THE HOUSES OF CLEBURNE COUNTY Memoir of a Southern Boyhood WILLIAM CARROLL MOORE
The Houses of Cleburne County by William Carroll Moore ©Copyright 2023 William Moore All Rights Reserved V. 2 This book is a work of non-fiction. All characters, names, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s memory or are used with reference made by the person whom the story is about, and any resemblance of actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely meant without harm. Other than family members, most names are pseudonyms. Except for the use in any review, the reproduction or utilization of this work in whole or in part in any form by any electronic, mechanical, other means, now known or hereafter invented, including xerography, photocopying, and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, is forbidden without the written permission of the author. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights. Published by: Nicasio Press Sebastopol, California www.nicasiopress.com Cover Design: Mandy Masciarelli Design mmdesignnapa.com ISBN: 979-8-9897756-0-6 Printed in the U.S.A.
Dedication To my sister, Helen Marie; my brother, Alder Lee; and to our late parents, Melba and Carroll Moore for the wonderful life they gave us. Also, to the people of Cleburne County whose stories , in their soft voices, are still in my ear. Acknowledgements My abundant thanks go to the members of my writers critique group: Sue Kesler, Gary Orton, Michael Wycombe, Sarita Lopez, Rose Winters, and Marty Malin, for their friendship and patient, valuable help. Thanks also to my beta readers, Lance and Susan Burris. Much appreciation goes to the publication Time and the River, a history of Cleburne County by Evalena Berry, which was a helpful resource in anchoring my memories to places and dates.
CONTENTS Introduction ................................................................1 Part I . The Houses Before Me.................................3 The Houses Before Me................................................5 The Gresham Little House.........................................5 Kimbrough Lane..........................................................7 The Badders Place.......................................................8 The Taylor Place...........................................................8 The Coe Farm...............................................................9 Part II. The Jackson Place; The Bettis Place.......11 The Jackson Place......................................................13 The Bettis Place..........................................................21 A Winter’s Tale...........................................................24 The Barlow.................................................................32 Boys of the Wild.........................................................37 Bettis School...............................................................42 The Green Dodge.......................................................54 King Arthur of the Sorghum Patch.........................62 The Master Trapper...................................................66 Rural Electrifcation ..................................................72 The Fifth Sunday.......................................................77 Trade Day in Quitman..............................................86 The Orange Box.........................................................91 Part III. The Gresham Place...................................99 The Gresham Place..................................................101 Quitman School.......................................................108 The Watch of the Weather......................................121 The Funnies..............................................................126 Jerome & Rohwer Relocation Centers..................128 i
The Cousin’s War ....................................................138 The First Harvest.....................................................140 Counting Crows ......................................................151 Knick-Knack Enterprises........................................154 A Childhood Christmas on Gresham Road.........157 Part IV. The Great Migration...............................173 Epilogue ...................................................................187 About the Author...................................................193 Appendix: Prince of Wales Cake Recipe..........194 ii
INTRODUCTION In February, 1983, Cleburne County, Arkansas, celebrated its 100th year. The Centennial delegation presented a copy of the just published county history, Time and the River, and a newly-minted commemorative silver coin to Governor Bill Clinton at the 74th General Assembly of the State of Arkansas. Included in the Centennial observance was an address, Brief Glimpses into Our Past, by Dr. Bert Stark, Jr., Professor, University of Central Arkansas, Conway. The following is an excerpt from his address: “Time passed, and in 1930 the greatest depression in the history of our country occurred. Drouth, no market for crops and livestock created an extreme shortage of money. These were extremely hard times. The Works Progress Administration was conceived. “Again, time passed, and World War II was here. Many of you will recall that this was a period of great social upheaval in this county. Again, hundreds of our sons enlisted or were drafted into the military services —some of them did not return. Hundreds of others left our county and scattered to the four winds to work in war plants, some of them never to return to live here permanently. “Then after the war a new social and economic scene was found. Small farms and row crops were no longer a viable agricultural venture. Many young people left the county to seek work elsewhere, and our citizens began to seek other means of livelihood.” – 1 –
THE HOUSES OF CLEBURNE COUNTY As the son of an Arkansas farm family, I am able to give a first-hand account of how Cleburne County families and individuals met the challenge of the changing times outlined above by Dr. Stark. I lived through those very changes, from my time in a oneroom schoolhouse, to participating in my family’s struggle to survive, and at the age of ten, migrating with family to the Central Valley of California to start a new life. This collection of stories represents a small window into the changes that shaped both Arkansas and the nation. I hope you enjoy reading them. – 2 –
1924 - 1932 PART I . THE HOUSES BEFORE ME
THE HOUSES OF CLEBURNE COUNTY – 4 –
WILLIAM CARROLL MOORE THE HOUSES BEFORE ME My family lived in eight houses in Cleburne County, Arkansas, where my parents were born, grew up, got married, and lived until I was ten years of age. Given the time and place—during the Depression of the 1930s—they moved from farm to farm, trying to get a purchase on life. The first five of these houses were before my unanticipated entrance into this world. These were the houses before me. THE GRESHAM LITTLE HOUSE My parents, Melba Adrid Gresham and William Carroll Moore, were secretly married the day after Christmas in 1924. Other than the justice of the peace who married them, only Mother’s friend and witness, Carmen Gunn, knew of the wedding until the announcement at a family gathering some days later. My brother, sister, and I never understood why they held the wedding in secret, and our parents declined to comment. Though never stated, we finally assumed, or at least I did, that Dad would have had difculty getting permission from Mother’s father, John Anderson Gresham, Jr., as Dad, at that time, had neither money nor land, and Mother was not yet eighteen years of age. She had, quite correctly, made this risky choice to become the lifetime partner to this handsome, charming, and industrious man whom she already knew she simply could not live without (her words). – 5 –
THE HOUSES OF CLEBURNE COUNTY The secret marriage seemed ironic as Mother’s father had been—or perhaps still was at that time– justice of the peace for the Pearson community where the Gresham family lived. In later years, Mother told me how as a young girl, on some of the many buggy trips with her father, he stopped the buggy at the side of the road, asked her to hold the reins, and disappeared into the nearby woods for some time. At first, she thought he had been disappearing to relieve himself, but later realized he had, as justice of the peace, been performing secret weddings in the shadows of the oak forest. We were never clear how our parents’ marriage was received by her father, who had clearly been oneupped by another justice of the peace, one Claude Jones. * * * * * My parents started their life together in the small cottage we called the “Little House” on the Gresham family property near the town of Pearson. It was a twostory cottage built by my grandfather John Anderson Gresham, Jr. in 1906. The cottage had a certain beauty in its simplicity. The downstairs had a kitchen and dining room at the north end and a living room in the south. The two were separated by an entryway with the front and back doors and a stairway to the second floor, which had a bedroom on each side of the stairs. The cottage was a wood frame, board-and-batten structure with a cedar-shingle roof. It stood in a level area facing the road and meadow beyond and backed up to the edge of a woods. – 6 –
WILLIAM CARROLL MOORE Long before my parents moved in, it had been used as a temporary residence by my grandfather and his new wife, Sarah Helen Thompson Gresham, as a “weaner” house, as it has been for other family members just starting out on their own as my parents were. It has also served as temporary housing for farm workers. I don’t know the circumstances of my parents’ stay—whether Dad farmed the surrounding land or not—but after two years, they moved to a house on Kimbrough Lane where Dad leased land for his farming operation. KIMBROUGH LANE None in our immediate family, except our parents, ever saw the Kimbrough Lane house, or even knew where it was. Old man Kimbrough and his son owned two houses on the mountain property, and both they and their families lived in one house. Mother and Dad rented the other, which stood, we were told, in a windy area facing the road going from Heber Springs over to Pangburn. It had previously been used for storage of hay and wasn’t well suited for habitation, as it was drafty and difcult to heat. The house was barely livable but the farmland that came with it was productive, with enough acreage for Dad to hire help with harvests. My sister, Helen Marie, —or “Sis,” as my brother and I call her—was born there in March of 1928, in a room whistling with cold. Our family never took us to visit the place, and I suspect they never wanted to see it again. They lived there for several years before their move to the Badders Place. – 7 –
THE HOUSES OF CLEBURNE COUNTY THE BADDERS PLACE In 1930, our family moved in and shared a house with a widower, Tom Badders, and leased his land for farming. Badders was starting a poultry production operation on part of the property and didn’t want to farm the land. He was convinced that the broiler chicken industry was the coming thing and would soon be a big business in the county, and maybe even in the whole state. The house was arranged in a bungalow plan with one half having a living room, dining room, and kitchen in the one side; and two bedrooms and a screened utility porch in the other. It had a deep front porch facing north to the road and a large barn across the road. My sister was just beginning to walk when they moved there. Both operations—land crops and poultry farming—went well, but after three years, Badders decided to re-marry and needed the whole place for his larger family. Our family then moved to the Taylor Place. THE TAYLOR PLACE I know little about the Taylor Place, but from stories of their two years there, it seemed to be a very happy place for my parents. They endured two deep, cold winters there and spent many hours with their friends and neighbors living nearby. Dad installed sled runners under a wooden soap box with a rope-pull to transport – 8 –
WILLIAM CARROLL MOORE little Helen Marie over the snow and ice to visit neighbors for tafy pulls and apple-bobbing parties. During their stay at the Taylor Place, one of Dad’s main jobs was head carpenter for the construction of a new house for Mother’s dad, J. A. Gresham, Jr., on the Gresham Road property, where our family later lived, and where it still stands. Dad also learned the side job of barbering. Men came to their house every Saturday for haircuts in ever-increasing numbers. Mother complained that if Dad didn’t leave home before noon on Saturdays, their house became a public place. Dad solved the problem by renting a chair in Lawson Roberts’ barber shop in Pearson. This solved the domestic problem, and we’re told Roberts enjoyed the extra trafc. During this time, we don’t know if Dad kept farming the Badders land or the land that came with the Taylor Place. From here the family moved to the Coe farm, owned by Dad’s family. THE COE FARM The Coe farm, which belonged to Dad’s grandfather Robert Franklin Coe, and where Dad grew up from boyhood, covered a large, farmed acreage and had several houses on the property. Our family lived in what they called the “Simmons House,” built by Dad and his granddad to house Dad’s aunt Nancy and her husband, Walter Simmons. Mother described the house as having two 16-foot-square rooms under a gable, with a lean-to kitchen room on the back. While there, my sister, Helen Marie, attended the McAnear School where Mother, – 9 –
THE HOUSES OF CLEBURNE COUNTY her sister, and two of her brothers had attended years before. During their stay at the Simmons house, our family bought a parcel of land we call the “Jackson Place.” – 10 –
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