PEOPLE WHO PASSED THROUGH MY LIFE FROM BECKHAM COUNTY OKLAHOMA Submitted by Paulyne Taylor pingtiger@arn.net ************************************************************************ USGENWEB ARCHIVES NOTICE: These electronic pages may NOT be reproduced in any format for profit or presentation by any other organization or persons. Persons or organizations desiring to use this material, must obtain the written consent of the contributor, or the legal representative of the submitter, and contact the listed USGenWeb archivist with proof of this consent. The submitter has given permission to the USGenWeb Archives to store the file permanently for free access. http://www.usgwarchives.net/ *********************************************************************** Ola Leona (Polly) Sechrist McRae I began my life in Beckham County Oklahoma in 1933 second child of William Paul and Edith Sechrist Rutherford. My sister JoAn died when I was 6 months old. Dr Windel was with her, she had dipitheria. It broke my grandparents Martin Jerome and Maggie Sechrists Heart, my parents left Beckham and went to Amarillo. That was not to stop the many trips back HOME as they called it. Many people walked through my life some quietly some not so quite. Ola Leona Sechrist was my mothers sister, only sister. Polly as we called her was born at Greer County Oklahoma March 20 1909. She and my mother had many great advantages over most girls of that time, their mother Maggie was a seamtress. Their clothes were the latest style. Polly didnt much care for flair, style, and upkeep she was low maintaince compared to my mother. Polly had just as soon have on overalls as a slinky dress. She didnt spend hours fussing with her hair, she didnt have to it was naturaly curly. Moma used sugar water to curl hers. She was taller than Edith, her sister, but skinny. She had a bad sick spell when she was 14 years old and never completely regained her health It effected her heart.Dr Speed was her doctor. She was devoted to JoAn my sister and myself she adopted us as her own. Polly married Ulis Jasper McRae Oct 10 1933. Ulis use to tell me that Polly slept with me, and when they married she just kept on sleeping with me, he said I wet on him every night till they moved out and Polly wanted to take me with with her. Health kept Polly from ever having a child. She said she never did get pregnant . She kept Gary ,my brother and I all she could, she was such a sweet loving, kind and beautiful lady.My children became her grandchildren and they all adored her. She spent most of her life traveling with Ulis who never seemed to find a place to light. Her last years were spent with her mother Maggie in Amarillo. Ulis was in Arizona. Polly was sick off and on all those years from 1923 till 1981 when she died at Family Hospital in Amarillo from a broken hip. She is buried at Llano Cemetry Amarillo Texas We never know when someone enters our life that they will leave an impression, but Polly did, she was our port of security more than once. We will always remember the kind person who so quietly passed through our lives and touched our hearts forever.The beautiful person who was always there for us no matter what. The person who would have defended us against the devil himself. Her tombstone reads Our Darling Polly and she was. We Love You Polly. ************************************************************************ Robert Manning I never knew Robert Manning, but I knew of him. My mother told me she married Robert when she was 17 years old. Her family had a fit. She ask to come home and her dad told her no. Robert was murdered 1 month after he and my mother were married. They lived on a farm near Erick for that short period of time. I have no idea what my mother thought after Robert was killed. She never said. But I have thought of Robert Manning through the years and finaly located him buried at Delhi with other Mannings, I know he had a brother from the clipping in the paper about his death.It seems he must have been a young man, had dreams, perhaps not of a happy marriage to my mother, but some kind of dream. It was as though he never was born, he left no children, and was dead before I was ever born.But I feel someone should remember Robert if only because he was born, lived,loved and died. Frank Hale Frank Hale was the love of my mothers life. She met him shortly after Robert Manning was murdered by Issac Martin. Edith was working and living with her sister Ola at Sayre Oklahoma. Frank was a fun guy who put her on a pedestal and thought the sun set on her. I never learned much from moma about Frank except how crazy she was about him. I found a letter Frank had written to his mother in Jan 1930. He and my mother were married shortly after this. They lived in Borger Texas where Frank contacted typhoid fever and died. He is buried at Texola Oklahoma. I have been with my mother many times when she visited that cemetery, it was always depressing as she would cry. Frank seemed to be another that just quietly came and left nothing except a mound of dirt, not even a marker to tell he ever lived. Frank had some personality to me as I read his letter, but he never seemed real . Frank died in 1930 and Mother married my dad in 1931. Dad said both Robert and Frank had died in Septemeber folloing their marriage to my mother. He said in Sept of 1931 he got really sick and he suspected that Edith was killing her husbands, as both Robert and Frank died in Sept. My mother also died in Sept 1970. I hope these pages serve to remind people who care to look that Robert and Frank were here and though they died some 70 years ago.Someone remembers.