Dear Editor,

My parents, Larrie and Rosa Mae, grew up about 25 miles from each other in Colquitt County and married in 1940 when she was 20 and he was 24, and the union lasted almost 60 years, until his death on February 28, 2000. She lived longer and died May 4, 2013.

Their childhoods were hardscrabble, both living on small farms, dropping out of school, he in the ninth grade and she in the eighth grade to continue doing adult shares of farm labor as they had since they were young children. They were poor, their families were poor, and their communities were poor. Everybody scraped and made the most of everything. Neighbors helped each other with food and labor rather than see the less fortunate starve and lose their land. Actually, my maternal grandparents did lose their farm because my grandfather was ill and bedridden and couldn’t work, and once when I was downtown with my mother in the late 1950s, she pointed out the owner of the loan company on the street who foreclosed on my grandparents’ farm. The war draft took many sons of Colquitt County, just as it took my father. The poor were at rock bottom and sought jobs, which were rare. Their lives were uncertain and their futures were hanging by a thread of total collapse.

Could things get worse? Yes, from the beginning of war in December, 1941, until August, 1945, millions were called on to serve the nation in many ways—in the military all around the world and on the homefront, rationing food and all kinds of material, gasoline, including rubber for vehicle tires and everything else imaginable, and citizens had to use coupons when they bought scarce items. Mama’s sister, Ruby, went to Macon to work in an ammunition factory to supply the military and help her family with their needs. Backyard gardens, recycling almost everything, patching clothes and shoes all became part of survival. Living with well water and outdoor plumbing and many without electricity and decent transportation, they survived by sheer grit and the will to stay alive.

After 1945, life was still hard for poor folks as the infrastructure for expanding industry was ramping up. Millions of soldiers were poured back as civilians looking for work and GI training—my dad, Larrie, trained on the job to be a paint and body worker, a skill he used off and on for the rest of his life. And finding a place to live was a grind as families started expanding and the economy grew. Life got a little better for my low income parents, but only by the generosity and family ties with my Uncle Woody. Both my parents died poor but surrounded by a large and loving family. I escaped their plight through education and the will to work hard, but actually the grace of God and help from friends were the bigger factors. And luck might have helped a little.

Today, I can see the past clearly and how my parents loved me and kept me from harm. For that, I am eternally grateful, and the closeness and love I feel for them will never change.

I finally put these thoughts in writing before Mother’s Day and Father’s Day this year as a reminder about parental love and self-sacrifice.

Grant Plymel

Thomasville