An Accident on the Farm
An Oral History Story
In interviewing my grandmother (Eva Caroline
(Smith) Cox (1889-1988) for her memories, we asked her what it was like when
accidents happened and many folks in Ohio County had no telephones and no
doctors nearby. She told us about the time when they lived on their little farm
not far from Rosine, and their horse kicked my dad in the head when he was
about three in 1912. They had no
telephone to call a doctor.
Grandmother: “Yes, we had a horse; her name was Old
Maud. Eula Mae was a baby, and I told
Gilbert to stay in the yard when he went out to play. In place of staying in the yard, when I got
through bathing Eula Mae and putting her in her cradle, I went to look for him
and he was up there in the horse lot.
See, he wasn’t but about three years old. And I could see him getting up and
falling. And Old Maud, I could see her,
standing there eating. And I run, my
land! Oh, and I got there and there was
blood all over the front of his clothes.
I had to go about…every bit as far as from here to Mr. Thames (her
neighbor) or farther, (which would have
been about three city blocks).
“And the wind was blowing and I was carrying him and I was
hollering for Daddy. And some of them
were working in the field cutting and shocking corn. You know how dry it is in the fall. And they heard me and they come. And we left Eula Mae there in the house by herself
all that time.”
G. O.: (my dad) “That’s the time that Aunt Della
was talking about when we went back to Kentucky to visit. And she said she took care of me when the
horse kicked me in the head.”
Grandmother: “Yes, she came. Just as quick as she heard the news. It got out that you weren’t expected to live.
The news got out. And every one of them
come. And Della did, too. Daddy had to go over home (meaning to her parent’s home). We had no phone. And he had to walk and call Dr. Oscar
Allen. And when Dr. Allen came out
there, he didn’t know what the trouble was, and he had to go back and get a
needle to sew this place up. It was in
the afternoon…nearly night. And horseback,
at that.
“And I had to put him on our old black trunk. We laid a quilt down and we had to put him to
sleep. And I had to hold him and help
with it. Mother had to give him the
chloroform while the doctor sewed it up.
But somebody had to help. Dr.
Allen was just by himself and didn’t have a nurse or anybody like that. It fractured Gilbert’s skull, and the doctor
said if Daddy hadn’t of had those shoes off the horse, it would have killed
him. He had just had those shoes taken
off.”
G.O.: “I know what happened…they don’t know what
happened. Daddy had given Old Maud a
load of that corn to eat, and I went up there and got a cornstalk and hit her
with it.”
Grandmother: “He still has the scar on his forehead. And then, after he got well and all, Daddy
got on the horse and rode to Cromwell and carried that baby and had his picture
made. He is setting on that stool, with
little white rompers on. He carried him
to Wise Jackson, a photographer, because we didn’t have no picture of him.
(All of a sudden, it became very important to get a picture of him.) And of course, I couldn’t go, because I had
Eula Mae, and besides, we just had that one horse.”
“Della came and stayed with me nearly two or three weeks to
help with Gilbert because I had to tend Eula Mae, who was only about six or
seven months old.”
After this interview
was over, someone sitting around the table asked: “Did you have ice to put on the wound to keep
down swelling?”
Grandmother: “No,
but we could go and get ice. We kept ice
when Mother was sick with typhoid fever.
We didn’t have any electricity…we didn’t have anything like that. We couldn’t keep ice.
“The only way you could keep ice was to dig a hole and put
it in sawdust and wrap it and bury it.
It seems to me they went to Beaver Dam after it. Beaver Dam or Cromwell, I don’t know
what. It might have kept a week, I
guess, or maybe longer.”
Eula Mae: (my aunt.) “You talk about pioneer
spirit. And they just had something we
don’t have – fortitude.”
Grandmother: “Well, you can do many things when you have
to.”
~.~
Gilbert Owen Cox, age
3
An important 1st
picture!
The above mentioned, Della Catherine Smith, (my grandmother’s oldest sister), was
born 5 November 1880, and was the daughter of James Thomas and Sarah (Sanders)
Smith. She married Fleming Letcher
Taylor March 22, 1913 at Select, Ohio Co. KY.
This couple had four children:
two sons, Jewel D.; Eldred S. Taylor; and two daughters, Evelyn Taylor
and Valois Taylor.
Obituary from The Ohio
County News, Thursday, October 23, 1975:
"Mrs. Della Taylor"
"Beaver Dam--Mrs. Della Taylor, 94, died Friday, October 17, Ohio
County Rest Home, Beaver Dam.
Mrs. Taylor was born in Ohio
County, November 5, 1880, and was a member of Bald Knob United Methodist
Church. Her husband, Letcher Taylor,
preceded her in death in 1960.
Survivors include two
daughters, Valois Shuffert and Evelyn Elmore, both of Louisville, eight
grandchildren; eight great-grandchildren, two brothers, Harb and Ellis Smith,
both of Cromwell, and two sisters, Mrs. Ella Stewart and Mrs. Eva Cox, Troup,
Texas.
Funeral services were at 2
p.m. Sunday, October 19, at the William L. Danks Funeral Home, with the Rev.
Malcolm Couch, pastor of Liberty United Methodist Church, officiating. Burial was in Liberty Church Cemetery."
Also, mentioned
from the above story:
Dr. Oscar Allen was
born at Round Hill, Butler County, Kentucky, on April 5, 1882. His parents were
C. Y. Allen, who was a native of Ohio County and a farmer, and Mary Elizabeth
Colburn, who was a native of Butler County.
Dr. Allen was known as
a man of genial disposition, whose practice was spent within a fifteen-mile
radius, mainly in Ohio County. He was a man looked upon with great esteem, who
held high the standards of his profession.
He was well known, was a good citizen, and contributed materially to his
community.
He was the family
doctor for James Thomas Smith while he was ill and before his death. He was highly regarded among all the Smith
family members.
~.~
From my Family Tree
Maker, Notes section:
Fleming Letcher
Taylor was the son of Lorenzo Dow & Gabriella Taylor, and was born
April 8, 1876, in Ohio County, KY.
He married Della Catherine Smith March 22, 1913, and they
had four children - two sons and two daughters.
He and Della were 38 and 32 when they married.
Obituary is from the Ohio County Messenger, Beaver Dam, KY,
dated Friday, March 11, 1960, page 3:
"Letcher Taylor Dies at Age
83"
" Letcher Taylor, 83, died at 3 a.m.,
Sunday at his home in the Mt. Pleasant community. He was the son of Dow and Gabriella Ford
Taylor. He was a member of the Woodmen
of the World.
He is survived by his wife, Mrs. Della
Smith Taylor; two daughters, Mrs. Evelyn Elmore and Mrs. Valois Shuffette, both
of Louisville; two sons, Jewell Taylor, Beaver Dam; Eldred Taylor, Terre Haute,
Ind., and nine grandchildren.
Funeral services were held at 2 p.m. Monday
at the Liberty Methodist Church, conducted by the pastor, Rev. William
Perkins. Burial was in the church
cemetery.
Pallbearers were Kenneth Baize, Samuel
Crowder, John Iler, Arthur Crabb, Charles Smith and Roy Stewart."
~.~
Another obituary in The
Ohio County News, Hartford, KY dated March 11, 1960, was almost identical
to the one above, However, it did
mention that he was a native of Ohio County and that Casebier Funeral Home,
Beaver Dam, was in charge of the arrangements.
My dad remembered when he was about 10 of riding his horse
to his Uncle Letcher's grist mill to have corn ground for his grandfather,
James Thomas Smith and Sarah (Sanders).
Letcher married their daughter, Della Catherine.
~.~
~Submitted by Janice Cox
Brown
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