Little More (eBook)

Jane Little (Autor)

eBook Download: EPUB

2024 | 1. Auflage
196 Seiten
Bookbaby (Verlag)
979-8-3509-7516-1 (ISBN)

Infos

This book is a memoir eighty years in the making. The book contains stories of family adventures, travels, triumphs, and tragedies. Love, faith, and hope provided her strength to endure. Humor, wit, and wisdom make this memoir one that readers will enjoy.

Jane Cobbs Little has lived a life of fascinating experiences for over eighty years. Her journal entries, narratives in the scrapbooks she has created, and her postings on social media all demonstrate her love of storytelling. Her books, 'Little by Little', 'A Patchwork Quilt of Memories', and now 'A Little More' are filled with her life stories. As a wife, mother of two, grandmother of three, and elementary teacher of thirty-six years, her stories are filled with love, humor, joy, and sorrow. While living in Cleveland, Ohio; Detroit, Michigan; Schenectady, New York; and the Dover, Delaware area, Jane was actively involved in her church, the community, and her sorority, Delta Sigma Theta. Now that she resides in Central Florida, she remains active while enjoying her retirement years.

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In this memoir, this author shares stories of her life of over eighty years and four generations of her family. She shares stories of her childhood, including her education and teaching career of thirty-six years. Some of her stories revolve around events during her fifty-one years of marriage. Parenting two children provided the basis for other stories. As the family grew, stories of grandchildren were added. The book contains stories of family adventures, travels, triumphs, and tragedies. Love, faith, and hope provided her strength to endure. Humor, wit, and wisdom make this memoir one that readers will enjoy.

Textauszug

Made in the Midwest 1942–1969

Mom’s Family: The Johnsons

My mother, Gertrude, was the third of four daughters of Fielding and Carrie Johnson of Keokuk, Iowa. I do not know very much about my grandmother because she died when my mother was fifteen. My grandfather was an important part of my life until his death when I was about fifteen.

My grandfather was born in 1881 in Missouri, which was a segregated state. My great grandmother, Mariah, did not want her two sons to grow up in a segregated setting so she moved across the Mississippi River to Keokuk. It was there that he met and married my grandmother and raised their family.

One of the fascinating facts I do know about my grandmother is that she and three of her friends had a catering business. Each of them owned one-fourth of a set of china, silverware, glassware, and whatever other items they needed to provide table settings for one dozen people.

My grandfather was a mailman and an active part of the community. He was a Boy Scout leader, an active member of the church, an avid fisherman, an amateur photographer, and a golfer, and he even organized and led a musical band of young students.

Upon my grandmother’s death, my grandfather raised his four daughters, sending each of them to the University of Iowa, where each received their bachelor’s degree. “Pops” was determined that his daughters would have a college education. This was quite an accomplishment during the economic depression of the 1920s and early 1930s.

When my mother’s next oldest sister graduated from college, she went on to Western Reserve University in Cleveland, Ohio, to earn her master’s degree in social work. In 1931, when my mother graduated, she followed in her sister’s footsteps and moved to Cleveland, where she also received her master’s degree in social work. My parents met each other there. My mother spent the next fifty years serving families and youth in various capacities as a social worker.

My grandfather, my aunts, their families, and our family remained close-knit throughout our lives. Even though we were geographically separated, we arranged to visit each other when we could. My grandfather made the rounds of visiting each daughter and their families at least once a year as well.

The four sisters had five children between them. Only three of us are still living. We are all in our eighties, but thanks to technology, we are still in touch with each other regularly. Although our children and grandchildren know each other, I am sorry that they have not had the same level of engagement with each other as we did. However, we provided them with stories and pictures that allowed them to know about their family legacy. We hope they will continue to pass it on.

Dad’s Family:
Cobbs Family Chronicles

My father, John Alfred Cobbs, died when I was six years old. Unfortunately, I have only a few personal memories of his side of the family. My mother provided the details I am about to share about the interesting relationship of my paternal grandparents.

The story began in a rural area near Roanoke, Virginia, where three young people lived—Lemoyne Fowler (my grandmother), John Cobbs (my grandfather), and Margaret, whose last name I do not know. John was engaged to Margaret. Instead, he married Lemonye and together they had three children—my father, John, a daughter named Variah, and a son named Casstello.

The family became part of what was known as the Great Migration of African American families who moved from the South to some of the industrial cities of the North seeking employment. The Cobbs family moved to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where my grandfather worked in the steel mills.

At some point, my grandparents divorced. My grandmother remained in Pittsburgh; my grandfather moved to Cleveland, Ohio. I have no idea what the circumstances were, but I do know my father and his siblings went to high school in Cleveland, so they were living with my grandfather at that time.

During those early years in Cleveland, my grandfather married his former sweetheart Margaret. They continued to live in Cleveland and went on to have two daughters. Meanwhile, my grandmother remained in Pittsburgh and remarried once, perhaps twice.

My mother found the dynamics of my grandparents’ relationship fascinating. My grandmother would go to Cleveland to visit and almost as soon as she arrived, she would call my grandfather on the telephone. She would say to my mom and dad, “I’m going to get that man back.”

My mom said whenever that call was made, my grandfather would rush over to our house to see my grandmother. He was always as happy to see her as she was to see him. Although they never reunited, they had a bond that was not broken.

When my grandfather died, my grandmother came for his funeral. She insisted that Aunt Variah’s children and I sit with her in the church, and when it was time to get in the cars to go to the cemetery, she took us under her wings and said, “You are riding with ME, not her, because you are MY grandchildren.”

My mother used to say that both Mrs. Cobbses were excellent cooks. That was about the only similarity between them. Lemoyne was almost six feet tall and very stately looking. She had a jovial, fun-loving nature. Margaret was short, stocky, and always had a sour expression on her face. My mom said Margaret seemed to complain about everything and had a constant pout.

After my father’s death, my mother made attempts to maintain a relationship with the Cobbses, but they did not reciprocate. There was an ongoing relationship with my father’s siblings and with my grandmother, but my grandfather and Margaret did not maintain a relationship with my mother and me. Their two daughters contacted us occasionally, but they did not. I regret that my memory of my father is so limited, but the shock of his sudden death had a numbing effect on a six-year-old who had been the apple of his eye.

My Social Development

When you are young, your playmates are often family members close to your age, your siblings, or your cousins. Since I had neither, my playmates were primarily the children of my parent’s friends. During my preschool years, we lived in a two-family house next to friends who had two daughters close to my age. Jacqui and I were the best of friends until they moved to California. Then when my father died a year later, my mom and I moved to a different apartment for one year before moving to Des Moines, Iowa. The Bryant family did keep in touch through the years.

During the two years, we lived in Des Moines, I do not recall making new friends. Every weekend my mom and I took the bus to visit our family who lived ninety miles away. There I had my cousins, Jo and Marie, who were six and eight years older than I was. We played with our dolls and paper dolls together.

Moving back to Cleveland at age nine allowed me to reestablish friendships with some of those early playmates. My mother’s friends welcomed our return and made sure to include us in the social life of their children and families.

One of the main avenues for my socialization came through membership in the Cleveland chapter of Jack and Jill of America. Jack and Jill of America was founded in 1938 by a group of African American mothers dedicated to raising the next generation of African American leaders. Their focus was to provide educational development, cultural enrichment, and unique experiences for children ages two to nineteen.

My mother was invited to join, which meant she would be a part of the mothers’ group that met monthly to plan the monthly activities for the age group that I became a part of. I already knew a few of my peers in the group, but being a part of the group from age nine until age fifteen or sixteen allowed me to make even more friends.

The monthly activities included a wide variety of experiences such as ice skating, swim parties, attendance at plays, and other events held in the city. We had holiday celebrations, parties, picnics, as well as educational trips to museums and historical sites. Certainly, many of the activities were things we could have done with our families, but the exciting part was sharing experiences with those friends our same age.

The church to which we belonged had an extremely viable and active youth group. The group meetings were held on Sunday evenings and attracted several young people who attended other churches, so we had a chance to fellowship across broad ecumenical lines. Through that group I was able to meet and get to know friends who attended different high schools in the city.

Scouting was another means of socialization for me. I was a Brownie, then moved up to becoming a Girl Scout for a few years. Several friends I made in Girl Scouts went on to become lifelong friends whom I probably would not have met if it had not been for being troop mates.

The Cleveland chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Incorporated had a group for teenage girls called Delteens. I was a part of that group during the years I was eligible to join. It was an opportunity for me to be involved with other girls my age. The purpose of the group was to provide guidance, support, and encouragement to young women who would soon be entering the job market, college, and...

Produkt-Details

• Erscheint lt. Verlag: 27.9.2024
• Sprache: englisch
• Themenwelt: Literatur ► Biografien / Erfahrungsberichte
• ISBN-13: 979-8-3509-7516-1 / 9798350975161