When Aunt Wanda’s welfare check came in, we would eat well for a week and then starve for three weeks. Her oldest son later said to me before he died that as a child he was always hungry and he had joined the Marines at 16 just so he could eat. I still liked staying with Aunt Wanda even if I didn’t get enough food. It was better than living at home.
I remember I use to send My 3year old cousin to the neighbors to borrow flour, baking powder, and eggs. When she returned, I would fix us something to eat. But one day the neighbors told her they wouldn’t loan her anything more. I guess I could have went to my Aunt Belvia‘s to eat but I never did. After The baby was born, Wanda moved her family to Man, in one of Aunt Hannah Apartments.
I was beginning to have a problem with Aunt Hannah. Every time I saw her she would talk me into coming and staying with her. I would pretend to be home sick to get away from her. So, I would temporarily go home then I would slip back to Aunt Wanda’s. I remember, I would make her children swear not to tell Aunt Hannah I was at their house. I was able to keep it a secret for about a week then Aunt Hannah would come to Aunt Wanda’s and get me. She asked me once why I like to stay with Aunt Wanda more than her. It wasn’t as if she was making me do housework nor was I babysitting the boys since they had a yard to play in. But Aunt Wanda was more then just my aunt, she was my friend and we talked like girlfriends.
Showing posts with label aunts. Show all posts
Showing posts with label aunts. Show all posts
Tuesday, March 20, 2012
Monday, March 19, 2012
My Family: Chapter 53
I stayed with Aunt Wanda while she lived in Logan, before she moved to Man. This one time she became pregnant while having two boyfriends. Pearl, her live in fella, was still with her but he would often leave then he would write to say he was coming home. The day he showed up, her other boyfriend would stop coming around until Pearl left.
I spent almost the whole nine months with Aunt Wanda because with her being pregnant we couldn’t hitch-hike into Man to see Aunt Hannah and her dance hall. Aunt Hannah wouldn’t come and get me.
The night Aunt Wanda went into labor, she asked me several times if I thought she was in labor and I would yell at her how should I know. I’d never been around someone who was in labor. See, Aunt Wanda had no labor pains and all she wanted to do was sit on the commode. I hadn’t been with her when she gave birth to her son, Spanky. I came to her house when he was a couple days old. So, I asked her how she knew she was in labor with him and she told me she hadn’t; eventually her oldest son had called a cab and sent her to the hospital. I thought this was a good idea, I would do the same thing because I wasn’t going to deliver this baby like her oldest had to deliver his sister when he was twelve. I sent him to call a cab. When the cab came, I helped her get in and I sent her to the hospital by herself and told her what to name the baby if it was a boy.
She said later the cab driver helped her into the hospital because she nearly had her 4th son on the front steps. She was home in two days because she was a welfare case. Her other boyfriend came to Logan to see his baby, but Wanda told him it wasn’t his that it was Pearl’s baby. They’ve argued the whole nine months over rather this was his baby or not - him for and her against. The other boyfriend got so angry he went all the way to Man and came back with his baby picture just to prove they looked like twins. She still said the baby was Pearl’s.
After I had moved away and had came back for a visit, I asked her who really was the baby’s father - she just looked at me and grin. Of course, I knew her other boyfriend was the father. Many years later, when the other boyfriend died in North Caroline, his son's brought him back to West Virginia to be buried along side His Parents.Wanda is buried behind her second son.
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| Aunt Wanda working in a Greyhound Bus Station | in Col, Ohio |
The night Aunt Wanda went into labor, she asked me several times if I thought she was in labor and I would yell at her how should I know. I’d never been around someone who was in labor. See, Aunt Wanda had no labor pains and all she wanted to do was sit on the commode. I hadn’t been with her when she gave birth to her son, Spanky. I came to her house when he was a couple days old. So, I asked her how she knew she was in labor with him and she told me she hadn’t; eventually her oldest son had called a cab and sent her to the hospital. I thought this was a good idea, I would do the same thing because I wasn’t going to deliver this baby like her oldest had to deliver his sister when he was twelve. I sent him to call a cab. When the cab came, I helped her get in and I sent her to the hospital by herself and told her what to name the baby if it was a boy.
She said later the cab driver helped her into the hospital because she nearly had her 4th son on the front steps. She was home in two days because she was a welfare case. Her other boyfriend came to Logan to see his baby, but Wanda told him it wasn’t his that it was Pearl’s baby. They’ve argued the whole nine months over rather this was his baby or not - him for and her against. The other boyfriend got so angry he went all the way to Man and came back with his baby picture just to prove they looked like twins. She still said the baby was Pearl’s.
After I had moved away and had came back for a visit, I asked her who really was the baby’s father - she just looked at me and grin. Of course, I knew her other boyfriend was the father. Many years later, when the other boyfriend died in North Caroline, his son's brought him back to West Virginia to be buried along side His Parents.Wanda is buried behind her second son.
Wednesday, February 15, 2012
My Family: Chapter 39
It got so bad living with my parents, I moved out and stayed with several of my Aunts. Aunt Hannah let me live with her and I watched her young boys. Which reminds me of a story about my Uncle Andy.
Uncle Andy's sister, Dolly, lied to her husband, Ernie, about her age. She was fifty years old but she told him she was thirty-five and he believed her. He was in the service with no one around to tell him any different. When he was discharged from the service, they packed up and moved back to the hollow. They were only home about three months when someone let it slipped how old Dolly really was, Ernie divorced her. Dolly loved him until the day she died. Ernie got married again within a year after his divorce.
Aunt Hannah lived in an apartment in which she had torn the wall down between two existing apartments to make one large one for her family. Since it’s over a dance hall, the boys have no place to play and Aunt Hannah wants me to keep them outside all the time.
This is how I spent my days: after breakfast, Aunt Hannah would ask me to take the boys outside and keep them until lunch. Then after lunch, they would take a nap (not for very long cause Uncle Andy had a big mouth) and I‘m to take them out again until dinner. I to entertain three boys who are two, three, and four years old with nothing to play with but one swing. I never took any toys outside because I would had to carried them back up fifteen steps. This was not a fun job and I wasn’t very happy.
Until I met Irene; she and I become fast friends. She was a widow with three children and her husband had just been killed in a mining accident a year earlier. She had a baby who was only eight months old and two girls; five and three. She lived a couple of houses down from Hannah and I would take the boys down to her place so the boys could play with her girls. There was a creek at the end of her row of homes but her yard had a fence around it. One day, I left the boys in the yard and told the oldest, Butch, to watch the other two. As I went into the house, I gave them strict instructions to stay in the yard. Irene was hanging curtains so I helped her; forgetting to check on the boys. When Irene’s girls came into the house, I asked where the boys were. They said they didn’t know. I ran outside, sure enough the yard was empty. Panicking, I searched the yard and surrounding areas but didn’t think to search for them down by the creek. When I couldn’t find them, I thought maybe they went home. I ran up to the apartment and asked Aunt Hannah if the boys came home. She took one look at me and said, “Lord Poodie, if you have lost my boys; I am going to kill you.” I said a quick “No, I know where they are at. Don’t worry I’m going to go and get them back.” I took off running down the steps and back to Irene’s. As I passed by an alley, I saw the boys. They were all soaking wet. I took a hold of Butch to shake and holler at him. He began to cry and said it wasn’t his fault, Rick went down to the creek. Steve and Butch had followed Rick to the creek where Steve fell in. Butch and Steve jumped in save Steve. They were black as a lump of coal from the coal dust that’s in the creek. I had to tell Aunt Hannah what happen as she could see us standing in the alley from her apartment window anyway. She had to throw their clothes they were wearing away; she couldn’t get them clean. I was a very lucky girl that day that those boys didn’t drown. At the bottom of the creek it’s like quick sand, although the creek itself isn’t high, there is at least two to three feet of coal dust on the bottom. In the creek in front of our house up Rum Creek, I once sank up to my knees in the coal dust and my girlfriend had to help me out.
Uncle Andy's sister, Dolly, lied to her husband, Ernie, about her age. She was fifty years old but she told him she was thirty-five and he believed her. He was in the service with no one around to tell him any different. When he was discharged from the service, they packed up and moved back to the hollow. They were only home about three months when someone let it slipped how old Dolly really was, Ernie divorced her. Dolly loved him until the day she died. Ernie got married again within a year after his divorce.
Aunt Hannah lived in an apartment in which she had torn the wall down between two existing apartments to make one large one for her family. Since it’s over a dance hall, the boys have no place to play and Aunt Hannah wants me to keep them outside all the time.
This is how I spent my days: after breakfast, Aunt Hannah would ask me to take the boys outside and keep them until lunch. Then after lunch, they would take a nap (not for very long cause Uncle Andy had a big mouth) and I‘m to take them out again until dinner. I to entertain three boys who are two, three, and four years old with nothing to play with but one swing. I never took any toys outside because I would had to carried them back up fifteen steps. This was not a fun job and I wasn’t very happy.
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| Poodie, Steven, Rick and Butch, Dolly's house in background |
Until I met Irene; she and I become fast friends. She was a widow with three children and her husband had just been killed in a mining accident a year earlier. She had a baby who was only eight months old and two girls; five and three. She lived a couple of houses down from Hannah and I would take the boys down to her place so the boys could play with her girls. There was a creek at the end of her row of homes but her yard had a fence around it. One day, I left the boys in the yard and told the oldest, Butch, to watch the other two. As I went into the house, I gave them strict instructions to stay in the yard. Irene was hanging curtains so I helped her; forgetting to check on the boys. When Irene’s girls came into the house, I asked where the boys were. They said they didn’t know. I ran outside, sure enough the yard was empty. Panicking, I searched the yard and surrounding areas but didn’t think to search for them down by the creek. When I couldn’t find them, I thought maybe they went home. I ran up to the apartment and asked Aunt Hannah if the boys came home. She took one look at me and said, “Lord Poodie, if you have lost my boys; I am going to kill you.” I said a quick “No, I know where they are at. Don’t worry I’m going to go and get them back.” I took off running down the steps and back to Irene’s. As I passed by an alley, I saw the boys. They were all soaking wet. I took a hold of Butch to shake and holler at him. He began to cry and said it wasn’t his fault, Rick went down to the creek. Steve and Butch had followed Rick to the creek where Steve fell in. Butch and Steve jumped in save Steve. They were black as a lump of coal from the coal dust that’s in the creek. I had to tell Aunt Hannah what happen as she could see us standing in the alley from her apartment window anyway. She had to throw their clothes they were wearing away; she couldn’t get them clean. I was a very lucky girl that day that those boys didn’t drown. At the bottom of the creek it’s like quick sand, although the creek itself isn’t high, there is at least two to three feet of coal dust on the bottom. In the creek in front of our house up Rum Creek, I once sank up to my knees in the coal dust and my girlfriend had to help me out.
Wednesday, February 8, 2012
My Family: Chapter 34
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| Uncle Andy and Aunt Hannah |
Aunt Hannah decided to leave the circus life and came back to West Virginia. Tennie Day also left the circus but he turn into a hobo and jumped trains - that’s how he got killed. Then Aunt Hannah re-meets Andy, who was divorced from his first wife, at the restaurant where she worked. They started to date and then three months into the affair, Aunt Hannah finds out she’s going to have a baby. Andy and her get married and in the first four years they have three sons and in a few years more she has another son just not as quick. There’s about four years between the last two boys. When Janice was about nine years old, Aunt Hannah let her go to Ohio to visit her family - only Aunt Eloise wouldn’t let her come back. I don’t think either Aunt Hannah or Janice Sue ever got over it. I know Aunt Hannah talked about it until the day she died.
Sunday, January 22, 2012
My Family: Chapter 22
Aunt Eloise’s husband left her and went to Ohio, so she couldn’t support all the kids. Dad went to get Aunt Eloise and her eleven children to move them in with us but by time he got to her house she had only seven living with her . Aunt Hannah had Janice Sue, Uncle Richard had Glenna Lou, Uncle Bud had Jeanette, Sandy, and we already had Ronnie. The seven children with Aunt Eloise were Tommy, Danny Joe, Helen, Abby, Freddie, Mike, and Russell and they lived with us for a year. Tommy and Danny Joe, Aunt Eloise’s two oldest boys, had a pair of roller skates which they let us play with; we would roller skate on the hard road, this was before the rolling rink came up the hollow.
We had a hard time having enough food and a place for everyone to sleep with 18 people in the house. We only had four double beds; two beds for all the kids (we slept six to a bed) the girls in one bed and the boys in the another. One of Aunt Eloise’s boys was a bed wetter and since my sister, Bonnie Sue, was still a baby she also wet the bed, so we had some pretty miserable sleeping arrangements. Eloise slept with her baby, Russell, in one of the beds.
When supper was on the table, you had better be there to eat because if you got there late you didn’t get any supper. I remember one time, Shirley got home late from school and it was after supper time she went to bed crying because she was hungry.
Dad got Eloise a house up Macbeth hollow and moved her into a three-room house. After she moved, Aunt Wanda came up from Columbus, Ohio to live Aunt Eloise. Uncle Bud and his wife, Marie, had lost their oldest son in an accident in Germany where he was stationed in the Army. Aunt Marie was taking his death real hard. I heard Aunt Eloise tell Aunt Wanda that she was going to give the newest baby, Sandy, to Uncle Bud and Aunt Marie to raise. Aunt Eloise thought if Aunt Marie had a baby to take care of, it would help her take her son’s death a little better.
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We had a hard time having enough food and a place for everyone to sleep with 18 people in the house. We only had four double beds; two beds for all the kids (we slept six to a bed) the girls in one bed and the boys in the another. One of Aunt Eloise’s boys was a bed wetter and since my sister, Bonnie Sue, was still a baby she also wet the bed, so we had some pretty miserable sleeping arrangements. Eloise slept with her baby, Russell, in one of the beds.
When supper was on the table, you had better be there to eat because if you got there late you didn’t get any supper. I remember one time, Shirley got home late from school and it was after supper time she went to bed crying because she was hungry.
Dad got Eloise a house up Macbeth hollow and moved her into a three-room house. After she moved, Aunt Wanda came up from Columbus, Ohio to live Aunt Eloise. Uncle Bud and his wife, Marie, had lost their oldest son in an accident in Germany where he was stationed in the Army. Aunt Marie was taking his death real hard. I heard Aunt Eloise tell Aunt Wanda that she was going to give the newest baby, Sandy, to Uncle Bud and Aunt Marie to raise. Aunt Eloise thought if Aunt Marie had a baby to take care of, it would help her take her son’s death a little better.
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| Shirley, Lucille, Aunt Eloise |
Thursday, December 22, 2011
My Family: Chapter 9
Shirley and I still had to go to school the day we found out our baby brother died. Our neighbor, Mrs. Childers, was there and she told Dad it would better if we went to school. She sent us over to her house to walk with her children - she had twenty in all. We had to pass the graveyard on the way to school and we could see the pile of dirt as they were were digging his grave. We passed his grave every day on our way school. Later I learned that Doctor Vaughn had given Dad a terrible choice; Mom or the baby (the doctor always gave the husband the choice). When a baby is born at home and the doctor can only save one he would used forceps to deliver the baby and most times break the baby's neck. I guess that if Dad took the baby’s life over Mom's then the doctor would have cut the baby out. I can tell you it was tough on Dad, he wanted a boy in the worse way and he took that baby’s death very hard. He's whole family knew it. As tough as it was on Dad it almost killed Mom.
I want to talk a little about my Aunt Eloise, Dad's sister. She married a man who didn't want to work and make a living for his family. He didn't live with her, so she had to live off Welfare. He would come home stay, for awhile, but when she got pregnant he would leave again until she had the baby then he would come back and do the same thing all over again. My Aunt Wanda, Dad's other sister, also lived off Welfare. Her husband had just left her with two small sons. She lived with Aunt Eloise and they put their money together to feed nine children. Aunt Eloise had a hard time raising her children on Welfare and she wouldn't consider adopting her children out, unlike my Aunt Alice. However, she was desperate so she lent her children to her siblings (for one reason or another) and in return they would help her to feed, cloth, and give them the love. Before she died, she had all her children back with her. She died at the age of 43 from cancer.
One day not long after our baby brother died, Dad came home with a little boy about two and half years old. We were all so excited and asked if we could keep him. Dad said he was ours and his name was Abby. He was actually Aunt Eloise's son. Mom even told Dad that Aunt Eloise wasn't going to let him keep the child, but Dad was sure she would. Aunt Eloise had five sons and she had trouble feeding them all that's why she didn't say anything when he stole one of her boys. She let him keep Abby for awhile. I remember Mom went to the store and brought boy baby clothes because Dad didn't bring any clothes with the baby. Eventually, when Aunt Eloise came to get Abby, Dad didn't want to give him back, but she told Dad that she missed Abby. However, she felt sorry for Dad and told him could have the baby that she was carrying - if it was a boy. Dad kept a close eye on her to make sure he would know when the baby came and he made sure the family knew that this baby was his - if it was a boy. Aunt Eloise delivered a little girl and Aunt Hannah took her to live with her because she didn't have any children after twenty years of marriage. So Dad had to wait another year.
Sure enough Aunt Eloise delivered a boy and named him Ronald Darrell (Ronald after our baby brother). Mom picked him up and went to Logan to register him at the court house. I have to tell you that there was no child on earth more loved and wanted than Ronnie. So that is how Ronnie came to live with us when he was a few days old. He was spoiled too. I remember how he like to bang on the coal bucket with the poker to make music. How he sometimes bang on us but we were not allowed to hit him. Once, I snuck him outside and rubbed dirt all over him just to see what he look like dirty. Mom was so made and hollered who did this to her poor little baby. Of course, I wasn't about to say me and Ronnie probably told her anyway.
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| Aunt Wanda |
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| Abby age 1 |
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| Aunt Eloise |
Wednesday, December 14, 2011
My Family: Chapter 3
A neighbor and Dad got into a play fight one day over a garden hoe. They tried
to take it away from the each other when I jumped in between them, cried, and told her to leave my Daddy alone. I got hit in the head with the hoe. As I screamed, blood just poured out of my head. Mom cried and told Dad he killed me. Dad rinsed my head in a dishpan full of water which they had to empty
three times by the time the neighbor got back with the doctor. He stopped the bleeding and said I was going to be alright it wasn't as bad as it looked. He put a black salve on my head with a bandage. I still have a scar on my head to remind me not to interfere when two people are fighting.
The neighbor had a daughter who was older then Shirley. The girl loved oranges, she would always suck on an orange. If we got an orange that would have been a treat for us. I don't know why she didn't just drink orange juice. I remember once when she was at least ten years old, she sat on her back porch steps while Shirley, Lucille, and I sat on our back porch. The porches faced each other. We watched as she made a hole in the orange sucked all the juice out, and then threw it out in the yard. One of us would go get it and eat it, she did this until we all had an orange. I’m going to get disgusting here and tell you why I remember about the oranges. I always had worms - they look like earthworms. As I sat and ate my orange, I felt a tickle in my rectum, reach down, pulled out a worm and held it up then threw it on the ground and continued to eat my orange - I was about four year old.
Aunt Belvia and Uncle Noah were destined to meet in Orville. Belvia was nineteen and Noah was twenty-nine year old. He just got home from the war. Belvia said she didn’t want to marry Noah . Mom didn’t like Noah, she accused him of killing her cat. Not only her cat but everyone's cat in the camp. They were always finding a dead cat with its neck broken. Mom and Belva got into a argument over Noah because he didn’t like cats so mom wouldn’t let him come in her yard. He would stand at the gate and holler for Aunt Belva. She announce she was leaving and went to stay with her sister in Tennessee but Uncle Noah followed her. She couldn't say no and they got married lived in Tennessee for a few years. After they came back to Logan to live, I don’t remember her ever coming to our house. Uncle Noah went to work for Orville mines and they lived next to the hard road across from his brother and wife. This took place after we had moved out of Orville camp and went to Macbeth. Mom and Aunt Belva still didn't talk to one another. It would be years before they talk to each other but she never came to our house again. It was after Grandma Francis moved across the creek from us that they began to talk again. Aunt Belva would visit Grandma Francis almost every day, and because she still was our aunt we would go to her house after she moved to Orville. I was with Aunt Belva before she died and we talked about how she was a scare of the dark when she said, "I bet Marie wasn’t a scare of the dark." I told her a story about how afraid of the dark Mom was:
Our parents didn’t know we went, Ike and Pearl didn’t know we were in the back of the truck until they got to where they were going. I don’t know how they let our parents know that we were with them. We didn’t get home until dark, Dad was waiting for us when we got out of the truck. We had been gone all day.
Dad and Mom drank and fought so much on the weekends the neighbors in Orville went to the mining company's superintendent and complained that they couldn’t get any sleep on the weekends because the Dillo girls screamed and cried. The neighbor’s at Orville finally complain enough that the Company boss told Dad we would have to move. He helped Dad get a job at Macbeth, who had changed their name to Hutchinson by this time. Now we are back to living in a three- room house again, across the railroad tracks and up against the mountain. Dad dug the mountain out from the back of our house so we would have a back yard. There were three community water pumps in that part of the camp, all of the houses had to use the pumps and carry their water. Finally the coal company did put water in all the homes although there weren't any sinks and no plumbing in the houses.
Here's the story of how I got my nickname, Poodie: It's the name Dad gave me when I was first born. Mom had promise an old lady (in the holler) she could name my sister but she was on vacation when Shirley was born so she missed it. Mom tried again when I was born but told the old lady if she was gone she would wait until she got home. Sure enough, the lady was gone when I was born and Mom waited for three months before she gave me the ugly name of Alma. Meanwhile while they waited, Dad told Mom that they had to call me something, so Dad told her that he was calling me 'Poodie.' The name stuck and it's how I am known to all my family and my friends while growing up. Once the teacher called roll at school, and I told her my name wasn't Alma it was Poodie, she said that she had to call me what was on my birth certificate.
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| Lucille, age 3 |
The neighbor had a daughter who was older then Shirley. The girl loved oranges, she would always suck on an orange. If we got an orange that would have been a treat for us. I don't know why she didn't just drink orange juice. I remember once when she was at least ten years old, she sat on her back porch steps while Shirley, Lucille, and I sat on our back porch. The porches faced each other. We watched as she made a hole in the orange sucked all the juice out, and then threw it out in the yard. One of us would go get it and eat it, she did this until we all had an orange. I’m going to get disgusting here and tell you why I remember about the oranges. I always had worms - they look like earthworms. As I sat and ate my orange, I felt a tickle in my rectum, reach down, pulled out a worm and held it up then threw it on the ground and continued to eat my orange - I was about four year old.
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| Shirley, age 6 |
All three of us had worms at one time or another, I remember Mom giving us worm medicine.
My Aunt Alice's husband left her, without food, to go parts unknown. Mom went to Lyburn to get her to bring her and the children home with her, she took me and Lucille with her - Shirley was in school. Alice didn’t want to go and laid in bed with her baby while her other two children took care of themselves. Mom told her if she didn’t get her lazy butt off of the bed and pack, she was going to whop her. She wasn’t at our house but a few days when her husband came for her. Grandma Francis told me years later, Aunt Alice went to the government in Charleston, told them her story, and since he had cross over the state line, they brought him back. Mom and Aunt Alice's husband got into a fight and I can still see him hiding underneath the kitchen table to get away from her.
My Aunt Alice's husband left her, without food, to go parts unknown. Mom went to Lyburn to get her to bring her and the children home with her, she took me and Lucille with her - Shirley was in school. Alice didn’t want to go and laid in bed with her baby while her other two children took care of themselves. Mom told her if she didn’t get her lazy butt off of the bed and pack, she was going to whop her. She wasn’t at our house but a few days when her husband came for her. Grandma Francis told me years later, Aunt Alice went to the government in Charleston, told them her story, and since he had cross over the state line, they brought him back. Mom and Aunt Alice's husband got into a fight and I can still see him hiding underneath the kitchen table to get away from her.
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| Aunt Belva & Uncle Noah |
Aunt Belvia and Uncle Noah were destined to meet in Orville. Belvia was nineteen and Noah was twenty-nine year old. He just got home from the war. Belvia said she didn’t want to marry Noah . Mom didn’t like Noah, she accused him of killing her cat. Not only her cat but everyone's cat in the camp. They were always finding a dead cat with its neck broken. Mom and Belva got into a argument over Noah because he didn’t like cats so mom wouldn’t let him come in her yard. He would stand at the gate and holler for Aunt Belva. She announce she was leaving and went to stay with her sister in Tennessee but Uncle Noah followed her. She couldn't say no and they got married lived in Tennessee for a few years. After they came back to Logan to live, I don’t remember her ever coming to our house. Uncle Noah went to work for Orville mines and they lived next to the hard road across from his brother and wife. This took place after we had moved out of Orville camp and went to Macbeth. Mom and Aunt Belva still didn't talk to one another. It would be years before they talk to each other but she never came to our house again. It was after Grandma Francis moved across the creek from us that they began to talk again. Aunt Belva would visit Grandma Francis almost every day, and because she still was our aunt we would go to her house after she moved to Orville. I was with Aunt Belva before she died and we talked about how she was a scare of the dark when she said, "I bet Marie wasn’t a scare of the dark." I told her a story about how afraid of the dark Mom was:
Uncle Vondon was in England during the war and he needed money to come home so he asked Mom and Dad for a loan. Dad had just gotten a check from a mine accident so they wired it to Uncle Vondon. He came home from the war in 1946 and lived with us for awhile. He would babysit for Mom and Dad while they went out to drink. He would give us a bath then sit us on the front porch steps daring us to get dirty.And if we moved off of the porch, he would paddle our behinds. This one time after he finished bathing me, I don’t remember why, I took off naked and ran through the camp all the way down to the last house along our row of houses. I was always going to visit Ike and his wife, Pearl, who lived there. Ike’s sister lived across railroad tracks behind us in the last house beside the Orville hollow. When Uncle Vondon got to the house, Pearl told him that I had a fever and the measles. She saved me from getting a good spanking. Uncle Vondon left sometime after that and went to Ashland, Kentucky to get a job. He was twenty-four years old. He went to war right after he graduated high school where he joined the C. Bees. that went straight over to help England before American got in the war. He became a mechanic in the Air Force and I heard him tell Dad and Mom he was shot down and he went missing for awhile. While he was hiding, he said that he saw the creeks were red with blood.
I can remember another story about Ike (who was Uncle Noah’s brother) and Pearl. They were taking their family to visit somewhere in Logan. Ike had a pickup truck and their kids rode in the back. Shirley and I decided to go along with them so we climbed into the back of the truck.
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| Me (Poodie) |
Dad and Mom drank and fought so much on the weekends the neighbors in Orville went to the mining company's superintendent and complained that they couldn’t get any sleep on the weekends because the Dillo girls screamed and cried. The neighbor’s at Orville finally complain enough that the Company boss told Dad we would have to move. He helped Dad get a job at Macbeth, who had changed their name to Hutchinson by this time. Now we are back to living in a three- room house again, across the railroad tracks and up against the mountain. Dad dug the mountain out from the back of our house so we would have a back yard. There were three community water pumps in that part of the camp, all of the houses had to use the pumps and carry their water. Finally the coal company did put water in all the homes although there weren't any sinks and no plumbing in the houses.
Here's the story of how I got my nickname, Poodie: It's the name Dad gave me when I was first born. Mom had promise an old lady (in the holler) she could name my sister but she was on vacation when Shirley was born so she missed it. Mom tried again when I was born but told the old lady if she was gone she would wait until she got home. Sure enough, the lady was gone when I was born and Mom waited for three months before she gave me the ugly name of Alma. Meanwhile while they waited, Dad told Mom that they had to call me something, so Dad told her that he was calling me 'Poodie.' The name stuck and it's how I am known to all my family and my friends while growing up. Once the teacher called roll at school, and I told her my name wasn't Alma it was Poodie, she said that she had to call me what was on my birth certificate.
Friday, December 9, 2011
Perry Francis and Hattie Sluss part 2
Remember my mom's parents, Perry and Hattie? Perry Francis died on April 05, 1941, two weeks before I was born; he dislocated his shoulder from shoveling sand and died from blood poisoning. The Company doctor didn’t treat him for a dislocated shoulder but just gave him a pill that was a cure all. His whole arm swelled up to twice the normal size, but by the time he went to the hospital, it was too late. He was sixty-five years old. The cemetery where my Grandpa Francis is buried are still in Chambers. The family Chambers owns the land and takes care of the cemetery. My cousin, Thurman, married a Chamber’s girl. Harris Funeral Home made a mistake on their files, they had the location of Grandpa Francis' burial at Macbeth, but Grandma Francis and their children said that he was buried at Cham graveyard. Maybe they made the mistake because my mother lived at Macbeth and he was laid out at home - not in the funeral parlor. In those days the funeral home would bring the casket home, and set it up in a room for the family to sit up and view him all night. However, Grandpa Francis was laid out at his friend’s home. My Aunt Hannah and my Grandma Francis told me, at different times, that something strange happened after Grandpa Francis' funeral. Grandma had put Grandpa’s clothes in a box which was placed in a corner of the viewing room. While everyone was sitting around talking after the funeral, the box raised up off the floor. My Aunt Hannah said she never did understand how that happens.
My sisters and I went in search of Grandpa Francis' grave, but since the grave had no marker it is lost to us. However, if we go by where Aunt Belvia said that he was buried in the Chamber's cemetery then we think that we found the grave but since it's unmarked, we have no proof. Especially since the Chamber's called the funeral home and they said that he was buried at Macbeth cemetery which is no longer there. Grandma Francis once told me she thought Mom was going to miss her father’s funeral because I was going to be born. Grandma said that Mom was washing clothes when she went into labor with me - Mom always did the wash on Monday. So I was born eleven days after my Grandpa Francis' burial.
Grandma Francis died on Dec. 26, 1964 at the age of sixty-six, she died from leukemia and a heart attack. Grandparents had five children while living in Rum Creek hollow. These are some stories about them:
Their oldest daughter, Alice, got to close too the fire place when she was about four years old and caught her dress on fire. She had some ugly looking scars on one side of her body for the rest of her life. She was lucky to be alive maybe that's why Grandma babied and favor her. Aunt Alice had a stroke and died in a nursing home in Logan, West Virginia. She was eighty-seven. Two of her three children died from heart attacks in their forties.
My grandparent's oldest boy, Vondon, never had any children that he claimed. Once, when he left our house in Orville and went to Ashland, Kentucky, which is across the river from Huntington, West Virginia, to work. He met a girl from Huntington who later said that she had given birth to his son. But Uncle Vondon said that the baby didn’t belong to him and that was the end of that until the boy grew up. After his son grew up he went looking for his father, and found aunt Belva living in Logan and explain who he was and gave her a picture of himself to send to Uncle Vondon who was living in North Carolina at the time. When Vondon got the picture, he showed it to all his friends and asked them who they thought it was? The son looked so much like the father. Vondon had made arrangements with his son, through my Aunt Belvia, to meet in Logan at aunt Belva's but before they could Uncle Vondon died of a sudden heart attack. Aunt Belva went to uncle Vondon's funeral while there she ask his wife if she had something of uncle Vondons that she could give to the son , she gave her Uncle Vondon’s Air Force service ring. When the son show up for the meeting aunt Belva gave him the ring. Uncle Vondon never came home to visit his mother - he didn’t go to his mother’s funeral either. However, he did come home to visit my mom. Aunt Belvia said one time she didn’t know that he was home until she saw him on the streets in Logan. He died from a heart attack at the age of forty-eight.
Aunt Tince was married twice and is still living. She had five children. She lost her youngest son, Ronny, to a heart attack just before his fifty-fifth birthday.
My mom died at the age of forty-eight also from a heart attack.
Aunt Belvia married but never had any children. She died at the age of seventy-eight of cancer.
My sisters and I went in search of Grandpa Francis' grave, but since the grave had no marker it is lost to us. However, if we go by where Aunt Belvia said that he was buried in the Chamber's cemetery then we think that we found the grave but since it's unmarked, we have no proof. Especially since the Chamber's called the funeral home and they said that he was buried at Macbeth cemetery which is no longer there. Grandma Francis once told me she thought Mom was going to miss her father’s funeral because I was going to be born. Grandma said that Mom was washing clothes when she went into labor with me - Mom always did the wash on Monday. So I was born eleven days after my Grandpa Francis' burial.
Grandma Francis died on Dec. 26, 1964 at the age of sixty-six, she died from leukemia and a heart attack. Grandparents had five children while living in Rum Creek hollow. These are some stories about them:
Their oldest daughter, Alice, got to close too the fire place when she was about four years old and caught her dress on fire. She had some ugly looking scars on one side of her body for the rest of her life. She was lucky to be alive maybe that's why Grandma babied and favor her. Aunt Alice had a stroke and died in a nursing home in Logan, West Virginia. She was eighty-seven. Two of her three children died from heart attacks in their forties.
My grandparent's oldest boy, Vondon, never had any children that he claimed. Once, when he left our house in Orville and went to Ashland, Kentucky, which is across the river from Huntington, West Virginia, to work. He met a girl from Huntington who later said that she had given birth to his son. But Uncle Vondon said that the baby didn’t belong to him and that was the end of that until the boy grew up. After his son grew up he went looking for his father, and found aunt Belva living in Logan and explain who he was and gave her a picture of himself to send to Uncle Vondon who was living in North Carolina at the time. When Vondon got the picture, he showed it to all his friends and asked them who they thought it was? The son looked so much like the father. Vondon had made arrangements with his son, through my Aunt Belvia, to meet in Logan at aunt Belva's but before they could Uncle Vondon died of a sudden heart attack. Aunt Belva went to uncle Vondon's funeral while there she ask his wife if she had something of uncle Vondons that she could give to the son , she gave her Uncle Vondon’s Air Force service ring. When the son show up for the meeting aunt Belva gave him the ring. Uncle Vondon never came home to visit his mother - he didn’t go to his mother’s funeral either. However, he did come home to visit my mom. Aunt Belvia said one time she didn’t know that he was home until she saw him on the streets in Logan. He died from a heart attack at the age of forty-eight.
Aunt Tince was married twice and is still living. She had five children. She lost her youngest son, Ronny, to a heart attack just before his fifty-fifth birthday.
My mom died at the age of forty-eight also from a heart attack.
Aunt Belvia married but never had any children. She died at the age of seventy-eight of cancer.
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| William P. Francis 1876-1941 |
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| Hattie Sluss 1898 - 1964 |
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| Golden Alice Francis 1919 - 2006 |
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| Ida Marie Francis 1921 - 1969 |
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| Vondon Lee Francis 1922 - 1970 |
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| Vicy Jane (Tince) Francis 1924 - ? |
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| Belva Louise Francis 1926 - 2005 |
Friday, December 2, 2011
Abraham Dillow Family part II
My Grandpa and Grandma Dillow moved to a farm in Gallipolis, Ohio when they left Dehue. My grandpa work for other farmers, where the farmer would live in another house close by and my grandparents would live in the farmhouse and work the farm for them.
In summer of July 4th 1947 when I was 6 yrs old, Mom and Dad took us on a vacation to visit our grandparents in Ohio. We went then because that's when the miners got their vacation - the first two weeks in July. Also at their house those weeks was my Uncle Woodrow and Aunt Gladys with their three sons and a daughter; my Aunt Wanda with her husband, Woodrow, and their two sons. Living at home still were Uncle Richard and Aunt Hope. So with my parents and my two sisters and myself, we had a full house.
All of us grandchildren were close in age. We would run and chase each other, and roll down the hills, and get ticks on us.
My Grandpa Abe was in the barn one morning, milking the cow while all of us children were running around upsetting the cow. Grandpa hollered at us and told us to stop. My Aunt Wanda's oldest boy, Jimmy, was showing off by pulling the cow's tail. My grandpa Abe told him to stop before the cow kicked him but he didn't listen. I can still see that cow kicking him, hearing him scream and watching him going up in the air to the first floor ceiling, it was a two story barn. I don’t remember how bad he was hurt, it couldn't have been too bad because later he still tried to drown me in the creek which was close to the house where our parents let us play. The other kids ran up to the house and told my Dad, he came down and pulled Jimmy off of me giving him a spanking. When we got older, Jimmy and I loved one another like brother and sister. I went to stay with his mom, my aunt Wanda, in the summers off and on from ages fourteen to seventeen - so we grew up together.
Another time, my sister, Shirley, and I found Aunt Hope's Shirley Temple doll that one of her brothers had sold chances to get for her. The chance was a push-out card and each number someone bought was a different price from five cent to ninety-nine cent. It was a lot of money for someone to be spending on a chance card but if you were lucky you got the prize. But this time it was for a Shirley Temple doll. It took her brother a long time to get that doll. The doll was thirty-two inches high so it was a big doll and my Aunt Hope had hid it while all the grandchildren were there. But my sister and I found it in a closet and started to fight over it, Shirley was pulling it one way and I was pulling it another and we pulled it apart that's when Aunt Hope found us. She screamed at us and our parents came to see what was going on. Aunt Hope was crying and Grandma told her that we were just babies and she was too old to be carrying on so over a doll, she was sixteen at the time. Now that I‘m older, wiser, and been married for all these years, I know what happen to that doll - it could have been fixed. All we did was break the rubber band that held its arms together, but at the time the doll was destroyed and had to be thrown away.
That was the best summer vacation, I remember my Grandfather put us all in the hay wagon to give us a ride out of the hollow to the bus stop so we could go home. The wheel broke off of the wagon and Shirley and my Dad spilled out - no one was hurt. We came away with pictures of the best time in our life. The next time that we went and visit my grandparents, they lived in Kermit, West Virginia across the river from Kentucky. By that time Hope had gotten married. I don’t remember how long that we stayed I only remember the house and yard.
Aunt Hope married Uncle Ray, a Minster in the Church of God. She would come to visit other relatives and I think she visited us only because we lived a couple of houses away. Dad would have not let her forget it if she should come up the hollow and not stop in. She only came to our house once that I can remember. She wouldn’t let us feed her three children, they weren’t allowed to have anything to eat or drink. We thought she was very strict. They made no fuss when she said that they couldn’t have the pop that we were offering them, most children would make a fuss especially them being so young. Later her daughter, Ruth, said something I think went for when they came to our house, too. She said that Aunt Hope didn't like the way Aunt Wanda kept the house. She didn't think it was clean enough.
Once when I was staying with Aunt Hannah, Aunt Hope asked me if I would come and watch her children, she had five children by then. Her and her husband wanted to go away on a retreat for the Church. I had no trouble with the children. Aunt Hope and Uncle Ray came home the last day and took us all back to the Church for the day. I stayed with them for an extra couple of days after we got back to their house and got to see my first couple to get married. The couple knocked on the door and asked Uncle Ray if he would marry them. He married them in his living room.
My grandparent moved away from Ohio to Kermit, West Virginia. I think it was because my Grandma Hester could no longer keep up with canning and take care of the farm. After living in Kermit they moved to Black Bottom in Logan, West Virginia. This one time, I remember Dad had taken us all for a visit. Grandpa Abe always would like to wrestle with us girls. Sometimes he would play with us all together and other times only one of us. If he got hurt, he would get mad and want to whip you. Grandpa and I were sitting on the front porch which had no banister and our feet were hanging off when he reach over and knock me backwards. I got up and pushed him backwards. Dad happened to come out of the house and this is what he said to his father. "You can play with her but if she hurts you, old man, and you get mad and want to hurt her back. I will hurt you."
Dad taught us girls how to wrestle and be tough, that is how he himself played with us. Sometimes as we walked by him, he would try to trip us or push us in our backs with his thumb which always started a wrestling match. I always enjoyed going to visit my Grandma Hester's, I remembered what a good breakfast she would cook for us when we stayed overnight with the house was always full. My grandparents lived in a three room house with a front porch. I fondly remember how she would show us that she could drop her front teeth. We didn't know it at the time what false teeth were. That's where they lived when my Grandma Hester passed away - I was ten years old.
In summer of July 4th 1947 when I was 6 yrs old, Mom and Dad took us on a vacation to visit our grandparents in Ohio. We went then because that's when the miners got their vacation - the first two weeks in July. Also at their house those weeks was my Uncle Woodrow and Aunt Gladys with their three sons and a daughter; my Aunt Wanda with her husband, Woodrow, and their two sons. Living at home still were Uncle Richard and Aunt Hope. So with my parents and my two sisters and myself, we had a full house.
All of us grandchildren were close in age. We would run and chase each other, and roll down the hills, and get ticks on us.
My Grandpa Abe was in the barn one morning, milking the cow while all of us children were running around upsetting the cow. Grandpa hollered at us and told us to stop. My Aunt Wanda's oldest boy, Jimmy, was showing off by pulling the cow's tail. My grandpa Abe told him to stop before the cow kicked him but he didn't listen. I can still see that cow kicking him, hearing him scream and watching him going up in the air to the first floor ceiling, it was a two story barn. I don’t remember how bad he was hurt, it couldn't have been too bad because later he still tried to drown me in the creek which was close to the house where our parents let us play. The other kids ran up to the house and told my Dad, he came down and pulled Jimmy off of me giving him a spanking. When we got older, Jimmy and I loved one another like brother and sister. I went to stay with his mom, my aunt Wanda, in the summers off and on from ages fourteen to seventeen - so we grew up together.
Another time, my sister, Shirley, and I found Aunt Hope's Shirley Temple doll that one of her brothers had sold chances to get for her. The chance was a push-out card and each number someone bought was a different price from five cent to ninety-nine cent. It was a lot of money for someone to be spending on a chance card but if you were lucky you got the prize. But this time it was for a Shirley Temple doll. It took her brother a long time to get that doll. The doll was thirty-two inches high so it was a big doll and my Aunt Hope had hid it while all the grandchildren were there. But my sister and I found it in a closet and started to fight over it, Shirley was pulling it one way and I was pulling it another and we pulled it apart that's when Aunt Hope found us. She screamed at us and our parents came to see what was going on. Aunt Hope was crying and Grandma told her that we were just babies and she was too old to be carrying on so over a doll, she was sixteen at the time. Now that I‘m older, wiser, and been married for all these years, I know what happen to that doll - it could have been fixed. All we did was break the rubber band that held its arms together, but at the time the doll was destroyed and had to be thrown away.
That was the best summer vacation, I remember my Grandfather put us all in the hay wagon to give us a ride out of the hollow to the bus stop so we could go home. The wheel broke off of the wagon and Shirley and my Dad spilled out - no one was hurt. We came away with pictures of the best time in our life. The next time that we went and visit my grandparents, they lived in Kermit, West Virginia across the river from Kentucky. By that time Hope had gotten married. I don’t remember how long that we stayed I only remember the house and yard.
Aunt Hope married Uncle Ray, a Minster in the Church of God. She would come to visit other relatives and I think she visited us only because we lived a couple of houses away. Dad would have not let her forget it if she should come up the hollow and not stop in. She only came to our house once that I can remember. She wouldn’t let us feed her three children, they weren’t allowed to have anything to eat or drink. We thought she was very strict. They made no fuss when she said that they couldn’t have the pop that we were offering them, most children would make a fuss especially them being so young. Later her daughter, Ruth, said something I think went for when they came to our house, too. She said that Aunt Hope didn't like the way Aunt Wanda kept the house. She didn't think it was clean enough.
Once when I was staying with Aunt Hannah, Aunt Hope asked me if I would come and watch her children, she had five children by then. Her and her husband wanted to go away on a retreat for the Church. I had no trouble with the children. Aunt Hope and Uncle Ray came home the last day and took us all back to the Church for the day. I stayed with them for an extra couple of days after we got back to their house and got to see my first couple to get married. The couple knocked on the door and asked Uncle Ray if he would marry them. He married them in his living room.
My grandparent moved away from Ohio to Kermit, West Virginia. I think it was because my Grandma Hester could no longer keep up with canning and take care of the farm. After living in Kermit they moved to Black Bottom in Logan, West Virginia. This one time, I remember Dad had taken us all for a visit. Grandpa Abe always would like to wrestle with us girls. Sometimes he would play with us all together and other times only one of us. If he got hurt, he would get mad and want to whip you. Grandpa and I were sitting on the front porch which had no banister and our feet were hanging off when he reach over and knock me backwards. I got up and pushed him backwards. Dad happened to come out of the house and this is what he said to his father. "You can play with her but if she hurts you, old man, and you get mad and want to hurt her back. I will hurt you."
Dad taught us girls how to wrestle and be tough, that is how he himself played with us. Sometimes as we walked by him, he would try to trip us or push us in our backs with his thumb which always started a wrestling match. I always enjoyed going to visit my Grandma Hester's, I remembered what a good breakfast she would cook for us when we stayed overnight with the house was always full. My grandparents lived in a three room house with a front porch. I fondly remember how she would show us that she could drop her front teeth. We didn't know it at the time what false teeth were. That's where they lived when my Grandma Hester passed away - I was ten years old.
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| Hannah Dillow |
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| Hester and Abe Dillow |
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| Stephen and Hannah Dillow |
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| Uncle Richard and Aunt Lilly |
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| Jimmy |
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| Uncle Lewis |
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| Aunt Oma and Great-Grandma, Mary Jane Perkins |
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| Aunt Hope |
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| Aunt Wanda |
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| Uncle Woodrow |
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| from left to right: Uncle Woodrow, his wife Gladys, Uncle Lewis, Aunt Hannah, Aunt Hope, Aunt Wanda |
Saturday, November 26, 2011
Abraham Dillow & Hester Perkins Family part I
Grandma Dillo's mother, Mary Jane, was a single mom and the story goes that she met a rich man from England. When she told him that she was going to have a child, he told her that his parents would not allow him to marry an Indian girl from American and he went back to England - never to be heard from again. So my Grandma Dillo was born on April 12, 1884, not knowing her father. Great-Grandma Dillow had another son out of wedlock but he knew his father - they even claim one other as father and son. The son kept Great-Grandma's last name of Perkins. Great-Grandma's father, Lewis, was part Choctaw - a member of the tribe of Muskhogean Indians - who lived in Southeast Tennessee. Family tradition says when Lewis was 2-1/2 years old and he raised by a Perkins. Then when Lewis was 34 years old, he nearly cut his left foot off in an accident chopping wood for a furnace company in Kentucky on March 6, 1857. Lewis had a son from his first marriage who he left with a couple when he moved and got married again. After he hurt his foot, he went and brought the boy to help him raise his family of eight children. Lewis' daughter, Phoebe, thought he was just lazy but being an Indian was not easy - they were very poor.
Lewis' 8 year old son, Ep (whose birth name was James) earned most of the money to support the family working on a farm as a laborer *all of this information found in National Archives records under James E. Perkins.* Ep died on November 11, 1863 during the Civil War in Brashear City, Louisana. He was in the Union Army, Company 22, Reg's Ky. Inf. mustered in at Grayson, Ky. on Oct. 25, 1861 as a Private. He was 18 years old, 5'6" high, dark complexion, blue eyes, dark hair and was a farmer by occupation.
"Ep was missing in action on December 29, 1862 at Chickasaw Bluffs, near Vicksburg, Mississippi and listed as a deserter. He was on the muster list for August 1863. So he was missing for 7 months. Ep died from a kick in the abdomen by a Negro after Ep instigated fight. six days later Ep died of acute peritonitis. When he died he had as possessions, 1 pair trousers, 1 flannel shirt, 1 pair of boots, 1 knapsack, and one silk pocket handkerchief [ old]," per National Archives records on the Civil War. His father then applied for a pension as a dependent of James Epson Perkins.
Grandpa and Grandma Dillo met and got married on January 13, 1901 in Grayson, Carter, Co. Kentucky when Abe was 21 years old and Hester was just 16 years old. In the year 1919, my grandparents moved from Greenup, Kentucky to Lorado, West Virginia on Buffalo Creek. My grandparent’s moved a lot for people who had to pack up everything they owned and move it by horse and wagon. While still in Kentucky, five of Hester's nine children died and she didn’t want to lose any more of her children so she said to my Grandfather that if she stayed in Kentucky she wouldn’t have any children left. They moved to Lorado, West Virginia with the four surviving children: Oma, Steve, Lewis (named after my great-great-grandfather) and Woodrow. My father, Wilbur, was born after they moved to Lorado. When he was six months old, in 1920, my grandparents moved to Chapmanville, WV. Oma was married and also lived in Chapmanville - a couple of houses away from them - with her husband, L J. Oma was 16 yrs old when she married L.J. and she had her first child when she 17 years old.
Rumor has it that while they lived in Chapmanville, Grandpa Dillow got into a fight with another man and kill him. My Aunt Hannah said Grandpa had to leave home, walking across the mountain to Tennessee where he stayed for almost a year before he came back home. Back then when you killed someone all you had to do was leave the state and stay away for awhile, then when you got home just change your way of living and the deed was forgotten.
By the time my dad was two years old, my grandparents moved back to Lorado, WV, where they had two more daughters; Hannah, and Eloise. Then in 1925, they moved to Omar, WV and gave birth to their daughter, Wanda. Lastly, they moved again in 1927 to Landville, WV where their son, Richard, was born.
My grandparents had total fifteen children with ten living to become adults. Their first child, Burdick, was believed to have died due to an overdose of "worm" medicine. He was between one or two years of age. The fifth child, a boy, was stillborn and the sixth child, Retta, was believed to have died by an accident. A story is passed down that when Oma was making popcorn for Retta, age 4, she apparently climbed up on a chair and fell into the fireplace catching her dress on fire. Lucy and Dixie, the seventh and eighth children respectively, died due to high fevers and sickness.
Grandma Dillow named her fifth daughter after her mother-in-law, Hannah Dillow. My aunt Hannah said that her mother always thought her mother-in-law was a witch and that she put a spell on Dixie, the last child to die, when she touched her. My aunt goes on to say, that Dixie wasn’t sick until her Grandma came over to her house and ask to see the baby. She walked over to the crib, put her hand on the baby, and after she left Dixie took sick and died.
We thought the reason why my Grandma Dillo believed that her mother-in-law didn't want her son to marry was because grandma was Indian, but Grandpa Dillow clear that up when he said her being Indian had nothing to do with it as his mother was Indian herself. Grandpa Dillow told us it was because my great-grandma thought, at sixteen years old, grandma was too young for marriage. On December 16, 1911 my great-grandfather, Stephen, was struck by a C&O passenger train and killed instantly. Great-grandma lived another six years after his death.
Somewhere between 1927 and 1930, Grandpa and Grandma Dillo moved to Dehue, West Virginia to Rum Creek Junction which everyone just called Rum Creek hollow. They had one more child while living at Dehue, a daughter they named Hope.
Grandma Dillo changed the spelling of their last name by dropping the "w" off of Dillow because she kept getting Dillon mail. Their children didn’t put the "w" on the grand-children's last names, except for Steve - who we called Uncle Bud - he kept the correct spelling for his children. The rest of the grand-children's last names are spelled Dillo. Aunt Hannah took me over to see Uncle Bud (Steve) before he died. He told me how glad he was to see me, said that he didn’t expect to see any of his brother's, Wilbur, girls before he died. He was on an oxygen machine and could only stay off long enough to say hello.
My father, Wilbur, started to work for the coal mine in 1932 when he was thirteen years old with his father and three older brothers to help bring some money into the house and feed the family. Aunt Hannah said that they only worked one or two days a week during the Depression. After the Depression was over, my Grandpa Dillow went back to farming for other farmers but his four sons stayed to work in the coal mine. Their youngest son, Richard, never became a coal miner. He went to school and became an electrician.
When Uncle Richard and his wife, Lilly, had been married for awhile they found out that they could not have children. By then, my Aunt Eloise was having a hard time feeding her six children, and she had a few siblings that didn’t have any children - or as in my father’s case didn’t have a son - so Aunt Eloise gave Uncle Richard a daughter, who they named Glenna Lou, when she was born. Five years later, my Aunt Wanda let them have her son, Alex, when he was about two months old. Uncle Richard and Aunt Lilly took their family and moved to Charleston, West Virginia where Uncle Richard fell from a telephone pole. After he got out of the hospital, they moved back to Logan but he was in so much pain that he never worked again. Uncle Richard started to drink and became an alcoholic so his wife divorced him. They gave Glenna Lou back to Aunt Eloise when she was about 9 years old but kept Alex for a while longer but then gave him back to Aunt Wanda when he was about six years old. Alex always held it against my Aunt Wanda that she gave him away in the first place but his siblings told him that it was the best thing that could have happen to him; what did he want to do: stay and go hungry like the rest of them? My Uncle Richard lived with my Aunt Hannah for a while but she threw him out because of his drinking. Uncle Richard died at the age of thirty-nine from alcohol abuse and at the time he was living with Aunt Wanda.
We went to see my Uncle Lewis before he died because I had to ask him a question about a story I heard when I was a young girl about him and his first wife, Maude. It had been a rumor in the family that he divorced his wife shortly after they got married because she chewed tobacco. I wanted to know if this was the truth (because I didn’t think this was a good enough reason). He laughed and said there were other things involved besides her chewing tobacco. He told me a story about his and Maude’s daughter, Ellen. It seems Ellen and a girlfriend were walking up Rum Creek Road when Uncle Lewis and a friend drove by in a car and had seen these two nice looking girls, they stopped and ask them if they wanted a ride. Ellen said yes and they got in - Ellen was about thirteen - Uncle Lewis said he asked them their names and Ellen replied that her name was Ellen Dillo. That, of course, got his attention and he asked her who her parents were? And when she said that Maude was her mother, he knew that he had a daughter for the first time. Previous to this he had no contact with Maude so he no idea he had any children. He then went on to tell me how Ellen was visiting him and taking good care of him since his second wife, Missouri, died. His first wife, Maude, never got remarried and she lived up Rum Creek all her life. She's related to the Lowe's so she buried in Lowe's cemetery on Kelly Mountain.
Lewis' 8 year old son, Ep (whose birth name was James) earned most of the money to support the family working on a farm as a laborer *all of this information found in National Archives records under James E. Perkins.* Ep died on November 11, 1863 during the Civil War in Brashear City, Louisana. He was in the Union Army, Company 22, Reg's Ky. Inf. mustered in at Grayson, Ky. on Oct. 25, 1861 as a Private. He was 18 years old, 5'6" high, dark complexion, blue eyes, dark hair and was a farmer by occupation.
"Ep was missing in action on December 29, 1862 at Chickasaw Bluffs, near Vicksburg, Mississippi and listed as a deserter. He was on the muster list for August 1863. So he was missing for 7 months. Ep died from a kick in the abdomen by a Negro after Ep instigated fight. six days later Ep died of acute peritonitis. When he died he had as possessions, 1 pair trousers, 1 flannel shirt, 1 pair of boots, 1 knapsack, and one silk pocket handkerchief [ old]," per National Archives records on the Civil War. His father then applied for a pension as a dependent of James Epson Perkins.
Grandpa and Grandma Dillo met and got married on January 13, 1901 in Grayson, Carter, Co. Kentucky when Abe was 21 years old and Hester was just 16 years old. In the year 1919, my grandparents moved from Greenup, Kentucky to Lorado, West Virginia on Buffalo Creek. My grandparent’s moved a lot for people who had to pack up everything they owned and move it by horse and wagon. While still in Kentucky, five of Hester's nine children died and she didn’t want to lose any more of her children so she said to my Grandfather that if she stayed in Kentucky she wouldn’t have any children left. They moved to Lorado, West Virginia with the four surviving children: Oma, Steve, Lewis (named after my great-great-grandfather) and Woodrow. My father, Wilbur, was born after they moved to Lorado. When he was six months old, in 1920, my grandparents moved to Chapmanville, WV. Oma was married and also lived in Chapmanville - a couple of houses away from them - with her husband, L J. Oma was 16 yrs old when she married L.J. and she had her first child when she 17 years old.
Rumor has it that while they lived in Chapmanville, Grandpa Dillow got into a fight with another man and kill him. My Aunt Hannah said Grandpa had to leave home, walking across the mountain to Tennessee where he stayed for almost a year before he came back home. Back then when you killed someone all you had to do was leave the state and stay away for awhile, then when you got home just change your way of living and the deed was forgotten.
By the time my dad was two years old, my grandparents moved back to Lorado, WV, where they had two more daughters; Hannah, and Eloise. Then in 1925, they moved to Omar, WV and gave birth to their daughter, Wanda. Lastly, they moved again in 1927 to Landville, WV where their son, Richard, was born.
My grandparents had total fifteen children with ten living to become adults. Their first child, Burdick, was believed to have died due to an overdose of "worm" medicine. He was between one or two years of age. The fifth child, a boy, was stillborn and the sixth child, Retta, was believed to have died by an accident. A story is passed down that when Oma was making popcorn for Retta, age 4, she apparently climbed up on a chair and fell into the fireplace catching her dress on fire. Lucy and Dixie, the seventh and eighth children respectively, died due to high fevers and sickness.
Grandma Dillow named her fifth daughter after her mother-in-law, Hannah Dillow. My aunt Hannah said that her mother always thought her mother-in-law was a witch and that she put a spell on Dixie, the last child to die, when she touched her. My aunt goes on to say, that Dixie wasn’t sick until her Grandma came over to her house and ask to see the baby. She walked over to the crib, put her hand on the baby, and after she left Dixie took sick and died.
We thought the reason why my Grandma Dillo believed that her mother-in-law didn't want her son to marry was because grandma was Indian, but Grandpa Dillow clear that up when he said her being Indian had nothing to do with it as his mother was Indian herself. Grandpa Dillow told us it was because my great-grandma thought, at sixteen years old, grandma was too young for marriage. On December 16, 1911 my great-grandfather, Stephen, was struck by a C&O passenger train and killed instantly. Great-grandma lived another six years after his death.
Somewhere between 1927 and 1930, Grandpa and Grandma Dillo moved to Dehue, West Virginia to Rum Creek Junction which everyone just called Rum Creek hollow. They had one more child while living at Dehue, a daughter they named Hope.
Grandma Dillo changed the spelling of their last name by dropping the "w" off of Dillow because she kept getting Dillon mail. Their children didn’t put the "w" on the grand-children's last names, except for Steve - who we called Uncle Bud - he kept the correct spelling for his children. The rest of the grand-children's last names are spelled Dillo. Aunt Hannah took me over to see Uncle Bud (Steve) before he died. He told me how glad he was to see me, said that he didn’t expect to see any of his brother's, Wilbur, girls before he died. He was on an oxygen machine and could only stay off long enough to say hello.
My father, Wilbur, started to work for the coal mine in 1932 when he was thirteen years old with his father and three older brothers to help bring some money into the house and feed the family. Aunt Hannah said that they only worked one or two days a week during the Depression. After the Depression was over, my Grandpa Dillow went back to farming for other farmers but his four sons stayed to work in the coal mine. Their youngest son, Richard, never became a coal miner. He went to school and became an electrician.
When Uncle Richard and his wife, Lilly, had been married for awhile they found out that they could not have children. By then, my Aunt Eloise was having a hard time feeding her six children, and she had a few siblings that didn’t have any children - or as in my father’s case didn’t have a son - so Aunt Eloise gave Uncle Richard a daughter, who they named Glenna Lou, when she was born. Five years later, my Aunt Wanda let them have her son, Alex, when he was about two months old. Uncle Richard and Aunt Lilly took their family and moved to Charleston, West Virginia where Uncle Richard fell from a telephone pole. After he got out of the hospital, they moved back to Logan but he was in so much pain that he never worked again. Uncle Richard started to drink and became an alcoholic so his wife divorced him. They gave Glenna Lou back to Aunt Eloise when she was about 9 years old but kept Alex for a while longer but then gave him back to Aunt Wanda when he was about six years old. Alex always held it against my Aunt Wanda that she gave him away in the first place but his siblings told him that it was the best thing that could have happen to him; what did he want to do: stay and go hungry like the rest of them? My Uncle Richard lived with my Aunt Hannah for a while but she threw him out because of his drinking. Uncle Richard died at the age of thirty-nine from alcohol abuse and at the time he was living with Aunt Wanda.
We went to see my Uncle Lewis before he died because I had to ask him a question about a story I heard when I was a young girl about him and his first wife, Maude. It had been a rumor in the family that he divorced his wife shortly after they got married because she chewed tobacco. I wanted to know if this was the truth (because I didn’t think this was a good enough reason). He laughed and said there were other things involved besides her chewing tobacco. He told me a story about his and Maude’s daughter, Ellen. It seems Ellen and a girlfriend were walking up Rum Creek Road when Uncle Lewis and a friend drove by in a car and had seen these two nice looking girls, they stopped and ask them if they wanted a ride. Ellen said yes and they got in - Ellen was about thirteen - Uncle Lewis said he asked them their names and Ellen replied that her name was Ellen Dillo. That, of course, got his attention and he asked her who her parents were? And when she said that Maude was her mother, he knew that he had a daughter for the first time. Previous to this he had no contact with Maude so he no idea he had any children. He then went on to tell me how Ellen was visiting him and taking good care of him since his second wife, Missouri, died. His first wife, Maude, never got remarried and she lived up Rum Creek all her life. She's related to the Lowe's so she buried in Lowe's cemetery on Kelly Mountain.
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