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AN AIR-MINDED FAMILY
(Georgia)
I asked the taxi driver if he knew just
where Mrs. Edwards lived? "Yes mam." At the same time stopping in front of
a one-story red brick house, with the woodwork printed white. Hyacinths,
forsythia and jonquils were in full bloom. These flowers bordered the
spacious lawn that was green with glass, low shrubbery surrounded the
house. There was a lattice fence with an opening just large enough for a
car to go through, screened the back yard, like the front yard flowers in
full bloom. A washpot turned upside down, a play house, and parts of a
demolished airplane in the garage.
I knocked on the door, and a voice within called to me. "Just open the
door and come in. I am too lazy to get up." I entered the livingroom,
there sat Mrs. Edwards dressing a small black haired, blue eyed little
girl about four years old. "Do have a chair, if I don't dress Sissie
before I get up she won't let me get her dressed. I haven't made a fire in
the furnace and the house is none too warm. The maid hasn't come yet and
everything is topsy-turvey."
As she talked about this and that I glanced around the room. There were
three lamps in this room. One on the radio, another on a marble top table
and a floor lamp by a governor Winthrop desk. Several chairs, modern three
piece livingroom suite, book case filled with books on aeronautics, two
mirrors and several pictures on the wall. A clock, and pictures of her two
grown sons on the mantel as well as a picture of her deceased husband who
was a well known aviator, and one of her oldest daughter on the desk. A
rug with a flowered of pink roses in block design and criss-cross curtains
with blue ball trimmings completed the furnishings in this room.
She had finished dressing the child turned out the light, came over near
the window where I was sitting on the red upholstered divan. Picked up a
sweater and began darning it. "My boys won't wear these sweaters because
there is a touch of red on them. It isn't necessary to mending this
morning, but I thought I might as well be doing something while I am
talking. It is such a bad day I can't get out and sell my cosmetics. My
battery is no good on my car so I will have to wait another day. When I go
out I take the two small children with me and leave them in the car while
I make my calls selling my product. I also sell Christmas cards in season.
My children fuss with me because I get out and work, but I have worked all
my life and know what it takes to live on. Too I don't fell right to sit
down and let my older children take care of me and the ones who are not
large enough to work. So after the negro finishes her work and dinner is
over I put the children in the car take my cosmetic kit and try to do my
bit. Some days I do real well and some days I get so discouraged I feel
like giving up but I can't.
"But what is it you want me to tell you I have just talked and talked and
you have come for my life history. Why would anybody pick me out of all
people? You know a mother of ten children and nine living don't have time
to think about what has happened and afraid to think what might take place
after all I have been through. I have had a child and my husband killed. I
am praying I wont have to go through it again. We never know what is to
happen to us in this life.
"My young days spent in Greene County at Siloam, Georgia. I was born in
Madison County out here at Neese. People in Madison County could sell
their land and buy land for half price in Greene County in those days. So
my people sold their land and bought a farm near Siloam and lived in the
little village that is the way people did than. I was 12 years old when I
went there to live, and perhaps my happiest days as a young girl was spent
in that settlement.
"It was a little odd the way I started to work. There was man who ran a
general merchandise store, his daughter who was my best friend helped him
in his business. On the day my friend was to marry another man the
invitations had been issued and everything set for the wedding, she ran
away and married someone else. A few days after that I met the girl's
father on the street, he told me his wife wanted to see me right away.
Well I was scared green, I thought sure, she blamed me for the girl
running away and marrying someone lese. That woman was a captain. Instead
of that she wanted me to work in the store in her daughter's place. I
accepted the job and received $6.00 a month. I worked from eight o'clock
in the morning until twelve o'clock on Saturday night. Infact I worked
twelve hours a day. I was crazy about my job, I worked and took music
lessons too. I remember I had an argument with my family they wanted the
money for something else and I wanted to continue my music lessons and did
it, also bought my own clothes as well as things for the house.
"My brother got a job with the Athens
Railway and Electric Company. He was here about a year when I decided to
write a leading store in this town for a job as they were the oply people
I had ever heard of in business. My people laughed at me and said. 'Why,
don't you know they wont give you a job. There are so many people in
Athens they won't even answer your letter.' "Anyway I wrote them and right
away I received a letter from them telling me the next time I came to town
to come by to see them. I lost no time coming to Athens on going to the
store, applying for the job they told me the one who employed the girls
were out sick and for me to come back the following Monday. As I was
leaving the store I asked them to save the job for me I would be back when
they told me too. As I walked out of the store the man to whom I had been
talking to came to the door saying to me. 'Come back when we told you too
and go to work.'
"I received the big amount of $15 a month. I worked there about three
years before I married and worked off and on about two years afterward. I
worked as long as I could before my first child was born. As soon as I
could I went back and worked until Jr. came along, then I gave up and
decided there was no need trying.
"My father and mother came to town with me to live. He went back and forth
to Greene County to [superintend?] his farms and saw mill. Mother kept
house, and looked after the children, cows chickens and etc.
"When I came here to live, I was engaged to a man studying for the
Presbyterian Ministry at Clemson college in South Carolina. I have had so
many things said to me that turned out to be true, it frightens me for
anyone to make any predictions. This man to whom I was engaged to didn't
want me to come to Athens. He said you wont be there three weeks before
you will meet someone you will like better than you do me. I told him that
was impossible, because I was in love with him and very much interested in
my music. Sure enough I hadn't been here but a short time before I met
Bert.
"One day I was leaving the store going to lunch. A boy I knew was standing
out in front he called to me and said. 'Wait a minute I have something to
tell you.' Bert started down the street, 'come back here pal I want you to
meet the new girl in the store, she hasn't been in Athens long.' From that
time on my friend kept asking me for a date to go automobile riding. I
didn't know girls went riding at night. I told my mother, she told me it
would be no harm if there was another couple along. So when my friend,
Bert and another girl came to my house I didn't know I was to be with Bert
until he got there. From that time on we had dates regular. I told him I
was engaged to someone else. He told me he didn't care, he was in South
Carolina and he here, and he was going to beat his time, and he did. He
was like that he started to build airplanes and wouldn't quit.
"After we married we lived with his mother two years then his father and
mother gave Bert a building lot just out side of the city limits. We built
a nice house, I thought I was all set with a well on the back porch, and
kerosene lamps. With a nice garden, chickens, cows and I even had a hog or
two. It wasn't long before Bert put an electric pump in the well. After
the children got large enough to go to school it was too expensive to send
so many to school in town. So I began to beg my husband lets build in
town. He told me, 'All right, but as sure as we do one of the children
will be killed sure.' Still I insisted so after living in the country 13
years we built this house and moved to town. Sure enough we had only been
here 3 years when the child next to the baby than was run over in the yard
and died as the results of that injury. He developed pneumonia and only
lived a short time. We have been living here ten years.
"My husband's real business was in the garage business. He had the first
filling station in Athens. You know every man has a hobby, his was with
airplanes when he closed his garage for the day instead of playing golf or
working in the yard or garden he tinkered with his planes, my brothers
just sat down. He begun building airplanes about two years before we
married.
"He made a short flight in 1909, in 1910 he write to a land company asking
them to let him attend one of their land sales and take people to ride to
draw a large crowd. They wrote him they would take the matter up with him
and they were sure it could be made profitable for the company as well as
himself, but they never did anything about it.
"The whole family is crazy on the subject of airplanes. However, when he
had a smash-up his family blamed me for not discourageing him. He was
doing this before we married, how could I change him than.
"There was no airport here to try out his planes, so he took them out to
an open field to try them out. That was when he first tried to fly them,
he smashed them up hauled them in and started all over again. He just took
it up as a hobby and only studied it a short time in a private school in
Virginia when my second girl was a baby. He took up this hobby a short
time before the Wright Brother's flew their's.
"Bert was never a person to talk about himself. He always brought the
newspaper clippings home for me to read. Several days ago Dr. Reid told me
that he and Mr. Hugh Rowe went out with Bert at two o'clock one morning to
fly his first plane.
"Back when my oldest son was 14 some friends took him on a trip to
Washington, D. C. Mrs J. S. Grey of Chevy Chase, Maryland was writing a
book called 'UP' aviation of yesterday and today. It never occured to me
to mention it to my son to visit her. So when he got to Washington he
decided to look her up. She was very much interested in him and wrote a
page and a half about him in her book.
"He made his first solo flight in Atlanta at an air show when he was 13
years old. That was the first time I had ever seen him fly and he handled
it just like his daddy. Then I look at these children of 13 it frightens
me to think of the things we let him do. As far as we know he was the
youngest person to fly a plane in this country or abroad.
"I remember there was a mob in Atlanta at the air show. It was about dark
when I started home one of my little boys was missen. I looked everywhere
in that crowd. Finally I learned that he had flown home with his daddy in
the plane, and slept all the way. Yesterday Mother Edwards was spending
the day with me. The planes were flying overhead. I said to her, 'my
little boys are dying to get out to the airport and get in one of those
planes.' She said, 'I don't blame them, I would too if I was out there.'
"Bert taught lots of boys to fly. It was $10.00 an hour, he gave one man
lessons to refresh his memory on flying. I had to get up when one of my
babies were two weeks old and get Bert's breakfast so he could get out to
the field by six o'clock to take him up and teach him two hours before he
went to his garage at eight. That man run his bill up to $80 and never
paid a cent of it. He was later killed in New York. He ran into a high
tension wire while flying a passenger plane over the city.
"Oh, I do wish the weather would clear up so I could get out and sell my
cosmetics. You know it's my disposition to work and I sold them during my
hisband's life time to help out. I don't make much but now, every penny I
make goes a long ways.
Mrs. Edwards daughter who holds a responsible position with reliable
company in Athens came in: "Good morning," her mother told her what I was
doing, "That's fine," she said: "Mother I want my lunch by twelve o'clock
and while you fix it I will make out some reports." She went to the desk
and lay her books on it. Mrs. Edwards got up to excuse herself while she
went to the kitchen, saying. "Now, you don't have to go just stay and have
lunch with us." I declined. "Now, don't go there's no need and after lunch
we can finish what you want to know. It wont take me but a few minutes as
I cooked quite a bit yesterday, I was expecting a house full of company
they didn't come so I am just warming it over. You just make your self at
home. I have the most convenient way of cooking in the world."
I followed her to the kitchen there was an electric stove, refrigator,
percolator and several other electric appliances sitting around, a kitchen
cabinet, rug on the floor and curtains at the windows. "While the dinner
is warming I want you to see the bed my daughter had made. A woman had the
lumber left from a suite she had made and sold it to her. I think it cost
$20 finished." I went into the bedroom from the kitchen. Was this ever a
breakfast room I asked? "No, this is the only say so I had about the
building of this house? 'I told my husband how in the name of the Lord
could I run through the kitchen, diningroom and livingroom to get to the
bedrooms to see about one of the children if one of them were sick.' "So
this door was cut."
In the room was a slender four post bed, vanity dresser painted green a
few scatter rugs on the floor and a pin-up lamp still burning over the
bed. This room opens into a small narrow hall. A bath room opens into this
hall. The floor is tile with tub and other conveniences. Another bedroom
opens into this hall, which is evidently the boys room as clothing, shoes,
book and airpleans are scattered all over the room. There was two white
iron beds, dresser, bed side table, pin-up lamp and nice blue bed spreads
on the beds. Mrs. Edwards took me into another room which she says: "This
is my room and the babies, I don't have no other place for this desk my
husband used in his office. I had several students staying with me for
eight months I let them have my room and the boys. I have a nice large
room in the basement and we went down there to sleep. There is a shower
too. I would like to have some boarders now, but the boys don't want them.
If I did than I could give up selling my cosmetics and devote all my time
at home." There was a walnut suite in her room. "Everything is so torn up
this morning I am ashame for you to see my house. The maid came, but she
didn't stay long she is a settled woman and has to look after her affairs
on Monday when I pay her off."
"Mother?" asked the girl. "Is lunch ready I have got to eat and get back
on the job." "Yes, all I have to do is to put it on the table." I was
writing and she went to the kitchen. In a few minutes she announced that
lunch was ready. "Now, I have set a plate for you, and there is no reason
why you can't have lunch with us." Again I declined the invitation saying
I would wait until they had finished to complete the interview. Miss
Edwards, said: "Oh, come on and eat with us." So I went to the diningroom
with her and had lunch. The suite in this room was much too large for the
size of the room. Consisting of a large buffet, table, chairs, an old
victorla, doll carriage and a large book case filled with books on
aeronautics, sat back of the door. A floor lamp was placed between the
windows overlooking the street. Criss-cross curtains with blue ball
trimmings was at the windows, a few pictures on the wall and a green rug
on the floor. We had Grace at the table by Miss Edwards and the lunch
consisted of spinach, turnips, mashed potatoes, cornbread, biscuit, banana
salad, cake and coffe also butter milk. "Now, help your self." Invited my
hostess, "Don't be afraid to eat for there is plenty for all. I had cube
steaks and gravy yesterday for lunch, so I didn't think we needed meat
today. Anyway vegetables are much better for people."
Lunch was over and we sat chatting then an airplane came zooming over
head, everyone jumped from the table some ran to the window while others
ran out on the front porch. After the commotion was over Miss Edwards came
back into the room saying: "Gee it was flying low." Did you ever fly a
plane I asked? "I never soloed, but I did take lessons from my father when
I was about fourteen or fifteen." Why didn't you continue your lessons, I
asked? "Well the depression came on and father couldn't afford to take his
planes up unless he was getting paid for it so I had to discontinue them."
Putting on her hat and coat she was gone.
Mrs. Edwards came in and began: "These children have pulled out every book
their daddy has on airplanes. At night I have to pick my way to bed over
modal airplanes, and find books all over the bed and even under their
pillows where they have fallen to sleep with them.
"Bert felt like he was a failure, but of course he wasn't. He went to New
York about twenty years ago and bought a flying boat that had been shipped
back here from France. I was so busy with babies I didn't know what he was
doing. He provided for his family what he thought was necessary. So He had
saved a little money of which I knew nothing about, and bought the boat
with it. He advetised it for sale for $100.000. A man who was an aviator
saw the ad, wrote him, saying. 'Lets get together on the boat you have
offered it too cheap, and rebuild it and make some money.' They spent
three weeks putting it in shape, then they took it to New Jersey to fly
it. The man who was an Englishman. He took it up and had to make a force
landing in a small place where there were lots of trees. When they tried
to take it up again they didn't have room enough to get it over the trees
they had a smash up. That $100.000 was gone, so they brought it back to
Athens and made a land plane out of it. They made quite a bit of money on
it. That was back when people didn't mind paying $15 to take just a short
ride.
"Bert had a very dignified man helping him at the air field. One day
several people went out for a ride in the party was a very prim woman.
That was when women wore long dresses. After the helmets, safety belts and
strappings were ajusted on the people in the plane. The helper noticed the
woman hadn't pulled her goggles down. He said to her, 'Pull your goggles
down, she looked at him but made no attempt to pulled them down. He told
her several times, after the door to the plane was closed he tapped on the
window and yelled. 'I say lady, pull your goggles down.' To this she
meekly pulled up her long skirt to her knees and pulled her garters down
around her ankles. That brought a burst of laughter from everyone who saw
it. That man would get out of the way at the mention of a woman's garters.
"The money my husband made on his planes he always put back in them, the
money he supported his family on was made in the garage business and
filling station. He had so many smash-ups it took everything he realized
from them to put them back in shape again. Once he was going to Florida to
an air show when they got to Macon they stopped for gas. They had hardly
got out the sight of town when he had a smash-up. He always did think the
people at the filling station put cheap gas in his plane. When he was
building his hanger, there came a terrible storm, it took one of the post
up out of the ground and sat it down in the middle of his plane as if some
person had done it. Every time he had an accident, people would say to me.
'Well, I guess Bert wont fly any more after this.' I would tell him what
they said. His answer was; 'I never quit.'
"The most honest thing ever happen to him was; he had a man helping him
rebuild planes, one of them he connected the control wires backwards and
when they took it up to try it our it worked in reverse. That smashed, the
man got out of the plane and walked off the field without saying a word.
Several years after that Bert was in Atlanta and saw him on the street. He
said to my husband: 'I want you to know when I smashed up that plane I was
broke, now I am making good and I want to pay for half of the damages
done.' My husband took the money as he was badly in need of cash at that
time.
"About fifteen years ago Bert built a light place of his own design and
sold it. Than he built another one, my son flew it all the time and my
husband was flying it when he had his last smash-up. Before his death he
had lost everything we had. He often said one thing he would never do that
was mortgage our home, but he did, and now we are doing everything we can
to save it. He had closed his garage and gotten a job at $35 a week he
thought with that coming in each week and what he made on his planes we
could do very well he had only drawn one pay check. At one time we were
worth $40.000, now it is a struggle to keep our heads above the water.
Just a few nights before he was killed he couldn't sleep. Mother Edwards
said, 'It was his guardian angel warning him that something was going to
happen.' "No, the Wright Brother's had no effect on him he thought
everybody was responsible for their own failure or success, he never had
one penny donated him toward his enterprise.
"His death has had no effect on us as to our disbelief in aviation we are
as interested in it now as we were in his life time. I am sure if Bert had
known that was his last flight he would have been happy to know he died or
was killed in what he loved best no matter how far he had to fall.
"His death left us without a cent. He did have two insurance policies
however, he had borrowed money on both of them. One policy had a clause in
it that the policy was no good in case he was killed in an airplane
accident. The other one was taken out before that clause was added in
policies. To be exact I only received $500. and $18. which was just enough
to put him away decent.
"I have two sons in college they work in the day time and go to Tech at
night. My oldest son is taking aeronautical engineering, and the other one
is taking a plain freshman course at the same college. I have two girls
who have finished college both have good jobs. One here and the other one
is teaching school at Tate, Georgia.
"One of my little boys told me not so long ago. 'mama, did you know one
day I went up with daddy to chase the clouds and got lost?' "No, I told
him." 'Well we did, we didn't have much gas and was afraid we would have a
smash-up. I am sure we were over Comer, Georgia so we turned around and
came back safe. Do you know why we weren't hurt or run out of gas?' "No, I
said." 'Well it was because after daddy told me that we were lost in the
clouds and didn't have much gas. I began to pray and prayed until we
landed. When we got out of the place I said thank you God for letting us
get back safe.' "Thats fine, 'I told him, but you children are going to
drive us to the poor house, spending every cent you get on model
airplanes. A few days after that the baby said to my oldest daughter."
'Did you know we are going to move?' 'No,' she said, 'Well we are.'
'Where?' she asked 'to the poor house.' 'How are we going?' 'In an
airplane.' answered the baby.
"I know what I have told you isn't interesting, but it is our life we are
all wild about aviation. But when you need some consmetics please get them
from me that is where my few pennies comes from now." I thanked her for
the story, and started to leave." "Do come back again." There is my
daughter she went to get a check cashed so I can pay my bille." The
telephone rang she closed the door. The girl was getting out of the car,
belonging to her company. "Come back again." Thanks I said, and left the
Edward's home and the air minded family.
March 6, 1939
Mrs. Omie Williams Epps (White)
892 Hill Street
Athens, Georgia
Saleslady
Sadie B. Hornsby
Text from: Library of
Congress, Manuscript Division, WPA Federal Writers' Project Collection
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