Memories: My Life at Pisgah, Union, LA submitted by Hazel Craig ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://usgwarchives.net/la/lafiles.htm ************************************************ MY LIFE AT PISGAH; By: Elese Dendy Fitzgerald. Written for the 150th. Anniversary edition of: " Memories and History of Pisgah Baptist Church and Community 1851- 2000. " I want to begin by saying "thank you" to the people of Pisgah for helping me all my life. I was born in Pisgah community on September 12, 1910. I have always lived here. I joined the church when I was fourteen years old. Bro. B. C. Smith baptized me in Corney Creek just below Barnes Bridge. Papa, Larkin Melton Dendy, built the big dog-trot house that used to sit here, where I live now. Hansel, Lucille, and I were born in that house. They built Floyd's house next, and he married Ora Grafton. Then Pen Lillie, Pink, and Elvie got married and settled in Pisgah Community. One brother, John Lee Dendy, left to find work, married Celyta Koch from Shertz, Texas, and they chose to settle there. Our half-brother, Brooks Dendy, lived in the town of Bernice. One child, Evie, died. Papa was one of the five that opened the Bank of Bernice in a tent. He built a store, but it burned. He moved out to Pisgah with a gin house, sawmill, and a brick kiln. My job was watching the kiln so it wouldn't get too hot. The mortar was made of mud, salt, and water. A lot of the buildings in town were made of our bricks. Baptisms were held at Corney Creek, Papa's pond, finally a small baptismal was constructed near the church. It is still there, but full of leaves and limbs. I remember many preachers have come and gone since I've been going to church at Pisgah. I first attended school at the little two-room school in Pisgah (a large room with a wall down the middle). Some of my teachers ere: Lottie Holloway, Nora Nugent, Fannie Torry, and ? Hebert. I went to school there until I was twelve years old. Then I walked to Bernice to school. The school at Pisgah closed when everyone started going to Bernice. Papa finally bought a car for us to drive to school. This was just before he died. ( 1925 ). Times were very hard back then. In 1917, 1918 and 1919, a lot of our men folks went off to war. Some never came back. Some of the family names I remember living in Pisgah were the Digbys, Copelands, Coplens, Dendys, Thaxtons, Graftons, Pratts, Elloits, Tuckers, Fergusons, Byroms, Fitzgeralds, Kelleys, Bennetts, Barretts, Heards, Stuckeys, just to name a few. Papa, Lillie, Pink and I all played the piano at church at some time or other. Papa let the singing and had singing schools. Way back, we had five different circles in our WMS. It was Woman's Missionary Society then. The men would go to t6own on Saturday, and the women would meet at different places in the community for WMS. I can remember Mrs. Eva Mae Byrom and me walking through the woods to Mrs. Ada Shackleford's for circle meeting. They eventually had GA's in the summer when school was out. We had a ballpark behind where James McCoy's house is now. The whole community would gather there on Sunday afternoons to play baseball. One thing that really impressed me happened just recently. On August 15, 1999, our pastor, Bro. A. W. Smart, had eight children to baptize, but the baptistery was leaking so badly that there were only two feet of water in it. So. Bro. Smart would baptize one, then hold the hold high so everyone could see him, before going on to the next one. One little girl said she wasn't afraid of going in there with just that much water, she had been scared when it was full. To me, that day was such an inspiration. Bro. Smart just took our problems and went right on. I married Otto Fitzgerald and had five children: Janet Fitzgerald Philbrook, Harold Shap Fitzgerald, Stephen Melton Fitzgerald, Irene Fitzgerald Hollis and Judy Fitzgerald Gray. There is no place on this earth that means so much to me as the Pisgah Baptist Church. I have always tried to be there when the doors are open. I don't feel right when I have to miss a service. Thanks again to all of you that have helped me in the past. I love each and every one of you. By: Elese Dendy Fitzgerald Submitted by: Hazel Welch Craig = Elese was my first Sunday School teacher at Pisgah Baptist Church in about 1929- 1930 when I was about six years old. Elese now resides at the Nursing Home in Bernice and just saw her 93 rd. birthday. I visited her last spring and she remembers my family. My brother who resides there visits her often, She was his Mother-in-law many years and he dearly loves her.