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Coakrall Story, page
4.
evirybody is ,in a bad fik. Some of them planted eatten
two co' throe times, and th.y just neva' mould get a stand.
,"The pesplo that fool withoattle are the en17 anes
who are doing any goad. ;Vas*, he gat into the, sow
business pretty heavy this year. I.00ks-Uhe now be will
'do pretty will if be mullet the hands to work. The rain
ruined all the first 'rep of hay. Seems like it nem
will get through raining; Just a let of showers5 .ugh
to rub* the hay every time he outs any.
"Fa was a Umber in different parts if eounty.
SA had been student at the University. When his pa died,
he get the old home place and lived thin, till he died. 1
thought I'd have plenty when P2died, but all 1 got after
they get INIMINO sliming over it was SO aeres..
"I been hying right hors on the old phase al my life,
and that has been a goad while now. Ism tw,) years younger
than my maighber, Dr. McCain, but he don't miter have
nothing the matter with hi.. He stays as spry as ever.
*Oa have amagad to get along sonahaw so far, but it
looks like the Devarement is trying te ruin us all nem."
"what is it they are doing now?" Isekod. He Ms a
way of &upsetting any new **torment ftattVitr04410aatYs State,
or rodoralmw to ruin the farmers.
*Why, they are going to take all rar hands away from
us and put them to work on tba big road. Theyve going to
dollars
give them two/•ckyo and it would break us up to pay that
musk. We just matt do it."
Hers *re. Oeekrell put in: "I won't even Sm able to
Ceekroli Star/
keep ay seek.. She wen't have to w ark, with the nfolks
making that mush measy.4
*Out 2 thought they were not going t* start that work
until the ere,* arefathered,"I pat in.
'Tea, but we mutt be throw b when it starts. It'll
take Frank till Christmas to get dons. It always toes
take till Christmas. The bands will all go on the road,
and be most get done at all. I don't knew what they
are thinking about to do such a thin& put the avrelbusts
will all get rink. They'll get all of it.
In politics, IT. CooLrell is a conservative Demoerat.
In the Worths as Prenident Roosevelt said of Senator Georg*,
be would have been a firm Republica*. About religien be
worries little. Often isolated for long: periods by bad
roads, the featly has never made regular church attendanee
a habit, Mis SMUSSIKA44 consist of playing dominoes with
his wife, and trying earnestly to keep up with ell She
gossip of the eounty.
The home has a essimenpleoe exterior, but is somfortabiy
furnished. In architecture, the homes is unusual. The
kitebea and diningroen,are about three *et below the level
if the remainder of the building. Several steps lead
from the rear of the front ball down to thiskitehow.
Ainingroen lewd,. Anot*er hall ma the kitchen level leads
tree these steps to the side entranee, peat the kitchen,
and dOniiean doers. Probably the original structure was
anciek-ehaped 0,04000roon affair. The kitchen was later
built as a separate unit, and attaehed to the main
Cook!'11 Story 4 0.
structure with an eye to utility rather than beauty.
Their family pride is quiet pride. Educators,
lawyers, politisiams, and business men in many lines dot
the fully ansestry and present senneetions. Leon and
Lida, his wife, wit :5 similar backgrounds speak of these
relatives oseasionally but without either boasting or
envying. Where those others battle the tiers. summits
of life, this pair is content with the quiet baskwater 01
a settle, eotton, and hay farm.
The father and five uneles of Len Cockrell battlid
for the Lest Cameo. One Anole was killed in battle, one
died d' wounds, mho resolved severe wounds fro. •hieh he
recovered, and still another who was an officer with
Miriam, the raider, was captured during a raid into Ohio
and spent many months in a Federal prison camp. But
Len Cookrell did not tell ot these things. MO never titles
to tight the war Botwaen the States over, as do mayor
his generation and section.
Mispits its placid eurfaeal his life has touched deep
(wren** of tragedy. A son and a daughter who reached
manhood and womanhood died soon after. Russell died
suddenly when he was about 24 Minnie was nearly 30 when
she died.
The only surviving son is MI years old, and shows no
Latoreat in marriage. Hs is a smart farmer, industrious,
a good. manager and a tkoughtful son. He lives at home but
has his own interests, while the father ran the family farm
until MO health failed.
Cockrell Story 5
Len does not like to dwell in the past. ale t,oughts
and his talk are still of the future, with scant regard
for his seventy-two years. He hopes to take over the
farm again next year. He may be aLle to do so.
that he has a pe culler twist in his philosophy. Hs
isas that all old people ehould be dead. "Old people.ain't
no business living; just being around in the way," is his
:nanner of expressing it.
Awn reminded that he, himself, might, be regarded as
oid, he said, "Yes, I'm in the way too. Thcy ought to knock
us all In the head and throw us out."
Living and working alone LO mudh, ha long ')go developed
the habit 4f talking to himself r to animals and objects
near him. Alen driving cows up for milking, it was a custom
of his to get a small stick and wave toward the last OM
in line, evory minute or tar remarking converitionally:
1:
"Co 'long, cow; go cow."
hen they beame unmanageable the remarks aesumed more
force and 2oint.
He has his o.an favorite chair ?,nd no other will suit
him. For hours, he and :Jis wife play dominoes until )ne
of them es a passerby coming. Unic,s thcre is scat:: par-
ticAdr reason for not 8oity- out, Lida hurriea to the
frInt porch to hall the tr-veler and learn whatever he or
shit has to tailor neighborhood goings-on. Then the uame
is resumed h1ie ver it the two discuss the flote and
hearsay collected.
The ails of th house are thickly spotted with pictures
Cockrell .4ery 6
of assorted subjects and sizes. 3everal lithographed.
calendars of the current year are always among
Um, "frant raom." The furniture is of amazing
TWO are no suites; individual places are the
those in
variety.
order,
and L4ase range from genuine antiques to those Df recent
vintage.
A homey fireplace in the front room is screened
during the aumer by a black and wUte picture of sylvan
4
scone. A radio—abettery set --occupies a table beside the wiadow
then it is in working order, Lida aakes it a -oint never to
rills," the program of the Birmingham radio revivalists.
Books and maaaaines of the better type are in evidense.
Unless they have been destroyed recently, vane of the books
on their shelves are older than the United States and numbers
of the magazines there were publiebed more than a quarter
century ago.
'aben the Townsend Flan furore was n,ar its climax
some yearo ago, Leon and Lida became mildly excited. Since
both of them were old enough to claim the It200a—month payments,
they spent many excited and exciting hours discussing ways
in which they could manage to comply With the attached spend.'
in requirement. They have not yet fully recovered from the
disappointment of its connote.
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