All the family stories indicate to me that while she spent a great deal of her adult life as a rover, my great-grandmother Leta held a special respect for women who dedicated themselves to their husbands and children. This is in no way is to conclude that she was an irresponsible or neglectful wife (when she was married) or worse yet a bad mother. As I have noted previously, she fought for custody of her children in an era when men usually retained custody. (Women had only recently been granted the Constitutional right to vote.) Further, she overcame a custody battle with their father (in 1927) and kept them with her until they were teenagers, when I believe, circumstances forced her to make an extremely painful decision to send them to live with their father.
While separated from her children, she moved in with her brother Aaron, his wife Florence and their two daughters. During that period, while she lived scandalously, she held a deep respect for her sister-in-law and the home life. In fact, one story has her creating a disturbance at a bar to so thoroughly rile her brother that he would drag her home, where his wife had need of him.
Leta’s daughter, in particular, was a dedicated homemaker, wife, mother, grandmother, daughter, daughter-in-law and even granddaughter. Leta honored her daughter and worried that she spoiled those she took care of.
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| Leta and five of her seven grandchildren, ~1952 | . |
Leta was strict with her grandchildren, but loving, as well. When her daughter and son-in-law went on an extended business trip/vacation to Europe, she stayed with their two teenagers (ages 16 and 14) for several weeks. She enjoyed spending time with all of her grandchildren and great-grandchildren.
Family was key, and she provided tremendous positive reinforcement to anyone in her own who was dedicated to family.
Chief among those in her family to be such was my own mother. While they knew and recognized each other as family for several years, their relationship did not begin to blossom until I was born in 1963, one day after Leta’s eighth husband Richard died suddenly.
While in the midst of funeral necessities, Leta spent a lot of time with my mother in the hospital, where they kept each other company during short winter days and life passages. From that point on, they became good friends, spending hours and hours in conversation over the next 20 years. When we were children, my mother took us faithfully to visit her in her second floor duplex apartment. After she moved into the senior residence, we continued to visit a couple of times a month at least. In 1976, my grandmother-her daughter died and shortly thereafter my parents divorced, but my mother and Leta continued to enjoy each other’s company. After my mother remarried at the end of the year, we continued our family. And even after my little brother Nathan (my mother’s son by her second husband) was born, my mother brought him along to visit. Leta loved having the little guy visit with her.
They talked about the family, their situations, their fears, their intentions, their regrets, their hopes, the world—life. And this continued. First my older brother Jeff grew up. Then I went away to college. They remained faithful to each other all that time.
You see, my mother, having grown up in a household almost solely maintained by a working mother, set as her life’s goal to be a full-time wife and mother. And she pursued this goal with an uncommon dedication. Even when her marriage was troubled, she held tightly to her passion. And I believe that my great-grandmother admired her for it, even going so far as to chastise her grandson—my father—for his disrespectful behavior when she felt he warranted it.
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