The Red Flannel Rag

In the 1980’s Mom was gett ing tired of carrying wood and coal for the stove, so

we put central heating in the downstairs. Later on, we put vinyl siding on the house.

The upstairs is still had no heat in the winter.

Mom: She Was the Queen of Her Hearth

Mom was the fifteenth child of eighteen children. She was orphaned at age five

by her mother, Grandma Mary, and by her father, Grandpa John, at age nine.

“I worshipped both Mom and Dad,” she always told me, and I really missed Mom

after she died. I almost starved. Dad made my older sisters, Goldie and Dorothy, do the

cookin’, but they either burnt everything or left it half raw. I wished I was old enough to

cook for my daddy.”

For most of her life Mom never cut her hair. At the longest point, her hair

reached the back of her knees when she let it down. In her younger years, it was dark

brown, very thick, and wavy. She wore it up around a long bun that reached from ear to

ear and wrapped around the front of her head.

When she washed her hair, it took all day to dry. It was beautiful as it billowed

down her back. I loved to watch her when her hair was down. She had to be careful to

keep it out of whatever she was doing. One time she got it caught in her wringer washer.

She said, “It’s a good thing my hair is so long. I got the wringer stopped before it tore

my head off.”

65