(Memories from 1930’s & 40’s)
My maternal grandmother, Martha Sharpe Bridgers, or “Granny Mothie” as she was known to us, appeared to be a simple lady who operated a country store at Pender’s Crossroads (Bridgers Grocery and Farm Supply) and maintained her home. She never appeared to be in a hurry but things got done quietly and without drama or stress. I think she must have moved through life and her chores kind of like a duck swimming across a pond. You know, the duck appears to be effortlessly gliding across the water but we don’t see underneath that duck’s feet and legs are moving like a propeller.
Some of the things I remember about her home and yard and the store, Bridgers Grocery and Farm Supply:
She could usually be found at the store sitting in her special chair near the pot-bellied coal heater. Her chair was low, suitable for her height. Although dozens of people came in the store daily and many of them sat on crates, chairs or a bench, no one sat in her chair. If she had time or decided to sit that low chair was always available to her. It had a cane bottom. The cane bottom was woven in her chair by her son and my Uncle, Calvin Bridgers, who was blind. Calvin had been a student at Gardners’ School and when he was in about the second grade he was accidentally hit in the head by a swing on the school playground. I think that back then he wasn’t immediately taken to a hospital and that lapse of time was likely the cause of his blindness and epilepsy. That is what I was told. Granny Mothie and Grandpa Wright Bridgers sent Calvin to The School for the Blind in Raleigh. He learned to read Braille, to enjoy music, clocks and watches. He learned to bottom chairs with strips of cane. On many days Calvin could be found in a small building in the yard (the pump house) soaking the cane to make it pliable enough to be woven into the chair bottom - like the one Granny Mothie sat in every day at the store.
People from the neighborhood and beyond were happy to get a chair bottom done by Calvin.
Although Calvin was blind he was not without a special vision. He was interested in people and could not recognize them by sight but he knew them all by their voice or by the sound of the motor of their vehicles.
Although most people in the late 1930’s and 40’s had a motor vehicle of some kind but some folks came to the store on a mule drawn wagon. In the early 1940’s there was one older man who came to the store on his buggy. He was a Mr. Cox who lived about four miles from Pender’s Crossroads. He was always dressed in a white shirt, a black suit and black hat. His buggy was black and had a fringed top with side curtains that he could open or close. This impressive rig was pulled by a beautiful white horse.
It was always a treat for me to see this buggy and the white horse with that long flowing mane. Mr. Cox’s daughter was married to Dr. M. A. Pittman who practiced medicine in Wilson. I feel sure Mr. Cox had automobiles, but his buggy and that high stepping white horse were a beautiful sight.
Calvin had a Victrola and loved to listen to his music and other recordings. He could be found in the living room reading his books in Braille. I remember moving my fingers across his Braille books and was amazed that it could actually be read by feeling.
Although Miss Mothie appeared to be a simple lady, that was far from the truth about her. She was a shrewd businesswoman. She was an excellent cook. Her back yard was put to a profitable use. She raised chickens and always had eggs and chickens to eat and sometimes to sell.
She had a fig tree that was the biggest one I ever saw. I can’t say that I have seen a lot of fig trees but hers was memorable. It was big enough that I remember climbing on it and sitting on a limb while eating those plump sweet figs. Granny Mothie made fig preserves and she shared the figs if we didn’t eat them all.
There was another tree in her yard that drew a lot of attention. I don’t know what kind of tree it was but in the spring or summer that tree was actually covered with worms. They were Catawba worms or caterpillars. Fishermen from the neighborhood and beyond came for those worms for their fishing trips. They must have been a lucrative bait.
Miss Mothie was also known for her healing powers. She had knowledge of how to make a tea from roots or leaves to cure sore throats, another potion for stomach aches, one for a cough or congestion. She made a concoction to treat children for intestinal worms. I remember her soaking a collard leaf in some mixture and tying it around our neck to treat a fever, cough or congestion.
Miss Mothie had a special gift of being able to talk the fire out if someone suffered a burn. There were many cases of people, especially children, getting burned by heaters, fireplaces or stoves. Parents brought their children to Bridgers Grocery and Farm Supply to see Miss Mothie and she would look at the burn, hum or say some words I didn’t understand. She would sometimes gently touch the affected area and hum, or say some strange words and the pain was gone. She also “talked warts away.” Maybe it was some form of witchcraft. I did ask her to tell me how she could do those things. Her answer was always the same. She said if she told how she did it she would lose her power. Of course, she couldn’t heal every illness or condition but she sure could make a burn stop hurting.
Her house had a wide hall all the way through the middle. That hall was wide enough to drive a truck through. There were rooms on either side of the hall - bedrooms on one side and a living room, a dining room and kitchen on the other side. At the back of the house was a long room (that had once been a back porch) across the back, and a bathroom.
The hall had a large trunk for storage of quilts and a dresser with a mirror. There was a sturdy table in the hall on which sat a water bucket with a dipper hanging on the side. Everyone drank from that dipper.
When I was about 8 years old (almost 80 years ago) I spent the night with her and my Aunt Blanche. I always slept in Aunt Blanche’s room with her because Granny Mothie kept her bedroom so hot it was like a sauna. It was so hot you could see the heat. A kind of funny thing happened that night. Granny Mothie wore false teeth. was in the winter and she had a glass of water on the dresser in the hall. When she got ready for bed she removed her false teeth and put them in the glass of water. The teeth looked harmless in the glass of water. Everyone slept peacefully all night.
There had been some activity in the hall while we slept. Aunt Blanche and I got up first because she was going to the store and build a fire in the coal heater so it would be warm for early customers. Her routine was to start the fire and then take out the cheese box which was located in front of the pot bellied heater and was used for the men who sat around the heater to spit tobacco juice in or as an ashtray for the ones who smoked. She would dump the dirty sand and refill the wooden cheese box with clean sand to be spat in again today.
As we walked into the hall to go to the store Aunt Blanche started laughing. She pointed to the glass and I was startled and then it was funny. A mouse had gotten in the house probably to get warm. He must have gotten thirsty and went for a drink when he fell into the glass of water and into the false teeth. The mouse had drowned and was resting like he was caught by Granny Mothie’s teeth. Aunt Blanche and I were laughing when Granny Mothie came out of her hot bedroom and saw the mouse caught by her false teeth. In her calm and no drama way, she calmly took the glass, removed her teeth and threw the mouse into the backyard. Within just a few calm minutes she had cleaned her teeth and put them in back in place and ate her breakfast with them.
You just cannot unsee some things.
Montress Greene
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