Uncle Homer Stewart

Uncle Homer Stewart has been a great pleasure in my life.  As long as I remember, he always brought laughter and joy to every occasion.  As a Methodist minister among Baptist and Church of God families, he has always been respected as a man of God.  It has been his joy to tease me, a Baptist minister nephew, about our differences in doctrine at every meeting, always in jest.  It was fun to tell him that my grandchildren have a Baptist minister as their Grandpa Jewell, and a Methodist minister as their Grandma Matthews.  I said, “I guess it must be the best of both worlds.”

He always loves to remind me that he was “nearly” present at my birth.  His wife, my Aunt Zelma was staying with Mother and Dad as the due date arrived.  According to his version, he and Aunt Zelma were holding hands in the living room, when my Dad asked him to leave.  “What have I done”, he thought.  “I have been behaving myself.  Why are you making me leave?”

“The baby is on the way”, Dad said.  So out the door he went.  So he was “nearly” present at my birth, but my first act in this world was to break up a perfectly good date!

I guess it wasn’t permanent because he married my Aunt Zelma and has been my Uncle Homer for most of my life.

A Natural Part of Their Conversation

Vermin and Margaret Jewell carried a little bit of West Virginia everywhere they lived.  Like many Mountaineers, they left their beloved state to find work in other areas of the country.  For Dad and Mother, it was the Buffalo, New York area and years of work in the Chevrolet plant in Tonawanda.

                We lived in a variety of places, since it is not always easy to find a house to rent with 5 children.  But whatever condition the property was in, they always made it a warm, loving home.  One thing always held true, though, we rarely missed a church service.  It was just an essential part of life for these Jewells.

                Years later, after college and marriage, I became the pastor of Jefferson Baptist Church in Jefferson, South Carolina.  My wife, Patsy, became close friends with a deacon’s wife and in conversation one day said, “Why don’t you all just go to New York with us on our vacation as we visit the Jewells?”  To her surprise, she said yes.

                Mother and Dad opened their home with great West Virginia hospitality, as usual, and we had a wonderful time showing the Reese’s Niagara Falls and all the other sites in Western New York.

                After returning home to South Carolina, Sabren and Carroll Reese and their 2 children had great memories of our trip.  Deacon Carroll pointed out something that impressed him about my Mother and Dad.  It was more than the hospitality and Mother’s good “Southern” cooking, though they gave plenty of praise for that.  Carroll said, “When we sat on the porch each evening, before the conversation went very far, they were talking about the Lord.  It was just as natural as talking about the weather or what we had seen that day.  I have never seen anything quite like that.”

                I had never noticed before, because it had been, and always would be, that way for Vermin and Margaret.  Their faith was not just for Sunday.  I thank God that I was brought up in that environment.  Though they didn’t actually trust in Jesus until they were both 20 (their birthdays were just 8 days apart), their determination to walk with God never wavered until I preached their funerals and we laid them to rest just 3 months apart in 2005. 

FAMINE IN BETHLEHEM

(repost from December 4, 2009)Reggie and I were born 6 years apart, so I was always the little kid brother. That continued even after we were grown and when in comparison to him, I was no longer “little.”

Though born to the same parents, we didn’t look much alike, but his imprint was strong upon my life. I liked the cars he liked, the clothes he wore, and we enjoyed the same kind of humor. I was blessed by God with an above average intellect, but Reggie was far superior to me in that area. But in size, my weight began to surpass his when I was in junior high school.

One Christmas memory I think about with a warm smile, involves Reggie and me, his “little” brother. He had recently graduated from high school and I was in the seventh grade.

Our church in New York always had a children’s play at Christmas. Though, written from a different perspective each year, it always included the basic presentation of the Christmas story. One year I was a priest, waiting for the coming of the Messiah, and to this day, I remember that I sang an old hymn, “Day is Dying in the West.” I’m sure this is one of those classics you sing each year (if you have ever heard of it)! The words are powerful, though. The chorus says, “Holy, Holy, Holy, Lord God of hosts. Heaven and earth are full of Thee, Heaven and earth are praising Thee, O Lord, Most High!”

But this particular year, I was a shepherd. You know, the way we picture poor shepherds, wearing burlap sacks with holes cut in them for our heads and arms. I was rather large compared to the other shepherds. Their sacks were loose fitting with little arms sticking out. Mine wasn’t too small, but was filled rather well.

I’m sure I didn’t appreciate Reggie’s comment then, though I have had many laughs about it down through the years. He looked at us and said wryly, “It looks like there has been a famine in Bethlehem.” Then after a pause, he finished, “And Sammy caused it!”

That Little Bag of Goodies

I don’t remember a name for that little bag of goodies, but it was a tradition when I was a child to receive one at church on Christmas Eve. My mouth watered during the service in anticipation of things eaten only at Christmas, and waiting for me when the service was over.


The bag was just an ordinary brown lunch bag, but “oh”, how special it was. Most of the time, the goody bag had an orange, a tangerine, an apple, a variety of unshelled nuts, and some candy. Those English walnuts, pecans and Brazil nuts (innocently called by another name) and hazel nuts were only eaten at Christmas. Chocolate drops and peppermint sticks were rarely seen except at this time of the year. Just like many things in life, that which is rare is most valued.

When we moved away from West Virginia, we lost this tradition in my family. Perhaps my relatives will tell me if it still continues, but just now, on Christmas Eve, as I was reminiscing, I remembered something wonderful that my children will never understand as being such a treat – That Little Bag of Goodies.

The Wishbook

I have learned this truth. For most things in this world, the anticipation of ownership is far more pleasant than actual possession, especially when you are a child and Christmas is coming.


The Sears and Roebuck Wishbook, and the J. C Penney Christmas Catalog are becoming collectibles on Ebay, but none that I ever handled had a chance to survive after Christmas. These on Ebay must have been saved by families without children. As for mine, favorite pages were marked, edges turned down, and hours of handling each day until December 25th absolutely wore them out.

Of course, many of my dream toys never materialized. I was one of 5 children and was “too old for my wants to hurt me.” I always loved and appreciated my gifts, though, and my parents did a great job of making me happy.

But a month of dreaming with the catalog had it’s own good memories. It made December a special "month" of Christmas wishes and not just "one day" when some of the dreams became reality.

Yes, I’m computer literate enough to know that the Wishbook exists online, but bookmarking a website somehow loses the joy of holding the book in your hands or taking it to bed with you with a flashlight, under the covers.

Wheatfield Street, North Tonawanda, NY

It’s hard to provide a place for a family with 5 children, but my parents did the best they could and we ended up in the upstairs apartment at the corner of Wheatfield and Simson Streets in North Tonawanda., NY.

The building was almost falling down, but with hard work, my parents made it clean and livable. It was on the “other side of the tracks” literally, with the tracks only a block away, and River Road a block away in the other direction. I could not imagine that the house was still there after 50 years, but Googlemaps street view allowed me to see today that it is still standing, though greatly renovated by necessity.

The neighborhood was interesting, and I have always imagined it to be like West Side Story. There were no gangs, but Puerto Ricans lived downstairs. They kept to themselves, not understanding English, and we didn’t know any Spanish. We really didn’t know they were there except for the days they fried plaintains. Our house reeked, and we didn’t like the smell, but it was a part of life on Wheatfield Street.

A beautiful ditzy brunette, Sophie Stroud (Maria), lived a few houses away and I had a crush on her, though I never let anyone know. We used to sit on the steps and talk all evening until she had to go home. I was super shy around girls, but I enjoyed spending time with her.

An older cousin lived with us for a while and he fit the West Side story cast, too. He loved Elvis Presley and tried to look like him. He always wore jeans and a T shirt. Jimmy Acord also had a “car” - I mean a real car. It was a customized 57 Ford. It was black with gold scallops on the hood and on other parts of the car. It had fenderskirts and a continental kit and a beautiful sounding, powerful engine. He was so cool to a junior higher like me!

A block away, at the corner of River Road and Wheatfield was Molnar’s Restaurant and Bar. I was not allowed to go down there, (we are Baptists, you know), but Pauley Molnar was a younger friend. He had an older sister my age, Gail, who I felt was a little uppity and was very proud of her status at school as one of the most intelligent students. I, of course, was recently from West Virginia and it took a full two weeks for the school to move me from the remedial class (dumb hillbilly) into the honors class. Bluefield, West Virginia does have a good school system. I don’t think Gail ever accepted me being in honors classes with her.

Pauley, on the other hand, loved me. I was a couple of years older and he was always trying to impress me. The main thing I remember about him was that he was allowed to get a soft drink at the restaurant any time he wanted, (I was so jealous), but all he ever wanted was Koolaid at my house. He thought it was such a treat.

Across the street was Snopkowski’s Junk Yard; not cars, but very similar to Fred Sanford’s place on TV. I suppose you could find just about any used item in the world at that place. Buddy Snopkowski was really my buddy and we spent summer days together playing in a field beside his house, and roller skating. My cousin Jackie Saunders lived about 5 blocks away and he came over to skate with us.

And that leads me to my reason for reminiscing about Wheatfield Street. Today, I heard part of a hit song from 1971-72 by “Melanie” Safka about roller skates and a key, and I remembered those old metal wheeled skates we had. You had to clamp them to your shoes and tighten them with a special key. Of course, the song came much later than my memories, for I was in 7th grade. That was 1960-61.

Does anyone else remember skating like that? Certainly not young people with nylon and rubber wheeled rollerblades. We actually wore those metal wheels off playing “skate tag” on the cement parking lot at Buddy’s house on Wheatfield Street.

Chocolate Milk Memory

What is there about the human brain that can relive an event from many years ago, being triggered by just a taste or a smell?


Today I took a small drink of chocolate milk and was transported to the fall of 1962. Not only that, but I was suddenly in Bluefield, West Virginia at Fairview Junior High School. That’s a rather long distance from Northeast Florida, but it was very real in my mind. No, it was not a vision, nor was it anything that most people do not experience from time to time. It was just a taste of chocolate milk - store bought - and a wonderful memory returned.

We lived on a small farm in Bluefield and usually had a few cows, so milk was abundantly available at the Jewell house. It was that good kind that really gave you a white mustache because of all the butterfat content that is lost when it is processed. But chocolate milk had to be purchased at the store, and it was never on the grocery list. When I had it, it was a special treat. Mother sometimes made hot cocoa in the winter, but, as good as it was, it was not quite the same.

Why at Fairview, you may wonder? Well, I guess I do too, because I have no idea who provided chocolate milk for the football team after the games. It’s funny, though, I have no recollection of any actual football games. I was a benchwarmer. I remember a couple of times being on the bus, especially how quiet it was all the way home when we lost. But I knew there was going to be chocolate milk and chicken salad sandwiches when we returned to the school.

Oh, by the way, we raised chickens on the farm, too, and fried chicken was always on the menu, but I never remember Mother making chicken salad. So a good chicken salad sandwich can mess with my mind in the same way and bring back thoughts of my Junior High days.

My memory is always the same, however. With that one small taste today, I shivered, remembering a cold, damp, rainy night, just outside the back door of the gym, a chicken salad sandwich in one hand and that smooth, rich, chocolate milk in the other. Did we win or lose that night? It doesn’t matter. But someone made me feel really special as a football player for the Fairview Falcons.

I could drink chocolate milk every day if I wanted to, but I just save it for special occasions when I want to feel young again.