“With Passion, She Paved the Way”- So Many times.

Charm is Deceitful, and Beauty is Vain, but a woman who fears the Lord is to be praised.” – Proverbs 31:30

Can you imagine having to start a daycare center from scratch? I was reminded by one of my older sister’s Gwen how my mother would go into homes recruiting children for the center. My sister and other siblings attended high school. However, she played basketball and would have to stay after school for practice. So she, unfortunately, had the privilege of being with my mom as she would drop by the homes of potential students. She talked about how she would witness my mother literally closing the deal on convincing a parent to let their child attend the center. Imagine in 1968 where the only school you would be expected to send your child is a public school. Therefore my mother had to convince these parents of the opportunity their child would receive. She would get excuses like “I don’t have a car”, my mom would come right back with ” I will pick them up”. As she had promised she did just that in our Rambler Ford Station Wagon. Some of the roads were red clay and what a ride it was when it rained. Her knowledge of driving on muddy country roads came in handy but didn’t always keep her from ending up in a ditch or two.

The job of recruiting the children for the center was just the start. Her next task was finding teachers. Many were young ladies right in our neighborhood and surrounding cities. With a tight budget, she had to find economical ways to obtain training. She would go to one-day workshops that would afford her skills that she could implement to enhance the growth of the center. I remember one, in particular, she attended taught her how the need for the students to have interactive objects, toys, learning tools to enhance the learning skills for the students. The next thing I knew as a student (attended when I was 2 years old to 6 years old) we had an entire kitchen (refrigerator, sink, and stove) made from wood. We also had a tall flip chart that consisted of our letters, numbers, and shapes. The most memorable learning tool she introduced us to was the cardboard shoe and everyone learned to tie their shoes before going to public school.

As the center progressed children did come with the help of other dedicated volunteers, parents, and the Presbyterian Church and they loved it. After our family car (the Rambler) which was already being used as our transportation for church, to pick up the feed a kid program lunches (30 mins away for the community) put her down, she obtained a van that was affectionately called “The Carry-All” by all of us. We even had a song titled “Here comes the Carry-ALL” and those were the only words you would sing over and over until the van pulled up. 🙂 LOL!!!!

The health of the children was of the utmost importance. After discovering some students had some health issues she found a way through the utilization of the high school boarding school campus medical staff and made sure that each child received a medical examination that also included full immunization which was a requirement to enter public school.

I remember the dreaded glass jar. These glass jars were sent home to every child with the instructions that it was be returned with a specimen. This was the start of medical records for each child. Ensuring a student received a hearing aid, glasses, or even taking a child to the dentist was just an everyday duty she didn’t mind doing for the sake of her babies, a name she lovingly called her students.