BERRY FAMILY REUNION - 1988

by Edythe Berry

As your program suggests, and as Imogene's cute little poem says, I am to speak about living at the "Old Home." To me originally the term "Old Home" meant my father's boyhood home. To Imogene it means where I live now, but I will try to make it clear to you of which I am speaking. Also, I will be speaking about a number of other subjects.

To begin with, my father was James Charles Berry. He was the son of Mary Eveline Berry and the step-son of William A. Berry. Born March 28, 1866, he spent his childhood, youth, and young adulthood with his mother's parents, Allen Bartlett Berry and Jennel Berry. The lived at what I call the "old home" which is about a mile west of the home I live in now. It was at the foot of Mineral Springs Mountain. It is no longer there but it did stand for a number of years after the the Berry family moved out of it. I remember that up through my teen-age years, and perhaps into my twenties we used to go there to get apples, muscadines, blue plums and other things.

Great Grandpa Allen and Great Grandpa Jennel both died in the early 1890's. She died first and Great Grandpa died without having made a will. Thanks to Marsha Davis, our family historian, a copy is in our family history files of the disposal, at public auction, of the family property. The land, which was about 50 acres, was to be sold with terms being 20% cash down and balance in 12 months. My father bought the land. I am not sure how much he paid for it, there is no price stated on the document, but I know he purchased it because he had the original hand-written deed and it was still in my mother's possession when she died in 1975. It was used by the surveyors when the property was run off for sale at her death.

By the way, does anyone in the family still have that old deed? If so, some other members would like to have zerox copies made of it. So let us know if it is in your possession.

It was about the time of or shortly after the time of his grandfather's death that my father went to work at the State Hospital at Morganton, now known as Broughton Hospital. It was here that he met my mother.

My mother was Annie Leila Snipes. She was the daughter of Lathan Eugene Snipes and Martha Malinda Williams Snipes. She was born July 31, 1876 near Morganton in the Mount Home Church section. She attended Mount Home and went to school - a one-room school - in that same area. When she was still a teen-ager she went to work at State Hospital, being employed as a laundry worker.

My parents had been residents there in the hospital until they were married, at which time they set up housekeeping in the home of a lady, Mrs. Fisher. They called her "Aunt Mollie" but I don't think she was really a relative. As they began a family of course my mother gave up working at the hospital to take care of her babies, do the housework, and everything else that a mother has to do.

My father continued to work there. He was a sort of groundskeeper. Also, he took care of the fruit orchards, pruning and spraying the trees and harvesting the crops. He also took care of the bees and handled the conservation and storage of the honey. During off season and in spare time he served as a patient attendant.

It was in the early 1900's that my father left Morganton and went to work in a similar capacity on the Biltmore Estate where the late George W. Vanderbilt's famous castle-like mansion was located. The family stayed there, living in a house provided by Mr. Vanderbilt for his employees, until 1909 when the family moved back to Burke County. They came to the "old home" at the foot of the mountain. By this time there were at least 8 children so there was really togetherness in the home - wall to wall people you might say. It was so crowded that beds had to be placed on an enclosed porch to accomodate everyone.

Prior to this time, however, my parents had purchased the 100-acre farm that had belonged to Elisha Berry before his death in 1896. My father and mother pooled their cash resources to purchase this farm on which our present home is built. The purchase was made in March 1897 when the land was offered at public auction at the Burke County Courthouse in Morganton. The purchase price was $318.00 for 110 acres. Due to inaccurate surveying or deliberate false calls on the deed of an adjoining land owner a ten-acre portion was in question at one time. Rather than have a dispute with a neighbor my father made a peaceable settlement with him and so the farm became only a one-hundred acre tract.

Going back to the crowded condition in the home, my parents knew that they needed a larger place. Plans were begun to provide that place on the Elisha Berry property. The land was wooded to a large extent so there was plenty of lumber to be cut from it. So by the mid-teen years around 1915 the original part of the present home was built. It was a two-story T-shaped house with four rooms downstairs and two rooms upstairs, a front porch and two side porches.

The home was heated by an open fireplace in the living room and a fireplace on the opposite side of the chimney. A flue for a heater was in that same chimney in an upstairs bedroom. A wood-burning range provided heat in the kitchen.

Our water system was a trolley line down the hill to a spring. We could stand on the porch and draw the bucket up the hill after it filled with water. There was another spring on the other side of the hill from which we carried water. It came from a spring which produced 5 gallons or more a minute and was colder and better than water from the other spring. We used it mostly for cooking and drinking.

My father was a farmer. It was very hard to feed and clothe a large family but he was very industrious and always provided for us. There on the farm much of our food-stuff was produced. We grew wheat and corn for bread. We always had a garden in which many kinds of vegetables were grown. My mother was industrious too, and along with the cooking, sewing, bearing and caring for all of her children, she canned food in the summer to feed us in the winter. We had an apple orchard that provided fresh fruit through the winter and into the following springtime. The old dry-house is still standing where we dried apples by the bushels. We had animals. The mules were used for the farm work. My brother Nathan, I believe, was the best teamster. Of course the other brothers could plow and plant, harvest and store. Even the girls could hoe corn, pick peas and do some of the farm work, but with seven brothers we didn't have to do a lot of it. We had cows that provided milk and butter. There was always a hog to kill for meat. We had chickens for eggs and meat. My father kept several hives of bees so we had honey. It wasn't the Promised Land but we did have milk and honey.

Mama sometimes sold milk and butter. Excesses of other things such as the farm crops were sold too. My father would do work for neighbors to earn cash. He taught school on a part-time basis which was also a source of income.

Of course there were some things we had to buy at the store: sugar, salt, coffee, oatmeal and a number of other staple food and household supplies. All the children had to have shoes, at least in the wintertime. We went barefooted a lot in the summertime. Socks, coats, sweaters and other clothing items had to be bought so the household was operated on a very tight budget.

My father was not a large person. He was bigger than Roy Whitener but not by much. He suffered throughout his lifetime from asthma and found it hard to do strenuous work, to be in a dusty place or be around horses or mules.

In the late Sam Levenson's book "Everything but Money," he told of life in his family. That same title could be the story of our family. We had two loving, caring parents. We were poor as you would judge by the economic standards of even that day and certainly by the standards of today. However, I don't ever remember being hungry or not having a home to live in nor proper clothing to wear. We had a Christian home and the Lord always provided.

As the children grew up (there were 13 of us) some of them went to work. Mary taught in a little school in the Abee's Chapel community. However, she soon left that and began working in D.W. Alexander's store in Connelly Springs. She lived in the (Connelly Springs) Hotel with the Davises and did some waitress work there. Also, the Davises had a mentally handicapped son whom she tutored. Later she worked in J.M. Brinkley's store in Valdese and boarded in the Brinkley home. After that she worked in M.V. Moore's department store in Asheville and stayed there until World War II when she came home where she remained until her stroke in 1982 and consequently had to be placed in a nursing home in Sept. 1983.

Neil worked in the "cotton mill"- Valdese Mfg. Co. but still lived at home until he went to live with a cousin in Florida where he did carpentry work for a number of years. After coming back home he worked again in carpentry for the Brinkley Co. and later in the manufacture of full-fashioned hosiery for Alba-Waldensian. He married and left home in 1927.

Nath, as I mentioned before was the main farmer, but for a number of years off and on he was away from home in Sawmill work. He married and left home in 1925. He worked in a shoe factory which operated in a building that is now the Pineburr division of Alba-Waldensian. He later worked for Alba -(Waldensian) known at first as the Pilot Mill.

Ted started working at Martinat's Hosiery Mill when he was around 14 years old. For a short time he went to work in a town called White Pine, Tenn, but he came back to Martinat's and worked there until retirement. Ted also got married in 1925 so there were not always 15 people in the house.

It was sometime in the decade of the 20's when my father decided to add four more rooms to the house. They are our present dining room and kitchen and two upstairs bedrooms. Also, since that time a sleeping porch which Mama wanted as her room, a bathroom and a lean-to enclosed porch where we keep our freezer have all been added. So that is very much the way the house is today.

We use a circulator oil heater in the living room which provides us with a warm spot in the winter time. A wood-burning cook stove in the kitchen and an electric heater for the bathroom are used. Of course, most of the old big house is unheated but with our electric blankets we don't fare too badly.

Our trolley-line water system has been replaced by a well and an electric pump & we do have hot and cold water.

It was not until about 1939 or 1940 that electric power was available for us. Prior to that time we had a lighting system that was very efficient. It was on the order of the Colemen lanterns of today. It used a kerosene/gasoline mixture which with the use of an air pressure tank forced the fuel through small copper tubing to the stationary ceiling light fixtures. I remember as the fuel was used and the air space in the pressure tank became greater the lights would grow dimmer. But a few more pounds of pressure pumped into the tank by one of the boys would bring the illumination back up to the right brightness which would have been about equal to a 150 watt electric bulb. These lights were not in every room so the old-time oil lamps were used elsewhere.

At the time the house I live in was built, it was said to be the nicest best-looking house in the neighborhood. Painted a straw yellow color with sky-blue porch ceilings and a red roof it was quite attractive. But after more than 70 years, time has taken its toll. It has been invaded by termites. Some of the under-structure has decayed. Portions have been repaired but problems continue. The exposed wood is decaying and needs paint; the tin roof is rusting and some of the plumbing needs to be replaced.

Before my father died in 1938 he had the farm divided into lots and gave each one of us a portion. Sam, the youngest child, was to get the home place and was to live there and take care of Papa and Mama while they lived. But of course shortly after my father's death World War II came; upsetting a lot of plans. Sam, along with Hob, Rob, and Dave, went into military service. Sam enlisted in the Navy; Hob was in the Air Force; Rob and Dave were in the regular Army. When the war was over all but Sam came back home. Sam who had worked in the hosiery mill before enlisting couldn't face the prospect of returning to that kind of work so he decided to stay in the Navy. In some of his travels he met and married Marie Bongiorno. Her family owned and operated a bakery in Stamford, Conn. At one time he left the Navy with the intention of going into the family bakery business but that didn't work for them. He went back into the Navy and built 24 years of service plus 16 years working for the U.S. Navy as a civil service employee. So it was 40 years later that Sam finally came home from the war.

It was about 30 years ago that the local section of Interstate 40 was built. It came right through our farm taking practically all of the lot that my father and mother had given to me. The lots of several other family members were in its path too. Dave's house was on the right-of-way section and had to be moved. Rob's house, built on his lot, was far enough away from the right-of-way that it didn't have to be moved but the road did take a big portion of his property.

Getting around to the point I want to make - all property adjoining or very near to I-40 today has sky-rocketed in value. Our old house even though it has gone in actual value has gone up in value as far as the county tax office is concerned simply because of it proximity to Interstate 40 and the nice very valuable homes in the Holly Hills development which is in a large part our original farm land. When the high taxes and the amount of money it would take to really fix up the old home were considered, Sam thought it would just be better to sell it. So in September 1987 he sold it to the Waldensian Bakeries. According to the sales agreement I can continue to live in it as long as they don't want to use the property. If they should opt to use it for some purpose and would want me to move out they would give me a six-month notice which would give me time to find some other place to live - a small house, a mobile home or an apartment. I guess I'll cross that bridge when I get to it.

If and when the time comes that I will have to pull up and leave it will not be easy to leave the only home I've ever known. There are a lot of memories about the house and its environs. As kids we knew where the bird's nests were each year. We knew where the wild flowers grew and we knew where the frogs would jump in the water every time we came near. But best and most importantly we knew the love and security we found in our family circle at the end of our personal day.