Childhood 5

Eva Idora (Songer) Jackson was born in Ohio on December 2, 1866 to Burrell J. Songer of Virginia and Olive Price of Kentucky.

Lafayette Jackson was born January 5, 1859 in Illinois. 

Eva Jackson is seen here with her youngest child, Bertha, born in 1901 after the family moved from Alabama to Kentucky. How old does Bertha look? Would this be about 1916 when Eva married for a second time to Andrew Peay; Bertha would have been 15 and Eva 50. Seems about right, as I am definitely having to make a guess here. 

In 1923 my maternal great grandmother Eva was 57 when she married her third husband Jeff "Dad" Turner, two years her senior. They were married for 22 years and had a home in Phoenix and later owned a roadside eatery in Wickman, Arizona, until Eva's death in 1945 at the age of 79. I was two and do not remember meeting her. In the photo below, Eva is seen in her 60's; she gained so much weight I hardly recognized her from earlier photos.

Eva with her third husband Jeff "Dad" Turner as they pose in front of their roadside eatery in Wickman, Arizona.

Shown in the late 1920's standing in front of their grandmother Eva's eatery in Wickman, Arizona are Verna and Everett Jackson, older siblings of my mother, Pearl.    Verna born 1909, died before her 22nd birthday.  Everett born in 1911, entered the Navy at the age of 17, lied about his age in order to leave home and escape his stepmother Lena's reign, and made a career of the Navy.  He had one daughter during his first marriage, whom he rarely saw, and was stepfather to Holly in his second marriage to Rhoda. He and Rhoda traveled the world during his Naval career and retired in Sun City Arizona close to my mom in Chandler until his death in 1978. There were several visits from Uncle Jack and Aunt Rhoda during my childhood that always meant a lot to me since they both seemed so "worldly" and sophisticated. I fantasized about having their kind of life--traveling widely. Mother also had a younger sister, Florence who I never heard about until I was a teenager. I have found no photos of her but remember her and her husband's visits from California. They had no children.

My mother, Pearl Elizabeth (Jackson) Shaddox Barrett born August 2, 1913 to Oscar Jackson an Engineer with the railroad and Margaret (Chandler) Jackson, a housewife in Morehead, Kentucky. When my mom was 8 her mother died from smoke inhalation after she worked feverishly to save the horses and cows in their barn. Mom was extremely unhappy with her stepmother who entered the scene a few years later. A woman, she says, who held her back in school, worked her hard at home tending the animals, and beat her, while giving her own daughter everything she wanted. Mother lived with her grandmother Eva and "Dad" Turner in Wickman for three years after she left home at the age of 16 before she had finished high school. She married Carmel Shaddox, a railroad man, when she was 19 and divorced him six years later in 1938 because he broke her heart. In her words, "He cheated on me, after I had gotten up at five each morning to fix him a big breakfast of bacon and eggs and homemade biscuits." Their entire marriage was spent living in Arizona residing in a railroad caboose converted into an apartment, parked beside the tracks where Carmel worked. She never again spoke to Carmel after the divorce. They had no children. After this marriage, she was happy working at the Phoenix Country Club managing a concession stand. In 1942 she married my dad, John (Jack) Ross Barrett, a fire inspector working civil service at Williams Air Force Base near Chandler, Arizona, and eighteen years older than her. They were together 14 years, until his death in 1956 at the age of 61. My mom turned 43 that year, my sister, Peggy turned 11, and I turned 13.

Oscar Jackson (Mom's father) with   Mom and I standing next to him in front of our white wood-frame house at Williams Air Force Base.  I am 2, the year is 1945.  Oscar has come to Arizona for his mother Eva's funeral. He is 59 and has not yet remarried after his second wife Lena's (Mom's "evil" stepmother) death.   

Oscar Jackson  and two of his sisters, Anna and Bertha.  Oscar has come about 2000 miles from Kentucky, Anna about 35 miles from Phoenix, and Bertha over 400 miles from Oxnard, California for the funeral in 1945 of their mother, Eva Idora (Songer) Jackson Peay Turner.