r mother’s inconsolable grief, and the theft by confidence-tricksters of every bit of her father’s wealth, her life began in tragedy. That is true, and it was surely a difficult beginning. Even sadder is that, for her, suffering seemed never to end.
She was an intelligent and hard-working mother. She did the very best she knew how for her two kids. Despite poverty and a marriage characterized by intermittent abuse, constant chaos, and crushing debts due principally to Judge’s alcoholism, she managed a pretty fair job of it.
Louise was diagnosed with heart disease in the 1940’s. Physicians warned her that she risked sudden death; she must quit work immediately. She outlived every one of those physicians, dying fifty years later of congestive heart failure. Her ashes are now a part of The Dr. Thomas Walker Historic Site, a knob that provides a spectacular view through The Narrows, with lots of flowering dogwood and soft pink mountain laurel in May. I hope Louise is able to rest comfortably there, close to what she always thought of as ‘home.’ My brother Dick and I thought this better than a conventional grave, our mother pinned to earth by a heavy granite stone.
