Old Time Funeral

The very first funeral I remember attending was in 1953.....I was about six years old...my daddy's Uncle Bill  (William Allen, my grandmother, Sallie Lee Allen Head's older brother) had died in Smith County, Texas, out in the country, near Winona and Chapel Hill, a little ways from Tyler. 

 Uncle Bill's wife, Aunt May Head Allen, was my grandfather, John William (Billy) Head's sister...brother and sister (Bill Allen and Sallie Lee Allen) had married brother and sister (John William*Billy* Head and May Head), making their children double-cousins. (And no, this was not one of those Arkansas deals!) I remember many visits to Uncle Bill and Aunt May's house and liked them a lot....I liked to sit on the front porch in Aunt May's lap and look up at her hair...it was snow-white, with many braids wound high on top of her head..her hair must have been very long, as I was always fascinated by it and remember wondering how she got the braids to stay up there. 

All of the Head family had come from Waco to stay a few days for Uncle Bill's funeral. This must have been before the days of the undertaker and funeral homes, as Uncle Bill's casket was on the dining room table. I don't think I and the other young cousins really realized what a funeral was, or that a dead body was in the open casket, as my main memory of it is all the cousins and me chasing each other, yelling, and running around the dining room table with the casket on it, as we played Cowboys and Indians!!!!!!!!!

Note: For more on the Head family and their history in Texas since the 1830's, check out the Archives, beginning with the first entry on July 8th, 2005.