Tell Me A Story: ANN AND NAT

Mary Marcia
America's STORYTELLER
Telling Untold Stories in Photographs, Prose and Public Speaking

Link: http://tellmeastory-marcia.blogspot.com/

ANN AND NAT

Ann and Nat

were sisters, and best friends.

Ann and Nat

were daughters of

Albert and Mary Lucille Schwamb.

Mary Lucille Culbertson

married Albert Leo Schwamb

on June 24, 1923.

Anna O'Dell Schwamb

was born in Stotesbury, Missouri,

on January 16, 1926.

She was called Ann.

Alberta Natalie Schwamb

was born in Stotesbury, Missouri,

on November 3, 1929.

She was called Natalie, or Nat.

Ann married Keith Mitchell on July 5, 1946.

Nat married Jewell Bush on October 6, 1947.

Ann and Nat

were sisters, and best friends.

The newly-weds lived in the same apartment building

that their mom, Mary Lucille, owned

at 311 Arthur in Liberty, Missouri.

They built houses in the same neighborhood in 1954.

Nat and Jewell lived on Middlebrook Drive.

Ann and Keith lived just behind them on Cross Lane.

They never locked their doors.

The foot-path between their houses was well traveled.

Mary Lucille was my grandmother, and the single most important person in my life. I was named Mary Marcia after her.

Ann was my favorite aunt. All of the kids called her "Nanny."

Both Lucille and Ann were successful business women in the 1940's, 50's, 60's, and 70's. Lucille owned and operated a dance hall, restaurants, apartments, and a home for senior citizens.

Ann was a top supervisor for Percy Kent Manufacturing Company.

A factory full of men and women reported to her.

I worked for both my grandmother and my aunt in my summer jobs in the 1960's. I learned how to operate big machinery as a bag "sewer" and "catcher" at Percy Kent, and I hated it.

Nanny treated me just like the other factory workers. Truthfully I was a little bit scared of her at work. That all changed when were in the car riding to and from work. She was back to being my favorite aunt.

Granny (Mary) Lucille hired me and my entire cheerleading squad to work at the Highway Barbeque in Liberty, so we could earn money for cheerleading camp. We learned how to wait on tables, wash dishes, and make change.

Natalie was my mother. I didn't realize how smart my mother was,

or how much I learned from her until I was older.

Mom was creative, hard working and stubborn. She stayed home while my siblings and I were in school. She cooked and cleaned and sewed for all of us. She took in ironing, cleaned Granny's houses, and babysat my cousin, Tandra (Ann's daughter)

for extra money.

She organized the household budget, and paid the family bills. When my youngest brothers were in high school, mom entered the workforce as an office manager and bookkeeper for physician groups. She reorganized their offices, and discovered employee fraud.

Read more about my mother, Natalie:

CLICK on the link or COPY & PASTE the link in your browser:

http://tellmeastory-marcia.blogspot.com/2013/11/my-christmas-skirt.html

CLICK on the link or COPY & PASTE the link in your browser:

http://tellmeastory-marcia.blogspot.com/2014/05/happy-mothers-day-red-wood-suit.html

Before my mother, Natalie, went to Heaven in 2003, I asked her to tell me stories about how she and her sister, Ann, became best friends, and what it was like growing up.

Natalie's Memories

"We were both born at home. Anna O'Dell was born January 16, 1926. I was born on November 3, 1929. We lived with Grandma and Grandpa Schwamb. Our father, Albert worked on the highway department. We hardly knew him. He was never home. He traveled for work, and shared a trailer with a friend and his wife."

"We lived in Stotesbury, Missouri. Stotesbury was a railroad place. When the railroad closed - the bank and town closed. Mom (your Granny Lucille) rented the bank and opened a restaurant. The bank moved to Hume, Missouri."

"Grandpa Schwamb was blind. Grandma Schwamb died after we moved to town. I was about two years old. Grandpa built us a child size wagon, and we had a billy goat."

"Ann and I played with Billy Bob Koon. He was the banker's son, and the same age as Ann. We were the 'Three Muskateers' until the bank closed. I must have been in first or second grade."

"There were strip pits - coal mine pits - where they dug for coal. We swam in them. Why we didn't drown - I'll never know."

"We walked everywhere just for the fun of it. We searched for old abandoned houses, and walked to all of them. We supposed everything was haunted. We used to sit down in the houses, and listen for sounds. Once we heard a shot gun. That scared us off. A farmer saw us, and shot because he didn't recognize us. We ran as fast as our legs would carry us."

"We explored. Everything was haunted to us. A lovely brick house across the street from us burned down. Only a garage and a hole full of water remained. We thought it was haunted."

"There was this house on the other side of town that was left vacant when someone moved. Our school teacher asked for volunteers to go to that house, and get school books that someone left there. School books were precious back then. The school books were supposed to be under the house. The story also goes that if you walked into this dark room you would fall into hell and never come back. Ann and five other school kids and I walked to the house. They were three years older than me. They dared me to go in. Of course I went in. I lived to tell about it, didn't I?"

"Stotesbury had a population of about 100. Everyone had outside toilets (outhouse), and they dug wells for water. There was no Kindergarten back then. When the gypsies came to town, Mom (your Granny Lucille) was afraid they would kidnap us. Parents came to school to pick up their kids: everyone except the kids who rode a pony to school."

"We lived about two blocks from school in 1935. We had a living room, two bedrooms and a kitchen...and an outhouse. There was no electricity, so we burned coal oil lamps. We cooked on a coal oil stove. I shared a room with Ann. We slept together on one full bed with a feather mattress that we sank down in. When it was cold in the winter, Mom (your Granny Lucille) would heat a brick in the oven, then cover it with flannel fabric. She put the heated brick on our feet: one for each of us to keep warm."

"In the summer we took one of Granny's handmade quilts outside and slept under a tree. We put a battery radio on the sidewalk by the tree and listened to the Heavy Weight Championship of the World and the World Series. I remember Joe Lewis."

"There was a 'cyclone cellar' in the middle of town. When heavy winds came up everyone that could get there in time came there during a storm."

"We liked to play in the rain. We made mud pies. Ann and the kids dared me to eat mud pies, and of course I did."

"When people died - they were put in a coffin, and the coffin was set on two chairs in the living room of their home. They were left there for two days, and usually buried on the third day. I went with Mom (your Granny Lucille) to a neighbor's house when a neighbor died. The chair that held the coffin fell. The coffin fell, and the body fell out. It scared the shit out of me."

"Grandpa owned some land across from our house. He rented the land to the circus when it came to town. Ann and I got free tickets to the circus. The biggest thrill I ever had was when a single engine airplane came to town. Rides cost 10 cents each. I begged to ride in that airplane. A dime was a LOT of money! Mom (your Granny Lucille) bartered with the man who owned the plane. She gave the man a home-cooked meal for lunch, and I got to ride in the plane. Ann was scared to death."

"Ann saved my life. It must have been in 1936, because I was seven and Ann was ten. We broke open an entire package of firecrackers, and dumped out all the powder. Everyone was chicken to light the powder - so I did it. My hair caught on fire, and burned it all off. It scared my face. My face was entirely black."

"I was on fire. Ann grabbed me by the hand, and dragged me to the water pump to put out the fire. Then she walked me to the restaurant. Dad took me to Hume, Missouri, to the doctor who put salve on my face, and wrapped my head in white rags. The only thing peeking out was my eyes and mouth. I wore bandages for a good month."

"Dad was mad. He went to the store and bought me overalls and shoes, and made me dress like a boy until the bandages came off. I didn't mind. I would much rather wear overalls than cotton stockings that the girls wore. Girls wore brown cotton stockings in the winter, and white cotton stockings in the summer, and they were HOT."

"Ann was the prissy one...the smartest. She pleased everyone. Ann was the lady of the family. I was the Tomboy who always got into trouble. Ann was picked to be the angel in the church play. I don't remember being chosen to be in the play."

"I loved my sister. Ann was my best friend, probably my only friend...except for Lorraine. Lorraine's mother nursed me, when Mom couldn't. Lorraine's mother would nurse Lorraine on one breast, and me on the other. Lorraine had an older brother who was Ann's age."

"There was a pecan grove outside Stotesbury. Ann and I earned money - 5 cents a bushel to pick up pecans."

"Ann and I took baths in a round tub in the middle of the kitchen. And went first. I was second, because Ann was usually cleaner than me. If the kids made mud pies - I ate them. If one of the kids got a goldfish, killed it, and fried it: they dared me to eat it. Of course, I ate it. That's what I did. I was Ann's little sister."

Alberta Natalie Schwamb Bush