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SISTERS IN 70S RECALL ROBBERY
The 'Mean People' Came
By ANN WOOLNER
Atlanta Journal Staff Writer
FLOVILLA.Ga. - Maybe
it’s the unchanged quality of
the 80-year-old Hay house.
Perhaps it’s the 70-plus ages
of Agnes and Vivian.
Or it could be the woods
and the fields and the sun and
house with a warmth and
calm fhat would seem foreign
to most city folk.
Whatever it is, chatting
with Agnes and Vivian Hay on
the pordh of the modest house
that “Papa built back in ’93”
gives the vistior a tranquil
feeling of timelessness.
They live in the rural Butts
County town of Flovilla, south
■of Jackson, over the railroad
macks, past that huge white
house, on the dirt road that
winds and bumps past their
lifelong home.
The sun and the rain have
weathered the house consider
ably but the peeling paint and
splintered wood are about the
only changes the house has
undergone.
Crops no longer cover the
land that surrounds the house,
and most of the nfne Hays
Who used to live in the house
either died or moved away,
but the house itself hasn’t
changed much, and neither
!aas the lifestyle it protects.
. Still no phone, no running
water, no car and no electrici
ty. “We don’t have no buttons
to punch,” Agnes said from
beneath the blue bandana
head-covering.
“But even folks that punch
buttons don’t get through with
their work, either,” she
■chuckled while her younger,
less talkative sister nodded.
Like their father, Agnes and
Vivian like to do things for
themselves.
“We’ve got age on us, but
we don’t go calling on the old
age pension and we’ve never
been to the welfare,” Agnes
said.
Instead, they live off the
few dollars they can milk
from their cows.
“We’ve had cows all our
lives,” Agnes explained. She
and her sister shovel hay and
compost, do the milking and
the churning and draw their
own well water.
And they do their daily
chores no matter how hot the
Georgia sun or how deep the
unexpected snows.
“Folks that never lived on a
farm don’t know what hard
work is,” Miss Agnes said.
Vivian nodded.
‘‘We never had fancy
clothes, but we always had
lots of good food on the
table,” Agnes said, thinking of
the days when Papa kept the
Hay farm covered with crops.
But now only cows and
underbrush remain on the
Hay land.
‘‘We used to have a
(vegetable) garden up until
about a year and a half ago,”
Agnes said.
“But the deers came and
dug it all up. They ate the
beans and they dug up the tur
nips. They even ate the okra
up.
“You just can’t keep a gar
den anymore for the ani
mals,” she said.
Agnes said that she and her
six sisters and brothers were
educated in the one-room
school “just up the road there.
“The name of the school
was Woodlawn, but most peo
ple called it Rocky Hill.”
The school taught “as many
as 50 pupils” at one time, and
Agnes and Vivian went all the
NEWS FROM
WORTHVILLE
By Mrs. W. G. Avery
Mr. and Mrs. Harmon
Edwards and family attended
the wedding of her nephew, Mr.
Kerry Bryan, at Ash Street
Baptist Church in Forest Park
Saturday evening. The happy
occasion ended in pain for Mrs.
Edwards when she fell and
broke her shoulder. We wish
for her a speedy recovery.
Mr. and Mrs. Stanley McCart
and Mike, accompanied by Mr.
and Mrs. Jerry Lloyd, of
Newton County, visited in
Charleston, S. C. Sunday.
Mr. B. F. Hamlin spent
Saturday night and Sunday
with his daughter, Mrs. Forest
Cook, and Mr. Cook in
Milledgeville. Mr. Virgil Ham
lin motored to Milledgeville
Sunday and returned his father
home. Mr. Hamlin is getting
along fine, his friends are
happy to hear.
Sunday afternoon guests of
Staff Photo—Hugh Stovall
AGNES HAY (LEFT) AND HER SISTER, VIVIAN, AT HOUSE BUILT IN 1893
‘We’ve Got Age Upon Us, But We Don’t Go Calling on the Old Age Pension’
way through, to the 10th
grade.
“I believe in some educa
tion,” Agnes said, “but I also
believe in good, down-to-earth,
sensible, logical, reasonable,
common sense.”
And most of the education
that the Hay sisters put to use
now was learned right at
home.
“I never worked out of the
house,” Vivian said.
‘‘ I worked out of the
house,” Agnes chimed in and
mentioned short-term jobs at
the “asylum” at Milledgeville,
the Fo y Hotel at Indian
Springs and a store in Macon.
Most of their lives, how
ever, have been spent doing
“hard work” on the farm.
But it hasn’t been all drudg
ery and work. The Hay sisters
have friends.
“One year we had people
come visit us from 13 differ
ent states besides Georgia,”
Agnes said.
She and her sister enjoy
telling about their friends and
relatives, some of whom they
can’t understand.
“We’ve got these two neph
ews in Atlanta who are po
lice,” Vivian said. “I don’t
know where they got that
from, being police. There ain’t
never been no police in the
Hay family before.”
They may not understand
all the people who come to
visit them, but they enjoy
most of them after all, they
grew up when the only form
of entetrainment was the
neighbor.
“People don’t know low to
have a good time anymore,”
Agnes philosophized.
“We used to go over to
somebody’s house ar.d some
one would have a fiddle and
Mr. L. L. Washington and Mr.
and Mrs. W. G. Avery were Mr.
Avery’s sisters, Mrs. Annie Sue
Stokes, and Mrs. Perry
Kirkland and Mr. Kirkland, all
of Covington.
Guests of Mr. and Mrs.
Hiram Smith Sunday were her
parents, Mr. and Mrs. Curtis
Clark, of Conyers.
Spend the day guests of Mrs.
Nellie Cochran Sunday were
her daughter, Mrs. Edna
Wilkerson and granddaughter,
Mrs. Mike McKinney, and Mr.
McKinney, all of Atlanta. A
brother, Mr. Otis Faulkner,
and Mrs. Faulkner of Lamar
County were also dinner guests
of Mrs. Cochran Sunday.
Another granddaughter, Miss
Janice Cochran, of Jackson
visited in the afternoon.
Mrs. J. H. Pope had as
supper guests last Thursday
evening her daughters, Mrs.
THE JACKSON PROGRESS-ARGUS, JACKSON, GEORGIA
someone else would play the
piano and we’d all sing,” she
said.
“This generation don’t know
what hard work is, and I don’t
believe they have as good a
time as we did.
‘‘ I know they aren't as
good,” Agnes said.
The tranquility and time
lessness of the sisters’ way of
life was upset last July for the
first time since “Papa built
this house back in ’93.”
Vivian “had j us t and rawn
some water for the cows, and
Agnes was in the kitchen.
“It was in the heat of the
day” when “two boys came
walking down the road,” Viv
ian said.
They asked for gasoline,
which the sisters did not have,
and then for water. After they
had a cup, “one of them grab
bed me by the shoulders, and
the other one ran into the
kitchen where Agnes was,”
Vivian said.
“I said, ‘Turn me a-loose,
I’m going to vomit. We’ve got
no way of making any money,
we don't hardly have enough
to eat.’
“I asked him, ‘Don’t you
have a mother?’ He wouldn’t
answer any of my questions,”
Vivian said.
Agnes, meanwhile, was
being beaten up by the other
man, the one with the gun.
“He tied my arms and my
feet and he knocked out three
of my teeth. He slapped me
right here,” Agnes said point
ing to her cheek. “The print of
his fingers stayed on my face
for three, four weeks.”
Agnes gave them what
money they had s2 and a
handful of change.
Meanwhile, Vivian freed
herself from her captor while
he glanced away, and she fled
to a neighbor's house where
they called the sheriff’s de
partment while the two rob
bers also fled.
Within an hour the sheriff's
John Fletcher, of Tucker and
Mrs. Robert Wilson, Mr.
Wilson and Bobby of Decatur.
Mrs. Pope’s guests Sunday
afternoon were her sister, Mrs.
Troy Welch, and Mr. Welch of
Jackson.
Messrs. B. F. Hamlin and
Virgil Hamlin visited Mr. Mike
Hamlin in Medical Center
Hospital in Macon during the
weekend and report him much
improved, we are happy to
relate.
Miss Janet Washington, a
student nurse at Georgia
Baptist Hospital, spent the
weekend with her parents, Mr.
and Mrs. S. A. Washington.
Friends of Mrs. Eloise Guess
of College Park will be
interested to hear that she
returned home last Thursday
after a week’s visit to Spain
and the Mediterranean coast of
Africa. Mrs Guess, with a
group of friends, made the tour
and reports a wonderful trip
and beautiful and friendly
country.
Let’s all remember the
department, with the help of
Agnes and Vivian, captured
the two culprits- with a third
man who was driving their
getaway car.
Last August a Butts county
jury sentenced the two rob
bers to 20-year prison terms
and their accomplice to a 7-
year term.
The jury decided the men
were guilty—solely from the
testimony of Agnes and Viv
ian.
No fingerprints had been
taken, the prosecution could
not definitely link the weapon,
the rope or the money that
was found on the defendants
to the crime.
But Agnes and Vivian iden
tified the two men. They were
sure the defendants were the
ones who robbed them, and
that was enough for the jury.
Now the Hay sisters are
trying to return to the peace
they knew before the July rob
bery. They are a little more
wary of stranger, and a little
more cynical of young people.
Agnes said they know not
all young people are like the
ones wht robbed them, “They
were just nasty—born mean.”
But the life that speeds by
at 70 miles an hour on 1-75 10
miles from their house that
“Papa built back in ’93”
seems to be getting closer.
Agnes said, “It used to be
that all the mean people
stayed in the city.”
PERSONAL
Mrs. C. L. Sanvidge spent
Friday night in Concord with
her mother, Mrs. C. C.
Eppinger. On Saturday they
visited Rev. and Mrs. Bob
Williams, pastor of the Mt.
Olive Baptist Church near
Molena.
Mrs. Emma Allen of Atlanta
spent last week with her sister,
Mrs. Laura Wright.
Mrs. Bryant Haizlip and Mr.
and Mrs. Bill Haizlip of Atlanta
and Mr. and Mrs. Ed Akins of
Covington were spend the day
guests Sunday of Mrs. 0. A.
Andrews and family.
Miss Cindy Cook, student at
Georgia Southern College,
spent the weekend with her
parents, Mr. and Mrs. Pete
Cook.
Mr. and Mrs. Naamon York
visited her brother, Mr. Ides
Gramling, in Austell who
returned home Saturday from
the hospital after undergoing
an operation.
singing at Worthville Baptist
Church Saturday evening at
7:30 and plan to attend.
Special singers will be "Ray
and Debbie Amerson" and
“The Robert Smith Singers.”
Hi CH
r ihrwoh it y
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