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 Mrs. Carrie Helen Webb of the Smyrna Community near Buena
Vista might have been an incredible Blue's artist; she has
a voice that could roll the tin right off the roof and let
the heavens shine through. Maybe it was because of her own
early grasp of heaven's mercy that, despite the hard times
she has endured over many years, she chooses instead to
praise the Lord, often accompanied by her talented
children.
Mrs. Helen was one of the workers affected when H.I.S.
moved its operations from Bruceton to Mexico two years
ago. After 35 years, and at the age of 63, Mrs. Helen was
forced to make new decisions regarding her future.
Training programs were offered by the state to retrain the
unemployed workers. For many, the first step was attaining
the G.E.D. (high school equivalency diploma), but Mrs.
Helen had even better reasons to complete her education.
"My motive for going back to school was to get my daughter
to go back and get her G.E.D.," she says, explaining, "She
married at an early age and quit high school."
Her daughter, Frances Jeanette "Pinkie" Teague, also a
displaced H.I.S. employee, was initially resistant to the
idea. "Well, mama, you don't have one," she said.
"I'll go if you go," Mrs. Helen replied, and the
mother-daughter team enrolled together at the Carroll
County Adult Learning Center in Huntingdon.
When Frances completed her work at the center after only
seven weeks, Mrs. Helen decided to stay, but soon became
discouraged.
"Mrs. Shelia Rogers was the one that inspired me to
continue because I was so old and dumb I didn't think I
could go on. She just kept on saying, 'Don't be
intimidated' and told me people learn in different ways.
She would say, 'Helen you are a sharp person and you are
learning.' I thank and praise God for Mrs. Shelia."
Her goal was to complete testing requirements by December
22, since changes in the G.E.D. program will wipe out any
old test scores at the beginning of 2002. She passed her
dreaded science test in October, completing the full round
of subjects two months early.
"I hated science worse than anything," she says. Her
favorite subject was math. "I love it to death," she
declares, "I like it because it's mind boggling."
Mrs. Helen's official graduation date was December 5,
2001. "I'll tell you what, as old as I am I didn't think I
could do that," says Mrs. Helen, who turned 65 on the 7th
of April. "That's kind of late in the day to get a high
school diploma."
Mrs. Helen's early education was cut short due to the
circumstances of her childhood. Born "right across the
hill here in Carroll County," Mrs. Helen was one of six
girls and four boys born to sharecroppers, Girtha and Ila
Jamison.
"We lived from first one farm to another, farming for
other people - whoever needed a family to work their
farm," Mrs. Helen says resignedly. "That's why I never
could get ahead in school. We moved about all over Carroll
County and I went to many different rural schools.
Until she started G.E.D. classes, she tells her
grandchildren, she never attended school five days a week.
"There was always cotton to get out, corn to get out, or
rainy days and my daddy never owned a car."
She walked to school anywhere from two to four miles until
she was able to take a bus to Webb School in McKenzie.
"I didn't get to go but a few months when my daddy got
down real sick," she says. With her older brothers already
out on their own, 17 year old Helen quit school to help
take care of the farm and her ailing father. Sick nearly
all the time, her father eventually lost his sight with
the disease that Mrs. Helen and her sisters have also
fallen victim to - diabetes.
Mrs. Helen left home at 20 when she married James Webb on
January 12, 1956, who took a job at the "Shirt Factory" in
Bruceton shortly after they were married. Mrs. Helen began
working as a cook in the lunchroom of the all-black Hale
School in Huntingdon when the couple's first child,
Frances, was a couple of years old. She continued in the
position for four to five years until becoming pregnant
with their second child, Jesse. Art was born the following
year with Riley coming along two years later to complete
the Webb family. Six weeks after Riley was born, Mrs.
Helen began her long stretch of employment with H.I.S.
As the years went by, however, her husband began
experiencing problems digesting his food and even eating,
with most foods causing nausea. When he was finally
diagnosed with pancreatic cancer, he begged the doctor not
to tell his wife, fearing she would not be able to handle
the truth.
The doctor, who had already advised Mrs. Helen of her
husband's condition while he was under anesthesia after
surgery, advised her never to mention the word cancer
unless her husband brought it up. Eight months later, he
passed away leaving Mrs. Helen a young widow with three
children, ages five, seven and eight, with Frances already
married and away from home.
Music had always been a part of the Webb household, with
Mrs. Helen's incredible talent at singing accompanied by
her husband's voice. "He sang with me a lot; he had a
beautiful voice," she recalls.
 While not a singer, oldest son Jesse proved to be a gifted
musician. "He slept music, he ate music," his mother
expounds. "As soon as he was old enough he got in the
Huntingdon band and learned all the music he could, then
he went to college at Martin and took music there."
The young prodigy could play any instrument he picked up
and taught his brothers to play as well. Their musical
skills were enhanced by the religious training of their
steadfast mother who is "still a member of the same church
I was saved in at ten years old," she says.
"I raised my kids up in the church, too," she says
proudly.
The years were filled with school activities: "The baby
played basketball, the middle one played football and with
the oldest it was band all the way," she relates
expansively, "Every week the Lord sent that boy was on the
road all through high school and college."
To help make ends meet, she spent evenings after work
doing laundry and ironing for others at H.I.S. "I brought
a big basket of clothes and hangers home every day," she
recalls.
A lot of Saturday evenings were spent playing music and
singing with her family. "After awhile I joined in with my
sister (Ora Mae Fitzgerald) and two other sisters (Eva Mae
Jamison and Arnetta Gordon)," she says. The "Voices of
Zion" gospel quartet performed "all over West Tennessee
and out of Tennessee" with Mrs. Helen's children providing
the music.
When the sisters eventually quit singing with the group,
Helen and Ora Mae joined their brother, W.T. Jamison and
his wife Bobbie and continued to sing.
Mrs. Helen never remarried, although she acknowledges, "I
was 35 years old (when her husband died) and that's a
wantable age. Every man that walked down the street looked
good. I would have loved to have had a husband but when
you've got children, your children come first and you
can't raise children and run men - it's don't work."
She repeated the advice she offers women who seek her
wisdom after long years of knowing Mrs. Helen as either
"Aunt Helen" or "Big Mama": "Women have a tendency to get
interested in a man and they want to please that man. If
children doesn't include her pleasing that man, the
children will go lacking. It's a hard decision to make,
but your kids watch you so close, you have to watch
yourself."
She is mentor, mother and friend to many in her community
as well as those she meets, metering out timeless wisdom
but mostly just listening. "Most of them don't really want
you to talk to them; they want someone to listen. I have
sat for hours and hours just listening."
Listening is just one way Mrs. Helen carries out her
favorite hobby - giving. "I love giving," she says, "I
don't have very much to give but I love giving - from
myself to anything that I have, I share it.
One of her favorite ways of sharing is directing the
"Angel Choir" at Smyrna Baptist Church, a dedication she
has enjoyed over the last ten years or so. The Angel Choir
is composed of children from the age of two up to ten
years old.
"If they are potty trained and able to take instruction
I'll take them, and sometimes I get some that can't take
instruction," she chuckles. "When they get ten years old
they graduate to the fellowship choir. I've got one 12
year old still there; he doesn't want to leave and I'm not
going to make him go," she says adamantly.
Her home is filled with angels - everywhere - and except
for one set, no two are alike. "Lots were given to me by
little choir members and lots by individuals," say Ms.
Helen. "They're precious to me - that and my pictures -
that's all I have."
She still lives in the home she and her husband built
early in their marriage. "This here's where I raised my
children - this little farm - it ain't much but it's
home," she says pleasantly, satisfied with the love of her
family and the love and respect of her community as well
as anyone who comes to know her.
"My children is my earthly life," Mrs. Helen repeats with
great sincerity.
Daughter Frances is married to Larry Teague and lives in
Hollow Rock. The couple has four children, two boys and
two girls. Their daughter, Marqutia, is a cheerleader at
Bethel College. Frances went on to technology school in
Lexington and now handles the accounting for her husband's
trucking firm.
Jesse Webb and his wife, Cynthia, live in Jackson. He
teaches music at Stigall Middle School in Humboldt and is
pastor of Brooks Chapel in South Fulton. "He's a wild
man," says his mother regarding her son's varied and
widely spaced pursuits. Jesse and Cynthia also have four
children, two boys and two girls.
Art Webb lives in England with wife, Stephanie, where he
is stationed as a member of the United States Air Force as
an airplane communicator. Art plays musical instruments in
church, playing the guitar during a previous assignment in
Mew Mexico.
Riley Webb lives in McLemoresville. He is the father of
two children, a daughter, Brittany, and West Carroll
basketball player Xavier Webb. In addition to playing the
piano, Riley organizes a choir from employees at Norandal
where he also works, singing in group homes and retirement
centers during the holiday season.
She has seven step-children from her husband's first
marriage during which he lost his wife to death: Emma
Nesbitt, Mary Parker, Ollie Walker, Patricia Easley,
Lester Johnson, Reverend J.C. Webb, and Buford Webb.
In addition to her own children, Ms. Helen raised her two
nieces, Alfreda Leach and LaRuth Jamison of Bruceton.
Alfreda has one child and LaRuth has four children. |
