The Grove Clan, Ch. 4

Hazel Opal Grove “Boog” to her family and friends, was the middle child of the Grove clan and was born on the 21^st of October, 1897 in Coalgate, Oklahoma.  She attended Coalgate High School and graduated with the class of 1916.  She enrolled in “District School,” and went on to graduate from college with a teaching degree.

                                   Hazel, ca. 1916

Like her sister Ethel, Hazel taught school in her home town of Coalgate, but unlike her sister, she taught grammar school instead of high school.  It seems that none of the girls stayed with their teaching careers very long after marriage, and Hazel was no different.  It appears that she only taught school for six or seven years before she took a position with the phone company in Ada, about 15 miles from Coalgate.

                                        Hazel, on right, ca. 1921

Hazel is the daughter who stayed in her hometown, near her parents.  She was there to help out during those trying years of 1926 to 1928 when her father, Thomas Franklin, had to travel to Texas looking for work.  She gave them money when they didn’t have enough to put food on the table.  She was there when her sister Ethel’s baby daughter Charlene died during a visit from Colorado, in 1929.  In 1931 when her father was killed in a highway accident out in front of their home, she was there to help her mother and niece, even though she had a husband and a home of her own at the time.  She became the matriarch of the family, and many of her extended family relied upon her.  Hazel was instrumental in the raising of her sister’s daughter Anna Bell, and watching over her mother for twenty years after her father died.  She also aided her mother-in-law, Lucinda “Scott” Warren who lived on her own and raised flowers.  Added to this, she managed to raise a family of her own that included 4 boys and a girl.

Hazel’s niece, Anna Bell Betts recalls the time she and her friend Virginia Estes came home from school to Gam’s, the name they had given to Hazel’s mother, Sarah Melvina.  Not finding the boiled potatoes they loved so much, they made a bee-line to Hazel’s and got into her cooking sherry.  By the time Hazel discovered them, it was too late.  The girls had obviously had too much to drink and spent the rest of the day recovering from their misguided adventure.

Hazel was engaged to another man when she met her husband, Raymond Werner Warren in Coalgate, Oklahoma.

                                Hazel, third from left, ca. 1918

It must have been love at first sight because they were married shortly after they met in 1927.  Raymond was working for “Hudson’s Big Country Store” in Coalgate, driving a truck.  He would travel to Missouri and other places to pick up produce and livestock to supply the store.  After Raymond and Hazel were married, Raymond purchased his own truck and started trading chickens and other livestock to packing plants as far away as Port Arthur, Texas, and Lake Charles, Louisiana.

               Hazel and Raymond Werner Warren, ca. 1927

The following is the transcript of a letter written by Hazel’s father, Thomas Franklin Grove wherein he tells about Hazel’s sister Lennie and her husband Wallace Betts.  Lennie and Wallace lived 15 miles away in Atoka, and had obviously been out to the Grove farm to visit their daughter “Tee-Tie” [Anna Bell Betts] who was being raised by Thomas and Sarah Melvina (that story in chapter 6).  Also, he mentions that they are getting ready to start construction on the new highway that would cut right through the Grove farm, and is the road on which Thomas was killed 4 years later.  It seems as they had all taken a drive to Ada, Ok, and left Thomas at home by himself.

Coalgate, OK,  3/30/1927

Dear old Boog.  Received your letter with money order.  Was so sorry you was not well.  Be sure and take good care of yourself whatever happens because your health is always to be considered before anything else.  We are all well.  Hope this finds you better if not altogether well.  Mama & Wallace, Lennie & Tee-Tie went to Ada Sunday.  We sure are having one time trying to farm as everybody else is.  The ground had got dry enough so we could get in the field.  I cut cotton stalks one day or 2-1/2 days and Monday afternoon it came an awful rain and has been thick cloudy ever since and is misting rain now.  Mr. Jennings has not got anything planted but [illegible (Spuds, Spinach?)].

Boog, get a bottle of Harlem oil, drop it in a teaspoonful of sugar and take it for your back.  Take 10 drops 3 times a day for your throat.  Drop a few drops in a little water and gargle that in your throat 3 or 4 times a day.  That is what I done for my throat and it got well right away.

There is not much news here.  Nothing ever happens but we are satisfied here if the weather would get better.  I almost forgot to tell you you can get Harlem oil in capsules that is the best way to take it.  The road will not touch our onion patch, but will go right through our potato patch.  We did not know that before we planted.  We don’t know when they will start the road.

Write often,

Lots of love, Dad, Mama & Tee Tie

It was the height of “The Great Depression” when Hazel and Raymond started their family with the arrival of Paul Franklin on January 3, 1932.  After that, the children came in quick succession with William Aubrey on May 9, 1933, followed by Doyle Raymond on December 9, 1935 and Hoyt Clark on October 8, 1937.  Hazel Jayne was the last born of Hazel’s children, arriving a full five years after her youngest brother, on December 8, 1942.

Hazel’s daughter, Hazel Jayne, recalls the depression era, rural lifestyle of the time.  The boys would be up early and milk the cows, so they always had fresh dairy products and a big garden kept them in fresh vegetables in season.  They had fruit trees and Hazel made preserves and canned much of the garden produce.  Like all the Grove girls, Hazel was a good seamstress and made many of the clothes they wore.  Flour sacks were the material of the time, and many of the producers printed their sacks to be suitable for dress material.  The kitchen was supplied with plates and saucers that came in boxes of oatmeal, and the jams and jellies they purchased provided drinking glasses.  Hazel would mark the kid’s glasses with their initials so there would not be any confusion.

Hazel suffered from gallstones during much of her later life, but she persevered through the discomfort.  She is the only one of the Grove girls who passed away before her husband and died on April Fools day in 1975, followed two and a half years later by her husband, Raymond on December 29, 1977.