This past week a close friend of mine, Judy Adams, and I took a ride to see one of my friends that I had not seen for awhile. Judy is now working with Hospice East and she told me she had gone to see a little lady and noticed her Hong Kong grass footstool in her house.
It caught Judy’s interest since she and I had made a similar Hong Kong grass stool at a homemaker’s camp in Carlisle more than 30 years ago. This stool began a conversation that led to this article.
Judy mentioned me to the lady, Vivian Fox Berryman, and told her we had also made a footstool. She remembered me and told her she would love to see me. Now, this may not sound so spectacular that she remembered me, but the fact that she is 97-years-old and had not seen me for more than 30 years is pretty spectacular to me.
When Judy told me about Vivian, I knew I did have to go see her. I was shocked that, as much as I have changed in my looks, she did indeed remember me after all these years. She looked at me, smiled and pointed her finger to me and said, “I remember you!” She looked so much like she used to, with the exception of being more frail and her hearing a little more impaired.
I remembered always buying her banana bread at the homemaker auction we would have in the Kiddville Homemakers Club when I belonged to that club. I remembered she would always make her way over to me before the meeting was over, if I hadn’t had the chance to sit close to her, to talk to me before she would leave.
I decided to interview her for this article, as she sat surrounded by pictures of her grandchildren and family members. She told me she was born Vivian Fox. She wasn’t positive but said, “I guess I was born in Clark County on Aug. 7, 1914, to Albert and Beulah Haggard Fox.”
I asked if she was one of the Fox’s cousins by the dozens in Clark County, and she laughed and said yes.
She told me she had one brother and one sister. Her brother is deceased and I am not sure whether her sister is still alive or not, but I think she said she was in a nursing home.
She told me the first car she remembered had two little round lights in the back and that was about all she could remember. She said her mother had family out in South Dakota and one summer they took a road trip out to see them. She said it took about two or three weeks to get there. She said her uncle Jim Fox made a cabinet in the car for her parents to put milk, sugar and other stuff in so they could eat on the way out there. Remember the roads were pathetic during that era, and there were no interstates.
I have been to South Dakota and I was in awe of this fact as I interviewed her. Even Judy and I commented on how long that trip must have taken. For a family to have even attempted a trip that far during that period baffled me.
That was about all of her early life we discussed and then we spoke of her husband.
She married Linville Berryman, who was a minister and a farmer. They attended Pharis Hill Christian Church. Linville is deceased now and her family keeps a look out for her.
She had two sons, George Gayle and William Albert. They all lived and worked together on the farm. Vivian speaks with pride about her family. She loves them all and worries about a grandchild who has developed cancer.
When I asked her what her hobbies had been she told me she enjoyed making quilts and gardening the best. She has given her quilts to her children and wishes she was still able to quilt. She has thought she might start quilting again.
Vivian will soon be turning 98. Her memory is still remarkable. She mentions that there is not much on television to watch anymore that interests her. She watches it some but does enjoy sitting out on her sun porch and looking outside.
She told me she guesses the reason for her longevity is her slow paced living, eating right and not smoking or drinking.
Whatever it is, I wish her many more happy birthdays!
