Mother & Daughter...

And Choices…

Hazel Gaddy Powell was born 1921, the firstborn child of a farmer, Houston Gaddy and a homemaker, Irene Thomas Gaddy.  Patsy Powell Poor was born 1938, the firstborn child of a farmer, Willis Powell and a homemaker, Hazel Gaddy Powell.  Soon after starting a family, Houston Gaddy left farming behind to become a merchant, first owning an auto repair shop and later, in secession, several small grocery stores in rural communities.  Willis Powell worked at numerous outside occupations throughout his life, but always owned a farm and remained, at heart, a farmer.  Neither Hazel nor her mother ever worked at a paying job outside the home.  Patsy, however, was mostly the sole support of herself and her family almost her entire life.

While growing up in Denver, Arkansas, the daughter of a local store owner, Hazel Gaddy had a life seemly free of hardship.  Her father provided the family with a good home, nice clothes, and financial security. She did however have a hard time with her school work. She was required to do much of the housework at her childhood home.  I am not sure when Momma and Daddy started seeing each other, but I think it was likely when she was 15 years old in 1936. From her early photos, we know she was a beautiful young girl.  From his stories, we know Daddy was a renegade.  I do not think her parents considered Daddy a good choice for their daughter. She said that their ‘dating’ consisted of meeting at school and church activities. It was about 5 miles from where Daddy lived in the Sunny Lane community to Denver.  He likely rode a horse when he went courting.  She was a young 15, Daddy was an old 21. 

On May 16, 1937, with their friends, Rex and Lovetta Robertson as witnesses, they were married in the middle of a county road by Uncle Jesse Powell, a Baptist Minister.  Their families did not know they were going to get married this day.  Mama said she had a nice dress to ware, but Daddy brought along in a paper sack a dress he had purchased and wanted her to ware.  It was wrinkled from being carried in the bag, but as always afterwards, she did what he wanted.  I think the dress was blue, but am not sure of the color. [Betty remembers the dress Daddy bought was powder blue.  The one Momma had was brown.]

For a short time after they married, Momma and Daddy lived close to  his parents in a house they shared with his brother and sister-in-law, Truman and Frances Powell.  This arrangement resulted in family squabbles and did not last long.  Daddy then rented a farm in the Parker community and farmed on shares with the farm owner.  The name of the owner of this farm is locked in the back of my brain at this moment and will not come forward.  In later years, my brother Richard and his family lived on this farm for many years when he worked for Billy Eldridge.  The picture of Daddy, Momma and Pasty sitting on the rock wall was taken at this first farm.

Richard, the second child and first son, was born in October of 1940, I think on the Parker farm, but I’m not sure.  No one is alive to ask. [Betty has corrected this date.  Richard was born in October, 1939]

About 1941, Daddy purchased a farm near Carrollton, Arkansas.  This farm was one his Grandfather, Richard Powell, had owned years before.  His grandfather, a farmer/carpenter built the house Momma and Daddy lived in here. [Betty says Daddy bought the farm 'on time' from his Aunt Tee Collier and just let it go back.]

On December 8, 1941, one day after the attack on Pearl Harbor, the US officially entered WWII. The way I understand it, Daddy worried constantly about being drafted into the service. From November, 1942 through April, 1943 he worked in the shipyards in Richmond, California near where his sister Betty Knight lived.  In February, 1944, he volunteered to enter the Navy.  The Carrollton farm was let go, and he was inducted on April, 04, 1944 as an Apprentice Seaman.  He was in San Diego on April 8.  On or about June 10, he boarded a ship bound for the Pacific Theater. 

Sometime between April and June, our pregnant mother and her two children boarded a train in route to join Daddy in California.  Momma was intercepted at the train station in Kansas City by her sister Helen with the news that Daddy had called and was being shipped out.  Momma returned home to a little house in Denver, behind her father’s auto repair shop/grocery store.  Momma was 6 months pregnant with Clayton by this time.

Although she lived within a few steps of her mother at this, by the time school started in 1944 she went to stay with Daddy’s parents in the Sunny Lane community.  Either Daddy did not trust her parents to take care of her while expecting a child, or they were not willing to care for Patsy and Richard. Anyway, for whatever reason, when school started in the fall of 1944 Momma, Patsy and Richard were living in with Grandpa and Grandma Powell at their home.

At 6 years of age, Patsy had to start her first year of school in a strange new place instead of with the friends she knew at Denver.  Plus, she had to walk about a mile through farmers fields to this school.  I have heard her tell many times about Grandpa Powell walking with her that first day and blazing her a trail by cutting marks on the bushes along the way. No road, just a path blazed by her loving Grandfather.  She told of bringing home books to read to Grandpa.  He was always reading books, so she was thrilled to have books of her own to share with him. She could tell by his attitude that he loved reading her books aloud to her. 

After Clayton was born in September, 1944, Momma, Patsy and Richard moved back to the little house behind Grandpa’s store in Denver. 

On February 11, 1945, Daddy crossed the international date line on a battleship in route to the little island of Iwo Jima one thousand miles off the coast of Japan.  He participated in the invasion of that island on March 3.  I do not know when he actually went ashore, but he said each man was assigned to a landing craft. Each craft had a number.  When your landing craft’s number was called, you went ashore. He remained on Iwo Jima for the remainder of the war. He was discharged on October 15, 1945, serving 1 year, 6 months, and 12 days.  He counted every day.

He said he was discharged at Little Rock.  The government would send him on to Denver on a bus or train, but he would have had to wait another day.  Instead he sat out afoot and was home before his ride left Little Rock. Soldiers in uniform had no problem hitching rides at that time.

Less than a year after Daddy got home, he bought a 100+ acre farm on Dry Creek, not far from where he grew up. Until this time the family had gone through some rough times financially, but I do think Momma would have said life had been good.  Then one day Momma was at the creek getting water to wash the family’s clothes when she fell and broke her ankle. The ankle did not heal correctly, and Momma limped the rest of her life.  She had pain in that ankle every day for the remainder of her life.  Until I grew old and felt pain in my own joints, I did not really appreciate how Momma must have suffered.

On their Dry Creek farm, Momma and Daddy raised eight kids, five girls and three boys.  There were many lean years, but we all survived.  The later years were less lean than the early years when Patsy and Richard were in school.  I remember my childhood as all good times.

Through it all, after Momma made Daddy her choice, Daddy made all the major choices in their lives. I doubt Momma ever regretted her choice.  I know as she left her home for the last time, I heard her tell the EMT attending her, “I have had a good life.”  Our Grandma Gaddy said not long before she passed from this world that our mother, because of her children, had a much better life than her two sisters. If our lives were to be measured by what we leave to the world, Momma left more than any of her children.

Sister Patsy mostly made her own way in life with little outside help, just like she made her way alone across the fields to school at age six.  She was highly intelligent, always interested in learning. She chose to marry a man with little education and ambition to match.  Unlike her mother, she spent most of her life earning a living for her family while her husband stayed home with the kids. I know I can not fully understand just how difficult her life must have been.  I have not been there or done that.  Still, although her choices were limited by her circumstances, to me, her life was ruled by her own choices, while her mother’s life was mostly ruled by others choices.

Patsy raised four children, three sons and one daughter. The family endured hard times through the growing up years.  I am sure many nights they went to bed hungry.  Still her children all loved and respected their mother.

Her son said of her, “There’s nothing my Momma couldn’t do.”  What better tribute could a mother have?