ida dell
TRANSCRIPT
Ida Dell
My grandmother and I had a real mutual admiration society. We were
so close. In 1890, she was born Ida Dell Craft, in her parents’ home, in rural
Braxton County, West Virginia. Her husband, William “Doc” Pierson, grew
up as her neighbor, on a nearby farm. Since he died when I was only three
years old, I don’t really remember much about him. Doc was a traveling dry
goods salesman, for Guthrie-Morris Campbell. He drove to general stores,
all over the central part of the state, selling fabrics and other merchandise.
Back in those days, traveling salesmen were called “Drummers.” “Granny,”
as we called her, worked as a registered nurse at Memorial Hospital, in
Charleston, working many years, after Doc’s death. She never drove, so we
either picked her up at the hospital, when she finished her shift, or she rode
the bus home.
The two of them lived in Rosedale, then Sutton, West Virginia, before
settling on the West Side of Charleston, in 1921. They raised a son, Ralph,
and daughter, Betty, my mom, in a crowded little court, called Woodward
Court. It ran off of and perpendicular to Garden Street, which was brick-
covered, as were many of the streets in the neighborhood. The houses lined
both sides of the narrow walkway, which extended down the court, from
beginning to end. They were crammed together so closely, that the
overhangs from their roofs nearly touched. In between the houses, was a
small, three-foot space.
My grandparents’ brown, one-story, wooden frame house was typical
of the vernacular architecture of their neighborhood. Doc was a master
furniture maker, and built a woodworking shop behind their home, overtop
of the garage. The house and shop were connected, by a stairway, which led
up to the shop, and down to the back yard. After he died, the gray wooden
door to his shop remained closed, as if there were memories behind that door
too precious to be disturbed.
Being a devout Baptist, and the matriarch of the family, Granny set
the standards for much of what we children were allowed, or not allowed, to
do. Decks of regular playing cards, which were used to play poker, were
never allowed in our home. We couldn’t discuss our going to dances with
her, since she didn’t approve of such behavior. To me, the most fanatic rule
she had, was her ban on Root Beer, because of the obvious reason…it was
some kind of “Beer.”
My immediate family and Ralph’s family, his wife, Virginia, and
daughter, Joyce, visited with her often, especially since we all went to
church together. We spent a lot of time with each other at camp, and our
homes were only a few blocks up the hill from hers. When we went for
visits, we rang her doorbell, and waited at the front door. She pulled up the
blind, on the window of her door, and was always so thrilled to see us. After
she rolled up the blind, to reveal who was there, she threw her hands up,
raised her eyebrows, and dropped her jaw from excitement.
More often than not, when we went to her house, she was making
medical bandages to send overseas. This seemed to be her self-imposed,
personal mission. For many years, she tore up white sheets into long, thin
three-inch-wide strips, then rolled them tightly into bandages. These were
mailed overseas to missionaries, who were in dire need of medical supplies.
She was also active in the local chapter of the WCTU, the Women’s
Christian Temperance Union. It is the nondenominational, worldwide
women’s group, which spearheaded the prohibition movement. Each year,
they held a coloring contest at local grade schools. Among other things, they
held annual White Ribbon Ceremonies, at community churches. These were
for parents of young children, to pledge that they would never expose their
children to any form of alcohol.
Sometimes, when we visited her, she stood at her ironing board, for
hours upon hours, starching and ironing her crisp, white nurse’s uniforms.
After she retired, she ironed for other families. I’m sure she was only paid a
pittance for ironing their baskets of clothes, but was happy to earn the spare
change. Frequently, she washed curtains for other families, having to
measure them carefully, then stretching them back to their original size. She
used wooden stretcher frames, to keep the sheers from shrinking, as they
dried.
Granny liked to quilt, and many times had an enormous wooden
quilting frame, set up in her living room. She painstakingly made beautiful
hand-stitched quilts, to give as gifts. All three of us granddaughters received
a custom quilt, made especially for us. The quilt she made for me, with
large pink dogwood blossoms, is one of my most cherished possessions.
When I spent the night with her, it always looked so strangs, to watch
her sit at the vanity, and brush out her long gray hair. This was such a rare
sight, since she always wore her hair pulled up in a tidy little bun. She loved
for me to spend the night with her. Every time I came home from college,
she called and invited me to spend the night. Usually, I took her up on the
offer. I think that’s why we were so close. I was still single, unlike my
cousin and sister, so I could willingly give her quite a bit of my time.
She and I often sat in front of the dark, wood mantle in her bedroom,
and snuggled up next to the gas space heater. Sometimes, we watched her
favorite television show, “The Price is Right.” When I was in the fourth or
fifth grade, while we were visiting in her bedroom, she commented that I
had dirt on my knee. When she realized it was the dark hair on my legs,
from then on, she became my advocate in convincing Mom to let me remove
the hair, with Nair cream.
While we visited with her in the kitchen, she loved baking sugar
cookies for us. She often offered her visitors treasures, which she had
hoarded from the hospital cafeteria…assorted flavors of jellies. She kept the
little rectangular packages on a plate, and only got them out on special
occasions. Queen Elizabeth couldn’t have been more proud, to have offered
her guests exquisite caviar, than Granny was in presenting us with the
packaged jellies. She acted as if those were rare delicacies.
Even though we had given her an electric blanket one Christmas, she
preferred not to use it. She slept in a handsome walnut bed Doc had made.
He had hand-turned the tall wooden posts on his lathe. The mattress sat a
little higher than on normal beds. When we went to bed for the night, I
climbed up, to those icy cold sheets. The weight from all of those blankets
was so heavy, it was nearly impossible to turn over.
We always celebrated Thanksgiving and Christmas meals at her home,
as we gathered around the large round wooden dining room table. Doc had
made the entire dining room set, with a tall china cabinet, wooden chairs,
and the large table. It had a leaf for the middle, to accommodate our big
family. Each meal was a feast of epic proportion. My favorite mouth-
watering dish, was turkey dressing with chestnuts. I liked to help grind up
the ingredients for the cranberry salad, shoving the orange peelings down
into the sturdy, metal, hand-cranked grinder.
At Christmastime, Granny had a small artificial tree, which she sat out
on a dark round coffee table. I don’t consider myself to be a materialistic
person, but some of the most cherished memorabilia I own, are from her
house. They are fragile, glass Christmas ornaments, which I remember
seeing on her tree, every year. I proudly hang them on our tree, every year.
One of my favorite things about her house, was the beautiful rugs she
had in her living room and dining room. The rugs in both rooms were
identical, and were so large, they nearly covered the entire floor. The tightly-
woven rugs had a handsome pink and black floral design. That has always
been my favorite color combination. I still love to see one of the rugs, in my
mother’s upstairs guest room, which we fondly call “The Shrine.”. Grannu
used to have us help her take the rugs outside, to help her clean them, by
beating them with paddles.
As a young lady, Granny was accustomed to washing clothes by hand,
out in the yard, using large wash tubs. So to her, a wringer washing machine
was a real luxury. For years, we watched Granny force her wet clothes,
through the wringers of her electric washing machine. On one occasion, she
caught her little finger in the wringer, smashing it. The machine had a large
round, white tub, and stood on fours legs. It sat out on her back porch, which
was enclosed with small window panes, serving as a greenhouse. She had a
beautiful display of large-leafed, magenta and purple coleus plants, and a
magnificent crown of thorns cactus plant. It was at least five feet wide,
occupying a large part of the porch.
One of Granny’s neighbors, Ernie, had an incredible green thumb.
Her back yard, was very visible from Granny’s porch and yard. It was a
beautiful palette of rich colors, from plants and flowers blooming all year
long. Granny never saw the neighbors on the other side of her house. They
were blocked off, by the big two-story shop and garage. We certainly could
hear them, from time to time.
These next door neighbors, frequently got into screaming matches.
Their domestic disputes always accelerated into throwing clay flower pots,
or anything else, within reach, at one another. When my sister and I heard
the screaming start, we hurriedly ran out the back porch door, and excitedly
tiptoed up the gray wooden steps, which led to the old woodshop. We
hunkered down, on the dusty landing at the top of the stairs, and with
outstretched necks, peeked down to her neighbors’ backyard. Staying
absolutely quiet and perfectly still, we watched, as the drama unfolded.
The neighbors were an elderly couple. He was short and stocky with
gray hair, and she was thin and spunky, with dyed red hair. Stage one of the
mayhem, was always loud screaming and swearing at one another. Then, the
real ruckus began. One at a time, they pick up an object on their patio, and
heaved it at their partner, as they let out a loud, primal scream. The wife
often ran into the kitchen, to fetch dishes and pans, for more ammunition.
The flying objects were hurled across the yard or porch with such
force and intensity, they surely had the potential of hurting someone. I never
knew if both the husband and wife, could never hit their spousal targets
because they were such bad shots, or if this was a case of deliberate misses.
Thankfully, their ability to duck from flying obstacles, far outweighed their
ability to aim at and hit their targets, with any accuracy.
These episodes went on for quite a long time. It was like watching a
Neanderthal version of dodge ball. Instead of throwing a red rubber ball, the
objects they used were loud, as they crashed onto the patio, sometimes
shattering upon impact. The couple was so completely engrossed in their
fight. They were totally oblivious to the fact that they had an audience, on
the landing above them, taking in their every move.
Granny was a stickler for what was proper, and was not one to
embrace change. She told one pastor at our church, that she thought it was
only appropriate for preachers to wear white shirts. He had shown up one
Sunday, wearing a pastel pink shirt at the pulpit. On the day I was to get
married, she called our pastor who was to conduct the ceremony, Reverend
Archie Snedegar, to ask him if he thought the wedding “Could be pulled
off,” with all of those men wearing long hair, in the wedding party.
One of the few times I remember her not being able to cope with a
situation very well, was when some of our relatives decided to attend a
different church. I never understood why this stirred up such a brouhaha
from her. As adults, they surely should have had the freedom to decide
where to worship. They seemed so enthralled with their new church. Still
upset about their departure, she refused to attend my cousin’s wedding,
because it was being held at a different church. Thankfully, at the last
minute, love conquered her stubbornness.
When my first husband, Doug, and I moved to Columbia, South
Carolina, Granny was one of the reasons I was so homesick and wanted to
come back home. A few days after we moved back to Charleston, my mother
called her on the phone one morning, and didn’t get a response. Doug and I
were staying with my parents for a few days, until we could move into our
own home. I volunteered to go down to the court, and check on her.
When I rang her doorbell, she didn’t answer, so I walked around to
her bedroom window. I could look in the window, and see that she was still
in the bed. I crawled through her window, and tried to wake her, but she was
completely non-responsive. Perfectly positioned in the bed, under the
covers, she was still breathing, albeit it ever-so-shallow.
She had suffered a stroke, and was taken to Charleston General
Hospital, where she never would regain consciousness. For three days, we
kept a constant vigil over her. We were clinging to hope, which started to
fade, with each day, of seeing no improvement in her condition. On the third
day, she peacefully stopped breathing, and was officially declared dead.
I always thought, that the way she died, was the perfect way to go.
There were no signs that she had struggled, and she never experienced any
pain. A few days before the stroke, at 82 years old, she was up on a ladder,
removing the leaves from her gutters. After witnessing many friends and
relatives endure such excruciating suffering, over prolonged periods of time,
I believe Granny was truly one of the lucky ones.
She was buried beside Doc, in a little cemetery near her birthplace, at
the Middle Run Baptist Church. There are at least three generations of her
family, the Crafts, and of Doc’s, the Piersons, buried on those hallowed
grounds. One of my favorite annual excursions, is to go to the little pristine
white church’s Memorial Day picnic, and decorate graves. That is a family
tradition we have carried out my entire life. Every year, the crowd gets
smaller, as the old timers have passed on, one by one.
The once bountiful, delicious spread of chicken and dumplings, baked
hams, deviled eggs, fresh green beans, and homemade breads and pies, has
changed too. There’s still plenty to eat, but there are not many ladies left,
from the older generation, who took so much pride, in preparing their
signature homemade dishes for the picnic. They have been replaced by a
younger generation, with different preferences and offerings: store-bought
fried chicken and desserts, humus and pita bread, and tossed salad. Even
though the food has changed, it is still one event, which I look forward to
every year.