by Omie Evelyn Raney Smith
Editor's Note: The following is an excerpt from a much longer article, "Frank Raney - Providence," written by Omie Evelyn Raney Smith and printed in The Raney Story, a collection of family material published in a hard-bound book by "The Raney Clan" in October 1991. The 2l8-page book, profusely illustrated by family photographs, is a remarkable record of a leading Faulkner County family whose progenitors first came to this area from Pontotoc County, Mississippi in 1859/1860. Omie Evelyn Raney was born in Benedict Township in the southwestern comer of Faulkner County in 1901, a daughter of John Franklin and Mary Josephine Claunch Raney. She taught school at Calf Neck in Perry County and Red Hill in Faulkner County before she married Verne Smith in 1921. Mrs. Smith died in Conway in 1988. The information in brackets [ ] has been added by the editor.
Schools were located about every four miles. Lollie, Providence, Ludwig [also known as Ledrick], Nutter's Chapel, Dew Drop (on the river), Red Hill (also on the river), Mayflower, Belks Corner all had schools. The Mosleys [Albert A. and Sophia Sevier Mosley] had deeded two acres of their land to be used for church and school, to be returned to the original property when no longer used for those purposes. The community moved a one-room school house from Flag Pond in 1903, and this served as both school and church. The Methodist Church purchased an old building on the community grounds and the entire community helped work over. Then we all moved into that building - Woodmen of the World, Odd Fellow Lodge, all our school, church and community meetings were held there. The little one-room schoolhouse was later torn down and the material used elsewhere. I first went to school in that remodeled building. My older brothers and sisters went to school in that remodeled building. My older brothers and sisters went to the little schoolhouse for a while.
Mr. C. R. Berry taught the first school at Providence. Actually, he is the one that named the place Providence. Professor C. J. Greene of Hendrix College had come to visit and stated that after traveling through the mountains for 15 miles, coming through Rocky Gap, it was an act of Providence that you get there at all. And so the place came to be known as Providence. Mr. Charles H. Nelson was a preacher there. Mrs. Nelson [the former Sarah "Sallie" See] taught school there is 1905. Rosa Isgrig taught there two years.
Mr. Albert Moseley was Sunday School superintendent, Justice of the Peace, School Director, and, I guess, [Benedict] Township Committeeman. But in November 1906 Mr. Moseley passed away. That was the first time I knew about dying. It seemed like the world stopped. Somebody had to take up the torch. That is where my Papa, Frank Raney, came into his own, and began to influence what was to be at Providence. He loved Providence, Benedict Township, Faulkner County and Arkansas. I guess he was elected Justice of the Peace about that time. I know he was a J.P. in 1908, for he was reported by the Log Cabin Democrat as serving in that capacity on the Quorum Court that year. He remained a J.P. until he left the area in 1932. He loved the peace and worked for it among his neighbors. He would try to get them to settle things out of court if at all possible.
"Squire Raney"
When Papa held court, our front porch and yard became a courtyard. Our teachers let the older pupils attend court. We all knew about the law - my Papa saw to that. The prosecuting attorneys, the lawyers pleading the case, and he, the judge, explained it all to us. They called him "Squire Raney." He loved holding court and was the township committeeman, so he also held the elections. Providence was the voting precinct for Benedict Township, and everyone came there to vote. Papa entertained all the candidates free. He thought it was his duty and would not accept any pay. He had his favorites, of course, but not because of political influence. Mama would cook supper and serve the judges and clerks on election night.
Papa worked as School Director to consolidate some small districts so we could have more pupils at Providence. Some of the people became unhappy about the lodge meetings in the church building, so the lodge finally moved to Lollie. That upset my father, for he had been planning to build a new two-story school at Providence, so the lodges could meet upstairs and school could have two classrooms downstairs. But Lollie got the two-story building instead. In 1911 we moved into our new school building -one room, with a curtain across the center to form two classrooms, with two teachers.
Miss E'thel Julian, a graduate of the State Normal College in Conway (maybe one of the first graduates) and Ruth Thompson were the first teachers in that school. Miss E'thel (pronounced with a long "E") graded the lower classes at the Providence School. There was also a high school but it was not graded. Providence awarded an eighth grade diploma. To receive a high school diploma, you had to take an examination given by the county. J. M. C. (Jim) Vaughter was our County Examiner. He graded our papers and signed our diplomas. We enjoyed many good years of school with an enrollment of about 100 as our highest total.
Sid [Sidney Thomas] Hughes, who taught in 1908, was a Hendrix College graduate. Joe Cavin taught in 1909 and 1910. Ruth Hamilton taught the winter of 1908. My sister, Muriel Raney, taught five years before she married [Alf Hardin] in 1916. Orian Ray taught with her. Kennon Wilkerson, another woman graduate of State Normal College, taught in 1912. Rosa Pierce also taught. Mr. and Mrs. Warren were teaching there when I married in 1921.
A petition was circulated to break Providence School District into three smaller ones. The move was successful, and Jones Hill and Riverview came into being, all small schools with one teacher. Papa was unhappy about that and with good reason. It was all downhill with the schools after that. It was not long until none of them existed. When you take the school from a community, you take its heart away, and the community seldom continues with much vigor. Providence suffered that same fate and for all practical purposes ceased to exist as a community in the early 1930s following the loss of the school.
Providence Methodist Church
We missed Mr. Albert Mosley, but Mrs. Mosley and her daughter, Emma, kept the spiritual fires burning in our little [Methodist] church. Every one of the Raney children went to "Aunt Sophie's Card Class" at Sunday School. Miss Emma played the organ and swept and cleaned the old church building. We always had a clean place to worship. I remember her making a banner of yellow silk with felt letters spelling "PROVIDENCE." On Children's Day we would march and sing, and carry that banner, and say speeches, and have dinner on the ground. The Log Cabin Democrat reported that 700 people attended the Children's Day in 1911. That eventually grew into "singing." We had community singing school and learned to read music. The churches and others in the community bought organs. I learned to play by ear or note and often accompanied the singing. Papa was M.C. of the singing, all day on the first Sunday in July at Providence. Lollie had all-day singing on the second Sunday in June each year. Mr. Jim Glenn was the M.C. at Lollie as long as he lived there. There was a Baptist Church at Lollie. People from all over that part of the county came to these singing days, wherever they were held - Providence, Lollie, Flag Pond, Round Mountain, Nutter's Chapel, Mayflower, and others.
Both Frank Raney and Tom Griffin [a black farmer] reared large families. Mama would have a baby one year and Linda Griffin would have one the next year. We could hardly wait to see Linda's new baby. We really loved those colored folks. They were clean, honest and hard working; good neighbors. The Griffins had an orchard and bee hives. We also had an orchard but got our honey from Tom. Tom's kids were Arthur, Bertha, "Sis," Wade, Cora, Dave, and some younger ones I do not remember. Dave became a preacher. I remember when "Sis" married the oldest son of Reverend Salter, who up in the mountains north of us. Everyone in the area was invited to the wedding. There must have been 200 people there. It was like a Fourth of July picnic. Sis was all dressed up in a white dress and veil; he was dressed like a Kentucky Colonel. Reverend Salter married them at the front porch of their house. After the ceremony, the men lined up in a row on one side and all kissed the bride while the women lined up on the other side and kissed the groom. They served white coconut cake and lemonade to everyone there. It was quite an affair.
Mary Jane Hall was a colored widow who lived in Providence and had several daughters. I remember that Papa performed the ceremony when one of them got married. Once again we were all invited to the wedding and went to the house. Everyone crowded into that little two-room house for the wedding, and once again they served white coconut cake and lemonade to all there. That little two-room log house is still there in Providence near Troutman Chapel.
"Uncle Sam"
Some other black families in Providence were Bice, Johnson, Hall, Paul Jones, Grant, Blair (up in the hills behind the church, I think). Sam Shettles (Sam) was an old ex-slave who lived with us when we were on the Ingram Place. [the Frank Raney family moved from the H. B. Ingram farm in 1904]. He was 20 years old at the time of the emancipation. He never married. He thought I was the cutest little thing he had ever seen and would bring me presents when he would go to Little Rock or to a store somewhere else. One time he bought material for Mama to make me a dress. We really loved Uncle Sam. When we moved to the hills in Providence, Uncle Sam did not come with us but lived with Joe Troutman for years.
The blacks attended a little church about a mile away from our h01 Providence. They had a church bell and also a graveyard [Pleasant E cemetery, six miles west of Mayflower] at the church grounds. When their folks died, they rang that bell, maybe in the night, and we would say, “old Johnny died.” Johnny Johnson was one of our colored neighbors who had been sick and Papa had been helping take care of him. The blacks also had a little schoolhouse close by. My dad saw that they had a good teacher, plenty of wood and chalk, just as we had at the white school.
The general election was the only time the colored folks were allowed to vote. There were lots of them, and they came out of those river bottoms and hills by the wagon loads to vote. I am glad they can vote all of the time now. [All black citizens were not eligible to vote in the Democratic primary until World War II.] We worked with them, shared good and bad times with them and always got along. As the hill land around Providence began to wear out and erode away, coupled with floods in the bottoms driving the whites from living there, the blacks began to leave Providence and move to the bottoms, particularly the Little Farm [at Lollie]. Mr. [John E.] Little built them a and schoolhouse on the farm. The black church at Providence later burned. [The Pleasant Branch Baptist Church re-located to Conway in 1955.]
Faulkner Facts and Fiddlings
Volume XXXV, No. 3-4, Fall and Winter, 1993
Pages 27-32