Martha Janice Threadgill Watlington
Oct. 5, 1927 -- Oct. 19 2003
Martha Janice Watlington was born to John Grady Threadgill (b. Feb. 8, 1893, d. April 9, 1960, pb. Hollywood Cem., Jackson, Tenn.) and his second wife, Katie Lou Latham (b. Feb. 20, 1900, d. Dec. 20, 1944) in Madison Co., Tenn., at her Grandmother Threadgill's place. John Grady was from the Luray community, Henderson Co., Tenn. and Katie Lou was from Mifflin in Chester Co. and Pinson Mound/Big Springs in Madison Co.
John Grady Threadgill farmed in Henderson Co. and in Madison Co., and had also worked as a traveling salesman. He and his family were living with his mother on the family farm on the Chester Levee Rd. south of Jackson in the Cedar Grove Community, east of Bemis, Tenn. He was farming the land there at the time he married Katie Lou in 1926. They continued to live there or near there, and farmed there until about 1930.
Then, for four of Janice's childhood years, they lived in the Charles N. Hammond family home on Hart's Bridge Rd., near the Old Pinson Rd. Her brother, Lewis Grady, was born there on May 17, 1931. The Threadgills shared the house with the J. Carl Davis family, who became great friends.
In the depths of the depression (1934), the family moved to a farm near Perry Switch (on the Mobile & Ohio railroad). Janice was old enough to remember well their move to this farm, where they lived in a seldom used, dilapidated tenant home that needed some insulation. Janice's mother, Katie Lou, used discarded corrugated cardboard and newspapers to improve it. It was after these "bad years" that Katie Lou discovered that she had tuberculosis in 1937. Janice's step-sister Christeen graduated from Malesus High School in May of that year. Janice's brother, Grady, remembers starting school while living there in the fall of 1937.
After Katie Lou's diagnosis, they moved to the two-story Patton place near Old Malesus Rd. on the west of the railroad. John Grady Threadgill farmed cotton on the Patton Place, but was also getting into selling agricultural fertilizers. While living here, the family attended attended the Bemis Methodist Church. Janice was baptized and joined the church in 1939.
Because her mother became ill in Janice's childhood she became acquainted with the kitchen and household chores very early, as well as buying groceries at nearby stores. The older children, Rebecca and Christeen, were also helpful while at home, but married soon after their High School graduations. They had a competent maid helping, and Katie Lou was able to instruct and guide the children until her death in December of 1944.
In school, Janice and Dorothy Faye Davis volunteered to help serve the school Hot Lunch, and therefore Arnold Rivers and I volunteered also. You could not only visit with the girls, you could also pick up extra favors from the cooks!
The Watlingtons and the Threadgills knew one another through the public schools. Christeen had been in my brother Herman Watlington's class, and Janice's older step-sister, Rebecca, was in my brother Samuel's graduating class. Even before our marriage, Janice ate often enough with the Watlingtons that Aunt Mai Hammond and Clara Mai Watlington were counselors and teachers too. My brother, Joe C., Janice, and Grady rode with Clara Mai to Bemis School in their last two years at J. B. Young High School. So Clara Mai and Janice became very good friends.
Clara Mai lived at that time on the Old Pinson Rd., but drove by Watlington Rd. to pick up Joe C., then went down Highway 45. Janice and Grady walked to Lester Riley's grocery store at the intersection of Hwy. 45 with Highway 18 to await Clara Mai, who was always very prompt. Clara Mai delivered them all to school in Bemis. Grady went with Clara Mai to Elementary School, but she dropped off Joe C. and Janice at the J. B. Young High School several blocks away and picked them up once school was over.
After living there from Spring 1939 through 1940, John Grady was able to buy the small home on the East side of the G.M. & N. railroad in 1941. He improved it for his family, adding an electric water pump and two additional bedrooms. The bathroom remained outdoors. At times, Uncle Bill Latham would stay there with them.
John Grady Threadgill's father, James Sykes Threadgill, and two brothers died in the early 1920s, but his mother, Mary Etta Reid Threadgill, continued to live on the family farm in the Cedar Grove community on the Chester Levee Rd. near Bemis. A younger brother of John Grady's, James Sykes Threadgill, Jr., continued to work on the farm. Another brother, Ernest, lived in Jackson and worked in carpentry, after leaving the Threadgill farm near Luray in Henderson Co. He continued to own the farm but with three daughters sought better schools for them. Janice and Grady were welcome guests with Grandmother Threadgill and she was able to help the family during the illness of their mother and her hospitalization in a tuberculosis hospital near Nashville, Tennessee. Grandmother Threadgill lived until 1948, four years longer than Janice's mother.
Katie Lou Latham Threadgill also had three brothers who moved towards Jackson, Tenn., and a sister, Pauline Latham Adcock who settled in Lexington, Tenn. Her brother, Clarence Latham, farmed along the Hart's Bridge Road and later bought a farm on that road. Their three girls were near Grady's age and developed "close cousin" relations with Janice and Grady that continued throughout the years. The older brothers, Elkon (Bill), and Tommy, worked at various jobs and served in the Army during World War II --- Janice's father worked in the munition plant at Milan, Tenn. Janice and Grady thus shared life with an extended rural family.
When Janice entered Lambuth College, her immediate family still lived in Malesus. By fall, 1947, her father had remarried a widow, Nell Fry, who owned a house in Jackson on Hays Avenue near Lane College. One of the terms of this marriage was that he move with his family to her Jackson home. John Threadgill's work at the time was mainly in Jackson selling and delivering fertilizer, and Janice could catch a ride to Lambuth College on the city buses. By this time, Grady was in his third year of High School. The whole family transferred their membership to the Hays Avenue Methodist Church in walking distance of their home.
Despite the obvious advantages of their new home, Nell Fry Threadgill let both Janice and Grady know very well that they were not welcome guests in her home in many slight and some very obvious ways and words. It was not a good adjustment for them but they stuck with it, and both continued to live there while studying.
Janice was an excellent scholar at elementary, high school, and college levels --- with class honors at each level. In Lambuth College, Janice majored in Home Economics: Sewing, Cooking, Nutrition and Meal Planning. Business Administration was her Minor. I considered myself another Major, as we became engaged around Easter, 1946, while I was in Japan. Her High School studies qualified her for secretarial work in the Registrar's Office at Lambuth. Her many hours of office work were sufficient to pay her tuition and have some pocket money as well. When she graduated in 1949, she certified as an elementary school teacher in Tennessee.
After two years of training and service in the Army of Occupation in Japan, I returned to the farm home in March, 1947, to begin college studies in preparation for Christian ministry. College was a wonderful new experience and I rejoiced in being home and in having the opportunity to study. I lived at home with my father, Aunt Mai Hammond, and sister Betty. But family was all around, and Janice was living only five miles away in Jackson. I had reclaimed my 1929 Model A Ford from my brother Paul to commute the five miles daily to college, and it served us (more or less) until June 1949.
After a year, Janice and I started making our plans for marriage. With no money, marriage plans were simple, and her pastor, Rev. Wayne A. Lamb united us in marriage on June 9, 1948 at the Malesus Methodist Church where we had attended Youth Fellowship together in other years. Our festivities were few but we went for a few days honeymoon in a car borrowed from my brother Sam which concluded at a Youth Rally in First Methodist Church, Memphis, Tenn., for Annual Conference.
Our first year of marriage we lived in Jackson, Tenn., at 227 1/2 Campbell St. (upstairs). This was near Lambuth College where Janice worked and I attended classes. Later in the year I journeyed by train or bus twice a month on week-ends to Wickliffe, Ky., where I preached at Pleasant Hill Methodist Church. Our first born, Martha Kate, arrived in April, 1949, so that made it a very eventful year for us. Janice graduated from Lambuth College six weeks after Martha was born, although her class work had been finished in the previous Autumn.
In June, 1949, we moved to a real ``country parsonage'' at Brazil, Tenn., Gibson Co. where we joined what has been called ``the endless line of Splendor'' -- a splendid succession of faithful Methodist ministers riding circuits around the world. There we were in the midst of good country cooks and eating simple foods at church dinners and homes. Janice picked up recipes from them and everywhere else we lived and ate.
In June, 1951, we went from Brazil to Elroy (Juneau Co.), Wisconsin. In Wisconsin, we gloried in casseroles with cheese toppings, good butter, milk, and ice cream. Joe Thomas was born to us there June 1, 1953 and Mary Emma on April 18, 1955. Ten years later John Andrew was born to us while serving in Lima, Perú. This gave us a Tennessean, two Wisconsinites and one Peruvian. They have each blessed our marriage and our lives and continue in good health, giving us ten grandchildren, five girls and five boys.
Janice's preparation for teaching and business administration served her well in the 1951-52 school year. The Camp Douglas High School needed a teacher for Business Administration and we needed money for an automobile that would operate in below-zero weather! After finding child care for our three year old daughter, Martha, Janice taught the entire school year, driving fifteen miles to and from the school in the Wisconsin winter.
After that year, she was able to dedicate her time to family, home and local church work. She served well as a volunteer (?) secretary for me as the Pastor-Student of a rural circuit with three churches. Janice cut stencils and learned to operate an "experienced" mimeograph machine in our home to provide weekly for two of the churches.
In June, 1955, we moved to Nashville, Tenn., to attend Scaritt College for special studies recommended for missionaries going into World Mission service -- including language, cultural, and biblical specialties. With an infant in the home, Janice found a wonderful helper, her father's sister, Gertrude Threadgill Gilliam, a widow who had time to spare and who appreciated small children and the small income from such child care as we needed. My sister, Clara Mai King, also helped some when we had need.
In February of 1956 we traveled to New York City by auto with three children, our bags, and a '56 Chevrolet the mission had requested we bring to our place of service. After a long two-week ocean liner trip, we arrived in Lima, Perú, to a Spanish language ministry in a strange land that became home for us for the next twenty-three years. Our major tasks in Perú were administrative: teaching and preaching. Most of our teaching was related to the preparation of leaders for our Methodist Church in Perú.
Our first year there was intensive language and cultural study. After our experience at Scaritt College in 1955, we had found a used Ditto (alcohol) duplicator, which we shipped with us to Perú to facilitate communications in the pastoral work there. Janice coaxed the machine to produce many hundreds of documents over the years.
That year, Janice served as hostess and bookkeeper for the Wolfe Memorial Home. It included four guestrooms for official visitors (such as our Bishop), in connection with our home and our Mission headquarters there. Homemaking became a valuable specialty again!
In Perú, it was Señora Elena Sanchez who had previously worked for and learned from a Swiss family and in the kitchens at Colegio Maria Alvarado (Lima High School) who helped Janice and introduced her to Peruvian cooking. In Perú, as in our family, luxury was not in style. Common food was prepared: good soups, vegetables with whatever meat available, pumpkin or sweet potato pie. There she learned more ways of preparing beans, and was introduced to lentils.
Our second year in Perú, Janice became the Secretary and Bookkeeper for our small Mission Office, which included considerable correspondance in English with supporting churches and visiting "firemen" representing our Church connections between the U.S.A. and Latin America. Janice worked at this very effectively and the Mission helped provide child care and help with household tasks in return. She continued this work for the remainder of the our five-year term.
Half of a furlough year (1961) was spent in further language training in San Jose, Costa Rica, then her work and home resumed at the Wolfe Memorial Home for 1962--1967.
In 1968, our family moved to Trujillo, Perú, on the north coast. The four years there were more directly dedicated to pastoral and evangelistic work. There, her talents in music and teaching were in higher demand. Missionary wives are not just wives; they too are full-fledged missionaries.
We returned to the United States in 1972 for family reasons, and settled in Ripley, Tenn. for three years. During this time, Janice substituted in the elementary schools for a year, then worked teaching at Ripley High School. At the same time, she was serving as a "volunteer" secretary to the pastor, and taking part in the choirs and United Methodist Women's activities.
Janice and I returned to Perú in August 1975 with son John, and were assigned again to the leadership training program with our home in Huancayo in the high (10,680 ft.) mountain valley of Jauja. Janice was elected treasurer of the Methodist Church in Perú and therefore traveled to and from Lima a lot in her administrative tasks.
In Huancayo, we promoted education in varied ways including the care of a church library, weekend institutes, the writing and publishing of a church officers manual and a newsletter for leaders in that district. We were also in charge of the Methodist Hostel which served many visitors related to the Mission and School work. Janice and I both worked in the local Methodist Church. She especially helped in the Women's work and directed the choir for the church. After celebrating Easter together with the local church in April 1978, we packed up to return to the United States, ending twenty years in Perú.
In June, 1978, we moved to Memphis, Tenn., where I served as pastor in a number of United Methodist churches: Springdale for two years, four years at Frayser Heights, and two years at Grimes. Our final task was to work with Greenland-Davant church in Whitehaven as it planned its merger with a sister church, Longstreet. With the return to pastoral work, Janice not only helped with the local church, but also found opportunities to share in District and Conference Committees and organizations. After acquiring computer skills, she served as Registrar for the Conference Mission Education Events at Lambuth College (now Lambuth University) for four consecutive years before suffering a heart attack in 1992.
During the 1983 sickness of her Aunt Pauline Latham Adcock and husband in Lexington, Tenn., Janice made many trips there to aid and comfort them. Uncle Fenner Adcock was admitted to a nursing facility and Auntie was faced with all of the decisions for the family. Uncle Fenner died weeks later and Auntie came to live with us in Memphis, as her health was spent in months of caring for him. Both were in their eighties, and had no children, but both had elderly siblings. Within six weeks of her husband's death, Aunt Pauline also died, in Memphis.
Janice knew well the two brothers of Pauline and they worked together on funeral plans very much like those for Fenner Adcock. A long-time friend and confidant of the couple was their lawyer in Lexington and Janice sought his help in the settlement of the estate. Finding no special problems, the Latham brothers offered to divide the estate between Latham and Adcock heirs with Martha Janice as administrator. There were small insurance policies, bank savings accounts, an auto, their home in Lexington, and fifty years of accumulated furniture and heirlooms. With representatives from both families participating, Janice helped share the heirlooms and sell the other items. Then Janice had to call and correspond with about twenty Adcock heirs and the few Lathams, pay outstanding bills, and plan the final legal settlement of the estate. There were tense moments that stretched into months for her, but she was good at it and her Latham uncles appreciated her help.
Janice's only brother Grady, and his wife Betty, owned and operated Threadgill Pharmacy, on Macon Rd. at Wells Station Rd., in the Berclair community of East Memphis. Their home had been a stopping place for us since their marriage in May, 1953. Their home since the 1960s had been on Tatum Road, near the pharmacy. Martha Kate, Joe Thomas, and John Andrew all worked shifts in the store at various times during their university or high school student years.
As we moved to the pastoral ministry in Memphis, we appreciated having Grady and Betty here also. Two other cousins of the Threadgill family were also here. Janice found opportunity to help fill in as a clerk at Threadgill Pharmacy during vacation days for the employees. She kept in close touch with Grady and realized that he needed more help with his paper work, mail, and collection of charge accounts, so in 1984 she elected to work on that part of the pharmacy as she had time to so with no more children at home. She decided to work there in order to relieve Grady of the paperwork he would take home to complete after closing the store. Grady trusted her to help, and she put in flexible hours of work each week according to her other activities. It developed into her part-time job, with pay! Because of this we could start an IRA savings account in her name. She continued working even after my retirement and her heart attack and surgery in 1992. Grady got some extra sleep at night after his ten-hour workdays, six days a week. They both appreciated having more time together also. She continued this until Grady closed the store in December 1999. During those hectic days after closing the doors, there was still a lot of "moving out" to do, and I was brought in as well. It took a lot of hours in January, 2000, to make the transfer of items and records to Fred's Pharmacy, who bought the stock of medicines and prescription records. We also helped move the older obligatory records to Grady and Betty's garage --- quite an experience!
In retirement we chose to stay in Memphis, near Grady and Betty, and where our youngest daughter Mary was teaching school and starting her family. We chose to make our church home where they worshiped, St. Luke's U.M.C. near the University of Memphis, a cultural center of the city. I accepted a part-time ministry for four years with the St. Luke's congregation, and Janice continued to be active in the church. She served for two years as President of the St. Luke's U.M.C.'s 120 United Methodist Women organization in 1993-94. She was active with me as corresponding secretaries for the Perú Mission Friends, continuing contacts with Perú. From 1992 thru 2000, we worked intensively with the Memphis Conference Commission on Methodist History and helped organize a United Methodist History Society within the Conference.
On October 19, 2003, after a day of playing with her great-grandchild and visiting with friends over dinner at Frazier Heights U.M.C., Janice suffered a massive heart attack and passed on. She was buried in Ebenezer Cemetery, Jackson, Tennessee.
© 2006, John A. Watlington. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 2.5 License.
wad@alum.mit.edu