Bessie Lawson Richey, born Oct. 7, 1910, in Eaton, in Lawrence County, recently celebrated her 107th birthday. Bessie's parents were James Clinton Lawson and Margaret Melissa Snider Lawson. She was one of 10 children born to this family.
Bessie remembered her big childhood home -- the parlor, living room and kitchen downstairs, with enough room upstairs for three or four beds. Her parents slept in the living room by the warm fireplace, and shared the room with the baby of the family -- the older children slept upstairs. The house included no electricity, water nor indoor plumbing. However, a cistern sat out back.
Beyond the house, toward the pond, Bessie remembered "the sandy place," where she and the other children played in the sand. There was very little time for play, however, as the children began early helping with chores. In the winter, the family did laundry in washtubs on the back porch, and in summer, they washed their clothes in the creek. In addition to helping with the laundry, Bessie started milking when she was 8 or 9 years old. Most of the time there were two cows to milk, which had to be done early before she took the 2-mile walk to school. Bessie remembered the ritual of separating the cream from the milk. The family kept a portion of the cream for making their own butter and sold the rest to add to the family income.
Bessie had a horse named "Ribbon," who among other things, took her to the fields to cut seed pods from the sugar cane, which the family harvested for chicken feed.
For fun, the children played marbles. The boys played "Mumbly Peg," a knife-tossing game, and sometimes, Bessie was invited to play as well. They also played a (handmade) board game called "Fox and Geese," using grains of corn and beans for their play pieces. The men played checkers, but Bessie's mother was too busy for games.
The highlight of the family's week was attending Sunday worship. Everyone walked to church together. Bessie Lawson was baptized in the creek that ran along the church property at age 12.
Bessie Lawson attended Old Lebanon Schools through the sixth grade -- the boys usually stayed in school through eighth grade. Arithmetic and reading were Bessie's favorite subjects. She loved books and remembered reading aloud to her family by the light of the coal oil lamp for evening entertainment. She taught her father how to read and write.
At the age of 17, Bessie Lawson married George Brooks Richey, from Lynn, on his 21st birthday. Their wedding took place at the family home in Eaton on Oct. 30, 1927. Justice of the Peace W.A. ("Mr. Ab") McElyea, performed the ceremony.
Bessie and Brooks Richey soon moved to Florida for Brooks' work with Standard Oil Company. After their first baby was born, they moved to southeast Missouri and began farming with a team of mules. In 1935, after two more babies were born, Brooks built a three-bedroom home for the family. Electricity had not come to the rural community, but water was conveniently available at the pitcher pump on the back porch. Rural electric began to makes its way through southeast Missouri, and in 1943, the Richey home was wired for electricity.
Bessie got a wringer washing machine. Brooks traded his team for a tractor.
Soon, Brooks Richey built a large multipurpose building connected to the main house via a short sidewalk. The building had a nice front room, which served several purposes. Bessie kept her cream separator in this room and spent many hours making her own butter. In one corner, a modern bathtub sat beside the laundry stove. Bessie and family members built fires in the stove and soon had hot water. They pulled a pretty curtain for privacy and enjoyed nice hot baths. The basement of the building served as a fruit and storm cellar. Along one side was the smokehouse, where meat was cured; on the other side was a shop and a tractor shed. Upstairs provided a room to store some of the harvest, including the peanut crop.
Around 1956, gas heat replaced the coal stove, and Bessie Richey graduated to an automatic washer. She didn't get a clothes dryer until many years later because she preferred to hang the clothes on the clothesline. She seldom used the automatic dryer -- after all, it used a lot of electricity.
Bessie Richey was not afraid of hard work. In addition to caring for eight children, she had a huge garden, a larger "truck patch" and a big orchard. She canned or froze all the fruits and vegetables to feed the family, so very few "store-bought" groceries were needed. In addition the crops, garden vegetables and fruits, the farm produced beef, pork, chicken, milk and eggs. Baby chicks were ordered from the catalog for about $5 per 100. The chicks arrived a couple days old by U.S. mail. The little chicks were feed and grown in about eight weeks, then dressed and frozen.
Between 1929 and 1951, eight children were born to the family: G.B. Jr., Eulah, Harold, James, Randy, Elbert, Carolyn and Sharon.
Sundays were a day of worship. Hardly any farm work was done on Sunday. However, Bessie Richey was up early cooking a huge Sunday meal, so after church, she could invite family and friends to her home for lunch. She was a great cook. Some of her specialties were biscuits, cornbread, fruit cobblers and peanut brittle.
In the 1950s, many grandchildren made their appearances. In 1961, Bessie and Brooks Richey retired from farming and moved to a smaller place in Poplar Bluff, Mo. They continued to garden and spent many hours fishing one of the two ponds on their place or taking the boat to a small lake not too far away. Brooks Richey died in 1997 at the age of 90, and Bessie continued on the small farm until age 96. The children finally convinced her to move into an apartment near her two oldest children, and she lived independently until after her 102nd birthday.
Bessie Richey started sewing at a young age and developed a love for quilting. She made hundreds of quilts as gifts for the children, grandchildren, church friends and many others. At her 100th birthday celebration, more than 50 of Bessie's quilts were on display. She was still quilting baby quilts at 100 years of age.
Bessie Richey enjoyed many fishing trips during her life. One of her favorites was a guided fishing trip on White River to celebrate her 100th birthday. She caught her limit, of course.
Bessie's children feel her lifetime of healthy eating is one of her secrets to her long life. That, and good Christian living.
In 2013, Bessie Richey moved to Brookstone Assisted Living in Fayetteville to be near her youngest daughter. She is the oldest resident and known as the "hat lady."
Bessie Richey's children and many of her grandchildren came to Fayetteville to celebrate her birthday this. In addition to eight children, Bessie Richey has 30 grandchildren, 76 great-grandchildren, 68 great-great-grandchildren, 3 great-great-great grandchildren, many in-laws and a host of friends.
NAN Our Town on 10/19/2017