The ceremony was simple, They were married in the parlor where there was an organ. Mama's cousin, Miss Kate Webb, played the organ, and since all she could play was Marching Through Georgia, that was the wedding march. They moved up the hall to the parlor, and Mama's best friend Florrie Matheny and Papa's best friend, Ben Butler, stood up for them. Back then they were called waiters. After the wedding, several couples got in their buggies and drove over to Ellenboro for the wedding trip. They went over and back in one day. They returned late that afternoon, then the next day went over to Grandma and Grandpa Hawkins' to stay for a few days. When all the visiting and celebrating was over, Mama and Papa returned to live at Grandma Mac's home, out from Henrietta.

At this time, Papa was working at the Caroleen Mill and rose each morning at 4:00 am to walk the several miles to work. It being winter time and cold, snowy weather; he often had to make tracks to get to the mill by 6:00 am. He would get off work at 6:00 pm and return home long after dark, proud of his dollar-a-day wages.

It wasn't long before Grandpa Hawkins gave Mama and Papa an acre of land near Caroleen. Soon they had built their first house, a small, four-room frame house with front and back porches. It was here on September 26, 1900, that Muriel Glenn, their first baby was born. In the spring of 1902, the little family moved again, this time into the small village of Caroleen, where Papa was closer to his work and the Baptist church in which he took a great interest all his life.

Not long after the move, on June 28, 1902, Daniel Reid was born. Mama and Papa were proud of their little family, but when Dan was only five months old, his older sister, Muriel, died with a form of baby diarrhea. Even though early deaths such as this were common at the time, nothing could prepare for the shock of grief that comes with losing a child. But Mama and Papa were blessed, for on June 24, 1905, another baby was born into the family. The baby was a beautiful little girl, and Mama did not name her immediately, but called her Sister. She continued calling her Sister for several years, but when I was born two years later on October 12, 1907, a problem arose: there couldn't be two Sisters! So Mama finally named her Melrose, but to this day she is still called Sister. To name me, they sent word to both grandmothers that I would be named after the first one to get there. Of course Grandma Mac got there first as she was a traveler all her life, so I was named Jennie Louise—Jennie as a nick name for Jane.

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