West Virginia Memories

TRIBUTE West Virginia Memories Elsa Peters Fall of '34 came to Martinsburg suddenly. The blazing summer was in back of us, and we could breathe again. The apple factories were running, and the crisp smell of cooking apples filled the air. Outside the factories, women stood on line in case someone got sick or just didn't show up. Then a lucky person got to take her place and was temporarily tapped for work. Mymama stood day after day inthose lines, wearingherhat with the feather and grasping her empty purse tightly with both hands. By noon no one else would be chosen and there was nowhere to go but home. Brown StreetSchool waited for me, dark and scary, steep steps leading upward to the unknown. My dress had been let down twice. Mama had starched it stiff. My knees and elbows stuck out. I was so afraid. The gloomy halls smelled of floor oil and chalk. On the high walls pictures ofWashington and Lindy looked down on us with disapproval. First grade marched in, many of them like me—seven or eight years old and kept home till better times that never came. The door opened and we were in her room—bright, different, wonderful. There were a sand table, colorful pictures and so much more. There she was, Miss Maude, wearing a dark dress with lace collar, silver-white hair, smiling and making us feel welcome. Life changed that day. Hope returned. At home, nothing changed. Nothing got better. The yellow smell of coal oil from the kitchen stove filled the rooms. It was in your mouth when you ate, in your clothes when you put them on. Bright fall came, and Uncle Joe Huffbrought two big baskets of the last ofhis Beef Heart tomatoes before the frost. They were the last fresh vegetables for that year, unless you counted the Christmas orange from church. The Dunkard Church had a Halloween party with doughnuts, cider, apples, and candy corn. Murbetiege pies, ginger cakes and Aunt Sally's famous sugar cookies lined the tables. The ladies told the children to eat all we wanted, and we did. Late one night the fire engines came. The barn where the Reedys lived, insulated with layers of newspapers on the walls to help keep 16 out the cold, was burning. The space heater had blown up. Little brother died, and Jesse and Nellie never did come back to Brown Street School. November lltn came and Miss Maude told the students about Armistice Day. It had happened before we were born. Lots of West Virginia boys went far away to fight and keep us safe. Lots were killed and never came back. She read us a poem about the poppies in Flanders' Field. It was very sad, and all us girls cried. Miss Maude said that at exactly eleven minutes after eleven, all the bells and whistles in Martinsburg would sound off, and we were all to stand straight and tall with our right hands over our hearts and say a prayer of thanks to the Lord for all the brave Americans, even those not from West Virginia, that had saved us. Sure enough, right on time everything commenced to blow and ring. We stood as still as we could with our hands over our hearts. I guess that was about the most important thing we children had ever done. When Miss Maude held our flag out from its pole we said the pledge. She then got out the big Bible she read to us from every morning. She told us we'd say the Lord's Prayer "like Jesus taught us." We did, and all of us had a special feeling we'd never felt before. It got colder, and down by the Water Street tracks the boys took buckets and fought over the coal the firemen let down. Chicken pox and whooping cough was everywhere. Some kids died. My daddy made the doctor come by. The walls were shiny red, and monkeys were running up and down them. There wasn't enough water in the world to make me feel cool. Then there was the sharp red taste of the thantus pills...