Early Years ...

My first few years were spent in the house on 346 H W Circle in Madison, North Carolina, and Suzie was with me constantly. My mother didn't want the dog sleeping in the house, but you might be surprised how many nights she was let in, especially in colder weather.

My father's mother was named Laura Augusta Wilson at birth, but everyone referred to her as Minnie for her entire life. Here she is at the right holding me in her lap. She was as pleased with that as I apparently was. She was never the motherly (or grandmotherly) type. The rules in our house were to be quiet when she was anywhere around, and to only speak when spoken to.

I learned when I was just beginning my family research that my grandmother had been married twice! She married Jeter Earnest Murphy on 2 February 1898 at a ceremony at my great-grandparents' home in the Lemley's District of Mecklenburg County, North Carolina. It was a short-lived marriage because Jeter came down with typhoid fever in June. After a slight recovery, he died in Statesville, Iredell County, North Carolina, on 9 July 1898. Minnie returned home to her parents' home to live. She inherited nothing from Jeter. 

She married my grandfather, Samuel Goodloe Morgan, on 24 December 1902, also at her parents' home. He was born on 6 April 1879 in Caswell County, North Carolina, and he died on 3 March 1953 in Madison, Rockingham County, just 6 months after I was born. He suffered from dementia in his final years and always seemed to think, so I am told, that my name was Sam - named after him. His dementia sometimes resulted in his wandering out of the house naked. Since they lived less than a block from the main street of Madison, he did stroll down the main street stark naked a few times.

Minnie was born on 24 January 1873. She lied about her age her entire life. Every US federal census from 1900 through 1940 shows that she has aged less than ten years. I sometimes joke that it was she who invented "new math."

We'll get to my parents, my older brother, my father's sister, and my mother's family later. Suffice it to say now that my parents and brother were shadowy personalities around me at this early age. I didn't really interact with my father; it was primary with my mother that I was bonding. I have little memory of my brother until I was five or six years old. He probably avoided the little baby brother.

Christmas was exciting because of presents, Santa Claus, and all that. I recall the tree on the round table in the living room. I still have that round table in our home.

I'm told by my brother that, just before I was born, there was a family discussion. Would we buy our first television or a new washer for Mother to launder my diapers. You guessed it! My father and brother won out and there was a television. I'm told we were among the first in the neighborhood to have one, and that neighbors would come over on Friday or Saturday evenings to watch. The women would bring food and the men would bring beer. The fact that Uncle Miltie (Milton Berle) sometimes dressed up as a woman probably explains why I've always enjoyed seeing drag shows!


We weren't in that house too long. We moved into town when I was less than three years old. I vividly remember that day! It was March and the sky was clear and brilliant blue. My father owned a green Chevy with whitewall tires. I suppose that there was a moving truck. However, I rode in the back seat of the car with my parents up front. (Who knows where my brother was?!) I was allowed to hold the precious lamp from my mother's dressing table. The base was what I supposed were Romeo and Juliet entwined in an embrace. Somehow I was entrusted with this treasure and held it tightly. The move was a big adventure for me. We moved into our house at 229 North Dalton Street in Madison on what was called Kemoka Hill, overlooking the Southern Railway tracks and the bottoms of the flood plain for the Mayo and Dan Rivers. It was a new beginning with new neighbors and new kids.