Margrea McDonald was born in Meridian, Mississippi. When asked about her childhood, she was quick to tell us about The Depression. As a child she had to work hard to take care of her numerous younger siblings. As soon as she was tall enough to reach the stove, she did much of the cooking. They didn’t have much. “Nobody did,” she would say. Her meals were often cornbread in milk, and she liked to add pepper. Sometimes they would work all day picking cucumbers for a dollar, and “They were glad to have it.” When she was a teenager she caught a bus at the bottom of Rawl’s Hill (about a mile away) and went to Hattiesburg to work at The Reliance. It was a kind of factory that made clothes. My grandmother worked there too. Margie’s father was a hunter and a trapper. In high school she played basketball and was probably the tallest one. Her sister, Lola, played also. In those days women didn’t have bras because they were so poor. Aunt Lola was well endowed so they made a bra from a flour sack for her. Life was hard. She learned to work hard.
After high school she went to nursing school at the Methodist Hospital in Hattiesburg. Part of her training was to work at the Charity Hospital in New Orleans. She told of working there for several months in the summer. She lost weight because she had to walk past the morgue to get to the cafeteria and the smell took away her appetite.
When Daddy returned from WWII he said that all the girls his age were already married. He knew mother a little because she was Lola’s little sister. One night he and mother were attending an event for young people at a house near the Old Watermill Fishcamp. Part of the party was that two people would “Go walking.” Eventually they fell in love. During that time it was against the rules to be married during nursing school. So they snuck off to a Methodist church in Richton, Mississippi and got married. They were secretly married for 9 months until mother finished school, and they could tell their secret. They moved to Greenville, South Carolina for Daddy to work at a Marine Corp boot camp, Camp Lejune. When my brother, Jeff, was three days old Daddy was called back to active duty and went to South Korea for 19 months.
After he returned they bought a farm on Rainey Road. Mother was very involved in every aspect of the farm. She would go to the poultry farm and get chickens. She would wring their necks, chop off their heads, and then pour boiling water over their feathers so we could take the feathers off easier. What a terrible smell that was! Mother milked two cows when we were young. Sometimes she would go to the dairy and get an orphan calf for us to raise feeding them by bottle. Once I was in a pecan tree by the road reading a book when I saw Daddy go running down the driveway from the field to the house. I had never seen daddy run before. Turns out that Mother had been bit by a copperhead moccasin while walking in the field. She stayed in the hospital for about a week.
Another time the truck came rushing in from the field, and Mother stepped out to show us her legs. While cutting firewood with daddy, she had pulled a vine away from where Daddy was cutting and the chain saw caught on the vine and cut across both of her legs above the knee! The cut was so deep it was barely bleeding. She told us very calmly to bring her a glass of Coke, call the doctor and bring the old towels from the bathroom. Over 100 stitches were required, and she had an awful scar.
During our growing up years we had a 4H club that often met at our house. It was kinda like scouts for country kids. She was a part of the Home Demonstration Club which encouraged sewing, cooking, canning, and other womanly chores. She made most of our clothes herself on her old featherweight Singer sewing machine.
One of her most important jobs was that of chauffeur—Jeff for basketball, and the girls to basketball. She took the girls to piano lessons twice a week for 12 years. These lessons were in Ellisvillle which was 12 miles away. Margie was the only nurse in our country community so she was often called on for allergy shots, medical advice and emergencies. She was always available to help. Later she helped take care of my elderly grandparents and aunts. She worked in the Ellisville nursing home for many years. She cared for her brother, Odie, and her sister, Eva Rae, who needed care after the war. She taught Sunday School and loaded up all the neighborhood kids in the back of the truck for Vacation Bible School or for swimming in the creek. She was always making a coconut cake with 7 minute icing to take to someone in the community or to church events. Her dumplings and pecan pies were famous in the family. She taught us all so much—how to cook, how to sew, how to work, how to garden, how to care for others.
The first picture is mother and daddy on their wedding day when they secretly eloped because she couldn’t be married and be in nursing school. The second picture is mother in the yard when I was about five. I love this picture.
Mother had a terrible time smiling for pictures. I think this is one of her prettiest smiles. What a woman she was! She died on the last day of May of 2024 at the age of 96 and a half.
