At Uncle Tom and Aunt Bess' House

..."Once when my sister, Annie and I were at Uncle Tom and Bess' house, her old cow had twin heifer calves and she..." named them Sally and Annie. I ate a lot of watermelon and when sleeping on a made down feather bed pallet I wet the bed. I was so ashamed that I rolled Strauther, who was sleeping with me, over in the wet place. Aunt Bess said not a word but long afterward we laughed about it for she knew at the time."

My First Bathing Suit

..."Later as I grew older, I lived in Jonesboro, either with Dad and they boys or with Aunt Mattie Anderson. I could only visit there during the summers. That end of Craighead County was low, swampy land with farming acres on a gentle rise. It was being dredged and reclaimed with dredge ditches running clear streams with sandy bottoms. I learned to swim in one when Joe rocked the old dugout we were poling. Rather than fall out I had the brilliant idea of jumping out - not knowing that clear water was so deep. I started paddleing like a dog and got to shore... my first bathing suit was a pair of Joe's overalls."

Grandpa Tuck and the Pony....

...."Grandpa, it was said, mostly by Grandma, could buy or sell just about anything, a horse or cow, maybe a steer and have it butchered. Once it was a horse. It was small and they teased him that he had bought a colt. I wanted to go out to Aunt Lula's and decided I would ride it. He laughed at me, said I would have to tie knots in my legs for I had grown up and my legs were getting long. But he helped saddle it up and away I went, I had to go through the little town and right there on the main street was a little cafe where they had a graphaphone going full blast and the pony started dancing. It was decided that he had been a circus pony."

How I Got My Name...

...."Grandpa told me once that he could still see clearly the face of Uncle Clarence, his first child, but none of the others. His first wife, my real grandmother, was said to be part Indian and as mean as the Devil. When she died Grandpa married Sally Baker, already mentioned with her 5 kids. They had the two boys, Joe and Henry, and right about then my sister, Annie, and I came along. Mother liked her Stepmother real well, even naming me for her--and Grandpa. We four kids all near the same age really had fun. My mother having died we too seemed to be at Grandpa's a lot. As I may have already said Joe and I even slept at the foot of the bed of Grandpa."

Ella Mae Wallace's Husband, Pierre Maxey

...."My Mother was Ella May Wallace, she married a man who worked for Grandpa as a wage hand or hired hand as some called it. Aunt Lula was a younger sister who told me most of it. In the fall when crops were in and the hands paid off her husband, Pierre Maxey took a wagon and team to Paragould for funiture for they would move out to their own house after the baby comes. On the way back he was robbed and killed and from all evidence thrown in the river. The baby, my sister Blanch, was deliveded by a midwife, Mrs. Holinshead, we called her Granny Holinshead. Mother lived on at home with her child who was about the same age as Little Tuck. The mother must have died about along then for Mother stayed and kept house for them until she maried my Dad."

Aunt Sally and the Itch

sketch by Sherryl Guthrie Miller

..."Grandpa showed his goodness and understanding as few people can.

I was teaching at Black Oak and came to Monette one Friday. Every kid in school had the itch and I got it too. I told Grandpa and he said to get Sack to make up some sulphur and lard, etc. I set up a protest! I hated the idea of the greasy mess. So Grandpa went to town and got a bottle of liquid sulfur and I soaked myself in it. Grandma put old sheets on a ged and gave me a ragged old night-gown and to bed I went. I smelled for three nights, got up Monday morning and bathed in the big old wash tub by the stove in the kitchen, then I went back to school."

Up, Up, and Away!

sketch: balloon; Sherryl Guthrie Miller, steeple & Jackson; Sandy Guthrie Moore

Sally recalls being told about one of her relatives by the name of Jim Jackson. Between 1890 and 1895 he had sewn about 50 flour sacks together and put tar all over the outside of the sacks, Jim took it behind Blakeman's Blacksmith Shop filled it up with gas and climbed into the basket of the "balloon" and cut the rope. The balloon, with Jim in it, shot up like a rocket and flew off toward the North. In a little bit it caught on the courthouse steeple. It took a long time, but friends got him a ladder and he was able to get back down to the earth.

also mentioned in William's "History of Craighead Co."

Derned Turd

..."The first set of children said Little Tuck was never really given a name, and while growing up, took up the initials "D. T." for Daniel Tucker, Grandpa's nickname. But when I asked him what the initials stood for he said "Derned Turd, I guess."....

sketch by Sherryl Guthrie Miller