Poverty Extends a Long Way

By David Presswood

Eddie Travis grew up living in small tenement houses in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, with his nuclear family. He spent a great deal of time staying with his extended family members on his mothers side of the family. The two members of his extended family with whom he spent the most time were his mothers aunt and uncle, who raised his mother. His mothers mother died when his mother was seven years old, and his mother was sent to live with her daddys brother and sister. Her daddy was always around, but she stayed with either her aunt or her uncle. By the time Eddie was born, his aunts children were grown and had moved out, while his uncle and his uncles wife never had any kids. Because his aunt and uncle raised his mother, they were more like grandparents to him than aunt and uncle, and because there were no children around when he came along, they treated Eddie like a grandchild, giving him the best of everything even though he lived with his parents most of the time.

It was after his great aunt and uncle were gone from his life that he realized how hard life could be.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Apr 17, 2017
• ISBN: 9781524673055

David Presswood

Attended the university of cincinnati, Stillman college, and the university of Alabama.

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© 2017 David Presswood. All rights reserved.

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Published by AuthorHouse 04/06/2017

ISBN: 978-1-5246-7306-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-5246-7305-5 (e)

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Contents

Chapter I

Chapter II - Rosedale Courts

Chapter III - The Band

Chapter IV - Quitting School

Chapter V - After Finishing School

Chapter VI - Starting to College

Chapter VII - Cincinnati

Charter VIII - Going Back to Tuscaloosa

Chapter IX - Understanding : Poverty Extends along ways.

Chapter I

Iwas born January 20, 1957 in Cincinnati, Ohio to Sidney and Lillie Mae. My mama’s Lillie Mae This is going to be an important factor as we move along in this story. I don’t remember anything about Cincinnati because my mama left my daddy in Cincinnati when I was about three months old, and I never remember my parents ever being together as a couple. When my mama left my daddy in Cincinnati she brought me back home to Tuscaloosa, Alabama where I was raised from the time I can remember. My mama, me and my little brother was living with my step daddy Alfred Who always went by the name of Jr. I would always call Jr. Daddy for the rest of my life. Daddy was my brother’s biological father. The four of us was indeed a family. I remember loving my mama and daddy very much, not to mention my little brother Robert, who we would always call Bob, and who would become my best friend.

We were a part of an extended family on both sides. On my mama’s side of the family, there was my granddaddy Ruben and his second wife Mary and their six children. There were also my mom’s brothers from my granddaddy’s first wife, mama’s mother who died in childbirth when mama was seven years old. I guess one of the reason’s my mom’s brothers was so close to mama is because she was the only girl. There were eleven boys by mama’s mama. When Mama’s mama died there were three younger brothers than mama, and she was only seven. There was also granddaddy’s brother and Sister Uncle Jim and Aunt Mariah. These two my great Uncle and Great Aunt played a major part in my early childhood development. It was because of Uncle Jim and Aunt Baby as we called Aunt Mariah, that even though I knew our nuclear family, my mama, daddy, my brother and I were poor, we always had a little money in the family because Uncle Jim and Aunt Baby both owned their own homes and had their own stores. Uncle Jim had a meat and odds store and Aunt Baby had a nickel and dime candy store. I worked in both stores. I remember that anytime mama needed something for us to eat and she did not have any money she would send me to one or both of my greats and they always sent what we needed. I later found out that Uncle Jim and Aunt Baby were very fond of me. I am not going into any further details about my mom’s brothers, except that they were a very important part of my early life. However, Uncle Jim and Aunt Baby played the parts of Granddaddy and Grandmamma to me until they both died. Even though I knew Granddaddy, and later became very close to him.

On the other side of the extended family was the Thomas’s, my step daddy’s family or daddy’s family. There was Cora or Ba as we called her daddy’s Mama. There was granddaddy Alfred Sr. There was Ernest the oldest brother; there was Callie Mae or sister, a only girl like mama. There was brother, Ellis and there was Willie James. Even though they knew I was not Jr.’s biological son they never, I mean never, treated me any other way than as a whole member of the Thomas family.

The Thomas family did not have much in comparison to the s. I mean they didn’t’ have stores or own their own homes like Uncle Jim and Aunt Baby, but this family loved each other as much or if possible more than the s’ and that’s a hard statement because of the Family closeness. However, I will still make that statement. The Thomas’s played an equally important part in my early childhood development.

Aunt Baby had three daughters who were raised with mama. Even though they are really my second cousin, I’ve always called them aunt. When mama’s mama died when she was seven, Aunt Baby took in mama and the three younger boys. Aunt baby’s three daughters are older than Mama, therefore I’ve always call them Aunt.

The reason I was born in Cincinnati, is because my biological father Sidney and on of Aunt Baby’s daughters, Aunt Rose husband uncle Camel went to Cincinnati and found work before I was born and sent for mama and Aunt Rose. Aunt Rose gave me the nickname that I’ve been called every since by everyone except for formal occasion, Butch; Aunt Rose still live in Cincinnati to this day. Aunt Marie, Aunt Baby’s oldest daughter lived right next door to us for the first five years of my life and she too played a very important part in my early childhood development. Aunt Rea, as we called Aunt Marie had a son Samuel Jr. Caesar, who took me in like a big brother. Some of the best times I remember from the age of three to seven years old were the times Aunt Rose brought her whole family down from Cincinnati. Anytime they came down was a Family Reunion.

There were other people from our small poor black community that played a vital part in my early childhood that I would come across again later in life that would always take me back to that early part of my life. There were the Anderson’s that lived next door to us and Aunt Rea. There were the Wares that lived right behind Aunt Baby. Probably the ones that would influence my life the most as I was growing up were the Riders. Mrs. Mary and her husband Mr. Jim Ed Rider and their two sons nearest my age, Wallace and Jim. They had two older sons that I knew, but me, Bob, Wallace and Jim grew up very close together. This family’s main influence on me was that they were probably the most well to do family in our community. I think that because of my Great Uncle and Aunt’s stores, they felt the same way about our family. Even though it wasn’t my mama and daddy’s money or property my brother and I was always around my uncle and Aunt. The reason my brother and I was always around the greats is because all their children were grown and they just needed us around to remind them of the days of their children youth. That was Aunt Baby’s reason because Uncle Jim never had any children of his own, him and Aunt Ellen that is even though I talk about us as being well to do, my parent really had a very hard time. It was me and Bob who had it pretty good because of Uncle Jim and Aunt Baby. Mama and daddy moved from one side of town to the other side of town with some frequency. Bob and I lived with mama and daddy most of the time but I think we were somehow shielded from the blows of our nuclear family poverty because of the greats. I might add that our cousin Jr. Caesar was always around during this time in our lives.

Aunt Baby’s husband died when I was around five or six. This left Aunt Baby living alone. We always called her husband grandpa, When grandpa died, at first Jr. Cesar, who was Aunt Baby’s biological grandson and I, without Bob, stayed with Aunt Baby for some time because she was scared to live alone. However, Uncle Sam Cesar, Aunt Rea’s husband And Aunt Rea bought their own home really on the other side of town. This put a lot of pressure on Aunt Baby. Aunt Baby was used to having mama and us, Aunt Rea, Uncle Sam and Jr. Cesar around all the time. So when Aunt Rea and Uncle Sam bought their own home things changed. Bob and I had started Elementary School. Jr. Cesar was four years older than me. The problem their move posed was who was going to stay with Aunt Baby and when. Like I stated earlier, Mama and daddy moved a lot, kind of unstable, and now Aunt Read lived on the extreme other side of town. Uncle Jim died in 1962 before all this took place which had already left Aunt Ellen, his wife, living alone, but Aunt Ellen never mine living alone. Me and Bob helped her run the store, but it really upset Aunt Baby that she might have to live alone. So Aunt Baby, Aunt Rea and mama worked out a plan where me and Bob would stay in Castle Hill Elementary school which is where we started to school near Aunt Baby’s house. Mama and daddy were living across town next door to daddy’s parents. The plan was that Bob and I would stay with Aunt Baby during the week and go to Castle Hill and go home on weekends. Jr. Ceasar would come and stay with Aunt Baby on weekends. This worked out really well for a long time. It was especially good for me because Aunt Baby made sure that I did my homework and was ready to participate in class activity. I was a good student from the first day I started to school. I even went to kindergarten before it was offer in school.

As a kid I really didn’t know everything, but I really don’t understand why Aunt Baby decided to shut down her store and move away from her own home to move in with Aunt Rea, which is what she did when I was in the third grade. After she moved in with Aunt Rea things were never to be that same on mama’s side of the family as far as closeness was concerned.

I finally got a chance to see my family for what it really was after Aunt Baby move away. My mama had three daughters by then, so there were now five children. My parents weren’t as good together as I had though. They had big personality difference that caused marital problems. It was after Aunt Baby moved away, and after Bob and I had to stay at home fulltime that I found out what poverty was. Both mama and daddy worked most of the time. Mama as a maid or housekeeper for some white people, and daddy drove tractor trailer for a construction company. However, for some reason they could never seem to keep the bills paid. Even after Bob and I started to live with them fulltime we still moved a lot. My parents would also physically fight a lot.

One thing I remember as a small child is that mama use to take me and Bob to work with her sometimes. She would sometime have to baby sit for the family she worked for as they would go out of town either for the weekend or a week or so. When she had to work over night she would take me and Bob with her and we would actually live with these white people daughters side by side. Therefore, in my early childhood I always had the feeling that all people were equal regardless of race. At that time in the south the races were segregated, but I wouldn’t realize that until I started to Elementary school. I also remember that daddy took me and Bob to Florida with him to pick up a trailer, and I realized that he had a really good job. He didn’t’ make that money his white counterpart were making for driving tractor trailer, but he did a lot better than most of the black men in our community. He didn’t do physical labor. Still with both of them working we didn’t do well as a family financially. We were always borrowing or crediting something or another from Uncle Jim or Aunt Baby. Even though we had financial problems, I remember I always felt love from mama and daddy, and both sides of their families. That is until Aunt Baby moved in with Aunt Rea much later in my childhood.

When Aunt Baby moved and me and Bob started to stay at home fulltime, we had to change schools to go to school closer to where mama and daddy’s house was. This would be the first time that we didn’t attend the school that we had started at. I had an impact on the Administrator and Teachers at the new school because I was a good student. On the other hand and I don’t know why, Bob was never a good student. In fact he repeated the first grade. He later would have problems throughout school until he finished. Fortunately for me if not us, Bob and me, we moved back to our old neighborhood right across the street to where Aunt Baby’s house was. I remember looking at Aunt Baby’s house sitting Empty and wondering why we weren’t living in her house. We were a close family, why didn’t Aunt Baby let our nuclear family at least rent the house when she moved. Until this day I still don’t have the answer to that question. This is when we reunited with the Riders and became even closer friends than we had been before we had moved. Wallace, Jim, Bob and I were always together. It was