Mom Remembers Her Mom
These are some of my memories of my Mom – Leighora Bell Jackson Woodfin, known as Ora. They are from 1920 to 1941.
Most people of my generation were raised by a “stay at home Mom”. Now people ask what she did all day. I only know some things my Mom did.
She got up early and cooked breakfast on a wood stove for my Daddy and their five children. (I was the second.) When she said “Breakfast is ready!” we all went to the table and ate together.
She milked two cows twice a day. Once or twice a week she washed our clothes on a scrub board but that was after drawing water from a well in a bucket. She would heat the water in a big black iron pot and boil the clothes after they were first washed to make sure they were clean and sterile. She would hang them out on fence or clothesline to dry. Fold what she could when dry and the next day iron what had to be ironed with a flatiron that had to be heated on the stove or at the fireplace.
She separated the cream from the milk, churned and made butter, and sometimes sale a pound for 10 cents.
She made our clothes, darned sox – Sometimes she sewed for other people. Pieced & quilted quilts to keep us warm. The neighborhood women would have a quilting party. That was fun time.
When Granma Woodfin came they would sometimes make soap. She cut our hair.
She would see to it that we all got a tub bath at least once a week in the old zinc laundry tub brought in to the kitchen to keep us warm. Water was heated on the stove. She wanted us to go to church clean and start off clean for school.
After we were all five in school we were allowed to bring a teacher home to stay overnight. There was no radio at our house but my Daddy was a good storyteller and they all loved his stories. Momma would parch peanuts and make candy. Everyone loved Momma and Daddy.
Momma was a Baptist & loved doing for the needy. She loved to sing old hymns as she worked. She was an untrained mid-wife and helped deliver many babies.
She always had something for us to eat when we got home from school. Maybe her famous teacake cookies or could be a hot sweet baked potato still in the oven.
She never got a raise or promotion. No recognition, just a plain ordinary woman who fortunately was my Mother who lived her entire 55 years in Autauga, Cousa, Montgomery and Elmore counties in Alabama.
Her children rise up and call her blessed.
By Irene Woodfin Halliwill May 2000
Figure 1 Lee and Ora Woodfin
Irene’s son Rick found four handwritten pages in old photo albums shipped from our old house on Carolside in Lancaster California. Notes transcribed on July 24, 2013.
Figure 2 Wash tub still in use 1955
Wash tub was still in use in August 1955. Think that’s Uncle Harold washing up.
Leighora Bell Jackson born in Speed (Coosa Co) Alabama Sep 22, 1886 died Nov 19, 1941 Wetumpka, AL. and is buried at Harmony Church Cemetery
