Grandma’s Drop-Down Table

In the mid-1950s, my Grandma Austill moved to an apartment in downtown Sikeston, above the Collins Music Store.  I remember taking a set of very steep stairs to reach her apartment.  At the top of the steps, there was an open landing area leading to the several apartments.  Once Grandma opened the door to her two-room, one-bath apartment one was always impressed at how fastidious she kept the two rooms.  She was a second generation German-American, and they believed that cleanness was next to Godliness.  You could not find a speck of dust on her floors. 

The apartment had a room in front where she had her bed, a chest, a chair and table with a lamp and a couple of other things in that space.  Then you went through a small hall with the bathroom on the right and her closet on the left.  She had a tiny kitchen, with a divider between the small stove, refrigerator, and dining area.  The divider was where she kept her dishes.  The dining area was small, a standard table and chairs would not fit into the designated eating area provided because space was only about four feet by five feet in size.  Instead of a standard table, she had a fold-down or drop-down table, and two thin benches, one on each side of the table, where she ate her meals.  The table and two benches worked like a Murphy bed.  You opened double doors of a cabinet.  Inside, the table and two benches were mounted to the kitchen wall.  The legs fit into specials sized wells cut into the back of the cabinet for storage. To use them, you unhook the latches, drop each down to the floor and place each leg on the floor to stabilize the table and benches.  When you are through eating, you do the reverse to put it back into the cabinet. Not once did I ever hear my grandma complain about a lack of space.  She loved the little place she made her home, and I loved visiting her in her unique place with the “special” table for two.  She would have preferred a standard table and chairs, but she never complained about the effort it took to take down and put up the table daily.  She was content staying home; she did not have the drive or need to travel and see the world.

Other than work, church and the grocery store, she rarely went anywhere.  She would have much rather people visit her in her apartment than to go and visit others.  She had no car and walked to work, shopping or to visit my family.  In a small town in the 1940s and 1950s, a person could live without a car.  I am not sure if that is true today.  Few of us today could be as happy and content with so little space or items of comfort as she was throughout her life.  When I want to travel, but don’t have extra money for that special trip, I think about my Grandma Austill.   I am truly blessed and can learn from her lesson of being content with what I have and with the good Lord above.  She was about minimalist before it was in vogue.  As an adult,  I am thankful for the many lessons she taught me, however, I will pass on having a drop-down table to use daily.

Next week, I will tell of my first meeting with my husband, and the results of that meeting.  I was a wee girl at the time.

Grandma Price-Austill was a loving Grandmother

Carrie Rettig-Price-Austill was my maternal grandmother. Grandma Rettig married Henry Price in 1914.  In April 1915, they had one daughter, my mother Marie, and were expecting a second child in the month of July 1916.  On June 5, 1916, a deadly tornado dipped down on the Price farm in New Madrid County, Missouri.  It killed Carrie Rettig Price's mother-in-law and sister-in-law instantly and severely injuring her husband, Henry Price.  My Aunt Beulah was born eighteen days later, and my grandfather died twenty days later on June 25, 1916.  My grandmother was a widow at age twenty-two with two young daughters to raise. She had a hard life with much work and little security.  Most impressive, she never complained and had a warm, caring, and positive attitude about life.

She briefly married Clyde Austill and, along with her daughters, raised his two sons.  She loved Mr. Austill but he drank too much, and she left him after a couple of years and was again without real means of support.  Upon her death, her two step-sons attended her funeral.  She took in cleanings and did what she could but was often forced to live with one relative or another during her daughters' formative years. About the time they were teenagers, she was employed by the International Shoe Company in Sikeston.  That allowed her to rent her a place, and she was much happier.

 She was a quiet lady who wore a hearing aid most of the time.  When she had her hearing aid in she was soft spoken.  Once Sunday after church, I went home with her for a few hours.  I played near her with childhood toys she kept in her closet for me.  All of a sudden, she said something to me so loudly it frightens me.  My parents said I got up and ran the three blocks home.  She did not have a telephone at the time, so she walked to my house behind me to learn what caused me to run off.  I told her she had never yelled at me before, and it scared me.  My mother laughed because she knew how Grandma talked without the hearing aid.   I think Grandma was embarrassed.  From that point on she never took her hearing aid out around me and I always looked to see if it was in her ear.  Back in the 1940 and 1950s they were worn outside the ear and were about the size of a nickel.

Grandma Price-Austill lived in small dwellings in the time I can remember visiting her.  One place was a small duplex with persimmon trees in her back yard.  She told me not to eat them unless they were dark orange.  One day I was in the back yard, and I just had to try one.  I had waited a long time for those persimmons to ripen.  I got a bucket to stand on, and I picked one that was mostly orange, but it had a bit of green on it too.  Oh my goodness!  That was the worst thing I ever tasted.  It puckered my mouth for hours.  Grandma did not scold me; she just told me I should listen to her the next time she gave me instructions about something. From that day forward I listened to her every word.

In the late-1950s, she moved to an apartment in downtown Sikeston, above the Collins Music Store.  I remember taking a set of very steep stairs to reach her apartment.  Once she opened the door to her two-room, one-bath apartment one was always impressed at how fastidious the two rooms were.  She was a second-generation German-American, and they believed that cleanness was next to Godliness.  You could not find a speck of dust on her floors.  The apartment had a tiny kitchen, with a divider between the small stove, refrigerator, and dining area.  The divider was where she kept her dishes.  The dining area was small, a standard table and chairs would not fit into the designated eating area provided, because space was only about four feet by five feet in size.  Instead of a standard table, she had a fold-down table, and two thin benches, one on each side of the table, where she ate her meals.  The table and benches worked like a Murphy bed.  Not once did I ever hear her complain about a lack of space.  She loved the little place she made her home.

On another of my visits, I remember Grandma taught me to like spinach.  When I was about five or six years old, I was spending another Sunday afternoon with her.  Grandma started cooking supper for us.  The vegetable was spinach.  After she had cooked it, she ate some of it and went on about how good it tasted.  She said there might not be enough for me.   After it had finished cooking, she put a big helping on her plate and a small serving on my plate.  That was not her normal way of feeding us.  I watched her eat it and heard her make noises of delight.  She had me wait until after everything else on my plate was eaten before eating my spinach.  When I finally tasted it, I thought it was the best vegetable in the world.  I still like it today.

She taught me many things in her unique style.  It is odd what we remember about the ones we loved after they are gone.  My paternal grandfather died when I was five, and Grandma Price-Austill was the only grandparent I had the privilege of knowing.  She was not well educated, but had good common sense; she had little in material wealth, but she was happy and a good Christian lady who I loved very much.