ENPages
Another version of "James Kerby Ward," entitled
"George Harmon Kirby," can be found on pages 1304A-l3l4.
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James Kirby Ward 4615 Shelby Street Jacksonville, Florida Bus Driver (White) Lillian Stedman, writer February 17, 1939 Evelyn Werner, reviser
JAMES KERBY WARD
After 1 got off the Ortega bus I walked four blocks that seemed like eight. My warm coat became warmer and heavier as 1 ploughed through ankle-deep sand.
The ward home on Shelby street in St. Johns Park, the most carelessly kept of all the houses on the block, had no garden, no lawn and no flowers. A shaggy hedge of evergreen grew in the white sand that surrounded tho house.
Two cars were parked at the entrance and were evidently the cause of the deep ruts in the yard. The porch looked cool and inviting. The large chairs had clean tie-backs and cushions on them; the morning paper was thron negligently on the couch-swing, and a smoking-stand nearby held a pipe. A11 around the porch potted plants in cans and tubs bloomed vigorously; the largest, a Christmas Cactus in full flower, grew sturdily in a white-enameled slop-jar near the front door.
The door was open, and the screen stood ajar. I could see the family in the dining room at their noon meal. Mr. Ward, a small, stout, gray man, came to the door and invited me in.
"Mr. Whitfield told me somebody wanted me to give them a life story or something. Mr. Whitfield's my superintendent. He's a mighty fine feller and a good friend of mine too."
I seated myself on a green divan, and he chose a matching easy chair and started to talk:
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"Well, to begin with I'm the poorest fellar you ever saw about remembering dates and such, my wife 'll have to help out a lot, I imagine. She's got a heap better mem'ry than me." He raised his voice a trifle and called to his wife in the dining room: "Come in here, sweetheart, and set down a minute." Turning to me, he said, Her health ain't so good and it wi11 do her good to rest a little, anyway."
Mrs. Ward, unusually stoutt and very pale, cane in reluctantly.
"Sweetheart, this is Mrs. Whad-y'say--the--name--was?''
"What did you say you wuz a--sellin?" she asked me. "I'll Just tell yon we had so much sickness lately that we ain't in no shape to buy nothin." At this point her husband explained, "Mr. Whitfield wants me to give her my life history, and I want you to help me out a little 'cause you know me better than I know myself.
"A feller's wife usually does know more 'n the man does hisself about his own life. We married a--way back in 1913 and that boy there was the onliest one of the children thiat was not born here." He nodded to his son sitting in the next room at the dining table. "He was bom at Worthington Springs 21 years ago and we came to Jacksonville when he was a little feller."
"You came here in 1918 and you went to work for the Traction Company the next day," Mrs. Ward interposed.
Mr. Ward continued: "A man didn't need no pull or nuthin in them days to get a job. All he had to do was to use his osn face. Business was good then and jobs wuz plentiful. But I've seen times change with all kinds of business since then. When times get hard the transportation
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suffers, 'cause people just don't ride like they do in good times. They get out and walk where they want to go; and then, too, more people have bought cars since I went to work for the company. Believe me we can tell you how good business is all right, 'cause when times pick up people ride a-plenty.
"I been on the job steady ever since I started except when I get off a few days to go up home to fish a little. I got a 160~acre farm at Worthington Springs where I was born. That's not the place where I was really born and raised. I was born at a little town named Lulu about 12 miles from Lake City and that's my wife's home, too.
"Her ma and pa were friends of my pa and ma. We knew each other all our lives just about, didn't we, sweetheart?"
Mrs. Ward was rocking rhythmically and seemed to be enjoying herself. She smiled broadly and replied, "Yes, but we didn't go together but about 3 years When we decided to get married, about all the folks around there got married, too. We caused a little excitement among the young folks. You see his folks were running a cotton gin and we had a sawmill. We both had big farms and all the kids worked on the farms in them days; even the girls worked some in the fields.
"But we had our good times, too. When we did turn out, we use to go to old barn dances and dance till daylight, work all day the next day, and never think of saying that we were tired. If there was another one anywhere around we would all turn out and go again. We would have our good time for a spell and then settle down to work again and go to bed early for a while. We were all healthier then than the present
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generation ever thought about being. Nowadays you hear young men and girls a-saying that they are tired. Why I wouldn't think of saying the work myself, and neither would dad, would you?"
Mr. Ward smiled at her and said: "I reckon we done right well. We coulda done better though if we hadn't had so much sickness. You know that takes a lot of money for doctors and medicine and for hospitals. I had to have my wife operated on a year or two ago and we are just now a-gettin out of that debt.
"That boy of mine, nodding toward the dining room where the boy sat at the table working a cross-word puzzle, has been healthy like me. It's the wimmen folks that're always ailing. William there had been real smart. He's been graduated from every school that he ever went to; the soda-jerking school graduated him, too. That's his diploma a-hanging there on the wall over the piano. He's bought and paid for everything he has had since he was a little feller of 14; so you can see that I ain't proud of him much!
That's his car out there, that new Plymouth. He's bought five cars and one motorcycle. I did help him pay for his motorcycle, but all the rest he done by hisself."
At this William rose from the table and came into the room saying: "I wish Dad had another boy to talk about besides me." He was a dark, tall, and quite handsome boy. He tossed the paper into his mother's lap. "Keep this for me, I didn't finish it, but I got to go. Have I got a clean shirt?" He came toward the divan where I was sitting and I noticed for the first time that he was in his stocking feet and his
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