[Granville-Hough] 28 April 2009 - 1 Jul 2005 - Uncle Ligie
Trustees and Executors for Granville W. Hough
gwhough at oakapple.net
Sat Jul 31 06:32:56 PDT 2010
Uncle Ligie Hough.
Uncle Elijah Ligie Hough has just about faded from collective Hough
family memory. Brother Donald Hough believes he remembers seeing him
after he found Donalds first pocket knife. I, Granville Hough, can
remember him more clearly as a family member to be reckoned with, out of
whose room you stayed, and whose chair you did not sit in or move. Older
brother Dueward Hough said Uncle Ligie always had a friendly greeting,
fire (a packet of matches in a sweat-proof container), a handkerchief, a
sharp pocket knife, and a twist or plug of tobacco. (A twist of tobacco
was one or two leaves of curing home-grown tobacco, twisted until it
could be turned back in the middle and the ends joined together. Then
you secured the ends by wrapping a smaller leaf around them to hold them
in place until the twist was dry. You needed a sharp pocket knife to cut
off a chew, but it was potent stuff. Uncle Ligie would share a chew with
anyone he met, black or white.)
Uncle Ligie was born 23 Nov 1874 near Raleigh and died 8 Dec 1929 in
Smith County at the Lisha and Lizzie Hough home between Mize and Magee.
At some point in his youth, he probably had spinal meningitis which
disabled his back so he could not stand upright. He himself could not
remember that illness, but he could remember that an ox had stepped on
him and broken his back. It may be that both events happened. (Many of
us learned at an early age that cattle would step on your feet unless
you got out of their way. They could step on your back only when you
fell down and were too disabled to move.) At any rate, Uncle Ligie grew
up disabled in body, but with a mind sharpened to compensate. As he had
to depend on others, he also developed his social skills. He was
remembered as a good talker, a hearty eater, a natural family historian,
and an ardent Mason.
My mother, Lizzie Hough, developed her own methods of dealing with Uncle
Ligies voracious appetite. Whatever food she had most of she placed in
front of Uncle Ligie. If she had just enough to go around, she placed it
in front of Lisha. On one occasion, she had prepared a dish which lasted
meal after meal, recalled as hominy. She just could not get anyone to
eat that hominy. She decided to talk it up as a special dish she wanted
everyone to try. So, while she made her pitch on the special dish, she
placed it in front of Uncle Ligie. He took his usual double portion and
passed it on. To Lizzies relief, the whole platter was emptied. At the
end of the meal, Uncle Ligie remarked, I tried hard, but I did not find
anything special about that hominy. Everyone agreed with hearty
laughter, and Lizzie could only say, Well, in that case, I am glad its
all gone.
Uncle Ligie and my father Lisha disagreed on Masonry as a secret and
fraternal order. Uncle Ligie must have joined early in life at a lodge
in or near Raleigh. Great Grandpa Sampson Arender was also a member, as
were other members of the Salem Community. Uncle Ligie emphasized the
fraternal, while Lisha emphasized the secret (something to hide). Uncle
Ligies membership probably helped him as a cripple, and as a visitor to
distant relatives on the Gulf Coast, in Louisiana, and in Texas. When
Uncle Ligie came to live with Lizzie and Lisha, he was a respected
member of the local Oak Hill Lodge, which had its meeting room in the
Oak Hill Schoolhouse at Concord Baptist Church. He was lodge brother to
Lizzies Richardson brothers. Like the school and church, the lodge
membership was from both Smith and Simpson counties. Uncle Ligie left a
trunkful of references on the history and functions of Masons. My
mother, Lizzie Hough, eventually gave this trunkful of books to Mr.
Archie Runnels, an aspiring Mason who wanted the books but had no means
for buying them.
In growing up, brothers Elijah and Elisha both became E. Hough for mail
purposes. Uncle Ligie would not change as he said he had the E. name
first, and it was rightfully his. So Elisha became E. J. Hough, to avoid
conflict, the J being initial only. Being older and very observant,
Uncle Ligie must have felt Lisha should pay more attention to his advice
than to that of others. In general, they got along well because Uncle
Ligie avoided conflict. He worked hard at the tasks he could do and he
endured the pain and frustration of his condition.
Lizzie and Lisha once had a conflict which would never have become known
had not Uncle Ligie talked about it. Lisha had a tendency to tease
people, and sometimes not too kindly. One day, he went too far with Lizzie.
Now, Uncle Ligie was set in his ways. He had his chair on the left side
of the fireplace in the living room, which was also the bedroom for
Lizzie and Lisha. After breakfast, Uncle Ligie would go sit by the fire
and lean back against the wall in his chair, take out his twist of
tobacco, cut off a "chaw of tobaccy," and chew it, spitting over his
left shoulder into the fireplace. After about a twenty minute chew, he
was ready for the days work.
After breakfast on this particular day, Uncle Ligie heard the rising
crescendo of voices in the kitchen and wondered what was going on. Well,
Lizzie always said she was feeling bad, was pregnant, and was in no mood
to be teased on any subject. And whatever this subject was has been
forgotten. Anyway, Uncle Ligie saw Lisha come laughing from the kitchen
into the living room. Lizzie was close behind, mad as a hornet. Lizzie
took a mighty swing at Lisha, who fell flat on the floor. From Uncle
Ligies angle of view, he thought Lizzie had slapped Lisha down. He
applauded, laughed heartily, and said: Round 1 for Lizzie. Lisha, it
looks like you have met your match this time. He continued to laugh so
heartily that he swallowed his chaw of tobacco and had to cough it up.
Lizzie always said she indeed swung at Lisha but he dodged and she did
not even touch him. However, in dodging, he fell over a childs chair
and wound up on the floor. Lizzie retreated in tears to the kitchen,
Lisha left the house, and Ligie continued to chuckle. When Lizzie and
Lisha got back together, they agreed on various mistakes, but the
biggest of all was forgetting Uncle Ligie was there. They knew he would
tell the story the rest of his life to any and all. They decided to let
him have his fun, and that they would never admit or deny anything about
the incident and say: Well, Ligie thought he saw something like that.
Uncle Ligie generally supervised any temporary hoe hands or cotton
pickers Lisha hired. He got along well with colored neighbors and shared
stories with them. Of course, they soon learned the story of his life,
how he had never married, and had never had sex with a woman. This
seemed to them to be an unnatural state, and they offered a solution.
In Dec 2003, my brother Donald asked me if I remembered Mandy Langston
and how she sometimes came to our house. Of course, I remembered Ole
Mandy, but I could remember no surname. I could picture her as a tall,
scrawny black woman who could carry things on her head. It may be in my
imagination that we set aside various extra things we might have such as
canned goods, potatoes, molasses, or vegetables from the garden, just in
case Ole Mandy came by. We also had lard and coal oil (kerosene) and
lye soap stored in our chicken house which we could and did share with
Mandy. (Storing these items in the chicken house may sound strange, but
it worked this way. These were barnyard chickens who worked that area
and the fields close by. In the chicken house, we had a separate room
for the setting hens, separated by wire mesh from the roosting chickens.
In that room we kept the flammable kerosene and lard. If anyone tried to
steal these items, the setting hens would squawk loudly enough to wake
the dead.)
Ole Mandy would visit us periodically for years after Uncle Ligie
died, and I never connected the two at all. My brother Donald told me in
2003 that an older brother had once told him that Ole Mandy was the
solution to Uncle Ligies sex deprivation. She was a widow past
child-bearing age who was quite capable and very willing. She lived
about two blocks away as a dependent of the William and Loney Langston
family, who were our nearest neighbors. She and Uncle Ligie apparently
worked out an arrangement which satisfied their mutual needs. After
Uncle Ligie died, I have a vague memory of brother Dueward once
announcing at the supper table that someone had left fresh flowers on
Uncle Ligies grave. To which my father said it was all right by him for
anyone to put as many flowers as they wanted on Uncle Ligies grave.
After Mandy moved away about 1935, I did not think of her again until
1984 when my daughter-in-law asked me about Amanda as a name for her
expected daughter. I told her it was generally shortened to Mandy, and
that I had only known black people with that name. I suggested Susanna,
for my great grandmother, Susannah (Cole) Miller, who had been a pioneer
settler in Smith County. So that is how my granddaughter was named Susanna.
I did not learn the full story of Ole Mandy until seventy-five years
after the supposed events happened. If I chose to believe the events,
then they explain why Ole Mandy was treated differently. If I choose
not to believe them, I have no explanation. If Uncle Ligie and Mandy get
to heaven, I hope first that they are not crippled or widowed. If there
is in heaven such a thing as sex, then I hope they are able to make up
for lost time if that is their desire.
When Uncle Ligie died from pneumonia in 1929, it may have been from
getting wet and exposed while feeding the cane grinder at the molasses
mill. The grinder crushed the cane and the cane juice collected in a
barrel which fed downhill into the evaporating pan where the juice was
boiled until molasses were made. The grinders were operated by a heavy
pole lever which a mule pulled round and round. The cane feeder put the
cane stalks into the grinders, but he had to duck each time the mule
came around with the long pole lever. If he did not duck, he got bopped
on the head, a most unpleasant experience. Uncle Elijah, not being able
to stand upright, never got bopped; so he was a favorite cane feeder.
The main thing I remember about Uncle Ligies sickness and death was a
personal victory of sorts. My brothers had cut the stovewood for the
winter and split up most of it into the cooking size. It was in a large
pile ready to be stacked when my brothers got diverted in
molasses-making, taking Uncle Ligies place and doing other chores. My
mother moved Uncle Ligie from his unheated north room into the boys
room where there was a fireplace and she could keep him warm and
comfortable. She also had three younger children to care for. I went out
to the woodpile where she could see me through the window and started
stacking wood. I was six years old. I stacked a cord of wood that day,
and I had to stop when there was no more split up.
Uncle Ligie died a day or two later. I am relatively sure there was no
church funeral. He was buried in the Ware Cemetery on our Hough farm,
and there was probably a graveside service. I do not remember being
there. In 1936, when we placed a gravestone for Lisha Hough in Sharon
Cemetery of Simpson County, we also placed gravestones in the Ware
Cemetery for Uncle Ligie Hough and our sister born dead in 1914.
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