'Aunt Kate' celebrates her 98th birthday

The following story was written and contributed by Patricia Walston of Fayetteville, following a birthday party for her "Aunt Kate" (by marriage) Kerlin. Historical accuracy and other information was provided by Marianne Davis, niece of Evie Kate Davis Kerlin.

I don't normally accept stories about living people, but this one is so chock full of Fayette County history that I'm making an exception ... just this once. I know you will enjoy it. Pat writes:

One week before the beginning of Summer 1904 another little girl was born to Jodie Evans Davis and Addie Knowles Davis. She was the fourth child born into a loving, turn-of-the-century family who would eventually have 12 children six boys and six girls. Her mother, Miss Addie, as she was called, was once asked, "How did you ever think up enough names for 12 children?" She replied, "The Lord sent me the names when He sent me the children!" The name He sent on June 14, l904, was Evie Kate Davis.

She came into this world with a rich heritage of family, love, and tradition. She was the great-granddaughter of Zadock and Betsy Davis who came from North Carolina to Fayette County during the early, fledgling years of the settlement. They were here in the county as early as 1821 having been in Georgia since 1810, possibly earlier. They received a land lot of 202 1/2 acres in the land lottery, and are buried in the family cemetery here in the county.

Evie Kate and her first three siblings were born in an old log cabin in Fayette County on 100 acres given to her father, Jodie Davis, by his mother after his father, Andrew Jackson Davis, son of Zadock, passed away. The "Old Home House" was located somewhere near where Tyrone Road meets Ga. Highway 54. Later, another house was built using lumber sawed in the old mill. It was built in only three weeks with the help of neighbors about the county. Although the house wasn't finished, Jodie and Addie moved in and started housekeeping. Here, the other eight children were born. As they added more children, they added more rooms.

In the early 1900s, family life centered on family, home, church, and school. The family kitchen with its wood-burning stove served for both warmth and cooking. "There must have been a lot of cooking going on in that big kitchen with the old black wood stove," said Marianne Davis, Evie Kate's niece. "There was syrup a plenty as Jodie had a syrup mill!" Marianne remembers being told that her grandfather, Jodie, also had a sawmill.

Music was an important part of their lives. Jodie played a fiddle and the twins, Lessie and Tessie, added the piano and organ. Most all of the Jodie Davis children played one type of instrument or the other. At one time Jodie Davis "led the singing" at Flat Creek Baptist Church.

School, although in held in one room, was hard to dodge when it was on your daddy's property and the teacher lived in your house, which was the case at one time with the Davis children. If you had misbehaved or "played hooky", it was sure to come up at the dinner table.

Evie Kate recalls that there was the occasional dance to attend and remembers a man named Hobson Blair who called the "set." She recalls that he was a great, tall man. Uncle Jim Davis, Jodie's brother, danced what they called a "jig" and they forever called him "Uncle Quaker."

In 1925, Evie Kate married a dashing young man by the name of Daniel Kerlin, also of Fayette County. During the depression, money was scarce for honeymoons and Kate fondly remembers a lady by the name of Kate Cousins who prepared a wedding breakfast for them. However, Dan did have a Model-T Ford and they used it to scamper about the county. In the early years Dan worked as night watchman for the mill at Bennett's Pond.

Kate and Dan physically moved away from Fayette County and eventually spent the majority of their lives in East Point, where Dan was a city employee for 40 years. During World War II, you could save coupons found in the wrapping of a loaf of bread, and turn them in toward savings stamps. These, in turn, could be converted to savings bonds. Since Dan worked for the city sanitation department, he collected enough bread wrappers to make a down payment on their first home. But their hearts forever remained in Fayette County.

In their golden years, a packed picnic lunch and a trip back to the county to visit old friends and relatives was a day well spent. They usually stopped and had their lunch at Starr's Mill originally built by some of the Davis kin.

Kate and Dan became involved in the East Point Methodist Church, and the Masons/Eastern Star organization. Then along came Mary Katheren Kerlin born June 15, 1926. She would be their only child. When Mary Katheren was older, Kate was active in the Rainbow Girls, an auxiliary of the Eastern Star. She also was involved with the students at Russell High School where Mary Katheren graduated.

Evie Kate, always soft spoken, quiet, and slow to respond in anger, raised her daughter to be like herself, another true genteel lady of the South. Katheren was taught proper manners, etiquette and decorum by a wise and loving mother. She states that Katheren never left to go to school, or anywhere for that matter, without a "hug." That is something that Kate has always had plenty of hugs!

Tragedy was no stranger to Evie Kate. Her brother, Howard, had been killed by

a train in 1935 or '36. And, in 1955, their beloved Katheren, then Mrs. Curtis Ragsdale, succumbed after a long battle with brain cancer. She was only 29 years old and left behind Kate's only grandchild, four-year-old Curtis Daniel Ragsdale. He became the focus of their life as Kate and Dan eventually raised him to maturity. Again in 1972, Kate would face sorrow with the passing of Dan, her husband of 47 years.

Her grandson, Danny, became her caregiver when she later moved to Winston to live with him and his family. Tragedy struck again in l999, when Danny was killed suddenly while working on his car in front of their home.

As these 98 years were added to her life, those family members she loved were subtracted. She has now outlived her parents, all of her siblings, her husband, her only daughter, and her only grandson. Danny left behind a wife, Sharon, and five children to carry on the family traditions.

Aunt Kate lived a life of service to others never adding the word "no" to her vocabulary. Her quiet manner and peculiar ways boiling her clothes on the top of the range in the kitchen, years after she had a washing machine, and straining all the seeds out of her tomatoes before cooking with them endeared her to all who knew her. She was ever ready to help those who needed her no matter how small or how large the task. She raised flowers and vegetables in her large garden on Dunlap Avenue in East Point for many years. She also helped raise her sister's twins, Tom and Ted Walston, also of East Point. Kate and Dan had a basement apartment, originally built for Dan's sister, Emma, which became the starter home for many young couples down through the years.

Evie Kate Davis Kerlin has seen joy and triumph and sorrow and tears. She lived through two world wars, the depression, the Korean War, the war in Viet Nam and suffered personal loss many times; but she has never lost her sense of humor, her love for life, or her zeal for other people. And she can still hug the daylights out of you!

She remained active and vital into her early 90s, until age and failing health necessitated that she become a resident at Well-Star Paulding Nursing Home in Dallas where, last Friday, family and friends met to celebrate the life of a truly remarkable woman. Even though her body is aged and frail, you can look deep into those ice blue eyes and see the heart and mind of that once young girl who called Fayette County ... "home."

Many thanks to Pat and Marianne for that portrait of their "Aunt Kate."

Send stories about your Georgia ancestors (but not living ones, please) to The Citizen, Drawer 1719, Fayetteville, GA 30214; E-mail jkilgore@thecitizennews.com or jodiek444@aol.com.

Until next week, happy hunting!