Person Page - 469

Among the first unexpected guests of my early home life on the Jackson Hill was an urgent call from Elizabethtown, Hamilton Co., OH. "Come over and get us." This was my first meeting with Bertha Belle Miller Guard (b.1869), Eva Mae Miller DeHart (b.1874), and Lou Ella Miller Irvin (b.1879) and their children. Ruth Alma Guard (b.1898) was a very pretty young teenager, too fat to run; then the two Irvin girls: Dorthy Bell (b.1903), perhaps also a little too plump, a blond; and her sister, Gladys (b.1899), an exceedingly lovely vivacious brunette; then the son Lowell M. (b.1899) of Eva and Allen DeHart (b.1870), a young slender lad. He and Gladys led in the race and these lively youngsters romped and played around and around the big house which today we know as the "House on the Hill."
     The fun began because there were too many for the spring wagon. The young man of the house met the situation by hitching the farm team to the hay wagon with a generous supply of hay to make it comfortable.
     Floyd Stanley Jackson (b.1881) started to E-Town in high glee to pick up his beloved cousins, the children of Father Jackson’s (John Harrison Jackson b. 1854) oldest sister, Margaret E. Jackson Miller (1843-1882). This was the first and only time I ever saw Bertha Miller Guard as she died early in her married life, as did her sister, Goldie Miller Sanders (1871-1903), mother of Vena Sanders Brown. How did I get onto this gloomy side of the picture? For this was indeed a happy party.
     It did not take a nice car or a fine home to have fun. I don’t know what I cooked, but I remember I did freeze ice cream and had the big table set; a little black cook stove, a big wooden box for a table or a large cabinet a very large one; I expect 4 X 6 with an oil cloth on top and I had to almost crawl inside to reach things to cook in, a curtain tacked across the front and the floors were covered with rag carpets.
     Another of my very early getting acquainted with my new relatives was in the fall of 1908 - the evening Mabel Grubbs and John Liddle were to be married. Mabel was very very dear to me. She was like a doll; the little sister of my very dearest school mate and seat mate and I had been in their home so much during our school days. Then in 1899, when Stella Grubbs was eighteen years old, “Angie” the lovely mother, was taken by death.
     Word had come that Aunt Mary Isabell Jackson James (b.1851) and Uncle Charlie W. James from Jacksonville, Morgan Co., IL. were coming to visit us on the noon train. I was very upset. I wanted so much to go to Mabel’s "Chivalry." Father, John Harrison Jackson, came home with empty seats, his sister and husband were not on the train; I was hilariously happy. There was another train at the Lawrenceburg Junction at 4 o’clock and Father had gone to meet that. I was sitting on the step where I could see the gate which led from the last bend of the road and turned into the yard. I was putting on my Sunday stockings which were neither silk or rayon and my Sunday shoes. Even with all my wistful thinking, I kept my eyes on the winding road and this time the seats were filled; really filled! Aunt Mary was large, I expect 200 lbs., but Uncle Charlie James weighed between 400 and 500 lbs.
     Nora Jackson never really swore. I did, however, say "gog-on-it" but I loved Aunt Mary, she was understanding. That word can mean so much, especially to a young wife who had come into a home where there was so much work. (During my young life on a farm I never did understand why my mother had to work all day. I would say, "Can’t you take the afternoon off?" but the most I remember, my Mother would wash her face, comb her hair smoothly back, put on a light clean wrapper, and lie down on the simple lounge for fifteen minutes.)
     To get back to my story, I will mention three things: Father, Aunt Mary, Uncle Charlie and myself, went to a funeral at Bright (I don’t remember whose). Father drove with the whip in his hands, and except for up and down the hills, the horses were kept trotting. Aunt Mary said “that is exactly like my father, the horses never dared walk; he was always in a hurry.” We did not tarry after the services. Dear Aunt Mary said, “I can see how much work you have waiting to be done at home.” Then the rest of the day she spent with me. After changing our Sunday best to a house dress, she followed me to the cellar where she chatted while I worked and patted the butter milk out and smoothed the sweet delicious butter. Then at supper, she bragged about my pumpkin pies; she always thought pumpkin had to be cooked hours. She said “Now Charlie, this pumpkin Nora didn’t cook very long at all and these pies are so good.” Now do you see why I loved Aunt Mary James? She too was a very pretty woman. Uncle Charlie would walk up and down the road fast just for exercise, and they broke the bed down. After all, there was over 600 lbs. of them to like or dislike and I liked them or her. I should say very very much They had two sons, Clifford (b.1875) and Loyd N. Jackson (b.1874).
     As I reminisce, I recall Aunt Nancy E. Jackson Rowe (1844-1911). I too saw her only once. She came to our wedding on September 5, 1906. I really saw her to remember at the breakfast table at my husband’s home on September 7th. I felt rather shy of her. She was not pretty like plump Aunt Mary; she was tall and proud, rather haughty, much given to boast. She married William H. Rowe, who was raised by the Blasdel family in the New Alaces community. They went to Jacksonville, Morgan Co., IL. to live and they had only one son, Charlie. Uncle Will became quite wealthy for that day. Charlie Rowe (1866-1928) never married. He was worth $160,000 when he died in 1928. Our grandfather clock came from his estate.⁴

Predeceased: Isabel Junop and Delbert Luloff.¹