IDA FREEMAN BLACK

The following bio was taken from page 114 of the book entitled "Rusk County History" compiled and edited and used with permission of the Rusk County Historical Commission.

Transcribed by Shirley Koym

Submitted by Gloria Briley Mayfield, Rusk County TX Coordinator

Awaking early in winter and snuggling deeper into the high bed between double blanket sheets, with quilts piled high, one could hear a roaring fire in the fireplace and in the kitchen, Mama and Daddy and could smell the bacon and coffee. It was hog-killing weather.

It seems that winters were colder and summers hotter back then. They really were not. I walked a mile to school my first year, along with neighbors relatives and friends, Basil Lloyd, my brother just older than I, kicking rocks and trying to keep warm. My sister, Virginia Dare, was not yet in school. In syrup buckets we carried our lunches consisting of syrup and biscuits, slab bacon, peanut butter and crackers. In 1927, the old school looked better, but it is still there in Chalk Hill where I as born and lived until I married in 1937. My first classmates were Emma Jewel Williamson, Robert Beall and Douglas Graham, my first cousin. Miss Alma Reese was my teacher. Miss Eleanor Clark was my second-grade teacher at Oak Hill, Miss Jeanette Watt, Miss Velma Lloyd, and Miss Elma Turlington were among my teachers at Tatum when I was in the third grade.

I married James Elbert Berry August 14, 1937. Our daughters, Mary Charlotte and Beverly Sue, were born September 2, 1938 and February 3, 1945 respectively. I married James Crawford Black June 15, 1956. Our daughter Jhetta Lea was born July 7, 1957.

During the early thirties I remember the "depression" when times were hard all over. I look back and admire the ingenuity of my parents. They never complained. Since we were farmers, we always had plenty to eat. Clothes were scarce and often fashioned from feed sacks. Those were the days of the "New Deal:, the "P.W.A.," and "W.P.A." – public works programs. In cities there were bread lines, soup lines, and suicides. Hobos, riding freight trains, were hunting jobs.

Daddy had one of the few trucks in Chalk Hill. Friends would go with us into Longview, Gregg County, on Saturdays to shop and to spend the day. Daddy often loaded the truck with neighbors and went fishing on Cherokee Bayou, Sabine River or Hendricks Lake, spending the night camping. The youngsters enjoyed telling ghost tales around the campfire. (Scary)

I remember the home dances and musicals Daddy and Mama played music to or piano. Mama also played the piano for church.

I first was baptized at age eighteen in Free Will Baptist Church. Later, after attending other Baptist churches all my life, in 1968 I was baptized, along with my husband, into Chalk Hill Primitive Baptist Church.

I remember how Cherokee Lake changed the face of Chalk Hill. It was built starting in 1947. Farm Road 1716 was also built about that time. Chalk Hill didn’t look like home anymore. The road that went to Grandpa Pepper’s gin lot was so beautiful; so was the Cherokee Bayou road with trees overlapping it. Cherokee Bayou was one source used to develop Lake Cherokee.

I remember the Wylie Pepper store and the Eddie Gilliam store on the hill. Uncle Ed Loden also had one close to our house. Later Jody Chapman ran the Wylie Pepper store. George Pepper had a store there, too, in the sixties. Long ago someone said there were always about four stores there.

A pottery factory between Chalk Hill and Stewart was claimed partly by Chalk Hill. The pottery used the clay from the chalk hill at Chalk Hill. Its location was at Smith’s Chapel on the old Harkless place.

I remember the oil boom in the early thirties when Grandpa and Grandma Pepper moved to Longview and ran a boarding house. I loved to visit them.

My first baby was born in a log cabin which was formerly the community-canning kitchen. I also remember the boys going off to war.

I was born September 14, 1921. My parents are William Mumford and Leatha Taylor Pepper Freeman. My grandparents were Sidney Mumford and Sara Flora Barton Freeman, and James Arthur and Ida Ferguson Pepper. My great-grandparents were Noah Thomas and Jane Amanda Hill Freeman, and Wiley Anderson and Leathayan Matilda Harris Ferguson.

My children, their husbands, and their children are: Orvel Lee and Mary Charlotte Betty Walker Reed, Kim Aline Walker Reed Lightfoot, Michael Alan Reed, Amy Lori Reed, David Christopher Reed; Dennis Daniel & Beverly Sue Berry Fogarty, Denise DeAnn Fogarty Davis, Sherri Suzette Fogarty, and Yvonne Christina Fogarty; Ansel Orren and Jhetta Lea Black Hayes, and Shannon Rae Hayes. My great-grandson is Geoffrey Chad Mortley Lightfoot.

Submitted by Ida Freeman Black