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GROWING UP ON MAIN STREET

By; Laura Anne Lambert

When life slows down, you disengage a little, you have a little time to write all the
things you wished you had told your children and now hope to relate to your grand
children. Through the years I did tell about some things as an event spurred my thinking,
of the life in Geneva on Main Street.
I lived at 203 S. Commerce Street. The second house from the comer. At the
comer was a "filling station" as they were called then. It was a Pure. The building was
blue and the Pure sign in front was real tall. Today in 1998 the American Bank resides
there in quiet a different building. On the other side of our house was the First Baptist
Church and the pastorium on the other side and the Presbyterian manse on the corner.
Across the street on the corner was the library surrounded by big live oaks. Next
door was the home of Sidney F. Latimer and his wife Ruth and their daughter Carol.
Mrs. Latimer was later my Training Union teacher at the First Baptist Church.
We had a huge white wooden house. It was where my mother grew up. We
moved in with grandmother Harris when I was five years old, George was 2. I remember
that the floors were called "hard wood" and I wondered if they were harder than the other
floors made of wood. The house was re-decorated when we moved in. The "hard wood"
floors were refinished to a high shine, and walls were painted.
The house had only three steps from the sidewalk to the porch. But, the lot was
sloped and the back of the house was about 12 or 15 feet from the ground. Underneath
the house was fun. We "Doddled Bugged". Sometimes the car was parked there.
Sometimes we got in trouble for playing there.
There was lots of shrubby and a coral vine at the south end of the front porch.
The porch had two swings . The one at the South end was reserved for Grandmother
Harris . We were not to swing on it because it had to be reserved for her at any time she
might want to sit there. In the afternoons her friends would come to visit, Mrs.
Wilkerson and Mrs. McCloud. Some times when would sit there and the people walking
by on the side walk would speak and she would reply good morning or good afternoon
Mr. or Mrs. so and so.
My room was the second on the right after entering the front door. My
grandmother Harris occupied the front bedroom. From my room I could lie in bed and
look out my window and see Mrs. GrifFen's house next door and part of the sidewalk and
cars passing in the street. I liked my room. I had a chifFerobe for my clothes and an iron
bed. My bed was so comfortable. It was soft and high. I had lots of dolls and they were
in a special corner.
When I was a little older, I kept stacks of Movie Magazines by my bed. During the war,
Uncle Ward left for the Army and Auga moved in with me and we shared my room. And I
loved it. I loved Auga so much. She was fun and let me do things. She would take me to
visit with her friends and to the Grill and to the "picture show", which it was called then.
(The Avon Theater)