Person:Lela Stem (2)

Excerpt from "We'll See Waht Happens Next" by Vera Mae Stem Watson

"...Written by my Aunt, my Dad's sister, Lorene Cunningham. (For my book) this article entitled: "Memories - Good and Bad"

It is so good to be able to remember events of the past - I have seen many who were not priviledged to have this blessing. I pray to God daily that my husband and I will have alert minds so long as we live. If it be God's will. So I will endeavor to put some memories down on paper and hope they will be read with enjoyment and nostalgia by those who have passed this way about the time as I passed.

My mother and pop were married on Christmas Eve in nineteen hundred and five (1905). They were parents of a son on September twenty-third, nineteen hundred and six. Apparently my mother was a "Mamma" girl. I have been told that while the baby son was very young that she insisted on going to Grandma's house. Not bad to want to go - but it was cold, bad weather, and it was miles to Grandma's house, and besides, they had to walk. My pop gave in and off they started with my brother, Floyd, all wrapped up in blankets and held close to the chest to keep him warm. While they were at Grandma's house, Floyd developed pneumonia and was very, very ill. My Pop and Grandma were up at nights trying to do the needful things for him - like working to get his fever down. They did the things that people did then. Remember there were no antibiotics at hand like we have these days. Soon the baby was well enough that they returned home. I am also told that she was a determined person, when she "set her head" to do anything then my Pop might as well go ahead and do whatever she wanted to do!

My Pop was a tenant farmer, so they moved here and yonder to different farms when they barely did well enough to exist. It was in the same general area where my brother was born (Floyd) that my sister, Elma, was born April 7, 1909. Poor kid, she was named Fannie Elma, which name, Fannie, she dislikes very much even until this present day. She had a bad habit of forever waiting until she was placed on the bench by the dining table to eat, to let her bowels and kidneys (move). Needless to say, this got all the diners upset with nerves and nausea. Many unusual things were tried on her before that habit was broken. Poor Mother, I surely hope Elma was 'bench broken" before I arrived on the scene on January 21, 1911 because without the throw away diapers that women use today, one would have had a bad time trying to teach two little girls how to leave the bench like we had found it and to begin using the acerage outside the house! We were taught that the catalogues were good for something besides to look at and order things from through the mail. We did not waste a single one.

Now to some things that I really remember because I was there. I must have been three years old when we moved from Robertson County, to Trinity County in Groveton. Here to fore my parents lived in country communities but now we had moved to town! We had very little of the world's goods in furniture, as I remember, a wood stove to cook on, beds to sleep on, chairs and benches to sit on, and tables to eat from and one to prepare food on which we called our cook table. The house we moved into had a nice big yard with huge running rose bushes which had frames to hold them off the ground. This was a favorite place to play under the bushes. We had some peach trees too, because I remember our next door neighbor (which was our house owner) had a son about my age who helped me pull the green peaches to put in our nest to sit on like hens set on eggs to hatch chicks. Before our eggs hatched though, the boys daddy discovered our hen's nest and believe me, our bottoms got into painful trouble. Of course when we were asked who pulled the peaches, each of us denied pulling them. You've heard about hen's nests being broken up - ours was ruined!

My Mother caused chill bumps to rise on my sister and me, it was insect and worm season. So she found a worm. Both of us were scared out of our wits when she began to chase us around the house, but I do not remember her catching either of us. Even now I hate worms! My brother comes into mind when I think about how he put some planks across the corners inside the chicken house and we would climb up on the planks and the older kids present would look out through the cracks in the chicken house and see the most horrible creatures coming down the road to get us and carry the smaller kids far away. We small kids did not have sense enough to know that the creatures would probably want the more meaty larger ones!

About this time my Grandma died and one of her sons practically drove my mother's sister, Jennie, and Grandpa out of their home. Our Aunt Jennie came to live with us. She brought Elma and I a pretty book satchel that was exactly big enough to hold a primer telling about Jack and Jill! Gee, Elma would get to use her satchel before I would get to use mine.

Aunt Jennie began to urge mother to go to town and buy some furniture on credit. They did not get Pop's permission but the furniture was bought and delivered. We even had a straw type floor cover that could be folded up, not to mention the pretty white bedstead with violets painted on the high head piece! Of course things were not too quiet when Pop came in from work and saw the furniture - we even had a dresser with a big mirror!

Our neighbors had a grandmother in the family who dipped snuff. They would get their snuff bottle and elm toothbrushes and settle down to an afternoon on the front porch, that seemed so enjoyable to my sister and I! Our mother and Aunt also used snuff. So we decided we would like to get some of their enjoyment. We got our brushes all chewed up good and began to twist it around in our mothers bottle that we had "borrowed" without asking for it. We began to mop, chew, and spit, just like we had seen the women do, but alas! Elma began to turn pale and got so deathly sick that we needed help. I probably did not get as much on my moppy brush because I did not get as sick as she did. This slowed us down, but we did try dipping again later. Floyd might have been a partaker also, but by this time he was studying the Jack and Jill Primer. I am sure Mother hated to see her little boy leave for school that first day.

My Pop worked for a lumber company and at last we were allowed to move into a barn colored, company owned house that had four big rooms! Pop worked in the woods where some of the employees lived, it was called the lumber company "front". He would be gone all the week and come home on weekends. He boarded with a family during the week. Remember I was the baby at this time, even if I was about six years old. I would go to bed Saturday night with Mother but would wake up the next morning on a pallet to find a box of marshmallow candy by my head. I was so happy to have Pop take me in his lap and read the funnies to me while I ran my hands over the big blood veins in his arms. His day at home each week was too short to suit me! When it came time for him to leave I am sure I would make it very difficult for him to go because I would sit on his foot and lock my legs around his leg and beg him not to go.

When I was bad, Mother would tell me that she was going to leave. I was so afraid she would leave that I did not want to leave her side. One day a lady neighbor and her husband wanted to take me to town with them. Oh, I really did want to go, but was afraid to go! I was dressed up to go and I remember crying but the man put me on his shoulder until my fears subsided. We made the trip to town then returned home, they let me in at the gate. I ran into the house and sure enough, Mother was not in the house! I began to cry and look for her. She just happened to be in the outside privy. You know what an outside privy is, don't you? I was so happy that she had not left. I can just see her now, in my mind, with her "Mother Hubbard" dress on. That is what is equivalent to a "hatching jacket" now. By this time Elma had started to school. We were not aware that we were going to have a new-comer to live with us.

Back to the snuff dipping - Mother and one of the neighbors had a quarrel about kids, I suppose, and they were not speaking to one another, sure enough Elma had got the snuff again and Mother found her passed out on the end of the porch toward the neighbors house, The lady saw Mother trying to bring Elma in. Elma felt horrible - but for once the snuff episode did well - it brought the two women together again!

Later one afternoon we visited the woman and her children. Floyd's friend went with us. The women began talking and visiting. The kids were having fun too, outside in the hall and yard. Suddenly the neighbors dog began barking, yelping and running like they were having a fit. The women came out grabbing kids into the house and having fits about as bad as the dogs! Only two people in the crowd knew what was wrong with the dogs. Hydrophobia? This is what the women thought. Not so, Floyd and his friend had petted the dogs so they could rub "high life" on them, it was a wonder that Mother did not give birth to her baby after such an exciting incident.

The great day finally arrived when Floyd, Elma and I were allowed to go next door to play with our friends. This was an unusual privilege! While we were playing outside, we did wonder why the doors were closed and the window shades pulled down - the doctor's car was at our house too! This was October 15, 1917 when our little brother Lamar came to live with us. We were very excited over his arrival. Do you ever remember hearing about the "Bowl hives" that new borns had? Well, he had them and you would not believe some fo the "old wives" remedies that was used on that child! He lived through the treatments, thanks to the Lord.

The United States and Germany were at war about this time and conditions were hard for everyone. Pop still worked away from home. Winter came on and Pop developed pneumonia. His work was in the woods and he probably did not have sufficient clothing to keep him warm and dry. He was very ill and one day Elma and I got up to find Mother with her foot on the apron of the wood stove and she was bent over crying. We were greatly disturbed so we asked, "why are you crying?" She replied, "Your daddy is going to die!" Pop was sick quite a while because pneumonia was not brought under control as quickly as it usually is now. We were really in need of food. Some of our friends saw that we did not go hungry. We have not forgotten their benevolence even until now. It was a great feeling to know that there were those who gave out of their deep poverty. Pop did not die at that time, but before he was physically able to work, Mother got sick and died on January 28, 1918. That was one week after I was seven years old. I remember Mother's papa arriving in the afternoon before she died last night. She put forth all the energy she had and talked some. She requested Pop to keep the children together. I believe she meant for him not to let different relatives have a child here and one there, but for years if we visited kinfolk's all of us went or none of us went!

Since Pop was unable to leave the house, the funeral was conducted at our house. That night Elma and I were put to bed on a mattress in the same room corner where Mother died. Even though I was only seven years old, I remember that night as one of the lonliest nights of my life. Not long afterwards we moved to another house in Groveton. At that time, Elma had the measles and Pop wrapped her in a quilt to carry her in his arms to where we were moving. Aunt Jennie was still living with us and I'm sure she and Pop were very despondent over losing Mother when she was only thirty-one years of age. Pop was still a young man - only thirty-nine years old.

Pop got a job with a lumber company at Trinity, Texas and we moved there. All of us were home together at nights. We did things together - like going to the silent movies on Saturday nights and even to see the Klu Klux Klan's parade and do a mock hanging act. Pop would take the kids, except Lamar, on hickory nut hunts and when magnolias were blooming he would use a rifle and shoot the stem so the flowers would fall to the ground for us. Before we left Groveton, he would take us to visit Mother's grave too.

After we got settled in Trinity, Aunt Jennie had a boyfriend and Grandpa came to live with us, About this time, Pop took us kids to visit his brother in Robertson County. It was our first time to ride on a train. My little brother, Lamar, was so cute and could sing well for his age. He began singing "I'm Forever Blowing Bubbles" and a traveling salesman became attracted to him and his songs. He had the butcher boy to pass his basket of goodies around to let every child in the railroad choose what he wanted!

We really had fun at Uncle Tom's house. His family wanted Pop's kids to stay longer but we must all stay or no one stayed. We must all be kept together and of all of us, I was the one who emphatically refused to stay. Can you imagine the tongue lashings and an occasional punch I got on the way to the train station? It was a long ride too, because we were riding in a wagon. We got to the station barely on time and had to flag the train to get it to stop for passengers. There was a set up whereby mail bags could be exchanged without the train stopping. We arrived home with kids baggage and Pop all together!

A year or so later Pop lost his job and we moved to a cut mill at Saron. This was a thinly populated place at that time. Pop got a job tearing down the vacant houses and Floyd had a job as a water boy during school vacation. He had to carry the water from wells and sometimes it was a long way to the wells. He never did like to go to school, but he had a girl classmate who exchanged notes with him in this manner: Floyd attached a twine string to a penny matchbox and would slide it down the aisle to her and then she would do likewise to deliver a note back to him! I would say that things got out of hand at the school sometimes - like the time we got a new superintendent to take the place of our preferred one and the boys irritated him by bumping his bottom on the flagpole!

While we lived at this place we almost lost our little brother, Lamar, to Cholera Infantum, which is an acute disease of childhood. Pop was working away from home. We had no way to go to the Doctor or that much money either. Aunt Jennie was told to give him some strained gruel, which she did and got word to Pop to come home. My little brother was so thin, pale, nauseated and weak. We were all very afraid we would lose him, but thank God, he began to be able to retain his feedings and improve. I know Aunty (as I will call Aunt Jennie now) was bound to have spent many anxious times about this baby because he was only about three and one half months old when Mother died.

Grandpa had gone to Carmona to live out in the country on Bull Creek. Pop was on the road again looking for work, so Aunty and we kids moved to where Grandpa was. He had a good garden and some meat to go with the vegetables. We were progressing well until his son with a wife and four kids arrived on the scene in their covered wagon. After vegetable season was over it was "root, hog or die." In season we picked berries to sell, fished and hunted. If only one squirrel was killed, it had to be cut into thirteen pieces since Pop had returned, so each person could have a piece of meat! That squirrel was really stretched, wouldn't you say?

Grandpa knew how to make "pine top" liquor that would make a blue flame when a match was struck and put to it, so the men attempted to boot leg the stuff because we really needed even some cornbread! Pop was not a good salesman and he knew it was wrong too, so he said one night out on the "job" he got down on his knees and prayed to God to show him some way to make an honest living! With God's help, he did find work at Helmic in Trinity County, Texas, working again for the same lumber company that he was working for when Mother died. My uncle also got a job working for the same company so all of us moved to Helmic. Floyd could work also, if Pop would sign some papers to release the company from expenses if Floyd were to get hurt.

A few happenings stand out in my mind that took place there, like Floyd having his first real girlfriend named Annie. He also began to tamper with liquor and stay out some nights. On one occasion on Sunday he came home but sat on the edge of the porch and soon lay down. It was not long until he "upchucked" and who should come while he lay there but Annie! Then to show a better side of Floyd, I remember there was a Mother's Day program that Floyd went to and came home crying his heart out. We all needed our Mother so much at the time that we lost her. Lamar was not old enough to go to school then, but Elma and I were. It seemed we had to walk two or three miles to school. Few kids lived far enough away to ride in what was called the "Hoodlum Wagon" - a covered wagon that was drawn by big mules. In those days Helmic had some good teachers, students and athletes. We even had a local physician too, who came to the patients homes to see them, but someone had to go to his office and pick up the medicine usually dosed out in doses and wrapped in small papers. Probably you are thinking like I am, that it is about moving time again!

This move was quite different to any that we had ever made. The houses were made in such a way that the rooms could be separated one from the other. The rooms were loaded onto flat cars with the furniture inside. Some people even fastened their cows, calves and chickens in their vacant rooms to be moved. In switching of the train, the rooms all got mixed up when they were set off the flat cars beside the railroad spur. Night time came on, and, believe me, people were having trouble locating where their beds were! One had to be careful not to open a door and let the animals and chickens out! Many were awakened the next morning by the mooing of the cows, crowing roosters, cackling hens, and grumbling of people. There had to be some exchanging of furniture and trading of rooms so a person could have a whole house to put together. By and by all of us got settled down. The carpenters got the houses so we could all sop our syrup without it all running to one side of our plates! This place was called Camp Melba, but the children went to school at Colmesneil. Some of the people did not want the kids to go to school there. We were looked on as sort of trashy for a while, but we proved out to be a pretty intelligent bunch as far as being honor students was concerned.

Pops kids began growing up. He helped Floyd get a 1925 model touring Ford car and things really got interesting. We met more young people and Floyd had a buddy who had kinfolk in the country who had some girls. What young fellow with a new car would not be interested in girls? So he fell in love with the oldest one at home. There were some lover's quarrels but they were married just the next day after Christmas 1925. Floyd was the first one to fly the coop and it was like someone had died around our house with Aunty and us girls sniffling all the time. The newlyweds lived with us until a company house became vacant. Floyd had bought some furniture but no bedding so we gave them some matresses, bedstead, sheets, cases and covers. His wife Elizabeth was a very good housekeeper. On down the line, she and my brother gave us four precious baby girls, one at a time of course! Opal, Vera Mae, Lena Larelle, Linda Darnell (Stems).

My sister Elma quit school and got married. She and her husband were married ten years before they had three lovely girls and at last a son. We have lost Elma. She died October 25, 1983. She is greatly missed, especially by her aging husband. I finished school and we moved to Robertson County where I met and married "the greatest guy on earth". I gave birth to our only child, a son, before Elma had any of her children.

Then we left the farm on account of inability to have the necessities, and I do mean necessities, for life. We came back to East Texas, where we have our home. We have cared for and lost my father-in-law, a very nice and agreeable man, my father, who I miss so much and loved more than I realized, my Aunty (Jennie). She was an inspiration to me especially in that she endured her pain with apparent patience. I had gone to nursing school and had worked ten years before I retired to take care of her. Our son, Donald, has served twenty years in the United States Air Force, has married to our beautiful, loved daughter-in-law. We do not have any grandchildren - she miscarried once. They have a beautiful home in another state. We see them two or three times yearly. My husband and I have just celebrated our Fifty-First Wedding Anniversary. We are thankful for God's blessings upon us and hope we will have one another for years to come.

My "little" brother, Lamar, married to a young lady who is very dear to us. They had a daughter and a son whom we love. Lamar also served twenty years in the Air Force, and spent some time in Puerto Rico and the Phillipines. They and Elma's family helped in caring for Aunty part of her lifetime.

We are looking forward to seeing a lot of those mentioned during the holidays! I could write much more about my love and respect I have for all "my families". My husband does not have any family now, but all of my folks love and respect him and I love them for that!