I have such good memories of my mother's parents, Oswald Cole and Bessie Jewel Mayberry Smith. I was the first grandchild and mother had brothers and sisters younger and still living at home when I was growing up. I was "special" when I went to visit them.
First I will talk about Papa Smith or "Bunch" as he was called. I never asked him how he got that name. I wish I knew. He was a very smart man and loved to read. He was a farmer most of his life and grew cotton and corn mostly. He was called the "watermelon king" in and around Elba. He always had a ripe melon to celebrate July 4th. In the 1940's, he farmed with a mule and never used a tractor. He always grew enough food in their garden to eat in the summer and they canned enough for the winter. Then he would gather the extra vegetables and take to others. He was a very devout Christian man and loved to read the Bible and go to church. He had a big leather suitcase he kept Bibles and religious books in and would stand on the sidewalk on Saturdays near Stokes Haire's drug store in Elba and sell his Bibles and books. Papa Smith had several brothers and sisters and he was very close to his youngest brother, Drayden, who had Smith Bros. store in Elba. Since Papa Smith didn't own a car, Uncle Drayden would provide transportation for him when he needed to go someplace that he couldn't walk to or in bad weather. He never got angry and always had something good to say about people. One thing that stands out in my mind was when I was 9 or 10, I was visiting them and went with him to take cotton to the gin, using the mule and wagon to get there. He gave me a quarter to spend at the 5&10 store and I bought a Captain Marvel funny book. He lectured to me all the way home about the "evils" of those books and gave me some religious books to read when I went home. I didn't see anything wrong with my funny book and kept reading them! He loved to go fox hunting and had a horn he blew to call his dogs. I learned something about him when I began to study the geneaology of our Smith ancestors. That his ancestors were Quakers, coming from NC to AL. I really think that influenced his upbringing and why he was such a devout, pious man. He never wanted material possessions; just food and a roof over his head. He liked to move around a lot and they lived in several homes when I was growing up. The last several years of his life he took care of Mama Smith who became an invalid due to several health problems. He was a great cook and only cooked and ate healthy foods. No junk food in his house! He had a heart attack when they were visiting my parents one Sunday and he never recovered from that. Died of kidney failure 21 Oct. 1956 at Opp Mizelle Memorial Hospital. I truly loved Papa Smith. He made me feel so special.
Mama Smith was always "old" to me. Maybe it was the way she dressed and she never went anywhere. Always stayed at home and cooked and took care of the house. She was a very quiet lady, with a soft voice. She wasn't very talented; not a very good cook and couldn't sew.I do remember her chocolate cakes with the thin chocolate icing. She just went about her daily life of looking after people. There was always an old person staying with them; somebody who needed a place to live and somebody to take care of them. I remember "Aunt Lou" and "Aunt Pink". They both died when I was young. It was many years later before I knew their relationship to our family. Mama Smith liked to play board games and dominoes with me. Our favorite was "Uncle Wiggly". She would play it over and over. She would let me read her daily journal that she recorded events of each day; who came to visit, the weather, etc. I wonder what ever happened to her big stack of journals. She was 90 years old when she died 30 Dec 1976, after spending several years in the Elba Nursing Home. She went there soon after it opened in the 1960's and really liked living there. In the summer she and other residents would gather in the big dining room and shell peas and butterbeans for lunch. I can't imagine that going on in the nursing home today.
