Uncle Edward and Aunt Laura in the 1970's

 Uncle Edward Atwood and Aunt Laura ran the Atwood Hatchery in Comanche for almost 40 years.  They had a very nice house on Highway 16 at Wrights Avenue.  Their hatchery property was across the street on Pearl Street.

In 1976 they had a huge estate sale and loaded a moving van with all of their household goods and moved to Everett, Washington.  Aunt Laura's sister Nora lived in Seattle which was just a short drive away.

These photos were made on their moving day.  Aunt Laura took care of her gardens and trees right up until the last minute, and visited with folks who came by to see them off.

Letter from my mother when I was a baby

Dec. 19, 1938   ( I was three months old)

Dearest Mamie:  (Mamie was Daddy's older sister who lived in Los Angeles)

…..Bill and I are so very proud of our baby, and I am glad all of his family seem to be so
 fond of her. (Bill was Thurston (my dad's) nickname in the family.  Everybody called them Bill and Ann.)

…..We have been in Comanche for just a little more than a month and are with Alma an Harold.  Alma and I take turns cooking and it works out fine.  Of course taking care of the baby is a big job itself, but Bill is very sweet to help me a great deal, and does the entire washing, even for Alma and Mrs. Atwood.

 …..You can never know how much my life with him means to me…and I suppose no one can except me.  We believe we are the happiest people in the world, even if we haven't become rich or famous.

Sincerely

Ann

Lake Eanes Park in Comanche, 1944

This was a company picnic for the people who worked at Camp Bowie in Brownwood with my dad.
The picnic was at Lake Eanes Park, a favorite place for family reunions and church outings.  In the background right you can see the pavilion where dances sometimes happened in my high school years.  All it took was somebody to open up his car windows with the radio on.

The huge tree in the center was one of many. The rock table and benches were all made of local rock by WPA workers in the 1930's who built parks all over the country in little towns.  One or two of the table bases had limestone imprints of dinosaur tracks.  The limestone in our creeks often held tracks like that.
I guess the most famous ones are in Glen Rose.

Beatrice Pinales

Beatrice Pinales gave me this picture ini 1954 when she was 11 years old.  It was her school picture that year.

The Pinales family lived down the street from us on College Ave. in Comanche.  Their father worked as a bootmaker with Dan Trujillo in his custom boot shop.  Beatrice was the eldest of five children.

She was in a Brownie Scout troop that year. I was a Junior camp leader and taught the girls songs.  We had a lot of fun.

Eventually the Pinales family moved to Fort Worth and I went off to college.  Once in a while I would get a letter from Beatrice during the year before I married.

About ten or twelve years ago Beatrice sent a letter to me from San Antonio by way of Comanche. Some one in Comanche knew my Fort Worth address and forwarded it to me.  In it Beatrice told me she had fifteen children, and that her youngest daughter was named Patsy after me.

I tried to get in touch with Beatrice in San Antonio where the letter was from.  But I never found her.
If you are out there, Beatrice, let me hear from you.

early days with our little family in Comanche

I found a group of old snapshots made when Bill and I were quite young.  Thought I would make a short slideshow with one of the songs Mother used to sing as a lullaby to Bill.

The first picture is from Easter 1943.  You can't see it in the photo but I was sitting in the back yard of our house on the De Leon highway.  In front of me was a huge blue potted hydrangea that Daddy gave Mother that day.

 The person in some of the car photos is my cousin, Cleve B. Denny.  He was aunt Alma and Uncle Harold's only son.  He had just come back from being in the Navy in WWII.

my early school days

I started school in 1945 at West Ward School in Comanche.  After two days in first grade I was moved to second grade since I already knew how to read. So my teacher was Mrs. Dean.  The following year in third grade I had the principal, Mr. Brown for arithmetic.  We learned the multiplication tables that year.  My third grade teacher was Berta Goodson.

I LOVED SCHOOL!!!

My uncle Edward took this picture of me in the back yard of his home at the Atwood Hatchery in Comanche.  I hope you can click on it and see it large because I had a really happy smile that day.

My wedding in Comanche, 1957

The wedding was at St. Matthew's Episcopal Church in Comanche on August 24, 1957.  Bridesmaids were Frances Evelyn Atwood, Quay Williams (maid of honoe) and Kay Vanderpool.

I made my own wedding dress.  It was designed after a Givenchy dress from the Audrey Hepburn-Fred Astaire movie called "Funny Face" which was popular that year.

I also made Mother's hat and at the last minute, the wedding cake.  The Brownwood,Texas baker broke his leg a week before the wedding! So I made the cake and somebody in Comanche decorated it for me.

Christmas 1939 and 1940 in Comanche

The first picture shows me on the left and my cousin Frances Evelyn on the right of the little tree.  I think we might have been at our house in Comanche.  The second picture was made the following year when I was a little older.  

Uncle Ed and Aunt Laura

My father's oldest brother was named Edward Beverly Atwood.  Everybody just called him Ed. He married Laura Fischer, a lady of German extraction who was from the hill country of Texas.

Uncle Ed and Aunt Laura when they married around 1934

They spent their lives building and running a chicken business called the "Atwood Hatchery."

It was located on Highway 16 north of Comanche, Texas.

When I became a teenager I had a job in their hatchery taking chicks out of the incubators.

When I stayed over at their house I thought it was funny that Uncle Ed blew his nose so loud.  

Aunt Laura and I joked that he could "wake up the chickens."

A Christmas card from the hatchery about 1947

More Maggie and her talents

 Mama Atwood's house was on one of the 2 main streets in Comanche, at 415 West Grand Avenue.

It was made of cypress wood and was never painted which made it a beautiful silvery gray color. She was always talking about having it painted. But never did. 

She is shown here standing on the west side of her house about 1951.

She was very expert and any kind of crochet, embroidery and tatting.  She won ribbons for her quilts and for her needlework.  Both at the State Fair of Texas and at the Cotton Exposition in Waco.

Manning and Maggie's children

Manning and Maggie Atwood's first child was named Mable. As far as I know we don't have any pictures of her. When she was two years old Maggie took her to visit Maggie's famiy. While she was there they both became ill; Maggie lived but Mable did not.

Aunt Ernestine told me that Maggie never went to visit to her family again. 

In 1902 Manning and Maggie moved to Comanche, Texas where they lived out the rest of their lives in the same home, at 415 East Grand Avenue. .

Here is a photo of their first 4 children, plus Mamie who is standing at the back. The seated child on the right is Sammie, who lived to age 12. The little infant is Edward, their first boy, whose nickname was "Sonnyman."  Standing at left is Alma Janice Atwood.  At right is Ernestine. Ernestine told me that Maggie made every stitch of the clothing all 5 children wore in this photo. After this picture was made Maggie and Manning had three more children, Watt, Ruth, and Thurston, who was my father.