Grandma's Kitchen
In this issue I am paying tribute to my Grandmother. Lisa Redd has also written about her Grandmother. Our grandchildren can read these years from now. It will tell them something about the special women they never knew.
Merry Christmas Rita Redd
Loma Chadwick Redd
1906 to 1988
Smyrna, GA
This picture was probably taken in the early 1950's. My grandmother (Mama Redd) never had a grand kitchen, but what she lacked in material things, she made up for in survival skills. It seemed she could take empty cabinets and create a great meal.
She managed every year to give each family member and many friends Christmas gifts. People used to tease her that she started on Christmas gifts the day after Christmas. She gathered and washed what was trash to many, orange juice cans, magazines, cigarette packs and many other items.
She always had family members saving for her crafts. My grandfather (Papaw) was often sent on collecting missions.
There were always many presents under her tree. Sock monkeys, yo-yo dolls, pocket books made out of cigarette packs, dish towels and crocheted items.
The list goes on and on. She created wonderful gifts from glue, thread, material and trash, carefully working and planning so that all could have a gift. Selling some of her crafts provided money for material to make all her own clothes.
She is the only person I have ever known to make a coconut and raisin cake. We all looked forward to this cake at Christmas. As a child I remember her making the cake layers from scratch, later years she used Duncan Hines cake mix. I don't know where the recipe came from.
She dug out an old hand grinder, and hooked it to the counter. The coconut juice was drained into a bowl, the coconut cracked and the coconut peeled out. She ground the raisins and coconut together. I have added her later version in making the cake in this issue.
A woman of modest means, her patience with me was endless. She taught me to sew, crochet and allowed me to help with her crafts. I can still hear her laugh as she untangled the crochet thread so I could try again.
There were handmade quilts and crocheted items through out her house. Each pillowcase she owned was gently embroidered. Her hands were never idle, even watching television she worked on a craft or a puzzle.
I remember her cooking three meals a day. Between all the cooking and crafts she had a garden and canned.
I think of the things she did when people say, "Women didn't use to work." Mama Redd worked all day everyday. She even managed to work at a nursing home as nursing assistant for a few years. Even during the time she worked, she maintained all the other things she did.
I am very thankful for the time I had with her, though it was not nearly enough. She would have been thrilled to meet my grand children and the other children born since her death. Each grandchild and great grandchild was a grand event for her.
As did many women of earlier years, she took what life dealt and made the best of it. I don't think I ever heard her complain. Maybe when Papaw spilled his snuff!
If I can be one-third the grandmother to my grand children as she was to me, I will be happy.
Author Rita Redd
Copyright 2003
Mary Marticia Sullivan Bates
Feb 18, 1915 to July 31, 1998
Submitted by Granddaughter; Lisa Redd
Mary grew up in Alpharetta, Georgia and married Talmage Bates during WWII. She was a good cook in her own right, but Talmage cooked also for his fellow Navy crew members.
As a child some of my earliest memories are of waking up to the delicious aromas coming from the kitchen. They were cooking my favorite breakfast, which included country ham with red-eye gravy and homemade biscuits. My grandmother (Mary) would roll up a big wad of dough, because I loved "big biscuits." I never acquired a taste for coffee, but I loved the smell that came from my grandparent's kitchen. Coffee was the secret ingredient of their red-eye gravy.
Mary always worked after she and Talmage were married. The longest job was at the Lovable Bra Company sewing "brassieres." She handmade all her clothes and also taught me to sew. She learned to sew and crochet from her Mother, Susan Lanier Sullivan.
Mary was a very strong woman. She worked hard and bought some property and had a home built for her parents on Pine Street in Roswell, Georgia. She took care of Talmage in that house until his death in 1988. She took care of the house and yard until she was in her 80s. She always laughed when she told the story about having the lawn mower in the yard whenever the meter reader was coming by, so she could get him to crank it for her.
She was always helping one of her friends or neighbors by driving them to the grocery store or to doctor appointments.
She developed Parkinson's disease and died in 1998.
Mary Marticia Sullivan Bates ~ Feb. 18, 1915 to July 31, 1998,
Submitted by Granddaughter; Lisa Redd
Published in U S Legacies Magazine December 2003
Published in U S Legacies Magazine December 2003
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