By Dickie Dixon

For Posterity’s Eyes 28^th:   Ivan Hernandez, Carolyn Cummings  29^th:  Guesna (Kirkland) Dixon, Brad Parker, Chris Fleniken, Ariana Ly, Elizabeth Cheney 30^th:  Bobby Tucker, Bird Tucker, Eddie Jay

Loved for a Lifetime  Last week was the anniversary of my grandfather’s death, Napoleon Bonaparte Dixon, my father’s father.  By the time I came along, Bony, as he was affectionately called had settled down a lot, although my aunt told me he started chewing tobacco at nine. (This was a practice he continued until his death.  Many a grandson tried out his cache of Beechnut near the old standup radio.) A tall man, at about six foot two or three, he was quiet but opinionated.  My mother told me one of my grandmother’s contemporaries, Miss Dever, told her (about my grandmother): “Blanche was quite a catch, and then she upped and married that ol’ Bony Dixon.”  Between December, 1907, when they were married and April, 1923, when Napoleon Bonaparte Dixon, Jr. (or June or Bona) was born, she provided him with seven boys and a girl.

Most of the time theirs was a happy existence—though busy.  They first lived on Fenley Flats north of U. S. Hwy 69 North, then they moved over to the John Cates place, then they moved on to some of her father’s land (whose name was Stanislaw John Pauszek though later changed to Poskey).  One year after June was born, they built a house just east of Poskey Cemetery on the Old Homer-Alto Road, not too far from the Crawford Creek bridge.  Some of the lumber came from the old Pilgrim’s Rest school/Poskey School—not too far from Grandpa Poskey’s house on what is now called Durant Road.

Bony was a farmer, and evidently a disciplined one; thanks to Blanche, he certainly had the work force to get the work done.  As these boys matured, not only did they have to cut firewood and stove wood for their own home, they also had to cut the same for John Franklin Dixon (who lived besie them died in 1926) and Grandpa Poskey (who lived about two miles from them and died in 1938).  Bony, evidently a man’s man throughout all his life, was very domesticated by the time I knew him.  I can still remember him sweeping the porch for Blanche and very neatly shucking corn for her.

When I was eleven, he died suddenly in his sleep of a heart attack.  She always rose before him, fixed breakfast, and, in the winter months lit the fire in the fireplace in their bedroom, before she woke him.  But that morning, he didn’t wake up.

I will never forget the evening in their living room that the funeral home laid him out .  My grandmother went over to the casket, rubbed her fingers through his still full head of hair (at almost eighty) and said:  “You’re my only sweetheart!”  I was freaked out that she was touching someone who was dead, but I still cannot forget that Bony was a man who was loved for a lifetime.

Save the Date!  Alene Dunn, of Jasper County, will discuss her new book Memories of the Way It Was, when she speaks to the Deep East Texas Archeological Society about 7 pm on Monday, October 2, 2017 at the Newton County Historical Commission’s Museum History Center and Genealogical Library on 213 East Court Street in Newton, Texas.  For more information, call Pam Wright at (409) 379-2109, Klaus Gehr at (337) 329-3829, or Dickie Dixon at (936) 240-8378.

Save the Date!  The Vernon Historical and Genealogical Society will meet Saturday, October 7th at 12:30 PM, in the meeting room of the Vernon Parish Library. The library address is 1401 Nolan Trace(Hwy 8) in Leesville. Stanley Fletcher will be presenting the “Outlaws of the  Neutral Strip”. Everyone is invited.

Save the Date!  Brick collector John Langston will discuss, as you may guess, brick collecting, at the October 16^th meeting of the Angelina County Genealogical Society  at 4:00 pm in the Railroad Depot meeting room of Kurth Memorial Library on 702 South Raguet Street in Lufkin, Texas.  For more information, call Vivian Cates at (936) 858-3801 or Dickie Dixon at (936) 240-8378; the public can email Vivian at txacgs@exede.net or Dickie at dickie.dixon@hotmail.com

For book notices or reviews please send me a complimentary copy to Kissin’ Kuzzins  P. O. Box 151001 Lufkin TX 75915-1001

Send your queries to dickie.dixon@hotmail.com by mail to Kissin’ Kuzzins P. O. Box 151001 Lufkin TX 75915-1001 or by phone to (936) 240-8378