My mother’s name was Harriet Elizabeth Savage and her mother Rebecca married a Sharp. Harriet was born in Union County Tennessee on June 8, 1891 and she died when she was 98 years old. My father’s name was Charles McEwan Stiner, how he got the name of McEwan I don’t know. His Mother’s name was Elizabeth but they called her Betty Russell. I met her but I was only two years old. Harriet (Mom) told me that after they were married, they walked through the field he didn’t hold the fence down and said get your clothes off and get me some grub. The first night Theodore, my Dad’s son by his first wife stood by the bed because he was used to sleeping with my Dad. My Dad was previously married and he had four children his wife’s name was Pearly, she passed and he was a widower for ten years before he married Mom. My Dad’s job was to haul coal with his mules from Tennessee to Kentucky. When he married Mother he built a brand new 10 room home. Harrison Heath was the one that built it, he was married to Dad’s niece. He would sing “Hanson Lolly” as he built the house. I was born in the back north room of this house which was the cooler room. My sister Sissy, (Edith Arthur Lynch), took me into kitchen to warm me up because I was turning blue. My parents had to move to Indiana because US Government was building the Norris Dam and they bought Dad’s land for water back up. He had over 200 acres of timber on his land. He also worked for train company and bought ties that were used on train tracks.
My mother was 5′ 1″, blonde hair, and blue eyes. Her eyes were as blue as the sky. She was 43 years old when I was born. My father was 6 ft 1 in, dark hair but I never saw it with full head of hair but he never lost all of his hair. He was 55 years old when I was born and I was the youngest of My Dad’s 13 child and my Mom’s 10 child.
My half siblings were Curtis, Josephine, Sarah and Theodore and Harriet’s daughter was Edith. My full siblings Firmin, Rudolph (Tip), Clifford and Clifton but they died at birth, Junior and he died 2 years old from a fall on glass, Paul, Russell, Norma Jean and myself.
My Mom had a daughter Edith (Sissy). Mother was 18 years old when she got pregnant. She wanted to get married but the boy’s Mother sent him to Arkansas. Mother went to live with her sister and had Sissy and it was hard to get work with a child. She was paid 50. cent a week at various jobs. Harriet came from a family of 15 and her mother is buried in California. Sissy was a second Mother to me. I would spend a month with her every summer in Indianapolis. She bought me dresses at Blocks which was the first time I was on an escalator. She’d take us to Riverside amusement park where ladies came out of the fun house and they’d shoot air so their dresses would fly up. She was married four times before she died of uterine cancer. She was in her 40’s when she died and never had children.
My memories of my Dad are that he would sit until it was time for a meal, walk from his chair and then back. He didn’t go to far. Our big meal was at noon we called it supper. He was quiet until someone came to visit. I was excited one time in high school when I came home and my parents were talking to each other which didn’t happen often. If the boys would fight, I would yell for Dad and he’d come and point his finger at them and say “one more time” and they’d stop fighting.
My memories of my Mom if she wanted to do something she’d do it. When she was older her and her neighbor, Mrs. Dodge would go to the drugstore and get her favorite drink a “pineapple sodie” She taught me a little prayer, we slept together until I left home because we only had two bedrooms. She didn’t want to sleep with my Dad because he didn’t take a shower and chewed tobacco. She’d scratch my back. The little prayer was
