BIOS: Leonard Roy Stevenson & Mary Lou Womack; Bienville Parish, LA Submitter: Martha Stevenson Owen Date: ********************************************** Copyright. All rights reserved. http://usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm ********************************************** Leonard Roy Stevenson & Mary Lou Womack 1914-1995 Mary Lou Womack and Leonard Roy Stevenson 22 February 1917 14 April 1914 7 October 1995 18 May 1958 Leonard Roy Stevenson was the son of Thomas Jackson Stevenson & Evie Irean Rowell Mary Lou Womack, was the daughter of Watson Womack and Louiza Elizabeth Myers All living their lives in Bienville Parish. Mary Lou was a vivacious, fun loving red head that was always either talking or laughing. She was really beautiful in her youth. Her red hair, with no freckles, made her stand out in a crowd. Her Uncle Riley Womack called her "Red". She was the only one in the family besides him that had red hair. Roy was soft spoken and a very gentle loving person. He was 6' tall, black hair, blue eyes, and dark complexion. He got his looks from Caleb M. Rowell, his great-grandfather, who is buried at Old Sparta. Cem. And one of the early settlers of Bienville Parish. As a boy Roy was not able to go to school for working in the fields. He attended part of the first grade, and part of the second grade. He was able to read and write a little through out his life. After he was a grown man, Mary Lou always read him the Sunday funnies from the paper. Mary Lou loved music and loved to pick a guitar and sing. She began picking "at" the guitar about the age of 5, she said. Her father Watson, and mother, Lular would holler outside and tell her to "hush up that racket"!! She told us she would sit out on the front steps picking at the guitar and singing as loud as she could. That was her favorite thing to do, and would rather be singing than eating. Of course growing up in a house full of people playing music didn't hurt any either. Around the time she turned a teenager, she started singing at every "county dance" within 100 miles of her home in Bienville Parish, with her family. Her father played the fiddle, her brother, George, played the guitar, and sang harmony with Mary Lou. One night around the late 1920's a man came up and told her he would give her a $20.00 bill if she would sing "Red River Valley" one more time. She had sung it several times that night already. I asked her if she did it, and she answered, "You better bet I did!! $20.00 was a LOT of money at that time"! Roy met Mary Lou at one of the "country" dances where her father was playing the fiddle, and she was singing. When they got to the dance Mary Lou soon noticed the very handsome; over six-foot tall, black haired, blue eyed, dark complexioned Stevenson boy; and he could hardly miss her red hair! Seeing him from across the room, she whispered to her mother Lular, "Mama, there's the man I'm going to marry!" Everyone laughed, but soon enough that's exactly what happened! All of the children & grandchildren of Roy and Mary Lou, have really enjoyed hearing the story of their courtship, because Mary Lou's mother or one of her brothers accompanied them on every single date, often sitting in the rumble seat of Roy's borrowed car! Roy and Mary Lou were married the 11th day of September 1932. Roy was 18 years old, and Mary Lou was 15. During the early 1930's the Womack's had their own live county music show on a radio station in Longview, TX. By this time Roy had joined the band playing guitar also. Mary Lou always said she could have been a country music star if she had had a manager. But she chose to have her "babies" instead. Roy loved to laugh, and had a good sense of humor. And Lord, did he love little babies. All of his children and grandchildren cut their teeth chewing on his thumb! Mary Lou had always been an emotional person quick to laugh or cry. Her house was always the first stop for any relatives or neighbors, who had heard a new joke, had a sick child or needed a shoulder to cry on. Her coffeepot was always on the stove, hot and ready. Roy had many occupations during the Depression years that followed. They lived with her parents for several years; anywhere there was work. They were living just outside of Longview, Texas, beside the Womack's house, in a tent with board floors and boards part way up the walls when Billy Roy was born. They moved to Shreveport about 1936. Roy worked as a welder and then learned the upholstering trade which he followed all of his life. Roy's brother Rex was an upholsterer also, as was Mary Lou's brother George. Roy served in WWII although he never served overseas. In 1949 the family moved to Calion, Arkansas, where his brother Reggie was then living. Also in Calion was Roy's Uncle Adrian Rowell. Mary Lou's house was the one on the block that every child in the neighborhood played at. Her flowers never grew, because they were always trampled down and the tree limbs pointed down instead of up, because they always had children climbing or swinging on them. Her yard is where the forts and clubhouses and playhouses were built. Her flowers didn't grow, but her "young'uns" sure did! By this time, Pete, Sidney, and Martha had joined Billy Roy in this family. The children all went to school in nearby Norphlet Ark. Anyone who has grown up in a small town (population 553, probably counting the coon dogs!) knows what fun these four have now when they get together. The moment always arrives when one of them says "Do you remember when ________?" and off they go! Halloweens when roads were blocked off and toilets turned over, girl friends, boy friends, deer hunting expeditions, water melon stealing (with several close calls!) The very same things every child who grew up in a small town remembers. Roy and Mary Lou's children are exceptionally close, emotionally and geographically, three of them live in the same area near Keithville, La. and Pete, who lives in Corpus Christi, Tex. visits frequently. Any occasion (or none at all!) is the excuse for a family barbecue and volley ball game, which more often than not includes three generations of their descendants with a few assorted nieces, nephews etc. thrown in for good measure. Her grandchildren loved to tease her. They were all called "her babies" even though some of them are over thirty years old. I can never remember a time when she wasn't cooking and feeding kids. Every child within "smelling range" knew when she baked cupcakes and I have seen her mix them up in a dishpan so every "young'un" that showed up would get enough. Not only her young'uns but all of the neighbors too. After Roy passed away at the age of 43 from brain cancer, Mary Lou moved back to Shreveport, La. where most of her family lived. She went to work at Big Chain Cafeteria, which was a part of a big grocery store. The other employees soon learned that she loved to laugh. Her manager would say, he always knew where Mary Lou was, if you listened for a minute, you would be able to hear her "laughing"!! Someone was always telling her a joke just to hear her laugh. She sang to her great grandchildren and her hair was no longer red but she still loved to talk and laugh! And she still loved jokes too! Roy and Mary Lou's Parents, Grandparents, and Great-Grandparents are buried in and around Bienville Parish. Mary Lou's are buried at the Ridge Cemetery out of Castor. She use to tell us, that when she died, we had "better not put me down there in those sand hills out in the woods"!!! Of course we all told her we were, just to hear her carry on so over it, and we would get to laugh with her. (G) Her and Roy are buried side by side at Forest Park Cemetery East, in Shreveport, La. Mary Lou passed away on 7 Oct. 1995 at home in her sleep. Mary Lou and Roy descend from the following Bienville Parish ancestor surnames. Stevenson, Rowell, Womack, Myers, Sledge, Garner, Carlisle, Williams, Frame, Smith, Pierce, Southern, Dildie/Dildy, Dunn, McGinty, & Owens. I think the Stiles were in Bienville Parish also. OK, OK, most all of the parish is kinfolks "somehow", as Mama always said. This is dedicated to my parents. Martha Stevenson Owen Co-written with Lynelle Cowan Stevenson 3 May 1999