Sunday Meetin' Time: Growing Up in the 1950's

It's a grand and groovy zippity doo dah ding dong day in the canyon this morning and do you know what a ding dong day is?
Well it's CHURCH day goofy!  :-)

When our kids were little...all the days had a name besides the day of the week it was.  It was either school day, or cartoon day or church day.


But when "I" was a little girl growing up in the

40's and 50's, church day to me was ding dong day. AND that was because when I was very little...daddy was pastor of Macedonia Baptist Church in Massac County and it was and still is a classic old fashioned greeting card church...the kind everybody should be building if they're building a church...because in MY opinion...we should never try to look bigger or fancier...we should always look 'approachable and warm and fuzzy' when we're a church.  Even this little country church in the picture...could be built to house a few hundred people...you just make the rascal BIGGER.  But you stay with the classic 'look'...but then who asked ME...I'm just as old as dirt and what would "I" know or have experienced in my short life time....

But when daddy was pastor of Macedonia...I was just a very little girl.  And we had a big old bell in the steeple of the church and when it was time to start church....someone would go ring that bell.  After I got to about 3 or so...I started wanting to ring the bell...so daddy would lift me up to reach the rope and let me ring the bell...so I started calling 'church'....'ding dong'....get it?  :-)

I've said many time I grew up in a story book life and then married an old geezer that gave me even more of a story book life in LaLa Land...I've been blessed in my lifetime beyond measure.  So most all of my memories from childhood and beyond are absolutely precious memories....

Sunday mornings though...I guess were my favorite.  Mom had a beauty shop and she'd take my sisters and I to the beauty shop behind the house...one at a time and shampoo our hair and put on that yucky wave set and give us Shirley Temple curls...then she'd dress us and set us on the couch in front of the TV one at a time....and we'd watch Gospel Singing Caravan...until she got the rest of us ready....then it was off to church we'd go.

We'd often have lunch at Wade's 66 Inn or Farley's or where ever...that was our big outing for the week besides church and then we'd all rest and do our own thing in the afternoon or go for a long Sunday afternoon ride and then supper and back to church in the evening.  After church on Sunday evening...mom would make chocolate malts for all of us and we'd sit down and watch Bonanza and Loretta Young.  Mom always wanted to be sitting down herself by the time Loretta came through that curtain waving the big skirt of her fancy dress.  Mom thought Loretta Young was the living IN.  :-)

Back in the early 1960's...MGM made one of their very last epic films.  And it was partially filmed just about 45 minutes or so from Metropolis...in Smithland, Ky.  It was a western and starred such old greats as Debbie Reynolds and John Wayne and Jimmy Stewart and Gregory Peck, Henry Fonda, Walter Brennan, Andy Devine and others...
Now some of you are saying "WHO is the WORLD ..are THOSE people?"  Well....you'd have to be as old as dirt to remember them...But no one in television or the movies today...can compare to any of these stars of yesterday...
But daddy wanted to make a huge memory for us...so during this particular summer of 1962, I believe it was... we'd leave church on Sunday morning and head to Smithland, Ky and have lunch in a big buffet there and then we'd go out and watch the filming for a while ... of this movie...It was so much fun.  We'd get a glimpse of a big star now and then...and it made us almost feel a part...of the filming of this movie. 

Daddy also had a lot of tent revivals when I was just a little girl.  And not realizing what a bashful wallflower I was growing INTO...he was always putting me in front of the people with a microphone to sing "This Little Light of Mine" or some such little chorus...I'd hold that big old cold/silver microphone and just sing to beat the band...SOME revivals were just 'outdoor revivals'...we didn't even have a TENT  :-)  But I loved LOVED the old tent and outdoor revivals.
Oh my goodness...outdoor revivals...how I loved them.  Singing "Amazing Grace" and "What A Friend" under the stars with the cool crisp air all around us and if it was really hot...we'd fan with those old paper/cardboard fans....and sometimes swat flies or mosquitos with them too....aaahhhhh those were the days....

Now I was the oldest of us 3 girls...so Sue was too little to sing during this time...and Beth was even younger...but THEY grew into pretty good singers and went on to sing and own a bus and tour and make records, and this and that waaaaaaaaaaaay after "I" quit to marry this old geezer. 

Well...my memories are priceless...and I hope most of yours are too.....

Precious memories...how they linger....how they ever flood my soul.  

Peace and love from the canyon...I love you all gobs and thanks SO much..for stopping by.



I LOVE this song...and tried to post it for you...but couldn't get it to take...but it's on my profile page on facebook if you'd like to take a listen.....

SUNDAY MEETIN' TIME
Sunday meeting time, back home where I was born, was a happy time-
Every Sunday morn- I remember well, the songs we used to sing-
How we made the rafters ring!
It was there I learned to pray, when I was just a kid-
Now I'm far away- I'm so glad I did!
Someday I'm going back, to hear those church bells chime,
At Sunday morning meeting time!

'Twas there I learned to pray, when I was just a kind-
Now I'm far away- I'm so glad I did!
Someday I'm going back, to hear those church bells chime,
at Sunday morning meeting Time!

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