Dot's Parents & Grandparents

Dot's father, Leonidas D. Barnette.
my great-grandfather

source

Dot's mother, Edwina Moore (Barnette), my great-grandmother. 
She died while giving birth to Dot's brother, Dewitt. 
Dot was 3 1/2 years old when her mother died, and had very little memory of her.
However, what an honor it was for Dot to be named after her:  Dorothy Edwina Moore Barnette.

Below are three photos of Dot with her younger brother Dewitt.  Dot also had a half-brother, John, from her father's second marriage.  Click here for some photos of John.

Dot's family home in Ramer, AL

Dot's mother (and her family) is buried in Mount Carmel Cemetery (Ramer, AL), just south of Montgomery.

More photos at Find A Grave

Edwina's siblings buried at Mount Carmel Cemetery:

Glenn L. Moore

Hill Moore

James Giddens Moore  (Jimmy)

Faye Moore (Hancock)

Lucy Moore Hancock

Dot's grandmother

Edwin H. Moore & Lucy Giddens (Moore)

Edwina's parents, Dot's grandparents, my great-great-grandparents
Mount Carmel Cemetery (Montgomery County, Alabama)

My grandmother Dot (wearing green) on a visit to Ramer, AL.  These ladies would be Dot's cousins.

 Mother's handwriting.  Describing the photos of Dot and the ladies just above.

In an interview I did with Dot for a high school project in the mid-1980s (my brother Miles also did one with her two years earlier), Dot talked about what it was like growing up in Shorterville.  I had a set list of questions.  My goal is to digitize the actual interview so you can hear Dot's own voice.  For now, here's a portion I have transcribed:

We liked to go on picnics and always went to the county fair.  I had to feed the chickens and get the eggs.  I had to bring in wood and help pump water.  We had a little store - a grocery store and a filling station.  I waited on people and pumped gasoline. 

We had to walk so far to school.  It was the worse thing I had to do.

In the summer I would go and visit my granddaddy in Montgomery.  I took a train.  Lots of children didn't get to ride a train.  And I looked forward to it every year.  I'd stay one week, and then come back on the train.

My father was an ex-school teacher and very strict.  When he said 'frog' he meant 'jump' right then.  Everybody said he looked like Abraham Lincoln.  He was tall, and had a beard.

My first school was Webb School.  They had five teachers and twelve grades.  It was an above average rural school in those days.  It was a frame building, and had a big playground.  We played lots of different games, dividing up according to ages.

I was always crazy about reading.  And I liked math.  Liked all my subjects, except geography.  It wasn't hard; just didn't like it.

I always got on the honor roll, and I was real proud of that.  I was striving to make good grades. 

I played basketball.  I went to football games when I was in high school.

I enjoyed walking home with my friends.  We walked about three miles together every afternoon.  My very best friend was Grace Murphy.  She had two sisters.  We walked to school every day.

One time a classmate had played a prank on me, so I decided to get her back.  I worked in a store, and we had candy.  I took a piece of candy, and an ice piece, and put a hole in the candy.  And then I inserted a "bitter pill."  Nothing that would have hurt, but something very bitter.  At school, on Halloween, I gave it to her, and I got my revenge.  Up to now (and I saw her two years ago), she says she'll never forget that.  (for now, this story I am mostly paraphrasing from her interview)

My daddy didn't let boys mess around at my house.  To him, it was a sin and disgrace for a girl to like boys while they were in school.  I had two or three "boy" friends.  They came up to the store, and we went to church together, and to parties.