Emma K. Meacham Collection
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Emma K. Meacham Collection Transcribed by Virginia Battle Edited by Gina Cordell and Laura Cunningham 2012 Memphis and Shelby County Room Memphis Public Library and Information Center 3030 Poplar Ave Memphis, TN 38111 Emma K. Meacham Collection Scope and Content The Emma K. Meacham Collection consists of one box spanning one linear foot. The collection contains Mrs. Meacham’s “Sketches,” stories she shared with her granddaughter as she reminisced about her life. These sketches were transcribed by longtime Library volunteer, Virginia Battle. In this collection, Emma Koen Meacham, 1869-1952, described the early history of Memphis, with notable mentions of the Lee Line of Steamers, the Kate Adams, and President Grover Cleveland’s 1887 visit to Memphis. Memphians Sara Beaumont Kennedy and Robert Looney are also mentioned. Outside of Memphis, she recalled her time as one of the first students to attend Belhaven College in Jackson, Mississippi. She also described in vivid detail the 1897 flooding and levee breech of Laconia Circle in Desha County, Arkansas. Mrs. Meacham was the wife of William Walker Meacham, a planter in Laconia Circle, Arkansas. Together they had two children, Chlotilda Louise Meacham Rechenburg and William Earl Meacham. Single photocopies or scans of unpublished writings in these papers may be made for purposes of scholarly research. While the Memphis Public Library & Information Center may house an item, it does not necessarily hold the copyright on the item, nor may it be able to determine if the item is still protected under current copyright law. Users are solely responsible for determining the existence of such instances and for obtaining any other permissions and paying associated fees that may be necessary for the intended use. Any image from the library’s collection published in any form must cite as the source: Memphis and Shelby County Room, Memphis Public Library & Information Center. For all requests, please contact the History Department at 901.415.2742 or [email protected] 2 Container List One Box 1880s – 1945 13 Folders Folder 1: Sketch 1 – Youth, History Folder 2: Sketch 2 – Poetry, Reconstruction, Childhood Folder 3: Sketch 3 – Seasons, History, Phases of Life Folder 4: Sketch 4 – Belhaven College Folder 5: Sketch 5 – Christmas and the New Year Folder 6: Sketch 6 – Reflections and Memories Folder 7: Sketch 7 – Marriage, River Steamers Folder 8: Sketch 8 – Devastation, Arkansas River Flooding Folder 9: Sketch 9 – Religion, Home on the River Folder 10: Sketch 10 – Literature, Religion Folder 11: Sketch 11 – Looking Backward Folder 12: Sketch 13 – Summer, Reflections Folder 13: Sketch 14 – The River Sketch 12 Was Not Included in the Donated Sketches 3 Emma K. Meacham To Mary Crenshaw – who has taken so much interest in what I write, and has listened so sweetly to me read. (I want her to have this book of sketches it embraces – memories and tales – so---- To Mary – who appreciates Emma Meacham “Mrs. W.”) 4 Sketch No. 1 Grandmother told me all about it Told me so I couldn’t doubt it How she danced—my grandma danced long ago. How she held her pretty head, How her dainty skirts she spread, How she slowly leaned and rose – long ago Grandmother’s hair was bright and sunny Dimpled cheeks too—oh how funny, Really quite a pretty girl – long ago. Bless her – why she wears a cap, Grandma does – and takes a nap Every single day – and yet Grandma danced the minuet long ago Modern days are quite alarming Grandma says—‘but boys were charming’ Girls and boys she means – of course ‘long ago’ ‘Brave, but modest, grandly shy –‘ She would like to have us try Just to feel like those who met In the graceful minuet – long ago - Mary Mapes Doge I heard my grandmother’s voice repeating these stanzas and knew she was in a mood for telling tales, I clapped my hands and called “Bravo! Grandmother, are you alone?” She looked up at me with smiling eyes--She was sitting by a window and the spring sunshine all about her. “Come in my dear,” she said. “I was away in Elysian Fields of youth, and was not alone. There was a goodly company all around me. Sit down with me.” “They must have been enjoying themselves, for this sunny room is very conducive to good cheer,” I told her. My grandmother was well past her three score years and ten, but there was no nostalgia in her meditations. She had lived through a part of four generations and was now vitally interested in the modern lives of her grandchildren. So there were many mirages of memory for her to rest on as she journeyed through life’s handicaps. “I have just read the newspaper,” she told me and was thinking of many things, making many comparisons--Thinking of my young life and remembering the facilities we had for living – now and then – and also of the frame of mind of people in those days, as to the use of them, and of our reaction today.” “I should like to know about your young life, Grandmother – I am young, I should like to compare your youth and mine.” “I cannot imagine your generation being interested in simple things, and I spent my young life very simply--” “Not your life exclusively--” I said, “but of the times into which you were born. In our world now, it seems that every interest in any country touches somewhat other interests in every part of our world.” “That is due,” she said, “or rather we are more familiar with the doings of our world now, because we have so many more facilities for hearing about its many parts.” “Radio has brought us in speaking distance of many lands. We have airplanes that fly hundreds of miles an hour to send or bring messages. Telephones, and when we can sit and see those to whom we talk, then will science have accomplished much.” “Oh, Grandmother, if somebody would or could stop wars!” “My dear, that is one of the fundamental rules for our preservation--We were given the impulse for defense when the world was new and people and beasts of the forest lived in close contact--As we have grown into groups-- away from animals and the enemy who wanted our cave--and used his club to get it-- we have come through primitive reactions, class consciousness—suppression—revolutions--political intrigue for gain, to gain freedom in our right to live--until today we are in the throes of the most brutal conflict the world has ever known.” “These descendants of the savage Huns are so filled with egotistic bombast that they want to control the whole scheme of things as they are. Their minds have been filled with the iron thought of supremacy since baby hood--in each generation. As time moves on and more implements of science can be converted into munition--and war craft, the more barbarous will be the wars.” 6 “To read history-- we are almost forced to believe that war is only a phase of living-- not the survival of the fit--as we once thought--for the best is taken now and the survival of broken bodies and minds does not build temples for the future-- This conflagration of earth and sea and sky that is battering our world, searing our youth and bringing untold agony to the mothers, fathers, and sweethearts of men, and immeasurable hate to the peoples of the earth, will not leave a unity of purpose, to build more stately mansions for our souls.” “There will be much to consider, the old order will change to make way for the new as it happens after each upheaval of conflict.” “Not what we would, but what we must, makes up the sum of living.” I was silent not knowing what to say. My youth had been so care free and youth wants what it should, not what it must. Grandmother rocked awhile in silence and a breeze blew the curtains, fluttering out into the room. I watched her and was thinking of what she had traveled through in all her seventy five years. “I was thinking my dear,” she said, “of the beginning of freedom in our own country, of our shackles as Colonists, under the rule of a land across the sea, whose ruler was then of the same blood as the usurpers who are now boastingly sure of owning the earth. In 1776, we, in this our America bound ourselves into a Union of States at the tragic cost of many lives and the stark terror of ‘those who only stand and wait.’ They too served. The mothers, wives, children, as armies of marching, shivering, starving, ragged men fought to be free. Today in this holocaust, we are fighting to keep that freedom, the jewel in every man’s soul.” “Freedom, my dear and license are two entirely different things, and a Democratic people, some times, do not discriminate. Then came mistakes. There came another time when we had to push England off our shores. On January 8, 1815, when 12,000 British Regulars, came before the cotton bale, breastworks at New Orleans, behind which Andrew Jackson, a long, thin, Indian fighter waited with 6,000 marksmen, who with their rifles could shoot a squirrel in the head from the top of the tallest tree. This motley army of volunteer, backwoodsmen cradled their rifles in the crook of their arms, while line after line of them stood, some knee deep in the ooze and mire of the swamps, watching the Red Coats advance, as they came forward in range of their arms.