Foster Lowe Harmon

After my wife died on Christmas Day, 1973, and was buried Dec. 27, my 81st birthday, I realized that I should keep myself busy writing, reading, and trying to keep my mind busy and not allow myself to get too badly depressed. Luckily my eyes are good, very good indeed, for an 81 year old man,

I had one brother until 21 days before I was 8 years old. My brother was 3 years and almost 4 months older than me and was stricken with spinal menigitis on Dec. 6, 1900, and died in less than 10 hours, leaving me to be raised as an only child, which is a hard way to be brought up.

My early schooling was in a one room, one teacher country school with anywhere from ten to more than 40 pupils from6 to more than 20 years old. The teacher, usually a girl, when she learned to count to a hundred and write her name was qualified to teach school at Union McMinn. My education was in a 4 parts. The first part in that country school until I was almost 16, and then a secondary high school teaching through the 10th grade and then a secondary 2 year college, a very fine school with a good faculty, but the 4th and most important part of my education was the part which I never was able to get.

My wife and I were married Feb. 14, 1913, and had almost 61 years together, but she had major surgery in 1938, and never was exactly normal after that. She had serious physical and mental problems from that time on, not too serious for several years, but serious enough to be bad. She suffered what her doctor described as cerebral vascular accident in 1952, and spent 4 weeks in St. Albans Psychiatric hospital in Radford, Va. They helped her a lot but she was never anything near normal after that time.

After I retired as General Delivery clerk in the local P.O., Dec. 31, 1957, I had a work shop in my basement and repaired more than 350 antique clocks, some of them very fine and rare, and built 17 really fine grandfather clocks, and a large number of smaller mantel clocks. My specialty was repairing the old wooden work clocks with broken gears and pinions. I made it pay fairly well but my charges were only a fraction of what they cost now. My wife's condition got so bad that I had to give up all my outside work and give her my undivided attention in 1965. With the help of my 2 daughters at first we cared for her in the home unti her death on last Christmas Day. Our youngest daughter died with a heart attack Mar. 18, 1972. We kept a woman 4 hours a day, 5 days a week,from 1968 on until her death so that I could have a little time off.

Salisbury is about 135 miles east of Asheville. That is where I live alone. I have closed off the 2 west bedrooms. I have no problem with my cooking and household chores, but I really hate to dust,but I do keep my home fairly clean. Washing dishes is no problem. I had to learn to cook a long time ago. I have a really goo colored TV, and like sports and a few shows, but no soap operas. I usually turn TV off about 8:00 p.m. and read until about 10:00 or until I get sleepy.

A horse kicked me on Good Friday, 4-21-1905. I almost bled to death before Aunt Mary Wallis found me. I was kicked about 1:30 in the afternoon and it was about 8:00 the same evening before 2 small-town doctors got me on a dining table to operate on my head by the light of 2 kerodene lamps held by Aunt Mand Garrison and Aunt Betsy Wallis. The skull and brain were badly shattered and they had to remove a half teacupful of shattered brain. I might have been smart if I had not lost that much brains. (Nov. 1974)

During the Scopes "Monkey Trial" in Dayton, Tenn. I was a clerk in the Fort Worth, Tex. post office, and my assignmnet at the time was weighing the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, in the mailing room of the Star-Telegraph building on W. 7th St. At that time they published about 8 editions of the Star-Telegram every day, and I read the news in every edition. I read the news about Williams Jennings Bryan's death within minutes after he died in Dayton, Tenn. By the way, Vesta Robinson, a sister to Dr. Robinson, owner of Robinson's Drug Store, where the beginning of the Scopes trial took place, once visited in the home of John Garrison's family, our closest neighbor, and I, with several other couples, walked her to church at Union McMinn Baptist Church almost a mile away. She was a school teacher, older than me, but a very fine intelligent person- -a very lovely and attractive young lady. (Mar 9th, 1975)