Site Map: Glencoe > Memories > Carol Ann Moore Robinson
MEMORIES OF CAROL ANN MOORE ROBINSON
This is a living document in that a person's memory of events may allow the information below to be updated or expanded over time. If updated, the revision number will change. This is revision 1, dated October 14, 1999.
By Carol Ann Moore Robinson, Middletown Ohio
Our family lived in Glencoe during the late 40s. My parents were Arthur and Vera Moore. My sister is Audrey. My mother worked in the mill for a short time, so Daddy's aunt Maude Tate came to live with us and she took care of me. Aunt Maude's granddaughter, Jackie Tate, also lived with us. Later on, Aunt Maude also went to work in the mill in the weaving department.
I wasn't born in Glencoe, and I was very young at the time we lived there, so my memories are those of a young child of the village.
Daddy worked in the spinning department. He never said much about work other than he was hit by a belt that broke and it broke his nose. He always had a big nose. Audrey and I would take Daddy his lunch and he would come to the door to get it. We never went into the area that he worked in. I remember Daddy coming to the door. We also took Aunt Maude her lunch downstairs in the weaving room.
We lived in two places in Glencoe. The first was the old wooden school after the new school was built and the wooden school was converted into apartments. We later moved to the fifth house up the hill (not counting the barber shop) on the side opposite from the company store. It is the one that has a vacant lot beside it. I can remember it because I had some rabbits and the cage was in that lot.
Our house had two large rooms upstairs and three downstairs. The stairs going to the upper rooms were closed in, and it seems like the walls of the stairs were brown. They were dark and I never wanted to go up them at night. Audrey and I slept in the upstairs room closest to the mill. Aunt Maude and Jackie had the other room upstairs. Mama and Daddy slept downstairs.
For rent, the mill charged 25 cents a room per week, which would make our rent $1.25 a week. The rent was deducted from your pay.
Glencoe was a very important time in my young life. It was a time of very few toys and I had one very special one. I had a plaid monkey that I carried around by the tail in my mouth. I left the monkey outside one night and the dogs tore it up. I remember crying and Daddy telling me he would get me another monkey. He didn't say he would get me another one right away, but just that he would get me another one. For years after that, Daddy bought me monkeys, but never a plaid one. Everywhere I go now that has antique toys, I try to find a plaid monkey like the one I lost so many years ago in Glencoe.
There was a very old lady who lived catty corner across from us in a one story house. Mama really loved her and I think the lady felt the same. Mama would visit her a lot, and my Mama was never a social person when it came to visiting people. Mrs. Smith, I think was her name, was a widow lady. I think she had trouble walking but didn't use a cane. She must have been in her late 70's or early 80's when we lived there. She had a vanity by the door with a carnival glass bowl setting on it. Mama always admired that bowl. Mama had a birthday and Mrs. Smith gave her the bowl. I have the bowl now and it is just as much a treasure to me as it was to Mama. In fact Mama made me take the bowl several years before she died. She said she wanted to make sure I got it. We have moved a lot because of my husband's work, but I never let the movers move that bowl; I always carry it with me. Mrs. Smith's husband won the bowl at a carnival so it is real carnival glass. I think he won it at the turn of the century.
Two doors down from Mrs. Smith was where the Massey family lived. I can't remember the parent's names, but I guess that's because, in those days, we referred to adults as "Mr" and "Mrs" rather than the way children do today. The Massey family had several children - Thelma, Pete, and Donnie, and I think all of them had soft bones that broke easily. Thelma Massey was in a wheel chair. There was a boy older than me but he played with me a lot because I wasn't a rough child. I guess for a child that had the bone problem they had, it was better to play with someone younger. He was very nice but I can't remember his name. I remember Thelma because I have a doily that she made and gave to my sister Audrey. [photo]
I remember when the bridge over the Haw River fell in the late 40s. I must have been about 6 years old and it made quite an impression on me. I think there were three cars on the bridge, and one of them was blue. The bridge didn't just fall, rather it collapsed in the middle such that each side slanted down into the river. After it fell, there were no road blocks at the bridge. You would just drive up there, park your car, and go look. It was a sight to behold and one that I have not seen since. I don't think anyone was killed or hurt badly as it seems like Daddy said something about it being a miracle that no one was hurt.
We lived in Glencoe at the same time polio was going around. Polio was so bad that we were told not to go to town. I don't know if that came from the Mill or not. I was taken to a Doctor Carlyle and he was not a doctor of the mill. The mill didn't have a doctor.
A special memory that we had as children was at every Christmas when the mill would give a bag of fruit, nuts, and candy to every resident of the village. It was a big thing for us kids.
