Full Text of the Excerpt

LEE KESSLER:

Well, not to go quite so far in the immediate past, then: what kind of a person was your mother, and what hopes did she have for you? You were her only daughter, right?

WILLIE SNOW ETHRIDGE:

Yes, I was the only daughter. She was a very strong, very strong character, and a very strict person. I don't believe she was particularly ambitious for me to ever become anybody special like a writer or evangelist or great singer or anything. She just hoped I would be, you know, a good Baptist girl [laughter] . I had to go to church four and five times every Sunday. I went to Sunday school, and then church, every morning. And I went in the afternoons; from the time I was fifteen or sixteen I used to go out to the Masonic Home and teach little children Sunday school. And then I went to the Baptist young people's meeting at six or six thirty. And then I went to church at night. I went five times every Sunday to church.

LEE KESSLER:

And did your mother go too?

WILLIE SNOW ETHRIDGE:

Oh, my mother, of course she went all the time. She was a great, great Baptist, pillar of the church. But she never was able to whip me into it. I finally joined the church, 'cause I had a beautiful black beaver hat—it really was beaver, and had white plumes on it. And I thought I'd never look better than I did that Sunday [laughter] , so I joined the church. But I never had any great conviction; that's sad, you know. I'd love to believe like she believed. It must be a terrific comfort, to think that somebody's guiding you and telling you what to do and how to do it. I just miss it dreadfully, but I just never have been able to convince myself of it.

LEE KESSLER:

I think some people just don't. 3 * Certainly a question had been omitted here.

WILLIE SNOW ETHRIDGE:

No. She was determined that all of us would go to college.

LEE KESSLER:

You included?

WILLIE SNOW ETHRIDGE:

Oh yes. She never had any idea of my not going to college. None of us went away to college, because my brothers went to Mercer University (in Macon) and I went right across the street. We lived facing the Wesleyan campus, so I didn't get very far [laughter] . 4 ** Also it seems to me L. K. must have asked a question here. And she would sit up for me at night when I started dating; she never let me have a date until near the end of my senior year in in high school until I met Mark, just as I was finishing my junior year—I mean my senior year in high school. And I was never allowed to spend the night out with anybody in my life when I was young because I had to be under that house roof every night; she had to know where I was. And then when I did start dating, she always sat right inside the front door until I got home at night.

LEE KESSLER:

Was she as cautious with your brothers?

WILLIE SNOW ETHRIDGE:

No, not that I know of; I don't remember her being cautious with them. I had my hands full [laughter] with her being cautious with me. The minute I hit the bottom step of the porch (we had five or six steps up to the porch) that door was opened. I never was able to tell a man or boy goodnight alone; she was right there, waiting for me.