Source: Ben Dixon wrote 4 pages about his sister Nora
in OUR BOOK: OUR ANCESTORS, OURSELVES, AND OUR CHILDREN, published in
1932. The submitter has selected five
of the paragraphs to share here.
Elnora
Thankful Dixon, known variously as Nora, Nonie, and Nogie, but never by her
christened name, was born on Thanksgiving Day, 1882; and was named Thankful by
her grateful parents. She was the first
child born in their new home, a little two-roomed shack on the corner of Maple
and Walnut, at the edge of Cob Run, in Kahoka, Mo. There were to be seven more children and a grandson born in this
tiny cottage; and still another diminutive grand-daughter, the youngest child
of Nora, was to be reared in the same humble home by the Mother that brought
forth Elnora Thankful on that Thanksgiving Day 50 years ago.
Nora
wasn t overly fond of washing dishes in her youthful glory. One day she had a pan of dishes sitting in
boiling soapy water on the kitchen stove.
She must have scalded her fingers when she started washing the messgear. At any rate something surprised her into
saying a naughty word! Her dad was
standing by and overheard it. What s
that, Young Lady? he demanded sternly.
Well, Papa, I didn t mean anything, said Nora, I didn t go to say
it. Give me that bar of soap! he
ordered. She handed it over
reluctantly. He made her take a bite of
yellow kitchen soap, masticate it thoroughly, and swallow it! She remonstrated, she apologized, she
howled, she wept. But all to no avail;
she had to eat the soap. Now, don t
let me hear you foul your mouth with such words any more! he warned. And believe me, he didn t. When Nora had to let off steam thereafter,
she did it outside her father s hearing.
One
cold morning I crawled out of bed and went into the long shed kitchen of the
old house. Great excitement
reigned. There was Nora, surrounded by several
womenfolk, being given a good rubdown and hustled into some dry clothes. As a girl she was very fond of skating. So,
bright and early, she had gone over to the mill pond and taken a turn around
the ice, unaccompanied. Ben Hickman, a
colored man who lived on the corner next to the pond, got up to build the
fire. He looked out of the window, and
saw Nora skating. He knew that the ice
was weak, because of the ice harvest that had been in progress there, so he
kept his eye upon her. Suddenly she skated
across a thin strip and down she went, clean under. Old Ben rushed out of doors, thinly clad as he was, got a couple
of boards, and laid them out on the ice.
Then, with a long pole, he crawled out on them, and managed to rescue
the girl. But for him, Nora would
certainly have drowned, for the water and the weather were bitter cold; thee
was not another soul in sight or hearing and Nora couldn t swim a stroke.
After
our father s death, Nora tried to get some kind of work to help support the
household. She worked a little while in
a garment factory in Keokuk; but her wages were too low to lay anything by. She
took the county teacher s examination and got a third grade certificate. But then she could not get a school, and so
had to give up that hope. Finally she
went to Nodaway County, where Grandma Dixon and several of father s people
lived, in hopes of finding a livelihood there.
She found it: Queen of the Kitchen on Walton Bale s farm.
Nora was ill with influenza when the baby, Rachel Maude, came. Joe named the child for her: Rachel for our Mother; and Maude for Maude Vansickle, Nora s long time friend of Nodaway County. Her influenza went into pneumonia, and it was impossible for her to recover. She and Mother were both abed, sick; the tiny babe was lying between them. Nora turned to her Mother and said, Mama, this is your baby. I want you to have her. See seemed to sense that she had lain down for her last rest.
Provided by Betty Latta Kitchen
-- e-mail: Betty Kitchen
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