Voices of the Ozarks – Joan Whitener

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My name is Joan Whitener. I was born in Flat River Missouri, September 6, 1935, I’m 83, soon I’ll be 84.

When mother and dad were married they lived with my mother’s mother who had lost her husband for awhile. She went to Jr. College for awhile and her brothers were int he service. Then my mother and dad moved to Fredericktown with his mother and dad. I was only 18 months old when we moved to Fredericktown so I have no memories of this time. But during that time they lived with dad’s parents, Eli Minor and Mary Burdella Minor, she was a LaPlant. When I was 6 I remember grandpa Eli and my dad and his brothers that were home at the time built our house on some land that grandpa Eli gave us and it was right next door, across the little field. My parents names were Claude and Glendora Minor. Mother was a Dudley from Flat River and she was a school teacher. And my dad was a farmer and a chicken rancher for awhile. And then he was a foreman in the shoe fitting department at Spalsbury, Steis and Deevers Shoe Company which was the precursor to Brown Shoe.

She remembers the building of the house and then a year later they decided they needed a basement so they hand-dug a small basement to put in a furnace and washer.

Joan is asked about her mother being a teacher and she says that she taught for 32 years. She was a teacher in the Boswell community (the name of their small community outside of Fredericktown) and then, later, in Fredericktown. Several of those early communities such as Cobalt Village and Katherine Place are mentioned. Joan says that her father was on the Boswell school board. Joan mentions that her husband, Bill Whitener, was from the Cedar Grove community. Earlier that area was called Creek Nation and it consisted of  several communities: Boswell, Little Vine, Cedar Bottom, Cedar Creek and Cedar Grove. Nearby were others such as Black Mountain, Minimum and Annapolis. She says they all had there own schools and churches.

7:00

Joan says that the area had its earliest farmers in this area in 1803 and by 1830 it was well populated. She says there were farmers there raising cows, hogs, dairies and chickens. She’s asked about allotments and she says that a lot of the earliest ones were given land grants. She says that by the time she was married to Bill in 1955 they had already consolidated all the schools and that they lived in the Cedar Grove community. The name Creek Nation was no longer used. She’d gone to Boswell for 6 years and was taught by her mother for 2 of those years. Her school was in Mill Creek. There school was about 30 children and was all 8 grades. She remembers walking about a mile and a half to get there and back. As they walked the neighborhood kids along the way would join them. She mentions that of her siblings she was the oldest and is the only one left.

After the 6th grade the Mill Creek had a 2 room school. 1st to 5th grade was in one room, 6th to 8th grade was in the other room. She went there for the 7th  grade. She says the building is still there but is now a home. She graduated from the 8th grade and then road the bus to Fredericktown for the rest of school. She graduated from Fredericktown High which was the end of her schooling.

11:00

She says that she worked a lot at the home too. Her siblings were both younger than her by about 3 years. That left her with dishes, ironing, and house chores. They didn’t have a farm but gardened. Her granny who they called Birdy, had a huge garden and they would help her too. Her granny taught her to make pies and to this day making the pies is her