Nancy's Story
By Nancy Mary Belt Vincent
I was born in my parents' bed in Silsbee Texas on July 25th,
1923. I was named Nancy Mary for my Daddy's dear only sister
Nancy Mary, nicknamed Nannie Mae by her brothers. Morris was
named Morris Edward for my daddy and Mr. Edward North Taylor,
Mother's daddy. Lucie was named for Mother's step-mother Lucie,
our Grandmother Taylor. Betty Anne was named for our other
grandmother. When the twins were born mother "honored"
our neighbors Letha Smith and Alice Marshall, naming the new
babies Letha Linda and Alice Glenda.
Our toys were simple, propelled by imagination: Blocks of
scrap wood became cars and we built roads and bridges for
them in the cool sand under the house which was built up on
piers. Daddy got tired of emptying out the melted ice from
our ice box, so he drilled a hole in the floor to let the
water drain out on its own. This made a perfect waterfall
and river for our imaginary towns under the house.
Daddy
Daddy was a "firemen" for the Santa Fe Railroad
(and later promoted to engineer), His job was stoking the
burning boiler to provide steam to move the train. When I
was 2, Daddy's train derailed and the boiler burst. He pushed
the engineer out first to safety and then he leapt himself,
but it was too late. He was scalded by the steam over 80%
of his body.
After Daddy's accident, he was in the Santa Fe in Temple for
months.
Mother went faithfully every weekend to visit Daddy, having
to rent a room.
My daddy's brother Uncle Bear also worked at the railroad.
Uncle Bear would
"pass the hat" at the roundhouse and then come over
to our house bring the
money he collected to Mother. He would hug Mother and she
would cry and cry.
A few years later the leg became infected. Mother always washed
Daddy's
denim overalls that he wore to work several times before he
wore them to rinse out the indigo dye. But one time, he put
on a pair of overalls by mistake which had not
been washed yet. The dye in them penetrated the old burn wound
on his leg and
infected it.The wound kept getting worse and worse. Daddy
was in and out of
the Santa Fe Hospital in Temple for months. The doctors were
grimly planning to
amputate his leg. But Daddy told the doctors that he had six
kids to feed and
"a one-legged man couldn't get a job." He fought
to keep his leg for his family.
His recovery was slow but he went back to work.
Later on, when Daddy went back to work, he also worked on
the "extra board" The men all "bid' for the
extra hours and whoever was most senior got the work.
We had a "charge" at Collier's Mercantile. That
store had everything,
from rat traps and cloth, groceries and milk, to hardware
and nails, everything!
…….that's how we survived those hard times.
Our House
Morris had his own room, an enclosed porch behind the girls'
room. After we were all in bed, Morris would climb through
the window and we would visit and play games, all in whispers.
We always got in trouble if Mother caught us playing instead
of sleeping.
In the corner of the dining room was a pot-bellied stove.
Morris would start the fire every morning so we could stand
by it to be warm, all hovering around it. We girls all dressed
in front of the stove, shivering. There was no modesty, but
we all looked alike and had the same thing. Morris dressed
in his room.
There was a kerosene stove that warmed the front room.
The sleeping porch where the girls all slept, two to a bed,
was glassed in. In winter, oh, it was like the North Pole!
Mother would heat bricks on the pot-bellied stove and put
them at the foot of our beds so we'd be warm.
When the twins were born, they were so tiny that Mother took
my and
Lucie's doll beds and placed one on each side of the stove.
It was February when the were born and that's where the twins
slept for a long time.
My Brother Morris
Morris was just awful! Being the firstborn and the only boy,
he got everything, and then would immediately proceed to take
it apart. We all wanted a bicycle. Daddy said he would buy
one for Morris and "if he takes care of it, I'll get
one for the girls."
Well, Daddy bought Morris a bicycle and he took the wheels
off it the same day and couldn't get them back on. So we girls
never did get a bicycle.
Morris was so overbearing, and Lucie was his partner in everything.
Morris had a grand idea to build a trolley from the roof of
the garage to the outhouse (in back and on the other side
of the house.) He got it all fixed and ready and decided that
Lucie should try it out first. She got on and glided smoothly
down to the outhouse just fine. Assured that the contraption
was sturdy, Morris climbed up on the garage and jumped off
the roof onto the trolley. But being bigger and heavier than
Lucie, Morris pulled over the entire outhouse, leaving three
piles of sh__ in the open air.
Another grand scheme of Morris' also had an effect on the
outhouse. Our outhouse was a "3-holer" with two
large holes on each end to accommodate adult sized bottoms
and a smaller hole in the middle for the "tiney hineys."
Well, Morris had the idea that he would raise white mice to
sell to the medical labs in Galveston and make a tidy profit.
But he needed a place to keep the mice. He decided to keep
them in the outhouse. Every time we had to "go",
we had to count to make sure all the mice were accounted for
before we closed the lid Morris was the only boy, of course,
and Daddy's pride and joy. Daddy wanted Morris to be a professional
violinist…….that never happened.
Morris was big, stronger and faster than any of us. So if
I was mad and wanted to hit him, I figured I would have to
throw something at him to get a head start on running away.
One Sunday morning he did something and I was really mad and
threw a shoe at him. But he ducked and the shoe hit Betty
Anne and knocked her cold out!
But she was revived and we all still went on to Sunday School
anyway.
Another time Betty Anne got kicked by a horse, or a swing,
I don't remember. But she was paralyzed and walked with a
limp for a while.
School
Every year when school started, we'd all come down with impetigo.
Mother said it was on the schoolbooks. I had athlete's foot
too, supposedly from walking barefoot in the barn. Mother
smeared my foot with sulphur and lard, put a handkerchief
over it and tied it with string. That was "doctoring."
Every day, mother cooked a pot of beans and a pan of cornbread
for lunch, loaded it into the old blue Chevrolet and brought
it to us at school. As each of us kids had our lunch period,
we'd go out to the car for a hot meal with Mother. Wow!
We always walked to school, taking a short cut through the
old baseball park. Mother made us girls all wear long ribbed
stockings to keep our legs warm. There were an awful greenish-brown
color and held up with supporters. I hated those stockings!
As we passed the ball park, I pulled out some loose boards
in the fence, pulled off those stockings and stuffed them
in the fence. Then I'd come back by there after school and
put 'em back on……..I wonder if Mother ever knew
that Daddy and Mother wanted their children to learn as much
as possible, including every lesson they could arrange. Daddy
was working the switch engine between Silsbee and Beaumont
then. One of his passengers was Miss Margaret Herle, a dancing
teacher. Daddy told her "My wife plays the piano."
(He really promoted Mother's talents) Eventually Daddy talked
Miss Herle into coming to Silsbee to give dancing lessons,
bartering Mother's talent and our front room in exchange for
dancing lessons for all five sisters. Lucie hated the lessons
and Betty Anne got sick.
So eventually the twins and I were the only dancers of the
family.
I dreamed fervently of going to New York city and being a
Rockette at the Radio city Music Hall, performing those same
high kicks I had seen in the movies.
Almost the only heat we had in the house came from an iron
stove we had in the
dining room. When one of us was scheduled "to practice
" the piano or study, we got to be in the warm room.
Aunt Emily worked at Mr.Million's "five and dime"
store. We called it Aunt Emily's store. On paydays, twice
a month, Daddy gave each of us 10 cents, Aunt Emily (Uncle
Bear's wife) was a clerk at Mr. Million's Five and Dime. On
payday, Daddy would give each of us 10 cents and we all went
shrieking running down the dirt road to Mr.Million's glass
candy counter. It was about 6 feet long, old oak and shiny
glass……….huge and bursting with sugary bounty
for us kids. Aunt Emily saw to it that we got good measure
for the sweaty dimes in our fists, she packed our bags full
of stick candy and peppermint patties and jelly beans. I gobbled
all my candy up on the spot. But that danged Lucie Jean! She
would eat one pice and hide the rest in her drawer, then draw
it out later, one tiny piece at a time, licked it and sucked
on it but never chewed it up, just re-wrapped it in its own
paper to enjoy later. Lucie was always a saver!
Cousins, Neighbors, and Friends
Across the street from us was the Marshalls' house. They had
seven kids. Some had already married and moved off. But Zenota
Marshall was my age. Zenota was very pretty, with beautiful
black eyes. But she was a snot too, and very feisty. We invariably
ended up in a fight and I'd come home crying. So Daddy told
me to fight back….or else! So the next time, I had Zenota
down in the ditch banging her head and pulling her hair.
Charlsie Vandenburg…..her mother had died…and they
had a housekeeper. She
real short dresses, so short her butt showed. Mother made
all our dresses. They were pretty but they came down to our
knees. Our cousin Emma Jo was an only child but would buy
enough material to make two dresses and bring it to Mother.
Momma sewed two dresses, one for Emma Jo and one for one of
us. That's how we got new dresses.
I loved our Easter dresses, all organdy and ruffles. But it
never failed that
there would come a cold snap and we'd have to wear our old
winter coat over those
pretty dresses. We'd get up early and hunt Easter eggs, then
dress and walk to church.
On the way home, as soon as we were out of sight of the church,
we'd pull off our shoes and socks and walk the rest of the
way home barefooted.
Mother was so faithful. She got up in time to get six kids
ready for church and be on time! And we'd be back in the evening
for BYTU (Baptist Youth Training Union.)
Daddy never went to church (maybe once) because he had to
work so hard and had to get sleep. Uncle Bear didn't go. Mr.Marshall
was always drunk so could never have even found the church.
Daddy worked fairly regular. Uncle Bear was on the "extra
board." Daddy got promoted from fireman to engineer.
(Uncle Bear was still a fireman.) Emma Jo married Leon Ashworth
and they moved to Houston. She had two boys, Bill and David
who was a Mongoloid. But he lived a long time because she
took such good care of him.
Mother had such a good heart. She was always sharing. When
she baked cookies or a cake, she always baked an extra batch
and took it to Aunt Letha (Smith).
Grandma Smith had the only phone in the area and let us all
use it if we needed to. One night I remember Mother was in
her bed and there was blood everywhere. Daddy told me to run
as fast as I could down to Ma Smith's house and call the doctor.
I didn't know what a miscarriage was. All I knew was there
was a lot of blood and I really thought she was going to die.
That's when I gave my heart to Jesus. I ran down the street
in the dark, crying and praying, "God please don't let
my Momma die. Please don't let my Momma die. Just let her
be well and I will serve you the rest of my life." And
that is what I have tried to do ever since.
Patsy Ann
At Christmas time the merchants of Silsbee placed a beautiful
doll in the drug store window. The Ladies Auxiliary all sewed
clothes for the doll, which would later be raffled.
I looked and looked at that doll but knew we could never afford
buying something like that so I never mentioned it to anyone.
But somehow the ladies saw to it that I won the doll, my Patsy
Ann. I still have her today.
The Twins
When the twins were born, the soft spot in Alice's head didn't
close
properly and she required surgery and Mother left again for
Temple.
I was sent to stay with Aunt Letha and had responsibility
for Letha Linda,
changing her diapers, feeding her, "minding" her.
I was the oldest daughter so a lot was expected of me. I sewed
clothes for the twins, from underwear to dresses, made from
cotton feed sacks sewn on the old treadle sewing machine.
Morris said he was tired of being the only boy, and when he
learned that a new baby was coming, he said it had better
be a boy this time, or else! Imagine his frustration when
he found out that there was not one more girl, but two! He
promptly "ran away" but Momma wisely said, "Don't
worry. He'll be home by suppertime."
And he was.
When the twins were born, the soft spot in Alice's head didn't
close properly. and she required surgery and Mother left again
for Temple. I was sent to stay with Aunt Letha and had responsibility
for Letha Linda, changing her diapers, feeding her, "minding"
her. I was the oldest daughter so a lot was expected of me.
I sewed clothes for the twins, from underwear to dresses,
from cotton feed sacks on the old treadle sewing machine.
Music and Dancing Lessons
Daddy and Mother both wanted their children to learn as much
as possible including every lesson they could arrange. Daddy
was working the switch engine between Beaumont and Silsbee
then. One of his passengers was Miss Margaret Herle, a dancing
teacher. Daddy told her "My wife plays the piano."
(He really "promoted" Mother's talents.) Eventually
Daddy talked Miss Herle into coming to Silsbee to give dancing
lessons, bargaining Mother's talent and our front room in
exchange for lessons for us five sisters. Lucie hated the
lessons and Betty got ill*. So eventually the twins and I
were the only dancers of the family.
I dreamed fervently going to New York and being a Rockette
at the Radio City Music Hall, performing perfectly the precision
high kicks I had seen in the movies.
Other than the pot-bellied stove in the dining room, the only
heat in the house came from a kerosene stove in the front
room where the piano was. When one of us was scheduled "to
practice" the piano or study, we got to be in the warm
room…sufficient motivation for a lot of practicing.
I liked to study and truly desired to excel in school. I wanted
my parents to be proud of me. Mother taught me to read music
and pick out notes on the old upright piano. I also played
"at" the saxophone and the violin.
Morris was the only boy of course and the first born…Daddy's
pride and joy. Daddy wanted Morris to be a professional violinist
but it never happened.
We had a big family and a crippled father, but we had the
best life ever possible.
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