Growing Up in Williamsport, Ohio

Jean’s Marriage Ends in Tragedy
 
Kathleen had married and Bob had gone into the Army. Jean probably felt alone with them gone. She met Harry Samuel Davidson at a carnival in uptown Williamsport. He was a tall, good looking man and older than she was. She was attracted to him and married young despite my parent’s misgivings.
 
Harry was from Circleville, the son of Myrtle and Oscar Davidson. Jean and Harry moved to a house outside of Circleville in a field surrounded by wheat or corn, I don’t remember which. As with my sister Kathleen, we visited them on Sunday afternoons.
 
I was around eleven and all of my older siblings were gone from home. I remember sitting on Jean’s porch looking out over the field and wondering what life was all about. Who was I? I didn’t know but I did know that I was bored. Looking back, I think it was the beginning of my spiritual hunger and thirst for God. I didn’t find the answers to these questions until several years later.
 
My sister Jean was married three years before Jeffrey Allen Davidson was born. I wish this story could say they lived happily ever after but it ends in tragedy. On November 10, 1953, Harry was picking corn when some fodder got caught in the corn picker he was operating. He probably thought he could pull it out without turning the corn picker off. He tried to pull it out and his hand got caught. Then he stuck his foot in for leverage to get his hand out. I could go on but you know the end of this story without my telling you.
 
Someone ran up to me and told me when I left school that day. It was the first person that was close to me to die. My first reaction was like so many others….maybe he’s not dead….but he was.

©Marilyn Francis Ferguson 2020
Photography/graphics by Michele Ferguson Schuck