| Notes |
- (The following article appeared in The Dothan Eagle, date: c. 1993)
SEEING A CENTURY
20 Presidents, Two World Wars Have Passed in Her Lifetime
EDITOR'S NOTE: Seniors have a lifetime of experiences to share. Each week, The Dothan Eagle profiles a different senior citizen in the Wiregrass.
By MATT MOORE
Eagle Staff Writer
COTTONDALE-A lot of things have happened since Mamie Lammons of Cottondale was born.
Twenty different presidents have sat in the White House, two world wars have been waged and mankind has set foot upon the moon.
When Ms. Lammons, 101, was born on May 31, 1892, Benjamin Harrison was president, the Spanish-American War of 1898 was six years hence and farmers were flocking to the Wiregrass to make their money in King Cotton, unaware of the impending boll weevil. A native of Georgia, Ms. Lammons has lived there, in Hartford and now Cottondale, but her heart remains true to her native state.
"I'm a Georgia girl," she said with a grin. "I was born in Harrison County about six miles from Buchanan." She said the times have changed since she was a little girl, especially the schools that have now become sprawling multi-room campuses that can sometimes have all the problems of inner-city slums, but it wasn't like that when she started school.
"I started my schooling at what they called the Flatwood School House. It was a one-room schoolhouse that everyone went to," she said. "We got along pretty good with it I reckon." She explained that all of the kids in the schoolhouse had to sit on their own chairs ("It wasn't seats, more like in a church, "Ms. Lammons said) and each grade sat in its own rows. All in all it was a good arrangement, except when the boys would try to play tricks on the girls, actions that Ms. Lammons recalls with clarity.
"Sitting right behind me and my younger sister was a row of boys and girls and there was this boy who pulled my sister's hair," she said. "He would just reach up and grab and pull it."
She said she warned him not to do that to her sister anymore, but "he delighted in reaching up and giving her hair a pull. The next time he did it, I just slammed him across the head with my book as hard as a little girl could and he didn't pull her hair anymore," Ms. Lammons said, suppressing a slight chuckle. Ms. Lammons came to Hartford on Jan. 1, 1901 after her father, a farmer, received word that the land was good for growing crops, and he tired of the rocky soil of Harrison County
"They had told him how good the land was out there, so he sold out what he had and moved to Alabama," she said.
The move introduced her to train travel and egg sandwiches for the first time, and she was quite impressed with both of them.
"My father and oldest brother came down on a wagon," she said. "On January 1, me and mama
and my two brothers went down by train, it was my first time, and when we stopped at Albany, Ga., it was time for lunch. Of course there weren't any cafes by the train station."
Ms. Lammons said the train conductors came through the cars offering sandwiches for sale and she bought an egg salad sandwich.
"I've liked them ever since," she said.
Now residing in Cottondale with her oldest son Milan, 82, Ms. Lammons said she wouldn't change anything about her life. She had four children, worked in the fields for her father and then her husband, Duncan Lammons, made sure her children received an education and waited anxious nights while her husband was on patrol as the Hartford Police Department's Chief from 1931 until his death in 1951.
The secret to her long life, which she said was noted on NBC-TV's "Today Show" by weatherman/personality Willard Scott, on her 101st birthday in May, she said it was simple.
"Well, I'll tell you, I've lived a normal life, and I've always been active. I've just always been active," she said.
And she has no complaints about the turns her life has given her, including outliving three of her four children and her husband.
"I live a good life," she said. "I've had my ups and downs, but so has everybody else."
- The following note from Dorrothy Janette Lammons Medved:
Mamie's family farmed in North Georgia and she helped on the farm. She had five brothers and one sister. Mamie was next to the oldest and her sister died when Mamie was 8 years old. In 1904, when she was twelve years old, her family moved to a farm near Hartford, Alabama, where the land was not as rocky as it was in Georgia. Mamie and her mother came to Alabama on the train, while her father and brothers brought the animals and household goods by wagon and on foot. Mamie and Duncan met in Hartford when she was 17 years old. They married when she was 18 years old. Duncan was 19 years older than she was. They had three sons and a daughter. Their daughter only lived 2 days. After Duncan died in 1951, she stayed in Hartford for several years and then spent time with her sons and their families. In 1971 she moved to Cottondale, Florida, to live with her son, Milan and his wife Lois. She lived with her son Milan until her death in 1998 at age 106. She loved to cook, sew and quilt. She was known for her pretty quilts, fried apple pies and chicken and dumplings. She loved visiting and spending time with her grandchildren and great grandchildren. She always had a smile on her face.
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1892 - 1998 (106 years)
d. 6 Jun 1951 (Age 77 years)