Two events set the floodgates of memory gushing this month: An invitation from Lexington Life Magazine to look back on our 20 years together, and the approach of my 100th (!) birthday. Irresistible. This lifetime neatly divides into quadrants. The most newsworthy part of my story was over by the time I was 25 years old. The next two quadrants featured 50 years of family life in Columbia. And the final quadrant began 25 years ago when we moved to the Columbia Presbyterian Community and my husband died.
QUADRANT 1: As I grew up in Barnesville GA, I spent my high school and college years as an active journalist on two newspapers and earned an ABJournalism degree from the University of Georgia in 1943. With my sparkling new degree, some letters of recommendation from my former editors, and resume in hand, I tackled New York City and within three days landed an entry-level opportunity position at United Press Association, the news wire service competitor of Associated Press. I had cracked the job market, but finding a place to live in the housing-shortage era of rent controls presented the next challenge. I lucked into a spot at a women’s hotel near Times Square that was safe, convenient, and affordable. The career had begun! I was 19 years old. For almost four years, I had a front-row seat to the biggest news of the century, writing for UP clients such as Newsweek, H. V. Kaltenborn (commentator), Kate Smith Speaks (radio broadcast), John Nesbitt (“The Passing Parade”), and many others. During those eventful war years, many military men of my acquaintance came through this port of embarkation on their way to England, stockpiling for D-Day. My phone number had been passed around here and there, and I served as a hostess for these visitors who wanted to paint the town before leaving it. We took in Broadway shows and nightclub life and lived it up. I connected with roommates that enabled us to rent an apartment on Lower Fifth Avenue, near Washington Square. Many WWII veterans will admit that those wartime years were the most exciting thing that had ever happened to them. This was true for me also.
QUADRANTS 2 and 3: The end of WWII brought my soldier home after 4 years in New Caledonia in the South Pacific. Jim Perrone was a Clemson electrical engineer and served in the Signal Corps at the Pacific Theater Communications HQ. We arrived in Columbia as newlyweds when he began his 40-year career at South Carolina Electric and Gas Co. For 50 years, I lived the homemaker role for three children (followed by three grandchildren), keeping house, carpools, PTA, church, Scouts, some volunteering, and part-time jobs. For one decade I worked as a Group Service Representative at Aetna Life Insurance Company. I traveled the state doing customer service and training the employees who would administer the Aetna group insurance benefits at their company.
QUADRANT 4: The empty nest found us downsizing in 1998. Jim lived less than a year after our move to Columbia Presbyterian Community, and I was living in a foreign country known as Lexington. I connected with Jerry Bellune at the Lexington Chronicle, and told him, “I don’t know the people or the geography of Lexington, but I have a map and a directory.” Soon I was writing personality profiles of local citizens as well as stories of some of the events and places which made Lexington unique. When Todd Shevchik created Lexington Life Magazine, we hit it off immediately and I embarked on another two decades of live journalism. From the start, Lexington
Life recognized the potential for reporting on this fast-growing and greatly changing community. Mostly I settled into telling the stories of Lexington Leaders. At my retirement community, I am surrounded by people talking about what they did 50 years ago. Lexington Life gave me the opportunity to meet people who are doing something interesting right now. And what stories they had to tell! Bankers: Raymond and Mike Crapps; public servants: Steve MacDougall, Randy Halfacre, Chris Wooten; businesspeople: Ted Hoover, Tim Driggers, Lou Kennedy; medical leaders: George Wendt, Eunice Medhurst; artists: Sissy Frierson, Michael Storey; educators: Kathy Maness, Lynn Summer, Gregory Little; musicians: Hal McIntosh, Einar Anderson, Sylvia Looney; and oh, so many more! The count was approaching 300 stories at the last count. I remember each one, fondly. Every interview was different, and yet I noticed a common thread across the spectrum. Many Leaders commented that although Lexington is growing and changing fast, we all hope it never loses the down-home small-town friendliness where you know and care about your neighbors. So far, I’d say that’s still a landmark here. These assignments were every month for 20 years, but I also wrote for other local publications: Columbia Living, Sandlapper, South Carolina Homes and Gardens, and others.
About that birthday: No one goes through life expecting to live to be 100. Even making it into the 21st century surprised me somewhat. Guess I owe that to my parents, Mother Nature and Father Time. The pandemic and advancing age brought on retirement from what I had enjoyed so greatly for so long. I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Todd and his editorial family for providing those blank pages for me to fill. It was a fabulous journey, guys. Thank you. Keep on keeping on.