Oct. 9, 1899-July 22, 1970
By: Lisa Redd
Alice and her husband, Forest, raised 3 children on Bishop St., in North Atlanta, GA. Near the Atlanta Water Works. She loved cooking and never followed a recipe. She always prepared a huge Sunday dinner where she could feed an army because she couldn’t stop, with just one meat. She cooked ham, chicken and roast and every vegetable imaginable.
Alice was also known for her fruitcakes that she cooked every Christmas. She would prepare 700-800 pounds of dark and light fruitcake. She made them by instinct, putting a little of this and a little of that.
When she wasn’t helping out her neighbors, she was working in her vegetable garden and flower garden. Her youngest son, James Edwin remembers her putting a rock beside every plant. She told him the plants could draw water from the rocks.
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You know that all potatoes have eyes. Well, Mr. and Mrs. Potato had eyes for each other, and finally they got married, and had a little sweet potato, whom they called Yam.
Of course, they wanted the best for Yam. When it was time, they told her about the facts of life. They warned her about going out and getting half-baked, so she wouldn’t get accidentally mashed and get a bad name for herself like Hot Potato, and end up with a bunch of Tater Tots.
Yam said not to worry, no Spud would get her into the sack and make a rotten potato out of her! But on the other hand she wouldn’t stay home and become a Couch Potato, either. She would get plenty of exercise so as not to be skinny like her Shoestring cousins.
When she went off to Europe, Mr. and Mrs. Potato told Yam to watch out for the Hard Boiled guys from Ireland. And the greasy guys from France called the French Fries. And when she went out west, to watch out for the Indians so she wouldn’t get scalloped.
Yam said she would stay on the straight and narrow and wouldn’t associate with those high class Yukon Golds, or the ones from the other side of the tracks who advertise their trade on all the trucks that say, Frito Lay.
Mr. and Mrs. Potato sent Yam to Idaho P.U. (that’s Potato University) so that when she graduated she’d really be in the Chips. But in spite of all they did for her, one day Yam came home and announced she was going to marry Tom Brokaw.
Tom Brokaw! Mr. and Mrs. Potato were very upset. They told Yam she couldn’t possibly marry Tom Brokaw because hes just a.... A Common Tater!
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"People travel to wonder at the height of the mountains, at the huge waves of the seas, at the long course of the rivers, at the vast compass of the ocean, at the circular motion of the stars, and yet they pass by themselves without wondering."
St. Augustine, 354 430
Early Christian Priest, Author
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It takes a lot of courage to release the familiar and seemingly secure, to embrace the new. But there is no real security in what is no longer meaningful. There is more security in the adventurous and exciting, for in movement there is life, and in change there is power.
Alan Cohen
Inspirational Author
Published in U S Legacies Magazine January 2004
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