Jewells of Thought

The world in 1890 was much different when this little girl was born today. Dugger where she lived most of her life was a mining town and she lived just south of the town. Ironically, I just described myself, but I will come back to this thought later.

Mining would be a part of her life even so that I now have a book her son bought about mining in Southern Indiana long after she died. This book is quite thick and was delicately pieced together by a church friend.

While I don’t know as much about her life growing up I know she had a big family of brothers and sisters including Eva, Blanche, Daisy, Guy, Hallie, Tom, but there were 8 altogether. These are the names that quickly came to my mothers mind. I have seen and touched photos of them that I cannot seem to find right now. An accident of sorts upended their last resting spot.

What I do know of this lady was that she could be a spitfire. On multiple occasions my Mom and Uncles have made statements that I am just like her at different times. I am still uncertain if this is good or bad.

Her family dealt with tragedy. After having a girl named Maxine and a boy named Ralph both children arrived at 10 years old, however, Ralph had some unexpected problems. He went to school one day and the teacher hit him we are not sure of all the details and he died. There is a possibility he had a heart murmur or a heart condition of some sort that just wasn’t known about until that unexpected day.

Some of my first memories of this very house I live in are faint. There was a wall between the kitchen and the living room all that is left of that wall is a good foot or so hanging from the ceiling. A reminder of the house it used to be. This was her home with her husband William. I was so young, but I still have those very faint memories of what this house used to look like. After she died my Uncle Floyd and Aunt Mary lived in this house with my 3 cousins.

She for sure, would not recognize the place she called home. But in her day living here with her husband a miner and her children made a good life in these acres. She had 2 big gardens one for flowers and of course a vegetable garden. Beautiful, big and luscious she had a soft spot for tomatoes and onions. I have heard she truly believed an onion a day kept the doctor away.

There you have it. Tomatoes and onions, some of our similarities. We love our garden vegetables especially these two. She even won ribbons for her garden work. Dugger had a flower show and she won ribbons for her gardens. Her Snap Dragons and Mums were beautiful. She sold her produce at the Dugger IGA including her lettuce and eggs. She was meticulous with her gardens; no weeds.

After another 10 years after Ralph died Horace was born. Then another boy was born another decade later. Freddy became the baby of the family. When he went into the Navy like his older brother Horace did, he ended up needing his War-Hero brother to get him home for their father’s funeral. Their mother needed both of them home.

I wonder though, while he was back in town, did he happen to catch a glimpse of the future Mrs. Alsman, during this time!

The only daughter, Maxine, became a teacher at what would become my alma mater Oakland City University. Then she took a job at St. Louis, Missouri for a time. All of her children ended up having good jobs from their work ethic garnered from her and each loved their gardens in different ways.

Papaw Fred said this lady actually had fields of tomatoes just south of our house. Down below the pond was her patch of Sorghum Molasses. There is nothing this lady couldn’t do. She had the ultimate green thumb.

She made pajamas every Christmas for her grandchildren. She measured them and made them from scratch with her own patterns. Plus she made each grandchild a quilt. Her hobbies were essential for life they weren’t done for just doing something fun. Her family needed these essential handmade clothes and food. She put her heart into her work and it showed in the quality of the work she produced.

Church was a big thing for her and her family. She was also gifted musically as she was in the kitchen. So she had a ministry entertaining Preachers who came to the Church. She played piano and sang bass in a quartet of women.

One specific Preacher she took care of came from Marian, Indiana. He would sleep with his shoes and hat on. My Mom remembers hearing her say that when she was younger. There was another couple who came to Church who didn’t have any children they came to Sunday dinner every week, Edna and John of Cole City, Indiana.

Here are a couple other stories I have heard about her. She took her grandson with her to milk the cow. The cow’s name was Pet she put her one year old grandson in one of the milk buckets while she was milking Pet. When you only have so many hands you do what you gotta do. Years later when two more of her grandsons were a bit older they didn’t get up to work that morning so she didn’t want to feed them. Her thought was if you didn’t get up and work you are not getting her breakfast. Basically you snooze you lose. Their father, however, had to stand up for them and say yes they are going to eat that was how they ate that morning.

Like I said, she was a spitfire and I wish I could have met my great-grandmother Mattie Alsman. She would have been 133 years old today.

She died before getting to meet all her great-grandchildren on April 8, 1978. Some of us were yet to be born the 1980s were just a few years away. In this photo as I look at Aunt Maxine I see traces of my Mom in her.

Mattie Alsman was essentially the Proverbs 31 Woman in the flesh. Her children learned how to be productive Christians and workers because of her example.