Frances Newton, The Early Years

My grandmother, Frances Newton Hall, has been on my mind a lot lately. I wish she was here to help me with my research ... I would have really enjoyed working on this project with her. With that said, I thought I would do a post about her. There will definitely be future posts with her as the subject, so I'll focus this one on her early childhood.

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Named after her mother's oldest sister, Frances Newton was born on 20 Nov 1919 at the family home in Minneola, Lowndes, GA to Charles Edwin and Margaret Julia Burney Newton. She was an only child, so naturally she was the subject of numerous photo shoots.

I am so fortunate that she left me A Gift of Memories from Grandma, where she answered questions about growing up. The booklet is completed in her handwriting and gives so many details about her life.

As a child she was awarded 10 cents per tooth from the tooth fairy and earned 50 cents per week for her allowence, starting at age 10. She liked to spend her money on toys and movies. She "could go to the movies two times for a quarter and have 5 cents left over for popcorn."

She described the house she grew up in as grey with two stories, a pretty lawn, shrubs, five pecan trees and a barn out back. There was a paved sidewalk in the front where she skated with her friends and a porch that wrapped around three sides of the house where she and her mother "took trips all over the world in our porch swing." They had electric lights and a wood stove to cook on. Fireplaces and wood heaters were used to heat up the house in the winter time and to keep it cool in the summer time, they simply opened the windows.

As with any child, the holidays were extra special to her. She recalled that on Thanksgiving, her Uncle Will (William Wirt Burney) always sent their family a live turkey and they enjoyed a big dinner, including her moms specialty items, mashed potatoes and dressing. During Christmas, Santa filled her stocking with apples, oranges, raisens, a candy cane and one or two small gifts. The family celebrated the Fourth of July with a picnic at the Blue and Gray Park in Fitzgerald and she always had a new dress to wear for the event.

Frances attended Third Ward Grade School, Fitzgerald High School and Southern Business University in Atlanta. She enjoyed History, Geography and English and hated Math and Science. She played Basketball and Tennis, was on the Debate Team and was in the Dramatic Club and the Glee Club.