Spillman Family History & Genealogy

LIVING BY GRACE

IN MY LIFETIME

First let me fill you in on who's who, otherwise you might get lost:

" Frank Wingrove, I called Papa - my grandfather
" Mary Wingrove, I called Mama - my grandmother
" George Spillman, Daddy
" Mary Spillman, Mother
" George Spillman, My brother
" Dollie Spillman, My sister
" Johnny Spillman, My brother

Now with that out of the way here we go...... As a child growing up in Arkansas, I could not have had a better life. That's the way I remember it now as an old woman.

I was born in McGregor, Texas. Us kids had a loving family from birth. Our grandparents were very special; the cog in the middle of the wheel. Papa was a veterinarian He took care of everyone's animals, most of the time without pay. All of us kids could go to see him at anytime in his McGregor office. He had a Model T and he would bring us home when we got tired of playing on the hay and just goofing off in general. There was something about Papa that made him so kind. Later I found out, it was Jesus.

Papa would tell us about Jesus, but as a small child we didn't really understand. We just knew Jesus was always around. We went to church and learned right from wrong. I think I was about six years old when I learned everyone must die. A friend of Papa's passed away. We were old enough to ask what it was all about. I remember Papa telling us it was about Jesus. He died for us that we might live forever, so death on earth wasn't the end"

Papa was always doing for other folks. He kept very little for himself. And he had that look, you know the one, the "you better be good look" We always told him the truth, we had a lot of respect for him.

Mama always worked around the house, which was a big two-story. She was born in Arkansas, and grew up in the mountains and always talked about how beautiful it was. We will get to the story of Arkansas later. Mama had a big garden. She would pick the garden with our help. She canned a lot of things from that garden. The best she would give away. She couldn't read or write, I don't think they had schools in Arkansas at that time. The only Bible verse I ever heard Mama say was "Jesus wept", but she was a wonderful Christian lady just the same. Papa would help her with the reading and Jesus did all the rest. She would tell us kids how wonderful Jesus was and how God could do ANYTHING.

We lived in the big house a 1ot of the time with Mama and Papa. There was a big round room at the top of the stairs with a lot of windows. Dollie and I would play house in that room in the winter. The sun would keep it warm. We lived up-stairs. Papa and Mama lived down-stairs. We ate down-stairs all the time. Mama had a big table with lots of chairs. Mama and Mother did all the cooking. Everything was so good. I guess I liked to eat because I was a chubby child. We always had a fire in the fireplace. We would go down-stairs for our Bible study. Papa would use very simple words for us, Mama and Daddy so we all could understand.

Daddy was a quite man and could not read or write. He had to work hard to get money. He was a World War I Veteran and was wounded in Germany. Daddy's mom died when his younger brother was born. Daddy was about ten years old at the time. Daddy's dad gave the two boys to an uncle in Cleburne, Texas and from there his brother was taken to California. Daddy never saw him again. The uncle and Daddy moved to west Texas. Daddy worked hard and learned to keep out of the way and be quiet. His uncle raised greyhounds and raced them. Daddy was always busy with the dogs. Daddy never said, but I don't think they knew God, or even talked about Jesus. After he got home from the war (where ever home was) he moved to McGregor and worked on farms for people. The various people had animals and I think that is how he met Papa. Daddy met my mother, and they went to church. He did learn about Jesus, and even learned to read some out of the Bible. Daddy wanted to get married and have a home and family. He didn't really have a home growing up.

So Daddy married Mother, but it was a time before they had a home of their own. They moved from farm to farm. Daddy would change jobs if a house looked a little better. The hard work fo1lowed my dad all his life.

Mother was a happy lady. She loved us kids. She played piano in church, College Avenue Baptist Church in McGregor. She had a good home and a good Christian life. She loved Jesus and she loved people. When she met my dad, she was thinking about marrying someone else. But instead said she married dad and her life changed after us kids were born. That's when we moved back in the house with Papa and Mama. We moved around a lot when we were young.

Mother found time to play paper dolls with me and Dollie. She told us stories about our family. Mother was twelve years younger than Daddy, but I always felt Mom was the cog in the wheel. She was in charge of us kids. Daddy left all that to her. I think it was because of the way he grew up. Everyone was always his boss. Daddy and Mother had a good life together and kept us in church.

I remember when Daddy started getting a check of $10.00 a month from the government, because of his wound in the war. Daddy kept working and since we were living with Papa and Mama, they saved a little money. I'm not sure when, but once Daddy received a bonus check for his injury. I remember how happy everyone was. We thanked God because at the time it was the answer to our prayers.

We were about to get a home of our own, I think I would have been about eight. Daddy found forty acres of land with a big old farm house. We had a couple of cows, a big red sow, two mules, some chickens and little else. Mother cleaned up that big old house, but without money we couldn't do much. Daddy did not make much money on that farm. .The house was a fine place, but we were always cold. The only happy times I remember was getting in our wagon, hooking up the mules and going every weekend, when weather permitted, to Papa and Mama's. We would go to church and come home in Sunday Evening. Mama would feed us kids lots of food and pack some for up to bring home.


Daddy and Mother were getting worried, so they prayed and prayed. Daddy didn't want to fail at making us kids a home. Times were bad. The money Daddy got each month went in the farm with nothing coming back to him. Us kids were going to school at Moody at the time. Daddy would get up in the dark and go to bed in the dark, but I guess things just got worse.

One day a man came by our place and talked to Daddy, he knew we were about to loose everything, I suppose. He told Daddy, he would take over the farm in a trade; he had about forty acres of land close to Bellville Arkansas. He would give us a car for our animals. Everything would be paid for. Mother and Daddy prayed and talked. At the end of the week, Daddy told us kids to check out of school. That was sure okay with us. The man brought the car to our place. I never saw such a big cir, and it had windows! We kids couldn't wait to ride in that car. Papa was not in favor of all this moving; after all, Mother was his little girl. He gave Daddy a trailer. Daddy loaded up the trailer with all he could, not an inch to spare: wood stove, clothes, blankets, pots and pans, dishes…everything we owned. Daddy even tied chickens in a coop on each side of the trailer and two pigs in a box of some sort on the back of the trailer. Papa, Mama, Mother and Daddy said a lot of prayers. Papa asked for God to go with us. By this time, us kids knew a lot about Jesus. We didn't have a worry in the world. We were so proud of our car and trailer. We must have been a "sight to see."

We left for Arkansas in August. What crops Daddy had he left in the field. I guess the crops were part of the trade. Papa must have helped with money to get us there. At the time I was almost eight years old. We had no secrets in our family. Us kids were in on everything and didn't ever want to be anyone else except who we were. This was such an adventure for us kids; we had never been anywhere. Daddy and Mother prayed and told us kids to do the same. I'm not sure how much praying us kids did, as we were amazed at everything we saw…and let me tell you, we were busy looking. Luckily for us, we couldn't go very fast because of the trailer. I'm not sure how long it took us to get there, but we just wanted to travel. We would stop at night and camp by the side of the road. Daddy would build a fire and put old black coffee pot on. Mother would fix bread and fry some bacon. We would have oatmeal and canned milk for breakfast and cold bread and meat for dinner. We had a can of water with us at all times, Us kids would get in the car and Daddy and Mother would gather things up and off we would go. We got to Red River at last, and had to cross over in a ferry boat. It cost a lot of money for that ferry, a whole quarter. When we finally got on the ferry, the chickens were hollering and the pigs were squealing, and us kids...we were crying Daddy tried to calm us down. Then there was Mother, telling the driver to slow down the boat. Finally we were in the state of Arkansas without any trouble at all. Continuing on…Daddy said the road was so narrow and bad, he didn't think we would ever make it to Bellville. Mother told us to pray. She always encouraged my dad in everything. We continued to camp on the side of the road. It was really dangerous, because there were snakes and that road was very narrow But God helped us all the way.

At last in Belleville Arkansas, we were a bunch of tired people and animals. Daddy asked directions to our place and how to get there. Folks pointed toward a big mountain. We could see a narrow road just hanging there; I think everyone started praying then. The man failed to tell Daddy, that the farm was on a mountain. We were almost there and about out of money. Our new home was about ten miles up that mountain "as the crow flies" couldn't tell you actual miles. We had to get there. Papa would be sending our money as soon as we found out our new address, we had to make it and there was no turning back now. We started up that mountain and instead of Mother telling Daddy to slow down; she was telling him to give the car lots of gas. We would have slid back down if we would have slowed down. It took for ever to get to the top and we thanked God when we got there. Daddy asked everybody we saw about directions to the farm, but we didn't see many people. Finally an old man on a donkey (who turned out to be the only law on the mountain) told us how to get there. He even met us there.

The house was a log cabin with a porch across the front. A few surprises like the two broken windows and oh yea, the old man and woman living there. They didn't know what was going on, but Daddy had all our business papers with him. I remember the old couple had a lot of jugs...it was homebrew. The couple had kids that lived down the road and moved in with them. They didn't really have anything to move, but they were very nice and we felt sorry for them.

Daddy and Mother got most things unloaded right then, but the pigs and chickens' stayed in the coops until the next day. Mother was busy fixing something to eat, our food was almost gone. Daddy invited the lawman to eat with us. He was hungry and glad to stay. That night, we slept outside. No way, Mother would let us sleep in the house. Even as little kids, we could see the mess in that old house. The next day, we went: inside and got to cleaning. It wasn't too bad. The house had a big rock fireplace. After everything was nice and clean, Daddy put our beds up, and then the wood cook stove…we were in business.

Daddy had a gun, so he went hunting everyday. Food was plentiful in the woods, plenty of fishing available and there was fruit on the trees. We lots of apple trees on our place. We didn't know how to act with so much food around just for the gathering. Almost September and a lot had happened since Texas. We walked everywhere we went, we met lots of people. They just came out of the woods. You could not have had better friends. They all went to church, but didn't care if their kids went to school or not. School started about the first of September. The weather was still warm, which was good because we had about a two mile walk. Almost everyday, we would see the lawman and his donkey. The mountain was big, but everybody lived near by. Some old hermits lived way out by themselves; that's what our neighbors said. They had some great stories. True or false, I don't know.

At school, we had a nice teacher, and one big room. There was a big swimming hole to play in and to drink from. I liked the shallow water. We would go out by the water hole and take our little buckets which contained fruit, syrup and biscuits. We could have some kind of meat everyday, but we preferred syrup and bread. We would bring extra clothes so we could play in the water. Our teacher watched us and scolded us if we got out of hand. We soon learned that it was her way or no way. Our little lawman would come to the school to see how we were doing. When it started getting to cold to play in the water, the bigger kids would start showing up at school. We did our lessons at school, because there weren't enough books for us to take home.

Close to Thanksgiving, Papa sent us our money. Mother told us God answered our prayers and all was well. We had $2.50 a week to live on. Needless to say, we didn't get to town much, just about once a month. Mother would make a list. . . .Canned milk, sugar, flour and some little things we didn't always get. After all we were having our first Thanksgiving in Arkansas. It was a day to remember. Mother fixed lots of good things to eat, supplied with meat that Daddy killed. There were lots of animals and snakes in those woods, but us kids were brave and we were never afraid of anything. We just played all over. Jesus watched over us. On Thanksgiving, Mother shared our flour and sugar with the neighbors and most of them came by and brought food. We all shared what we had. Thankful to God for our blessings.

Our church was close to the school and we walked there too. We would gather with friends on the way home a lot of the time, and they would always stay for supper and tell stories. Daddy played a harp, so we entertained ourselves. We had our home, food of plenty, our good friends, and most of all Jesus.

I loved that mountain, but we all missed Papa and Mama. They sent letters and it always made us home sick. When we started back to school after Thanksgiving a young man started coming by our school.

He would bring baseballs, bats, gloves and a big bag of candy. He came at least once a week. We called him Dizzy and knew him well. Story was that he was visiting someone near the school. Near Christmas, he stopped coming by, and we sure missed that candy. He went home to the big city far away to play baseball.
We didn't know about him until years later, but turned out that he was Dizzy Dean.

Everything was going good and Christmas was close by. As Daddy would tell Mother, "Christmas is right on us~. We got a beautiful pine tree. Made the ornaments with popcorn on string, the silver lining of milk cans, nuts, and pinecones. I remember all our neighbors coming by to sing songs and of course eat. Our neighbors always brought food too. Especially that Christmas, we missed Papa and Mama; they loved Christmas and had such wonderful stories to tell. It wasn't a white Christmas, but it was sure a happy one. I will always remember times with our family and friends.

I'm not sure if we learned anything at school, but we did learn a lot about life on that mountain. School was turned out in June. Daddy was taking us fishing not far from our home. I didn't care for the fishing, in fact I still don't, but Daddy loved it. I just loved to play around the lake. We had lots of fish to eat. You know, people really didn't need money in Arkansas, not then. We ran wild with all those mountain kids. Daddy warned us to not eat the meat when we were out and about, because whatever they trapped, they ate. We had to be careful.

We had a very special girl-friend that we frequently visited. Her name was Vervel Otealia Higgins. I'll never forget that name! One day on our way to her house, the lawman on his donkey caught up with us. He had us to climb a tree and told us to stay there until he told us to come down. You see, there was a rabid dog close by. He actually shot the dog a short distance from our tree; calmly told us to come down and be on our way. Mother and Daddy started worrying about us kids now. All we wanted to do was play in those woods and run with our friends.

It was time to go to town again. Mother always got the same thing. We needed sugar; it was getting time for berry canning. We needed Carnation milk for Johnny. Us kids would be glad when Johnny didn't need a bottle… maybe, we could get some candy then. My little brother, Johnny (just a baby.) had heart trouble. If he didn't drink Carnation milk, he couldn't keep his food or vitamins down Usually he was very weak, but God kept him safe through all that journey. Daddy carried him every where we went. Later on, Daddy fixed a little junked up wagon and pulled him Seems like he took a bottle forever, finally one day he started to eat a little. Daddy and Mother thanked God for that they just depended on God for everything and never failed to give him the praise

Winter passed and all was well, none of us got sick. We started back to school, and then came more baseball and swimming. Along about June, our teacher said good-bye and moved to another part of Arkansas, I doubt that she ever came back to that mountain.

Our church was a Baptist church with lots of members. We never missed church, even if we visited with friends. It seemed everyone smoked corn pipes, chewed tobacco, and drank their moon shine; but on Sunday morning, everyone was in church. Sometimes we had dinner on the ground, we'd sing and most of the people had fiddles and harps. Boy, could they play that gospel music. We enjoyed our friends and they watched over us.

I remember some bad thunderstorms. One day, us kids were out in the woods, amongst those tall pines when lightning struck a tree. We were already in a rush to get home, but when that lightning struck it not only scared us to death but doubled our speed. We told the story when we got home and Daddy said God was with all of us. He added that we might go back to Texas, if he could just save some money. One morning, Daddy got up and told us he was going to try and find a job. We knew there weren't any jobs on the mountain. Soon after, Mother was fixing supper on the wood stove and it started storming. All of us were just scared and our nerves were on edge. All at once, there was a loud noise and Mother screamed. The lightning had struck the skillet she was using. She passed out cold, there on the floor. We didn't know what to do. Daddy came in and got Mother up and started walking her. Mother came to herself and we just thanked God for his goodness.

Daddy got a job at the saw mill. He worked and Mother started saving the money. About the first of October, we planned our trip back to Texas. Daddy was just going to leave the farm and our old house. Us kid, were ready to go. Our car was still in good shape, just needed an extra tire. God was truly with us. The day we were getting packed, all our friends came over. They loved us and we loved them. Good-byes are hard, but we were still ready to go home. About noon, the lawman and his donkey showed up. He told Daddy that the state wanted to buy our farm. In fact, they wanted to buy the whole mountain for a state park. Daddy and Mother couldn't believe what they were hearing . . . the answer to prayers. So we stayed long enough for Daddy to get papers fixed up. We all realized that God had a hand in the deal. I don't know how much money we got, but everyone was happy that we would get a check later. They would mail it to Texas. We packed again, but this time we left a lot of stuff. Before we could get gone, the little old man and woman that were there when we got there came back. We left them sitting on the porch, just like we found them. They had come home. Daddy gave them and the lawman, the possessions we left behind. We left the animals and the chickens.

We were glad to get to the Red River. This time, us kids had a big time on the ferry. Daddy told us we were growing up. We didn't have any trouble and at last, we were in Texas. We each had a pint of Mother's homemade grape juice. That juice was so sweet! So here we are laughing and drinking juice all the way home, laughing a lot as a matter of fact Daddy's hat blew out the window, his favorite felt hat He said let it go, he'd get another one in Texas Nothing damped our spirits. We stopped early that night, Daddy poured out our juice and we went to sleep op the side of the road Daddy slept good all night, not once waking up. This trip not once did Mother tell Daddy to slow down; it was just a great day. I guess Johnny was the only one that wasn't laughing He was Just too little. We had a good trip all the way

Papa and Mama were so happy to see us. The big house looked so good. We put our things up. We didn't tell Papa about the grape juice drinking. We settled in once again and felt so safe. Now, we missed our mountain and our friends. Mother never wrote any letters back to Arkansas, citing the fact that no one would be able to read them anyway.

Daddy had proven that he could take care of his family with God's help of course.

I thank God for my life, after all the prayers and church going: I didn't really have an experience with Jesus until I was grown. Jesus touched me, but that's another story. As of today, I'm happy with my life, with Jesus, and my family. I miss Papa, Mama, Mother, Daddy, George, Dollie, and Johnny, but life goes on and God gives us the strength to go on. When Jesus calls us, we must be ready to meet him. What a beautiful here after we can look forward to.

In case you're wondering, the name of our mountain was Schkilla Mountain. Our lawman's name was Lester Brown and his donkey was named Ears. Maybe someday, some of you can visit that beautiful mountain. It's still a state park. I never got to go back, but the little donkey's foot prints must still be there some place.

I LOVE YOU ALL, GOD BLESS AND KEEP YOU.

As told by: Dorothy Marie Spillman - Klepper
1996