BIRD-DAY MEMORIES

Tom Pry

It was a bit of a shock to me today to realize that Thanksgiving is just one short week away. As Anita Hart Fuller suggested, it’s time for memories or strange observances and, to make the point, she kicked her husband off the couch and told him to produce.

Bobby Scott Fuller

Anita asked me to send a copy of the attached photo to you. The original was not the greatest, so what I'm sending is the best that Photoshop, combined with my rather limited knowledge of it, could do.

The date of the photo is 1950. I'm not sure what Anita has already told you about our family Thanksgiving Dinners, so just ignore any duplications I include.

Beginning in the foreground and moving clockwise around the table aremy granddad, Scott Fuller (The photo was made in the dining room of his home); me (One can barely make out the stripe on my band uniform pants); my dad, Bill Fuller; my mom, Lillian Faye; my paternal grandmother, Nora Pope Fuller (Her brother was J.D. Pope, who owned a piano store on the East side of the Court Square), my maternal grandmother, Ada Garlington; my aunt, Ruth Fuller; my uncle, John Fuller; and my brother, Bill.

Missing is my sister, Ruth Ann; I'm not sure where she was. The photo was taken by one of the Pope brothers, either Bill, Edgar or Milton.

The custom of gathering at my granddad's place for Thanksgiving had gone on for several years.

Two things seem special about the festivities. One was the "dinner" had to be over in time for most of us to get to the Searcy-Beebe football game, in those days played in the afternoon. Naturally when the game was at Beebe, our meal was very early, usually around 11 a.m.

The other interesting thing -- to me anyway -- was what we ate. Long before my memory had kicked in, the Fuller Family was celebrating Thanksgiving with platter loads of hot tamales, all prepared on a wood stove by my Grandmama Nora. That tradition continues today - admittedly off-and-on, depending upon who can come.

I still carry the tamale recipe, dictated to me by my dad, in my billfold.