Eula Rae McCown - In the Very Beginning: The Story of My Life...

In The Very Beginning

THE STORY OF MY LIFE .

Eula Rae McCown

Copyright 2008 by Eula Rae McCown.

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Contents

WALKER AIR FORCE BASE
ROSWELL, NEW MEXICO

FAIRCHILD AIR FORCE BASE
SPOKANE, WASHINGTON

SIDI SLIMANE AIR FORCE BASE,
FRENCH MOROCCO, NORTH AFRICA

DEDICATION

This book is dedicated to my family my beloved sons, Jeffrey, Steve, and Jimmy, and their families, so that in sharing my stories with their children they can get the stories straight from their mothers mouth.

Let your light so shine before men,

that they may see your good works

and glorify your father

which is in heaven.

St. Matthew 5:16

F or a number of years Ive been contemplating writing down some of the interesting things that have happened to me in my lifetime. As I grow older Ive seen so many changes in the landscape, morals, families, and the world in which we live. I never dreamed there would be so many changes.

It is hard to know where to begin. I love history and most of our history comes from the stories that our families tell and share with us.

My grandmother Larrabee died while I was living in French Morocco and I was not able to return stateside for her funeral. I wrote to my dad and told him the saddest thing about losing Grandmother was the fact that all of her stories died with her. She was a wonderful storyteller of true stories and now they were gone.

When I was a child growing up, each spring Grandmother Larrabee would take all of her grandchildren to the woods. Our dads would put up tarps for us to sleep under and we would build a big fire. Wed cook our supper under the stars and our parents would stay until after supper and then go home. At that time Grandmother would gather us all around the fire and the story telling would begin. She could scare the bejeebers out of you and enjoyed doing it.

Im going to write this just as though Im telling you a story. It is a true story, and in the years to come I hope this story is passed around by my children and grandchildren and their children in order for you to know something about me. My life wont be just like a vapor in the wind but you will have an opportunity to know me.

I have had a very blessed life. Life is an adventure that is very hard. There is good and bad and hopefully with each situation we learn to have a better life. May your life be enriched by the reading of my book and may God richly bless each of you.

To everything there is a season

and a time to every purpose under the heavens.

Ecclesiastes 3:1

I t was a cool afternoon in Seabrook, Texas, that 12 th of October in 1927. Ray Larrabee had stayed home all day, for his wife Eula, had gone into labor early that morning. They had already arranged for Granny Walden, a mid-wife, to come and help with the birth of their first child. Granny had been a dear friend of my grandmother Heiman, Eulas mother, for years. She would come and help with the birth of a child and stay for several days to help with the care of mother and child. In those days new mothers were not to let their feet touch the floor for at least a week or two.

There was a fire in the fireplace, to keep the dampness out of the room, and a wood stove had water boiling on it in the kitchen. A bed had been prepared in their living room, so the baby could be born in this room and Dr. Patton, from League City, had arrived to help with the birth. It was a difficult birth and when the child was born, they had a girl. Then there was an emergency. The doctor could not get the baby to breathe. The doctor kept spanking the baby until the baby turned blue. Mama said it seemed like hours before the doctor succeeded and the baby let out a howl. A new life began and that new life was me Eula Rae Larrabee.

I have always loved my name for I was named for my mother and my dad. Being the first child and grandchild I was much loved and lived a very blessed life. My mothers mother, Grandma Heiman, was the most wonderful grandmother and she was also named Eula. I learned a great deal from this lovely lady. She adored me. It has been my experience in life, when someone loves you, as she loved me, you respond likewise. I adored her. She thought I could do no wrong and I always behaved perfectly around grandmother, because I could not let her down. I wanted her to think I was perfect. We had a wonderful relationship.

The house in which I was born was always called the house in the woods. Mama always said she could never see the sun rise or set in that house, the trees were so dense.

Before Mama and Daddy were married my dad went to Ellington Field, which had been an Army Air Force Base during WWI, and purchased a barracks building. He tore this down and moved the lumber by wagon to our property and built our home. The house consisted of a living room with fireplace, kitchen, bedroom and bath and the front of the house had a porch and a sunroom off the bedroom.

I can still remember that house. It was located in the woods behind my grandmother Larrabees home on Clear Lake. Grandmother Larrabee was of French descent and her home was a very large, beautiful home of French design with dark green shutters closing up the rooms in the heat of the day and opened at evening time to allow the breezes off Clear Lake in to cool the home. Each room had French doors opening out onto a veranda that was across the front and down one side of the home. It was delightful to sit in the porch swing and watch the water of the lake.

My earliest memories of my Grandma were of her working in her yard. She grew beautiful flowers and when she worked in her yard she wore a hat with a large brim and stocking gloves that would cover up her arms and protect her from the sun. She was one of the first skin cancer patients in the United States. She had gone to St. Louis, Missouri to have the cancer removed and there was a large white scar on her face. She was very pretty and the scar just added to her beauty.

At that time there were very few houses around the lake. The main paved road between Webster and Seabrook ran in front of her home. On the other side of the road was a steep cliff at the very edge of Clear Lake.

My dad told a funny story. As a teenager he owned a model T Ford that was stripped down to look like a racecar. No fenders were over the tires, although it did have a windshield. He said driving it on shell roads was hell. He would come home and his ears would be full of shell, thrown up from those uncovered tires. One time he was backing his car out of the driveway when his brakes did not hold and his car went over the cliff down into Clear Lake. He had to get his horse to pull the car out of the lake.

At the side of the house was a huge water tank where my grandpa Bob would water his horses. It was full of beautiful goldfish and we used to love to hang over and splash our hands in the water and try to catch the goldfish.

Some of my earliest memories of the house in the woods were when my brother Jimmy was born. He was born at home 2 years and three months after I was born and I remember the day well. Daddy stayed at home that day and insisted we take a nap after lunch. He had never done that before and when I awoke I had a new baby brother. I was just the age to love to hold a baby and rock him. I owned the rocking chair I rocked him in for years, but finally gave it to one of my granddaughters.