs, there were the sometimes mournful, sometimes lively, Negro Spirituals. My favorite was “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot” in which the singers dream of a band of angels and a chariot coming to carry them over ‘Jordan’ where friends who have gone before await them.

A rather peppy, joyful sounding Negro Spiritual is “Oh, Dem Golden Slippers.” Looking forward to wearing golden slippers refers to the happiness and beauty in heaven, but it also speaks of a deprived existence here on earth. I heard more of the hope and joy that the songs exhibited than I heard of the painful situations from which the people were longing to escape.

As children, we did not ‘see’ the inequities of slavery or of the living conditions common to black people after they were set free. We were unaware of the fact that slaves were not allowed to be educated, and that when they were later granted the right to pursue an education, they were not privileged to use the same facilities with white children. Their schools were substandard for many years until segregation was forced upon the white communities in the 1950’s, almost a hundred years after the Civil War! Even our “Christian” colleges had not taken the initiative to right the wrongs done to their fellow human beings. There were no black students at FHC when I was there in the late 40’s; they were not allowed!

It now seems ironic that Christians did not understand what they were doing; it demonstrates what a stronghold common beliefs and attitudes of a community can have upon those who belong to it. The evidences of that influence upon good people was all around me as I was growing up, and for several years I was simply apathetic. That was the way it was, and I felt no need to challenge it.

A little black lady in the Piney Chapel community lived all alone in a remote field on our neighbor’s farm. She evidently had been allowed to remain in the little house where her family had lived as slaves, and she grew old there. She had an apple tree in her yard, and it was rumored that she had given people permission to get some of the apples, but when I accompanied one of my sisters and some neighbor children to take advantage of her offer, she was not so pleased. It was rather frightening to my six-year-old mind when she hobbled with the aid of a cane out of her house, yelling as she came. Her anger, however, was due to the fact that we had picked apples off the tree rather than having gotten the fallen ones from the ground!

The prejudicial attitudes that existed in Alabama in those days had resulted in all-white rural communities, and the few black people who were allowed to live in a city, huddled together in its most impoverished sections. It was in just such an area in Athens, that my grandfather’s hired man, Will, lived.

Will came early every morning, worked all day and walked home each evening after his work was done. While everyone else ate lunch in the dining room, Will always ate sitting on the edge of the porch or in the kitchen depending on the weather.

Many lines of demarcation had been established, so when another black man came occasionally to pick cotton, it must have been unacceptable for me to admire him, but admire him I did. He sometimes sang as he worked and his voice seemed to me to be right out of heaven! I don’t even remember his name, but I remember having asked him more than once to sing as we worked side by side at the same kind of job under the same hot Alabama sun, now made more bearable by the music pouring forth from this poor man’s soul. My recognition of something great in this lowly being may have been the beginning of the end of whatever prejudice I had acquired from my community.

As we seriously look at what happened in the minds and hearts of many honest, God-fearing people during the troublesome times of slavery, we must continue to examine ourselves for similar delusions that rob us of our abilities to know right from wrong.

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Marshall Keeble – Cotton Patch

The prejudice that presented its ugly head in the lives of Southern people was not unique to those who were reprobates. As a learned tradition, it etched its way into the hearts of many family members who professed Christianity and who should have known better. I take some comfort, however, in the fact that their behaviors often conflicted with their spoken denouncements.

My Dad occasionally made racial remarks that were not becoming to his position as an educator and certainly not to his profession as a Christian minister. On the other hand, when someone had a need that Dad knew about, prejudice did not enter into his decision…he did whatever he could without hesitation.

In the forties and fifties, a black minister of the gospel won the hearts of many Christian people, and even though he has been dead for several years, his name and work are still alive. He succeeded in getting the support of several well known white brethren to help him establish a preacher training school for young men of his race, and Southern Bible Institute in Dallas, Texas continues to fulfill Marshall Keeble’s dream.

Once, Dad took the family to a neighboring town to hear Brother Keeble in a tent meeting. Brother Keeble, who was known for his use of humor in making important points, sometimes exploded a laugh through half-closed lips. My brother, who happened to be sitting on the front row that evening, declared that he saw a rainbow in the moisture that sprayed from Brother Keeble’s mouth during one of his witty outbursts!

Later, around 1953, my husband and I were privileged to take our small family to an outdoor meeting in Abilene, Texas in which Brother Keeble and some of his student preachers spoke. I am glad that prejudice did not do its dirty work and rob me of these two special experiences.

When I was teaching school, I discovered and read two wonderful books about African Americans to my students. One book, Amos Fortune, Free Man, was about a slave who was given his freedom when he was still a young man, and he spent the rest of his life buying freedom for others. The other book was a biography of George Washington Carver. I never tire of reading about his numerous talents and his unpretentious way of life.

From musician to botanist, to chemist, to artist, to sports doctor, to educator, Mr. Carver credited all of his talents to God. This man, who recognized God as the source of all his talents,….how could anyone suggest that he did not have a soul?

One of Dad’s sisters married the son of a German immigrant, who owned and operated a meat market in Athens, Alabama. Aunt Alma and Uncle Carl were respectable citizens of their communities. She taught in the public school system for many years and later in a private Christian school. I did not have as much contact with them and their children as with the relatives who lived a more rural lifestyle, but the times that we were together made good memories.

During World War II when Hitler began pouring out his terrible wrath upon Jews and others, people in the US identified all Germans with the detestable dictator and Nazism. The prejudice that resulted from this unfair way of thinking made it very difficult for innocent Americanized Germans, and it was particularly hard on their children who had to attend public schools and be subjected to the spiteful remarks that targeted all Germans.

Prejudice can exist between races, between sexes, between rich and poor, between young and old, between educated and uneducated, and it can extend in both directions. Although the cotton patch had a great potential for equalizing all who worked in it side by side, it did not always succeed, and there was also prejudice between those who worked in the fields and those who wouldn’t.

I have witnessed a great improvement in the attitudes of those close to me toward others who are different, and I pray that it will continue to be so.

Prejudice can rob us of having some rewarding relationships, and making generalizations is a form of prejudice totally unfair to those in the group who have done nothing wrong. Give honor to whom honor is due, whoever they happen to be.

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Mother’s Day Ela Morgan Bullington – Cotton Patch

December the fifth was my mother’s birthday, so I thought that it would be appropriate to write some special memories of her. The year of her birth always eluded me, and in trying to recall that and some other facts, I began to read Dad’s memoirs that were written after her death. I found the following statement dated December 5, 1969:

“Ah! This glorious Anniversary- I retired about 12:15 A.M. thanking God who so wonderfully blessed us all sixty-five years ago by sending into the W.E. Morgan family such a bright, sweet little daughter, Ela. This placed the town of Henry, Tenn. firmly on the map. I’m sure the quiet little town could not dream of the far-reaching effect and blessings of this, seemingly, common event. This, the first birth to the family of the principal of their High School………”

This statement was written by a lonely man who had lost his wife of forty-six years. Overtones of emotion tend to discredit the reasonableness of the statement about the far-reaching effect of her birth, but I knew the unpretentious, mature woman who gave so much for as long as she had strength. She may not have been recognized in any newspaper or magazine, but in the schools and communities in which she served, she was well known for she gave of herself generously.

Because of her selfless support, her husband was “known in the gates”. Enabled by her hard work and her willingness to forego the ownership of silver, china, crystal, and fine furniture, he gave of himself to build up and broaden the scope of schools and churches for which he worked religiously. They lived in hard times, but theirs were made even harder because of his devotion to others and she aided, if not encouraged, him in doing so.

Throughout this series of stories, I have referred to many of Mother’s talents, but the most vivid impression that she ever made on my childish heart came at the end of a long hot day of work in Uncle Lake Bates’ cotton patch. When I came home very dirty and very tired, I was presented with a pair of white and pink flowered flannel pajamas, complete with buttonholes and buttons on the front of the shirt and on the cuffs at the bottom of the long sleeves. This within itself was not unusual, for Mother was a very efficient seamstress, and I was used to her making all of our clothes. This time, however, she had not only made me a pair of pajamas, but she had also made an identical pair for my doll, Robbie Joe!

This gesture of love was the most meaningful of any that Mother ever demonstrated to me. Even in my small untrained eye for quality, I saw the labor of love that went into that small pair of pajamas for my doll. Not only was it an extravagance of material, but also of her time. The tiny band at the bottom of the sleeves, the collar, the front placket, and the tiny worked buttonholes on the small pajamas were every bit as artfully done as the ones on the larger pair!

I do not remember what I said to my mother, but I know that the surprise and joy in my heart had to have been visible to her. Perhaps she was sufficiently rewarded by my delighted response to her “gift”.

By the time that I went away to college, Mother had so many responsibilities she could not make all of our clothes, but she made two dresses for my college wardrobe that became favorites. They were made of cotton blends so that laundering was fairly easy. One was a medium blue and white checked gingham, made simple, but neat and comfortable. The other was made of red, white, and black plaid material, and it was not so simply made. It had a peplum effect on the skirt, which was trimmed with white eyelet embroidery through which black grosgrain ribbon was run. A square neckline was also trimmed in the same eyelet and ribbon, and a big full bow tied the rounded ends of the peplum in the back. It was beautiful due to the details and workmanship rather than to the quality of material, and it helped me catch the attention of a young man, named Bill Redding, as he waited in a line across the cafeteria…. and the rest of this story is still under construction.

Giving of ourselves unselfishly is one of the most effective ways of making someone feel our love. Mothers may go unrewarded and even unrecognized for the things that they do, but recognition does often come when their children grow up and have children of their own!

Ela Morgan Bullington
Ela Morgan Bullington
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Christmas-Cotton Patch

When I got a funny little windup figure of Popeye one Christmas, it made quite an impression on me. I cannot remember more than three or four gifts throughout my entire childhood, but Popeye is one of those. The little tin man stood about five inches tall, and he had the typical Popeye look complete with one eye shut, a pipe in his mouth and oversized muscles that symbolized his strength. I have wondered many times over as to why I remember the funny little character. There is no remembrance of anything else that I got that Christmas, but I know that we opened our gifts on Christmas Eve, preparing to leave the next morning to go to my grandparents’ home in Puryear, Tennessee. Trips to Mother and Daddy Morgan’s did not happen very often, and the memories of those visits are uniquely their’s.

Although it is not associated with Christmas, I can still smell the reddish bars of Lifebuoy soap that were always in the “bathhouse”. There was an outbuilding in the backyard that had one room especially arranged with a number three washtub and all the things necessary for a sitdown bath. The clean, fresh smell of Lifebuoy permeated that whole shed. I don’t know what we did about bathing when it was cold weather, but I enjoyed my baths in that little neat room.

Another smell that was an all year round smell was that of homemade rolls. Mother Morgan seemed to specialize in making wonderful rolls, but for Christmas, I also remember her homemade fruit cakes. Other smells of Christmas were those of nice juicy oranges and apples, and peppermint candy (not canes, but long fat rolls of it!)

It seemed we were not limited as to how much fruit we could have…. and then… there were always nuts. We didn’t need to crack nuts open by putting one down on a rock and smashing it and our finger with another, nor did we have to use a hammer. Mother Morgan had a tool called a nutcracker that was so much easier than our methods, and our fingers were certainly safer.

Even a dusting of snow didn’t keep my cousins and me from playing out as much as we wished. We felt the joy that only children are capable of feeling, before the burdens of adulthood have dulled the senses of magic.

Could it be that the expectations of going to my grandparents’ house was what made the little tin man memorable?

A few years later, my two younger brothers and I were held as hostages in the kitchen, while our two older sisters made us believe that we could hear sleigh bells ringing and the hoofbeats of Santa’s reindeer on the rooftop. We remained there just long enough for Santa to leave our presents, and then we were allowed to go into the living room and open them. I remember getting a pencil box and some other odds and ends for school, and I remember being pleased with what I got.

It was Christmas Eve! We must be going to Tennessee again! Was it this glorious thought that put the magic in that Christmas, or was it the mystery that my sisters played out in the kitchen that evening as we anticipated a visit from the traditional jolly old man of the season? I think they were equally responsible. The small family unit worked together to provide the mystical joys, traditional to the season, in the privacy of our modest home, and it was the love of the extended family that brought special joys because we belonged.

This story of Christmas would not be complete without telling about one really special gift that I got from an aunt and uncle of mine who lived in Tennessee. They had learned that I did not have a baby doll, and when they gave me one, I was enormously touched. I immediately named it Robbie Joe. The next thing that I did was very important to me, and I am thankful that my dad understood and helped me with it. I had a dollar, and I wanted to give that dollar to Uncle Joe and Aunt Robbie. Whatever they thought of the transaction, I don’t know, but they accepted it graciously, and I felt really good. That doll was my treasure for a long time.

The Christmas pageant I referred to in my last article referred to my part as an angel, in which I recited, “Inasmuch as ye have done it to the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” Giving to those in need is a good activity for any season. May your Christmas be a joyous, happy event!

Feeling the magic of Christmas or any other family togetherness is a blessing due all children. The security and love within a family that exhibits God’s love among themselves and others will make longer lasting memories than could ever develop from a gift under a tree.

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Winter Fishing Trip- Cotton Patch

Winters in my northern Alabama home were not so severe that we had to stay inside for long periods of time, as is so in more northern states. Snows deep enough for snowballing, sledding, or building snowmen were seldom, and I don’t recall a single snowfall that stayed on the ground for days and days.

Living in the country and with few luxuries, we didn’t always have sufficient clothing for the worst of weather, but I enjoyed the outdoors and was seldom restrained from being outside whenever I wished. We didn’t seem to worry about bundling up for fear of getting sick. It seems there was an unwritten law that said as long as you can stand it, enjoy it. That may not be practical for all children, but my happy memories include those times of playing out in the very cold, fresh air.

My recollections may be somewhat colored by a childlike delight with snow and the fun it can provide for the young and the young at heart. On the other hand, I can remember times when my hands and feet were so cold that they had to be warmed slowly and gently back to usefulness.

One particularly cold experience, when I was about ten years old, was a fishing expedition with my parents. It was rather common knowledge that my parents loved to go fishing, but it was also a way of putting more food on the table for their family. There were many Saturdays and holidays from school that one or both of my parents went fishing, and on this very cold holiday, I decided that I must go along. After warning me of how cold it was and that there would be no turning back, they left the decision up to me. We rummaged around through the family clothing and came up with a snowsuit, a knitted hat and some gloves that I could wear, and we set out to go fishing.

We lived near some back waters created by dams on the Tennessee River, so there were several good fishing places within driving distance from home. Dad chose to drive down some back roads that took us only a few miles from our home at Oxford. We launched our boat and headed out across the cold, cold water in search of a good fishing spot. Dad probably, as he often did, looked for a tree top that had fallen into the water making a likely place to find a big school of crappie, but I don’t remember all of those details…I was cold! In fact, I was so cold there was no keeping me quiet enough for my dad, who was a fairly good fisherman , with some rather strict rules. The first rule was that of being quiet, and the second one was that of being patient. Fish must be given time to find your bait. According to this master fisherman, holding one’s mouth just right was very important. We didn’t really believe him, but this and many similar bits of humor added to the fun of fishing trips with Dad.

Because I could not control my shivering, Dad pulled up to the shore, built a good roaring fire near a nice big log that became a warm, comfortable place for me to sleep while my parents did the fishing. I don’t know how long I slept, but Mom and Dad caught the limit allowed for three fishermen and were forced to quit. They came back for me, rowed across the lake, and proceeded to take ‘our’ catch home.

On the way, we were to pass the home place of an uncle, who was a writer and photographer for a paper in Auburn, Alabama. As it happened, he, along with his wife and two children, were visiting his parents, and we stopped to show off our big string of fish. The men started talking about making a picture, but Mom would have nothing to do with posing for a photograph, so one of my cousins and I were selected to help hold up the heavy chain of fish.

Having been born and raised in the city, my cousin was not so accustomed to the slimy feel and strong smell of freshly caught fish as I. Dad held up one end of the chain and I strained with all my might to hold up the other, but it was really heavy. My cousin gingerly took hold of the chain in the middle and the picture was quickly taken. The strained look on my face, the delicate, ‘hurry-up-and-get-it-over-with’ look on my cousin’s face and my Dad’s proud look made an interesting picture of an unforgettable fishing trip.

I was a burden on my parents that wintry day, because I was not up to that adult task, but they quietly took care of my needs and were actually rewarded by being able to claim my limit of fish along with theirs!

Children often believe themselves more capable than they are, and no amount of reasoning to the contrary can change that belief. Parents, who can allow a child to participate in activities that are not harmful, will have more success when the answer has to be absolutely, “No.”

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Dad and the New Century – Cotton Patch

This is a reprint from the Cotton Patch (2000) Written by Jo Redding and talking about her father who was born in the year 1900.

If my father had lived until January first of this year, he would have welcomed in the new millenium 2000 A.D with a passion. Having been born August 1, 1900, he could have seen, except for a few months, the entire twentieth century. That would have been exciting!

If Dad were here today, he would delight in telling everyone what tremendous changes had occurred in his lifetime. Concerning the first quarter of the century, he would recall how horses, horse-drawn carriages and trains slowly gave way to automobiles, so that by the late twenties, many families owned their own cars.

Change begets change. Rough, muddy streets were not as easily traveled on in the newfangled vehicles as they had been with horses, and poor pedestrians and onlookers were subjected to more dust or mud being stirred up and slung at them by fast rotating wheels. Streets needed to be changed to harder smoother surfaces and sidewalks became a necessity for the comfort and safety of shoppers walking about town. As more and more families began to travel together, women’s clothing had to slim down to allow room for everyone to fit into their vehicle and so ruffles, bustles and hoop skirts gave way to slimmer styles of the “flapper” era.

Dramatic changes resulted from everyone having their own automobile, but during the second quarter when electricity became available to rural Americans, the door was wide open to a variety of new experiences. Electric lights, stoves, refrigerators, washing machines, sewing machines and radios became standard items in a household. Following that came record players, tape recorders, typewriters, etc., and in the late forties TV antennae began to adorn the roof tops of city homes.

Of all the electrical gadgets that developed during those years, TV has been the most controversial and yet it has influenced our lifestyles considerably. From active, creative, outdoor recreation to sedate, passive indoor entertainment. Indoor, interactive family fun with games such as Monopoly, Tiddlywinks, Checkers, Bingo, Old Maid, Dominoes, jigsaw puzzles, charades, plays and skits (made up on the spot), singing, story telling and readings have been laid aside while the TV does the entertaining of its passive living room audiences who interact very little among themselves.

My parents had a TV, and I know they enjoyed being in touch with what was happening in the news and weather. Although I had moved away by then, I can imagine them enjoying the Lawrence Welk show and Red Skelton. Mom would have loved historical novels and Dad would have kept up with political issues. He was a true patriot of our country and always said he enjoyed paying taxes! He knew that without them his schools would suffer from lack of funds, and he realized how much we all enjoy good roads and public facilities that make life easier. He certainly made good use of the government-owned TVA lakes in northern Alabama where fishing became one of his greatest passions.

Dad was very interested in science, history, geography and math, and as I make this statement, I recall that he held a high regard for the disciplines of English and literature as well. Perhaps being the dedicated teacher that he was, he developed an interest in all areas that could provide him with knowledge that he considered important to the many students he hoped to influence.

Since his death in the early seventies, the standards for TV shows has changed tremendously. Dad would lament over the fact that immorality is displayed so unashamedly; in fact he would be very vocal about it. He would be saddened to tears at the perversion of love as it is portrayed in the lyrics of popular songs and in movies. So much of what he tried to teach in schools and churches would be lost in the flood of publicity that seems to laud the greed, lust and selfishness of human beings without a God. His patriotic emotions for his country would have been crushed by the immoral acts of our president and by the fact that his behavior got a mere “slap on the wrist.”

Except for mainframes and punch cards, computers were unheard of when Dad died. Had he lived to see PC’s in every school and home, he would see them as tools of education and be delighted at the opportunities they could provide. Upon further investigation, he would become dismayed by the availability of smut and pornography via e-mail and chat rooms as well as entire web sites. He would be torn in his judgement: “Does the good outweigh the bad?” He would not deny the use of computers or TV or anything that has such a great potential for education, but he would increase his efforts to teach right from wrong. He would impress on individuals the importance of maintaining their own integrity whether anyone else around them did so or not.

I believe this represents how Dad would have perceived a century of changes if he could have spoken to us on August 1, 2000 A.D.

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Oxford School – Cotton Patch

Revisiting the familiar territory around Oxford School where I had attended fifth and sixth grades under my father, brought back more memories of the years between 1939 and 1943.

We lived in the teachers’ home which had 2 small bedrooms, living room, kitchen, pantry, 2 porches and a “car shed”.

The bathroom was an outdoor building that also served the school. It was on a slight hill on the other side of our large fenced garden spot making it quite a distance from the house. Because such a walk was unthinkable in the dark, we used a small portable facility called a “slop jar” at night. The job of emptying it was not a favorite thing to do, but we each had our turn. Once, it had gotten dark when I remembered that I had not brought the “jar” in for the night and, being somewhat afraid to go get it, I mentioned it to my oldest sister and asked her what I should do. Well, she gave me an extremely effective answer; one that has also become a very popular saying among Christian young people today. She merely asked, “What would Jesus do?” I didn’t have to think …I knew…and it gave me the courage to accept my responsibility. Knowing that I was doing right empowered me to lay aside my fears that night, and that question has been useful to me many times since. When the WWJD bracelets began to be worn a few years ago, I was excited about the positive influence they could have in the lives of those who used them properly.

On December 7, 1941, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor and we entered into World War II. It was a hard time for many families whose boys were drafted into armed services, but it was a time when patriotism was at a peak. We sang patriotic songs at school, and we were encouraged to buy ten-cent war stamps which, when enough were accumulated, could be exchanged for war bonds. The smallest bond cost $18.75 mature at $25.00. Gasoline, coffee, sugar, etc. had to be rationed, and communities worked together on many common causes.

In 1941-1943 I attended a Jr. High school whose principal had served in World War I and was a high ranking official in the National Guards. He incorporated army style marching (including presenting arms) into our physical education program. We learned to do right turns, left turns, about face, column march, march in place, attention, at-ease, etc. It connected us to the boys who were fighting in faraway places.

Aunt Ethel Bates, Dad’s sister, lived in a nice big yellow house about a quarter of a mile up the road in one direction and Aunt Vona Davis, Dad’s aunt, lived about half that distance in the other direction. Both families were a big part of the enjoyment of living in that community. Each family had a girl near my own age with which I shared some good times. Bessie was the youngest child and only girl in Aunt Vona’s family. Evelyn was the fourth child and the first girl in Aunt Ethel’s family of four boys and two girls.

Both of these aunts were good homemakers, diligent in providing for their families and in sharing with neighbors. Both husbands did well with farming and their homes reflected their prosperity. The homes still look good today because someone has continued to care for them.
Few tragedies have touched my immediate or extended family, but one which can’t be surpassed occurred in the Bates’ home. I seldom speak of them without the memory surfacing to haunt me still.

Aunt Ethel’s washing machine was on the side porch, and one day as she was busy with her wash, she had hot water in the washpot. Some of the children were playing marbles out in the yard and had been cautioned to be careful, but in the excitement of the game the youngest boy backed into the fire and fell into the pot of hot water. He was not killed immediately but died on the way to the hospital or soon thereafter. A sister-in-law related how Brice tried to comfort his mother on the way to the hospital saying that he didn’t hurt. Evidently, his feelings were gone and he felt no pain!

For months I witnessed the unbearable pain suffered by a parent in the loss of a child. The months became years before grief did its healing process well enough for that household to be restored to its former state of joyfulness.

Tragedies, though hard to bear, can teach us lessons that help us survive hardships that follow. They can also help form within us the softer qualities of compassion and concern for the feelings of others.

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Piney Chapel – Cotton Patch

Recently, I had the privilege of revisiting several of the places where my childhood memories have taken me in the stories from the Cotton Patch. It was a rewarding visit, complete with the nostalgia that we experience when we realize that those times of the past are only memories. The joy of the experience was made greater by the presence of two of my sisters, who have shared in my memories, and my husband who has encouraged me to write about them.

The Piney Chapel community was the place where we moved in with the bedbugs and waged an all-out war to get them out of the crevices of our beaded ceiling walls and where our mother persistently treated us for scabies every time we scratched. It was there that my anger got the best of me and I hit a first grade classmate in the head with a piece of coal for following me and singing, “She’s My Curly Headed Baby”. Of all the events that I have recounted that had nothing to do with cotton, most of them occurred in this little corner of Limestone County, Alabama.

As we drove around looking for familiar sights, we were dismayed by the changes in and the loss of many buildings, but we were equally amazed at the unchanged condition of others. Sixty-four years ago, I was running around playing on the swing sets and climbing on the monkey bars of the school that still exists. A small area of the schoolyard was familiar, but the addition of many buildings has displaced the teacherage in which we lived. The house had been about halfway between the school and the church building, and, although we missed it the first time we drove by, the church building is still there. It is not so magnificent a place as I remembered it, but it gave me a thrill to see it. Best of all, diagonally across the street stood the house where the Broadways lived.

We could not believe how little this neighbor’s house had changed. The cellar, with its sloping tin door, was there, validating my memories of sliding down the cellar door and singing, “Come Out My Playmates, come out and play with me…and bring your dollies, three…climb up my apple tree..shout down my rain barrel….slide down my cellar door, and we’ll be jolly friends forevermore….”! Windows that opened out over the roof of the front porch reminded me of times Rebecca and I had played “dress-up” in that upstairs room.

We left Piney Chapel and went west of Athens to the very rural community of Oxford Elementary School and Pleasant Valley Church. On the way, we tried to find an old favorite spot for swimming and fishing. We almost despaired of finding it, but eventually, we got our thrill of knowing that we had located it. The “end” of the backwaters from the river and two streams through which we had driven before they put culverts across the road were foolproof evidences that it was “our” spot.

A few miles from the river we located the old homeplace of one of my dad’s aunts. Some of her children and grandchildren established homes on nearby farms, and we were able to recognize a few. One that I was most interested in was Ross Holland’s home that had sat among some big shade trees and had a porch that went around two or three sides of the house. The porch always intrigued me and I thought the house was handsome. Well, it has changed a great deal and if houses could shrink, I would say it has shrunk to about half of its original size!

I saw fields where I had picked cotton and the barn looked the same as I remembered it. There were cows in a pasture and the country store building across the street is still useful. Except for the house itself and the paved street, the place looks as if life has continued in the same way for sixty years.

Oxford school no longer exists, but the concrete bell tower that I watched being built is still standing, and the teachers’ home where we lived looks very much the same. It was here I had the great Halloween scare and in turn frightened my parents by hiding so successfully. It was here my father taught me in fifth and sixth grades. It was here we lived between an aunt and a great aunt whose houses appear so wonderfully unchanged.

Time is forever moving forward, never backward, and so our experiences come and are gone. We will never relive a moment of time, but our memories enable us to vicariously play pleasant scenes and emotions over again and again.

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Halloween Cotton Patch 14

I have decided to keep the articles in their original order. Even though Halloween is not in July! Sit for a spell in the cool and enjoy a story of long ago. -Reda

Whenever our rural Alabama schools celebrated a major holiday, it was always a special and joyous occasion for me. Not only did the holidays contribute to my joy, but the seasons themselves, each with their own unique beauties, were just as delightful..

The autumn season in which Halloween and Thanksgiving are celebrated was especially impressive to me, as it is today. The beautifully colored leaves stirred up a wonder in my soul, and the fresh, crisp air renewed the physical energy that had been sapped by the long, hot summer. An abundance of acorns lay everywhere inviting me to step on them in order to hear crunchy, crackling, delightful sounds. Gathering scaly bark hickory nuts, pecans, black walnuts, beechnuts and just plain old hickory nuts, gave excuses enough to take long, lazy walks in the woods, either alone or with other family members. Celebrating a holiday, however, was most often a public experience that centered around school functions.

Pilgrim costumes, complete with black top hats for the boys and big white collars and aprons for the girls, made the acting out of the first Thanksgiving feast an impressive extension of our reading and history lessons.

Halloween was announced, as it is today, with figures of ghosts, witches, bats, skeletons etc. hanging from wherever they could be hung. The teachers and parents of the community usually took advantage of this season to make money by staging a school carnival.

Very little money was spent on preparations for the carnival. A “fishing pond” containing cheap, but neat, trinkets allowed those who paid a fee to throw in their fishing lines to go “fishing”. People behind the scenes attached a prize to the line with a clothes pin and then gave a strong tug on the line as a cue for the fisherman to pull out his “fish”.

The “haunted house” was full of all sorts of things to create weird or icky feelings and sounds. A rubber glove filled with oatmeal, attached to the end of a stick, became a dead man’s hand to be shaken. An “airplane ride” for blindfolded customers jostled and shook them around on a board which was never more than six inches off the floor! (Such was the simplicity of it all ). Fortune-telling, cake walks, and other fun-filled activities rounded out the evenings of fun and fellowship with neighbors, both young and old.

We did not go “trick or treating” in those days, but people made a lot of strange noises in their attempts to create a scary atmosphere. One homemade instrument that produced a horrible sounding noise was made from stretching a cowhide over the open ends of a metal cylinder. After punching a hole in the middle of each stretched hide, a cord or heavy string was pulled back and forth through the holes in the hide. What an **awesome **sound it made! That sound was a major force that precipitated the events of the following story.

On this particular Halloween, we were living in the teacherage which was located between Oxford Elementary School and the country road below. The secret “rooms” had been set up at school, ready to thrill and perhaps frighten those who would pay to be thrilled and frightened. I was chosen to stay home with a young sibling that evening, but from the front porch and living room of our home, I could see all the lights at the carnival, and I could see silhouettes of the parked cars and of people going in and out of the building. In the beginning I felt pretty secure, yet as it became darker and darker and the noises got louder and louder, my secure feeling began to feel shakier and shakier.

I turned out all the lights in our house so that I could see into the darkness better, but eventually the din of noises (which included some cow hide contraptions) reached a level that was intolerable. I had had enough Halloween “fun”, so I took the baby to the car and locked the doors. We were not long in feeling safe enough to fall sound asleep.

When my family came home to an empty house, it was not long before neighbors joined in a desperate search for the two of us. Someone even peeked into the car and missed us, but eventually we were found, and my most memorable and frightful Halloween was over.

Unfounded fears are not limited to children, and the fact that they are unfounded does not make them any less real to the fearful individual. If a child’s unfounded fears are dealt with realistically, his mental perception will probably develop so that he is better able to distinguish between real and unreal fears as an adult.

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Bluebirds 2 – Cotton Patch

Whenever I see Father Bluebird sitting on top of a nesting box flapping his wings and “singing” in a low raspy voice, I know that there is a Mother bluebird out there watching and listening. The prospective father will go in and examine the proposed home and return to his singing and wing flapping on top of the box until the female comes onto the scene.

Lady Bluebird may go into the box to look around, or she may go into another box first. It seems as though Father Bluebird tries to sell his lady on a particular building site, and if one doesn’t suit her, he carries his amorous display to other boxes. Eventually, the finicky lady decides which one suits her special needs or tastes, and a new family is about to begin. (My husband jokes over the female being so particular in choosing her house, that she gives the male a hard time over details that only women understand. If the plumbing is not in perfect order, or if her kitchen doesn’t suit her fancy, she will have no part of it). She evidently knows what her contribution to this proposed venture is worth, and can well afford to make such reasonable demands! This choosing process can go on for days before any actual building begins.

This spring, we began observing bluebirds in March, and by March 19, a pair had indicated that they would nest in a new blue box by our pear tree. The box is in the same place that an older popular box had been. I am always thrilled when birds choose that spot because it can be easily seen from our kitchen window and from the sliding glass doors that lead to the backyard. Without the aid of binoculars, we can watch and keep up with a series of events that was set in order at the creation. When God ordained that every living thing would produce after its own kind, the beautiful russet-breasted bluebird must have been there obediently taking its orders. That you and I today can enjoy the sound and sight of the eastern bluebird (as well as many other wondrous creatures) is a gift from God for which I am truly thankful.

By April 12, our nest had 5 little greenish-blue eggs in it, and we began watching for anything that might threaten the pair of birds in fulfilling their mission. By April 25, all of the babies had successfully hatched out, and the parents began their feverish work of feeding the hungry nestlings. As usual, I began digging around in my flower beds and in and around old rotting wood in search of big juicy grub worms. For some unknown reason, the “pickings” were slim this year, so I finally resorted to buying mealworms, which the birds love. I placed them in a shallow pan near the nest, and it was not long before the birds knew that when I “visited” their area they would find a good supply of food in the pan.

Bluebirds like a big open area in which to feed, and they prefer the grass to be short. They make use of low perches from which they can look for insects without the danger of being on the ground. 3 to 4-foot stakes driven into the ground make excellent perches, but of the three that I put up, our birds almost exclusively used the one which was placed about 8 feet in front of their nest.

On May 7th, the parents were hauling little white “diapers” out of the nest. According to the books, the parents begin hauling away white bags shortly after the babies are hatched, but we have not been able to observe this activity until a few days before the babies fly. A bag, which contains body waste, is collected immediately after a baby is fed, and then it is removed and deposited away from the nest… Even the birds, living in such humble abodes, are not exempt from housekeeping chores!

Our bluebird babies flew from the blue box on May 13 and 14. We do not know if they all survived, but we have hopes that they did. We heard the special call that parents make to their fledglings for several days, and then what we believe was a new pair visited the blue box, started a nest, and by May 21 when we left on an extended vacation there was 1 egg in the nest.

By the time we returned on June 30, the nest was empty, so we don’t know how many babies there were. We have boxes up at two of our rental houses, and one of them produced five babies even though the children had taken the scarcely-feathered birds out of the box and played with them! We wired the box shut and monitored it often. The little birds miraculously grew into fully feathered fledglings and flew to a new home as they were created to do, despite their early abuse.

Besides the possible 15 bluebirds launched this year, we had 5 black-capped chickadees get their start in one of our bluebird boxes. The parents dove at me each time I opened the box…but I got a great picture of the five little black caps with the white rings around them.

My space is gone, and you haven’t even heard about the Carolina wrens…However, they built on an old dirty shelf in a dark corner of the tool shed. Now, if they find our bluebird boxes in 1999… I’ll just have to write about our birds again next year.