As Susie and Eileen's talents increased, they began singing with the older boys and Susie remembers one time they won a picture and a pair of shoes. This was a really big prize to get new shoes in those days. Dad tried to get us each a pair of new shoes every winter but sometimes he just couldn’t. We would wrap burlap bags around our feet and shoes, if we had any and it would help keep them warm and dry.
Susie had a special talent the boys didn't have. At age twelve she began writing songs. She said God spoke to her and began giving
her beautiful words and over the years she has written close to 200 songs. When Susie married Hugh (Bill) Champlin, they wrote some
songs together and Bill wrote about twelve himself.
There was a beautiful song they named 'Path of The Fold' and in later years two of her brothers, Gene and Riley and her sister Dorothy and Riley's wife Billie made a gospel album with that song as the theme song on the jacketcover. Bill said he was at work when the words came to him and he wrote them down on top of his boot so he wouldn't forget until he could get home.
Bill and Susie tried to get several songs published, but they had no idea how to go about it and they would answer magazine articles advertizing for songs and they would send them in, but never hear back. The publishers wanted fees in advance to take a song and promote it and all the copyrights in their names for twenty-eight years and they wanted to give them 10% profit. Well we never had any money to pay and get the fee paid so we sent some in and they were going to promote them. We didn't have any education and knew nothing about this and just trusted everyone to do what he said he would do, but we learned it didn't work that way. More than once, songs Susie wrote came out on the radio by a recording artist that had not written the song.
As Susie got older, she and Bill moved to Kansas and by then James Henry had been born, and Loyal Riley, Arlis Gene, Elvie and Edgar Blaine. While in Kansas Susie, Bill, and Riley sang on the radio station at Leavenworth, Kansas. Susie sang most of her own songs wherever she went. She sang at many conventions in and around Newton County and at the Beechwood Church and churches in the Kansas City, Kansas area.
One day while the boys were cutting wood, Rufus went to stick the ax in a log just as Jessie started to jump it, and Rufus cut off four of Jessie's toes. We had to take him into Jasper to a doctor. It was a sight to see, because the toes were still wiggling on the ground after being cut off. The boys buried the toes in a match box. After a long time, Jessie's foot kept hurting really bad. Someone told Dad to dig up the toes and lay them in the order that they had been in on the foot. He did, and the pain stopped. I wonder to this day if the pain stopped because of what we did or what??
The outdoor fires were the favorite of us all. It was not unusual to have a fire built outside most of the time, even hot weather. They really helped keep the bugs away too in the summer. We had a huge iron pot we hung over the fire outside and we would carry water from the spring so Momma could wash. The spring was about 200 yards from our house. Dad built a little wooden structure over the spring.
We all liked to sit around the fire and either
play music or tell tall tales. Big bear tales. The older kids would
tell such big stories that it would scare the younger kids, and then
they would get into trouble. We played hide-and-seek until it was dark
and had to be made to come in. One time Eileen and Rufus were
chasing each other round and round the fire. Loyd was sitting on
Uncle Grady's lap and Rufus and Eileen ran into one another and
knocked Rufus toward the fire...his arm went into the hot coals.
That burn kept him from playing the guitar. He was the only one
who didn't play. He tried, and even turned the strings around on the
guitar and played some left handed, but never played like the other
kids. He sure could sing though.
Rufus was a real horse rider. Folks said he was the best
anywhere around. He could trick ride just like
the rodeo men. He married Lottie Farmer. Rufus was stricken with
cancer and died October 29, 1989. All of the rest of us kids were
living until April 7, 2001, when our sister Eileen left us.
Mom would no sooner get one child on it's feet and another would
be on its way. Lonnie Earl was born April 3, 1930 and Dorothy
June October 15, 1932.
Continue... Precious Memories, Part 3
Back to Newcoa Newsletter, April 2001
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