FOREWARD

I'm delighted to have the opportunity to republish my mother's first book, Magnolias and Mavericks, mostly set in her childhood home, DeFuniak Springs in the Florida Panhandle.

It was first self-published in 1991 and included many, many photographs, which I hope to gradually integrate back into the text portions. For the time being, I hope the AI-generated illustrations can give some extra character to the stories.

Marjorie drew deeply from her girlhood spent in this colorful, deeply spiritual, sometimes old-fashioned, county-seat town.

I've visited there myself several times. I enjoyed this time-forgotten, unhurried corner of the world, utterly distinct from the faster-paced suburban towns where I grew up in California.

 After her earlier career as a music teacher, my mother became a lifelong activist--primarily in civil rights and racial justice. 

Marjorie was deeply offended by the racial divides she experienced as a young girl growing up in Defuniak Springs, Florida, and ultimately, everywhere else. She was a precocious child, and her sensitivity to these issues made her intolerant of even the gentlest forms of racial discrimination.

On the other hand, she cherished her hometown community's kindness and spiritual centeredness. In a time and place when people seemed, and perhaps were, naturally moral and good-natured, they were held together by a strong and unquestioned set of Protestant values. 

For example, the swings were tied up on Sundays in the children's playgrounds. Out of a  fear of offending the Lord on His mandatory Day of Rest!'

This was a great paradox in her life. She loved the warmth and gentility of black and white people in her corner of the American South. And yet she couldn't abide the injustice of black people taking second place to white people.

Growing up in the San Francisco suburb of Menlo Park, our house was always the hub of some social justice campaign.  I was frequently enlisted in helping her in the production of endless newsletter printings and mailings promoting her various causes.

Aerial View of DeFuniak Springs, FL. 

Often, it was a Democratic Party electoral campaign. 

 Sometimes, it was a more controversial effort, such as when she participated in an unpopular lawsuit demanding integrated elementary school education, even at the substantial social cost of busing white kids to predominantly black schools.

During the campaign for Jimmy Carter, she was a relentless campaigner, even flying back to her home state of Florida to try and make a difference.  

Governor Carter was a Southerner who, like her and her family, lived the Gospel of Jesus Christ daily, not just on Sundays. Especially the part about 'doing unto others.'

My father, a lapsed Irish Catholic from New York City, espoused liberal views and supported her.

Even when my father retired and they moved to an upscale senior living community, she organized yearly Martin Luther King Day celebrations that came to rival the more traditional holiday fests in their production values and turnout.

Ultimately, in her later-life vocation of writing, she infused most of her work with the challenge for anyone reading it to stand up and do the right thing.

Although justice was the central concern of her life, my mother also deeply enjoyed music and other earthly delights.  She and my father, both music majors in college, shared a love of jazz in particular.

She was as comfortable in her skin as anyone I've ever met. She was too busy thinking of others to care much about whether or not she was wearing the optimal outfit, for example. She set a high standard for self-sacrifice that I am ashamed to say I could not follow as much as I wanted to!

She particularly enjoyed the seaside--a profound and ongoing source of inspiration.

The nearby and lovely Gulf Coast.

Whenever we'd arrive at some coastal vacation spot--it didn't seem to matter where--there was a palpable sense of relief about her. Like she had finally come home after a long exile in civilization.

Her family had the good fortune to frequently spend portions of the summer at Grayton Beach, which at the time was a humble, almost dilapidated beach town with sugary-white sands of the Gulf Coast.

Even in my own era in the 1960s, the area was remote from anywhere and singularly undeveloped--in distinct contrast to the 'Redneck Riviera' reputation and traffic jams that plague it today.

In her later years, my mother suffered terribly from circulatory issues. Yet she was the model of stoic endurance.

Her sense of having a mission to complete always seemed to enable her to overlook the succession of medical indignities she endured.  I counted '13' as the number of trips that she made to the hospital in her final year of life.  

I miss her terribly. However, her stories are so vibrant that I've been transported back to my past and hers in reading and enjoying them.

I never met my Grandmother or Grandfather, but I did meet Aunt Bern and Uncle Stewart. (My favorite memory was those tempting bottles of Coke that tingled in the fridge whenever it was opened,  and how celestially refreshing they were on hot summer days before the era of air conditioning!)

(Many writers have noted how A/C shut people up in their homes who would normally have been out on their front porches in the late afternoons, socializing with passers-by.  It was a profound social change that mostly went unnoticed at the time.)

I am happy to report that De Funiak Springs is still a largely forgotten historical and geographical jewel that preserves, in microcosm, the best of genteel Southern culture, both white and black.

It boasts neither proximity to natural resources or industries and is distant from higher learning institutes.  The downtown area has been struggling for many decades. The nearest hospital is a long drive away. The attractions, for young people at least, are few.

And, though generally, residents do not demonstrate the extremes,  subtle vestiges of the separate racial identities remain.   The city is still 90 percent white. And the controversy of whether or not to fly one or another version of the Confederate flag is still an unresolved local issue.

The Victorian-era Themed Hotel DeFuniak.

As of this writing, one of Marjorie's contemporaries, Francis Campbell, lives on in DeFuniak at the age of 107.

I wish her continued good health. And that also for all the fortunate people who have endured with her,  in the beloved town that was such a significant influence on and solace to my mother throughout her life.

I have added some AI-generated images, which I hope enhance the stories here. I am still deciding which of the book's original images to retain.

These were often fuzzy reprints of reprints. I will add these later when my still-evolving publishing skills feel sufficient for the task.

I'd love to receive your comments, should you feel moved to share them.

Thank you, Marjorie, for being such an exemplary parent and model of modern Christian discipleship and forgiving love to all your beloved friends and family.

Thomas Malcolm Moylan, 72,  San Francisco, January 2025

gonebeyondtom@gmail.com

PREFACE

 This collection of stories is a fictional memoir.  Through first-person tales, I aim to convey a sense of a particular kind of Southern life that may not be widely known.

The setting of the stories, for the most part, is De Funiak Springs, Florida, a small Northwest Florida town located thirty miles south of the Alabama border and an equal distance north of the Gulf of Mexico.  The time, the late 1920s through the mid-1940s, is a period which went from Depression era, sparse economic sufficiency for a majority of white people to economic despair for both white and black people, and then to hope and the beginnings of recovery just before and including the early World War II years.

The small town I knew was not that of the decadence and meanness so frequently portrayed in Southern literature and Hollywood films.  Rather, it was a time and place of innocence and enjoyment of simple pleasures overlaid with the strong influence of religion; the persons in the stories are not living out the remnants of plantation life, nor are they the familiarly stereotyped illiterate rural whites or wholly subservient blacks.

That black people were not treated as equals was as true in my town as elsewhere in the nation, prior to the historic U.S. Supreme Court's 1954 Brown vs. Board of Education decision and the Civil Rights reforms that followed. However, humanity and relatedness existed in our racially interwoven, socially separated lives.

I hope that portrayals of black people in these accounts will provide insight into their influence on the lives of white people, sometimes subtle, sometimes dramatic.  At least, this is the way I was affected. Perhaps, too, the stories will add a dimension of understanding and something of the admiration the writer feels for people of African descent who demonstrated strength to endure, dignity despite humiliations, and graciousness of spirit.

I know how fortunate I was to have been born into a loving family, a family of strong convictions with some of us fitting the label of maverick while adhering closely to the structured manners and mores of the times and the town. I am grateful, too, to have grown up in a community of caring and interesting people.

While each story is based upon actual occurrences and as true to facts as I can ascertain, some sequences of action are compressed into a smaller time frame, and some characters and situations are composites of several persons and experiences. For example, Rosalie in "Five Miles from Argyle” is not one little girl but two, and the male figure in “Walk Around the Lake” is no one individual. "The Day the Yankees Come" is an adaptation of a story recorded by Bernice Morrison Gillis.

My hope is that these stories will preserve something of the history of the community of De Funiak Springs as well as the character and relationships of the people.

Marjorie Morrison Moylan Menlo Park, California July, 1991

PAST IS PRESENT

 Because I believe there is a dominating presence of the past in the lives of all persons, let me summarize something of the past that preceded my stories.

The Scottish Presbyterian settlers, who arrived in Northwest Florida in the territorial days of the early 19th century, established devotion to education as well as to church throughout the area that became Walton County.

In 1882 surveyors and officials of the L. & N. Railroad—completing the line across the Florida Panhandle—saw in the perfectly formed spring-fed lake setting, midway between Tallahassee and Pensacola, the potential for a winter resort. They proceeded to build a fine hotel and named the town Lake De Funiak. Soon afterwards, the Southern counterpart of the famous Chautauqua in New York State was organized with similar educational and cultural programs lasting six to eight weeks.

The Florida Normal School, which trained teachers, and the Presbyterian Palmer College soon followed. Prior to the existence of these schools, there was the flourishing Knox Hill Academy near the original county seat, Eucheeanna. All these institutions gave De Funiak Springs an educational level not matched in neighboring small towns.

Appreciation for the arts and attention to social forms established in more affluent times continued for most of the town's residents even in the harsh and stressful economic days of the 1930s.

Among my relatives, as in many other households, talk of Civil War horrors and pre-Civil War abundance made that time seem like yesterday. The "Yankees" had come all the way down through Northwest Florida, .* devastating the people and property. Ironic because our county and my great-grandfather, John Morrison, as one of two Walton County delegates to the Florida Convention of January 1861, had argued against secession. Under the abolitionist preachings of the Amherst-educated Presbyterian teacher imported for their children at Eucheeanna, these early settlers and their descendants pledged themselves to "stay with the Union, and Mr Lincoln" and thereby abolish slavery. This made Walton County one of only a handful of counties in the entire South to take such a position. But, when War came, they fought and suffered the same fate as the rest of the deep South—as if there had never been arguments, debate and decision. A tragic time, not forgotten even into the 1940s and beyond.

One characteristic shared by the Southerners of my growing up years was an indomitable spirit fueled undoubtedly by the strong religious faith that permeated the whole culture but just as much by pride.

The stoic pride that kept the South fighting against the insurmountable odds of the North's industrial superiority and military strength in the War Between the States became more entrenched as Southerners lived with the consequences of that War: their ravaged homeland. A defensive pride in their valiance and ability to rise above defeat then sustained white Southerners for generations. . .

For African Americans in the rural South, I believe pride was the result of the centuries-old determination, as captives in this land, to keep an inner sense of self while having little choice but to accede to  discriminatory circumstances. Unquestionably, segregation and the denial of equal opportunities shattered the lives of many black people (North and South). Others became very creative in finding outlets to keep their own identity and, wherever possible, to assert individual will.

I think singing raised spirits and reinforced that will of all Southerners to survive yet more “hard times” during the Depression of the 1930s. We sang a lot. The songs we white people sang in church, in school, on automobile drives, on social outings were hymns, Negro spirituals, American folk songs, WWI tunes and popular hits.

The singing I heard by African-Americans (and which affected my life) was as they worked, or in their churches. The songs were primarily the rich legacy of spirituals created during slavery days. Years later I learned that many of the historic songs, sounding like spirituals, actually had double meanings meant only to be understood by other black people—a kind of coded communication which might be veiled criticism of the boss, or cleverly poke fun at the white people over them. It was inside humor, a very inventive survival technique.

A railroad work crew, farm workers, domestic servants sang songs that accompanied their tasks and made the work seem lighter. The sounds I heard from these activities were not joyful. But I imagine they kept body and spirit together. Many black people found deep solace in gospel hymns and spirituals sung in church as an affirmation of religious faith, a source of hope and promise. This singing was and remains today emotionally charged, uplifting, unforgettable—forever a part of my life.

Sorrowful and joyful spirituals, the blues and highly creative improvisations combined with African rhythms became the basis for our distinctive American music—jazz. That, too, I experienced first hand at the Negro Juke (dance hall) in De Funiak Springs. Like millions of other Americans I became an avid listener of recordings and radio broadcasts featuring the uniquely gifted African-American vocalists and instrumentalists, and the popular music influenced by them. Music, then, became a strong tie of kinship with African Americans.

All the information absorbed from the senses, particularly in the early years, are acutely a part of my past and present. Stories told by elders (black and white) before a fire or on a porch vividly conveyed an interconnection of our lives and the history that shaped us. My own experiences growing up in De Funiak Springs and Northwest Florida continue to direct my present life.

Past is present.

CATTIE AND THE LAKE

When I awakened, the sultry summer morning had already begun. On the back screened porch I could hear my mother at the sewing machine. It had been placed there because in pre air-conditioned 1931 in Northwest Florida, this was the coolest place in the house. Mamma was up early making beach pajamas, the latest style in summer wear, for my sister and me.

I'd watched the day before as Mamma cut out the material on the dining room table according to the Butterick pattern with the picture of the wide-legged outfit on the cover. When we'd selected the small floral print at King's Dry Good Store, the saleslady said she thought my sister and I would “look so cute” dressed alike. I liked the style, but since I was growing older, I didn't especially want to have an identical costume. I didn’t say this out loud. My mother just seemed to know my feelings. As we left the store, she explained that it would save a little money if she made the beach pajamas from the same cloth, and with the Depression on, we didn't have much money to spend.

Mamma was getting our clothes ready for a trip from our home in De Funiak Springs to visit her sister in Quincy, near Tallahassee. Cattie, our nurse, was going with us. Mamma also planned to make two new dresses for Cattie.

My mother enjoyed sewing, but ever since she'd begun teaching more piano pupils she didn't have as much time for sewing, and the departure date for our trip was nearing.

As I lay in bed slowly coming to life, I pictured Mamma at the sewing machine and was sorry I'd missed the morning pleasure of watching her brush her long, dark brown hair, wrap it around in a circle at the back of he head and then secure it with large, tortoise shell hair pins.

Above the sound of the sewing machine I could hear my five-year-o}, sister Chris pleading, “I want my bathing suit on. Please, Cathie, help me put on my bathing suit.” I was glad I was two years older and didn't need help in dressing.

As I listened, I guessed what the answer would be. Cattie, our nurse (who today would be called a babysitter, but with much more authority), Would calmly explain, "When your Mamma says you can go swimming the lake, you can go. Besides, it's too soon. Your breakfast ain't settled yet."

I can't recall why I overslept, unless it was that we had been allowed to stay up late because the night had been so hot. Although Chris and I nodded as we listened to our parents and the neighbors talk, we got to stay outside on the front porch, where in the evening there was some respite from the heat.

Summer nights were enchanting with the moon's glistening reflection On the lake in front of our house, the soothing sounds of crickets, and the fragrance of magnolias which somehow became stronger at night.

Now with a new day it was time to get out of bed and join in the chorus of, "When can we go swimming?" We had obviously missed any chance of a before breakfast swim, which was always gloriously exciting in the just-after-dawn light.

“Well, Maryrie,” Cattie greeted me as I walked into the kitchen. “It's about time you got yourself out of bed.” Never was she as gentle with me as with my sister. Perhaps because my sister was the baby, “her baby.” Cattie had come to us shortly after my birth, but she was present when Chris was born. In addition, my sister never "ruffled any feathers.” I seemed always to be creating situations or conceiving ideas which upset Cattie's routine, and sometimes the whole household.

My sister hovered about while I quickly ate breakfast. Then, together and in turn, we took up the swimming plea. To my sister, Cattie replied, “Honey, I ain't got but two hands, and as you can see, they're busy."

This “I ain't got but two hands" answer was very familiar and it meant we'd be waiting a long time before Cattie would take us down to the lake, so I persisted, tenaciously. My mother, who was usually very patient, called to me from the porch with a reprimand so unlike her that it stung, though it certainly fit my behavior. "Marjorie, I'll declare, you are as determined as an old fly. Just when you think it's gone, it comes back again buzzing around and bothering you. You must stop this. Catherine and I have much to do. We will all go soon.”

By the time we finally got to put on our scratchy, wool bathing suits and run, run as fast as we could to the lake, the struggle and the interminable wait to get there was forgotten- at least for the moment. The water was soft and cool. The gently sloping clear bottom allowed us to gradually wade in, deeper and deeper until we had to swim to stay afloat. Could anything be more wonderful than swimming in the lake? Could anything be as painful as having to leave it?

Although this was a daily routine throughout the summer, the experience was always fresh, always exhilarating. On the barefoot walk back up the hill with towels drawn over our wet bodies, we concentrated on not stepping on the prickly sandspurs, which could penetrate our feet. Overhead the blue jays and crows announced it was getting hot, hot, hot.

Ten summers later I took what was to be a final swim in the lake, just at sun up. The previous evening I had challenged a young man to the delightfully remembered early swim, suggesting boldly that we try to make it across the lake. I thought he too found the idea appealing.

For this swim I did not have to ask my mother. Cattie had married and moved to another town. I planned to leave my sister sleeping.

Next morning I arose with the same expectancy as in childhood and raced all the way down to the lake. I waited for the fun of his company in swimming. He never did appear. Later, he would explain that he hadn't thought I was serious.

For awhile, I was disappointed that my friend had not kept our date. At the same time, I loved the quiet of swimming all alone. Little was stirring, not even a mockingbird. I swam until cars and people began to move about on their way to work. I knew I should leave, but was as reluctant as ever to do so.

All at once I heard in my head Cattie's voice calling, “Marj'ri I don told you ten times to get out. Come on now, right now. You hear me? 

"Yes ma'am, I'm coming." When Cattie got that tone of voice I obeyed . Slowly I moved out of the water and walked up the bank.

I turned to look at the early sun on the water and with a cold shive, saw the long snout just at the top of the water. As I stood transfixed, the alligator opened and closed its long jaws. Then, silently it turned from the end of the wharf where a few minutes before I'd been swimming and lazily glided back to its murky home amidst the reeds.

Was this my imagination? I am not sure, but at the time through chattering teeth I whispered, "Thank you, Cattie, thank you."

FIVE MILES FROM ARGYLE

“Pack up your troubles in your old kit bag and smile, smile, smile,” Mamma and Daddy sang as our family began its customary Sunday afternoon ride in the Chevrolet. On this day in 1932 my mother, father, sister Chris and I were making a short drive out of town to visit two elderly ladies. Although Chris and I dreaded the visit, Daddy usually made the Sunday drive fun, and occasionally, something really special happened. 

The songs we sang on this early summer afternoon were not hymns or spirituals, or currently popular tunes; they were from World War I, which was still vivid in the memory of my parents. The patriotic war songs set off their reminiscences.

“Malcolm,” Mamma asked. "Did I tell you about the Army parade we saw marching down Fifth Avenue the summer of 1918 that Ethel, Jessiemae and I spent in New York City? Ethel kept thinking she saw her betrothed, Johnny, as the men marched to board their ship for Europe."

“Yes,” Daddy replied. “I recall how upset you said she was, but that didn't stop you girls from having a good time seeing Broadway shows, did it?* 

Many times I had looked at the picture postcards of New York in Mamma’s scrapbook and heard her tell of the bustling streets filled with people, streetcars, carriages and automobiles. As I was thinking about this, we passed the only car we'd seen since leaving town, heading east on the two-lane Highway 90, the Old Spanish Trail. De Funiak Springs was a small, quiet town, especially on Sundays. It certainly wasn't anything like New York.

My father turned to Mamma and asked if anybody at Columbia University had questioned her about where De Funiak Springs was.

Mamma told him she would explain that it was the cultural and educational center of the South with the Chautauqua, our colleges, and a beautiful lake in the center of the town

Said Daddy, "My answer every time some smart-aleck Navy boy at the Key-West base asked me with a sarcastic laugh where a town with such a funny name was located was to say, "Why, it's five miles from Argyle, a Tm sure you know where that is!’ Somewhere in their minds, they thought they should know Argyle. Likely didn't realize the Scots in Northwest Flonda had to name something for their ancestral land, everything else having an Indian name, except, of course, De Funiak Springs.”

We had driven past Magnolia Cemetery, and occasional houses on clearings among the long leaf pine trees. Now we were approaching Argyle, Daddy's birthplace. It didn't look to me like a place many people outside Walton County would know about. It was an almost deserted village since many people long ago had moved into town. My father's family had moved over thirty years ago, in 1900, from Argyle to De Funiak. Before that, they lived in the nearby Euchee Valley where the earliest Scottish pioneers to Northwest Florida (by way of North Carolina) had settled around 1820. By the latter part of the 19th century, most of their descendants had gradually moved to other parts of the county or to Argyle or to De Funiak Springs, upon completion of the railroad.

"Daddy, where did a name like De Funiak come from?" I asked. “Nobody here is named that."

My father loved to talk, so explaining how our town got its name pleased him. “Well, let’s see," he began. "Frederick De Funiak was an official with the Louisville and Nashville railroad and was very impressed with the beauty of our area. When the big boys from the railroad companv saw our sparkling, perfect circle of a lake and the surrounding beautiful land. they thought it would make a fine winter resort. So, they built a grand hotel close to the railroad station and began promoting the town, which they named Lake De Funiak.

"Don't forget the Chautauqua programs that lasted six to eight weeks) Mamma said.   Turning to us, she added, "You girls should know that De Funiak was selected as the site of the Southern Chautauqua like the original in New York State."

“Why was the name changed from Lake De Funiak to De Funiak Springs?” I asked.

"Because," Daddy replied, "people who'd seen really big lakes were afraid the visitors would say, ‘Oh, what a small lake’, There are deep springs in the center of our lake, so it was decided it would be better for people to say, ‘Oh, what large springs,’ than ‘What a small lake."

Asserting my loyalty, I proclaimed, "It's still a perfect lake, a perfect circle.”

“It is," Daddy affirmed as we turned off the main highway at Argyle onto an unpaved road which ran along the side of the railroad tracks. “Argyle may not have a lake or springs in the center of the place, but remember," my father said as he took on the oratorical style and gestures of a preacher or politician, “Argyle was where Malcolm A. Morrison was born!” He concluded with a flourish of his flat-topped straw hat, while looking at Mamma for the laugh he expected. Seeing her in a pretty summer dress, her dark hair not covered by a hat, but glistening in the sun, Daddy said in a soft voice, "I do not know how this string bean from Argyle ever won such a prize.”

Mamma, always embarrassed at compliments, didn't answer. She just smiled and looked around at my sister and me, so we wouldn't feel excluded.

We stopped at the home of the two spinster ladies who'd stayed in Argyle. I don't recall if they were distant relatives or just friends of my father's family, but this was a call we made on occasional Sunday afternoons. The house was closed tight, even on a hot summer day, and old, musty smells greeted us at the door. In addition, my sister and I were expected to sit quietly on the uncomfortable, Victorian horse-hair stuffed chairs in the parlor whule the grown-ups talked. Mostly the elderly ladies talked about their ailments and who had died. Daddy tried to turn the conversation to current events or politics, subjects that interested him, but Mamma was a patiently sympathetic listener as the ladies returned to what they wanted to discuss. Her kindness kept them talking.

After much squirming, Chris and I were allowed to go outdoors. As we left, Daddy surreptitiously took a Milky Way candy bar out of each coat pocket and slipped them to us. We had dutifully sipped the unpalatably warm lemonade and now thanked our hosts. 

Once away from the depressing dark house, we raced around the yard aimlessly for a few minutes before climbing a fig tree to enjoy our treat. The sturdy, low branches of the fig tree were just right for climbing or sitting. That is, until a person with sensitive skin rubbed against the leaves, which stung. I carefully tucked my dress under my legs and avoided the leaves. 

Chris happily ate all her candy bars while I ate just half of mine, saving the remainder for the long afternoon ahead. As I was wrapping bits of Paper around the candy, I looked up to see a Negro girl, about my age but taller, walking on the other side of the road next to the railroad tracks. She was wearing a thin, white dress, which looked like flour sack material, but made attractive by a tiny lace collar and a wide, blue taffeta sash. Her hair was braided in two strands, tied with blue ribbons, and she was swinging her shoes in one hand as she strode purposefully along. 

Chris and I scrambled down from the tree and ran eagerly to the picket fence to see her. We hoped she'd play with us and relieve t. monotony of this dead place.

"Hey," I called out to the girl.
“Hey, yourself," she answered, continuing to walk on.
"What's your name?” I tried again.
"Puddin ‘n tane. Ask me again and I'll tell you the same.”

Sensing how rebuffed we were at this reply, she stopped walking, looked directly at us and said, "My name's Rosalie.”

 ‘Tm Marjorie,” I answered, “this is my sister, Chris. She's six and two 'years younger than me.” 

“Where y'all from?” Rosalie asked. 

“We're from De Funiak Springs. Where do you live?" 

“Down the road apiece." 

“Where're you coming from?" my sister asked. 

"Qh, I been at church ALL day,” she answered in a complaining voice. “MY mamma finally said I could leave and go on home ‘cause I couldn't a still no longer.” 

“Can you come in the yard and play with us?"

“Uh, uh," Rosalie said, shaking her head so vigorously the pigtails flopped around her face.
“Why not?"
“Because I ain't goin' near them, crazy ladies."
“They're not crazy," I replied. "I think they're just old."

"No, they're plumb crazy. They wear them long black dresses like nobody wears anymore, and when I walk along here, one of them looks out through the curtains while the other one comes out on the porch and hollers for me to come feed the chickens. And, they ain't got no chickens. I know that for sure.“

“Maybe they're just lonesome," I said. "That's why Mamma said we were calling on them.”

Rosalie, feeling more comfortable with us, walked across the road to confide from the other side of the fence, "Maybe, but I ain't goin’ near them. They might put a hex on me."

"What's a hex?” we asked in unison.

“You know, like some people got the magic power, and if they don't like you, or they’re crazy, they can make bad things happen, like maybe even make you die.”

“Our grandmother died last winter," Chris blurted out.

“You think somebody put a hex on her?" Rosalie asked.

My sister began to back up, her eyes looking frightened as they did when Cattie told us ghost stories. I spoke up quickly in defense of my grandmother.

"I don't think so. She was a sweet lady. Everybody loved her."

Rosalie, not giving up on her own ideas, said, “Well, did you hear a rooster crow in the mght before she died?”

I shook my head.

"Likely you didn't hear it,” Rosalie said. “But, if a rooster crows when it's still dark, somebody's gonna die."

"Do you think there are ghosts in this house?" Chris whispered as she motioned to the house behind us.

“I ‘spect so," Rosalie answered positively. "Anyway, I ain't gonna go lookin,""

I began to squeeze the candy bar as Rosalie talked. Now I could feel the chocolate melting.

"y'all want to play walkin’ on the railroad tracks to see who can go the farthest without fallin’ off?" she asked.

"Cattie told us not to do that because a train could come along and run over us,” Chris said.

Rosalie was quick to refute that. "I don't know who Cattie is, but she don't know nuthin’ about trains. All you gotta do to find out if a train's comin’ is to put your ear down close to the track and you can hear if it's gettin’ close.”

"Cattie takes care of us," I explained.

"She a colored lady?" Rosalie asked and then, in a disparaging voice, added, "I bet she's black as coal."

I didn't understand why Rosalie spoke so scornfully of black skin. I'd never paid much attention before to shades of skin color, but now I looked closely at hers. Rosalie was a light brown. "Cattie's not black,” I answered. "She's chocolate colored like this candy." I opened my hand, which I noticed was pink, to show Rosalie, who looked eagerly at the candy.

"Cattie's pretty," my usually shy sister added. No one was going to say anything that sounded critical of her beloved Cattie.

We didn't understand that Rosalie was simply reflecting the attitude of Negro people of that time--that lighter skin color raised one's status.

I offered Rosalie the half-eaten candy bar. "You can have it. I don't want any more. Besides, it's gettin' all melted."

Rosalie took the candy, as I licked my chocolate-covered fingers. With one bite she finished it, murmuring, “Thank you."

“Come on,” Rosalie said to me, ignoring my sister.

As I opened the gate to follow our new friend, who was already across the road, Daddy came out on the porch and called to me, "Marjorie, where'ré you going?"

“Just over to the railroad tracks.”

‘Wait a minute. I'll go with you,” Daddy said, catching Chris by the hand as we ali ran to join Rosalie.

“Daddy, this is Rosalie. She can tell when a train's coming.”

“Hello, Rosalie. I bet I can too,” Daddy said.

Both of them knelt down, each putting an ear close to the track.

“What do you say, Rosalie? Is one coming?" Daddy asked.

"Sure is--likely a big freight.”

“How do you know that?" I asked.

"Easy," she said. “Passenger train's not due ‘til about dark, so this has got to be a freight.”

Daddy took out the gold watch his mother had given him and studied it. Then he said, “I figure it'll be by here in about five minutes, don't you, Rosalie?

As he snapped shut the watch case, Rosalie nodded in agreement, her ear still to the track measuring the sound..

“Marjorie, go ahead and listen. You can hear it."

“I hear it,” I shouted as if I were the first person ever to make such a discovery.

"Y'all better step back now,” Rosalie ordered with the authority my father had accorded her. “And remember to keep your eyes sorta closed when the engine goes by so you won't get a cinder in your eye. That really hurts."

My sister had already run back to the yard and was swinging on the gate while Daddy, Rosalie, and I stood looking up and down the tracks.

“Rosalie,” Daddy asked, "what's your last name?"

“Campbell,” she replied.

"Are you Ezekiel Campbell's daughter?"

"Yes, sir."

“I heard he fought in France in the War--gallantly, I'm sure.”

"Yes, sir, he did. He got some medals, but we don't ever get to Armistice celebration in De Funiak."

"Why not?” I asked. Armistice Day was a major holiday in our town with all-day events and excitement. I couldn't imagine anyone's missing it. ‘My daddy says as long as some white people don't want colored veterans marching in the parade, we ain't going near it,” Rosalie said to daddy, Standing up straight as she looked into Daddy's eyes.

My father was quiet, a frown on his face. I knew how he felt about fairness, and this didn't sound fair to me.

"It's not right, Rosalie...for men to fight in a foreign country, the world safe for democracy, and come home to..." his voice trailed a long sigh. “I don't have much pull with the American Legion boys since I'm not even a member, though I did serve in the Navy." Rosalie was lo him closely. Daddy was searching for some way to ease this little girl's discomfort, or perhaps that of all of us, with some kind of plausible explanation. He said, "Maybe there just aren't enough Negro doughboys in the county to make up a marching unit."

“I don't know,” Rosalie replied in a sad voice, "but I guess we'll never: get to see the parade.”

Changing the subject, Daddy asked, "What's your father doing these days? We played together when we were boys roaming these beautiful woods all the way to Eucheeanna."

“He was working at the turpentine still in Caryville, but that closed down. He says there ain't many jobs anywhere." "Times are really hard now. This Depression has put a lot of people out of work." 

"Oh, he stays busy. He says you can't be idle." Rosalie wanted us to know. 

“He goes huntin’ and fishin’, he says, so we can eat. And we keep chickens and a garden. My father says he has good land. My mother likes flowers, but mostly we grow corn, greens, string beans and tomatoes."

 "Your father's a good man, Rosalie. Tell Zeke that Malcolm sends his regards." 

"Yes, sir, I'll tell him." 

While Daddy and Rosalie talked, we all kept our eyes on the railroad tracks.  "Here it comes,” Rosalie and I shouted together, jumping up and down as we saw the single powerful light and smoke way down the straigh tracks, We could also feel the earth begin to shake as the powerful steam engine came closer and closer.

The engineer saw us too for he began to blow the whistle, not just with a single long blast, but as if it were a musical instrument.

Daddy took Rosalie's hand and my hand and we backed up almost to the road. When the engine roared past us, we forgot about cinders and waved and shouted greetings to the engineer. He waved back and tipped his cap. Too soon he and the engine were gone followed by a long line of different kinds of freight cars, which grew ever more quiet until the caboose sounded insignificant. We got a final wave from a man riding it. His was not nearly as enthusiastic a wave as the engineer's. I decided he was not having as much fun as the engineer. But Rosalie and I waved back furiously anyway.

“They'll be in De Funiak in a few minutes," Daddy said.

“Takes me longer'n that to get to town," Rosalie said wistfully.

"Do you walk down the tracks, Rosalie? That's what I sometimes did when I lived in Argyle."

"Yes, sir, but I don't get there much. One time though my mother's brother came to see us in a car from Atlanta and we rode to De Funiak," she told us with pride. “Argyle's about five miles from De Funiak."

“No, Rosalie," Daddy said. "You must remember that De Funiak is five miles from ARGYLE."

Rosalie laughed and nodded in agreement, as I tried to figure out the difference. Matter of fact, I thought about that a long time. I decided Rosalie must be smarter than I was. By the time we took our eyes off the disappearing train and turned towards the house, Mamma was walking towards the gate. Rosalie turned just in time to see Miss Maggie and Miss Mary step onto the porch.

“Oh, oh," she said, "I gotta be going."

“Rosalie, wait," I called to the swiftly running figure. "You forgot your shoes."

Without changing her graceful stride, Rosalie turned, circled around, scooped up her shoes and continued her pace. As she went past my father, she gave him a broad smile and called out happily over her shoulder, “Remember, De Funiak is five miles from ARGYLE."

THE DAY THE YANKEES COME

When I was a child in the early thirties, my father would regularly drive my mother, sister and me thirteen miles into the country to Eucheeanna to visit our ancestral Presbyterian Church (founded in 1828), its graveyard of Scottish settlers and to see the childhod home of his mother. The Euchee Valley, original home of the Euchee Indians with whom the Scots shared the land and lived in peace for decades, is located in Northwest Florida in that portion of the state which is directly south of Alabama and southwest of Georgia.

The old house had been vacant for nearly ten years when I first saw it. All the furnishings had been divided among the heirs, except for those in the parlor. The parlor remained exactly as it had been when as a child my father visited his grandmother. My great aunt Julia, the youngest and only surviving descendant of the house's owner, was for years unwilling to sell the place. It was also because of Aunt Julia that the parlor remained intact.

We approached this large, two-story, frame house with awe, as my father began to tell us stories of its history. The barely. visible remnants of fading white paint revealed that the life the house had once known was gone.

The center of the house was a wide, open downstairs hallway, perhaps twelve feet across, which ran the full length of the house. On one side of the hall was the parlor. Two pieces of furniture dominated the room: a beautiful Square rosewood piano, and, in the center of the room, a marble topped table with the family Bible. Tables and chairs were arranged as if waiting for people to engage in conversation or listen to music.

Behind the parlor was a bedroom, which my father told us was always kept ready for the visiting Presbyterian minister. When we viewed the room it was used as a store room. There, for the first time, I saw spinning Wheels, | small footstools, old lamps and other outmoded items.

On the other side of the downstairs hall were two bedrooms and behind those the dining room and a section of the kitchen, where a large wooden stove was used in more recent times. The main kitchen, where foog was originally prepared, was just behind this and separated from the house Its most amazing feature to us children was a huge, deep open fireplace with q few large remaining skillets, pans and heavy tools for cooking and for managing the fire.

On the second floor of the house were four additional bedrooms. As we climbed the stairs, I could imagine all the times my grandmother, her brothers and sisters, and then their children had run up those stairs.

Behind the house, one could see foundations of the small houses once occupied by the domestic and farm workers, originally brought in as slaves. My great grandfather, Giles Bowers, had changed their status before the Emancipation Proclamation. However, most African-Americans remained right there until separated and scattered by the Civil War.

My father showed us the remnants of the house in which Ellen had been born to slave parents. We knew Ellen, who now lived in De Funiak Springs with Aunt Julia, and was a much loved part of the family. We regularly visited Aunt Julia and Ellen, who lived to her ninety-fifth year.

From Ellen, my father, his brothers and sisters and later I in my youth heard stories of the early days. I heard the stories both from Ellen and then repeated by Aunt Bern, my father's sister.

Ellen's most dramatic story was "The Day the Yankees Come". Sitting by a bedroom fireplace this frail-
looking, very old woman with very black skin would begin the story staring straight into the fire. Her voice, quiet but strong, became animated as she relived the events. Her speech was that of many 1860s African-Americans in the South. And, like some other ethnic groups transplanted and separated from their native languages, the letter "a was used instead of “th” at the beginning of a word. When Ellen paused fort emphasis or recall, she'd pull deeply on the small pipe which she smoked. 

“Well, let's see," she began. “You chillun don’ know nuthin’ 'bout dem days when the Yankees come. Ump, ump, ump," she said, shaking her head, her face showing the distress. “Honey, dat was a hard time.”

Looking up, she clarified. "This story ‘bout yore great granpa and granma, but I calls ‘em Granpa and Granma same as I did for yore Daddy and Aunt Bernice. Now here's de way it was."

"One mawnin’ my mammy say a man come on a horse hollerin' dat de Yankees was comin’. He don' stop. He jus' keep goin’ and hollerin’. Everybody scared nigh to death. Yore granpa say he don’ know what's gon’ happen."

"Granma quick as can be she ran and got de meal, just back from de mill, and sewed it up in an ol' mattress she figured no Yankee gon want. Den, she took de good dishes and sunk ‘em right down in de buckets we use to feed de pigs. She gave a handful of silver spoons to my mammy to quicklike hide in her house. Dat was all dey had time for. In no time a’'tall here come de Yankees."

"Fore you know it dey's all over de place. One big man, a cap'n or gen‘ul, he walk about talkin’ loud and big. He say dey gon' take over dis place. Den, he tell dem men what was with him to go to the fields and gather everything. Get all de cattle, and sheep and pigs and chickens. Don't leave nuthin’. Den, he say to other men to take Granpa and put him in de jail with de other white folks men who was left to take care of de women and chillun. All dem Yankees work fast, honey, and dey make our kind help ‘em."

“One mawnin', dey ups and gits ready to leave. Dey bring Granpa from de jail and say dey gon’ take him off to jail far away. My mammy say everybody begin to cry. Dey don’ want Granpa to leave us. Lord, ‘a mercy, honey, dem Yankees say to all our kind, 'Hitch up dem horses and de wagons and de buggies and git yoselfs ready. Y'alls gonna go north too."

“De Yankees took everything cep'n scraps, but dey never find de meal Or dishes or silver spoons what Granma and my mammy hid. Dey took all Our kind cep'n de ones what was sickly an’ ailin'. My mammy not well, so dey leaves me and my mammy an’ de udder chillun."

While Ellen paused to look into the fire, remembering this troubling time, we waited quietly. Finally, I broke the spell. "Ellen, Aunt Bern told us her grandmother, Granma, was very brave and didn't cry. She just walked up to the man in charge and asked him to please leave one horse so she could work the fields to provide food for the children."

“Dat's right. She did, but dat man don’ pay her no mind. He jes’ say bossy-like to dem mens, 'Do as I say, git goin’.’ But another man what was standin’ close by, he say quiet-like to de man holdin’ ol’ Vixen, ‘Tie dat hoss to dat post and leave her.’ Pore ol’ Vixen ‘bout ready to die anyway, but Granma glad to have her."

"Oh, honey, Granma she work and work so hard. How she manage nobody never knows. She took ol’ Vixen and de half grown chillun and she plow and hoe and work from dawn till late sundown. She allus the last to leave de field and den she help my mammy fix for us to eat. None of y‘all can know what we all went through."

Ellen again lapsed into silence, staring into the fire. My sister spoke up and asked, “Tell us about what happened when the War ended.”

"Well, one day we hear dat ol' war was over. We knowed our folks not all gon’ come back. Dey never could,” Ellen added sadly and I wondered if she was thinking of her own father. She sighed and con mued, “But Granpa he come back from dat ol' jail up North. I don know how he done it, but he did.”

"Ellen, didn't one of the men from Eucheeanna die in prison?" I asked.

"Oh, yes, honey, old Mr. Mac wut lived over the hill. Granpa say Mr. Mac died right dere beside him in dat jail, grievin' for his folks he had to leave here. I ‘spect too dey never had enuff to eat cause Granpa looked mighty thin.”

"Then what happened?" my sister asked.

“Well, Granpa and Granma went on workin’. Dey never rest. Dey work from ‘fore day 'til no light left. Course, you know, dem crops never come up like before. Nothin’ was like before, but dey manage."

“Pretty soon, dey send yore Aunt Lally off to school in Georgia. Lally say she gon’ be a teacher and teach all us, white chillun and us, to read. And shore ‘nuff, she did. Least she tried. Some of our kind jus' don’ pay her no mind, but Lally, she don let any of de young ‘uns in de Valley quit. She say dey can read and she gon’ make sure dey do.”

Looking to us to emphasize the point, Ellen said, "Y'all remember, yor Aunt Lally was somethin’,

After a pause, Ellen went on with her story. "When my mammy died, Granma puts me to sleep in a room right next to hers, an' I been close by ever since. Now it's yore Aunt Julia I tries to look after, but," Ellen stopped to laugh a small, cackling sound, "I guess you could say since Julia's young’n me she's takin’ care of me. You see, I was dere, ‘bout eight or nine years old when de Yankees come, but Julia weren't even born yet."

Turning to us, she said, "Bout time y'all went home. I hear yore daddy sayin’ 'Good-night' to Julia and fixin' to leave."

“Yes, ma'am," I said as I reluctantly got up. "“Good-night, Ellen.”

"Good-night, chile. Don’ forget to say yore prayers.”

"Yes'm, we will," my sister and I promised in unison.

Ellen had once again told the story to yet another generation of children. To her the events were as vivid as if they'd just oc urred. To the listeners it would never be forgotten.