My Granddad McEntire

His full name was, Aubrey Huston McEntire, but everyone called him Arb. I remember most of the McEntire's could play some kind of instrutment and Granddad McEntire told me that to be a McEntire you had to play music or be able to jig. So, I guess I'm a jigger because I can't carry a tune in a washtub.

I remember shortly after moving to the farm near Reydon, Oklahoma, that Dad and Granddad were working on the roof of the old house. It had a flat area right at the top that was leaking and they decided to reframe and bring the roof to a peak before re-roofing. Granddad was up in the attic of the house, and Dad was on the roof, when Granddad slipped off a rafter and fell through the old plastered living room cealing feet first. He caught himself on the rafter and it didn't hurt him, but I sure learned some new words that day.

Granddad and I got along really good. When I'd mess up and Dad would chew me out, Granddad would usually later tell me a story about Dad doing the same thing when he was a kid. Granddad told me a lot of family history simply because I was interested and would listen. He told me of two half brothers walking from North Georgia after the War Between The States and settling near Decatur, Texas. One of the brothers was my Granddad's granddad, making him my great, great Granddad. My great Granddad and Granddad was born and raised in the Red River area of North Texas. Great Granddad later made the land-run and homesteaded in Western Oklahoma.

I remember trying to talk and walk like Granddad as he was one of my heroes. He told me stories of working on ranches at an early age and gave me a lot of advice on different subjects. He would say, "Now, Doran, if you ever get in that kind of situation here's what you do, don't you see?" And I'm sure that in my world travels and working with people from different parts of the world I fell back on his wisdom more than I'll ever know.

This picture is of my great Granddad and Grandma Bearden. (Martha Melvina Wilson/Bearden and John Jacob Bearden). The small girl is my Grandma McEntire who married Aubrey Houston McEntire. The boy is my great Uncle Simp Bearden. Two other children, born later, are Uncle Walter and Aunt Lillie.

Grandma Martha Emeline Beardon/McEntire

Grandma was born in Fannin County, Texas, and came to Oklahoma as a small girl when her parents homesteaded in Old Day County. Day Country was later split up and became part of Roger Mills and Ellis County.

This story was related by my Grandma McEntire. Great Grandad Bearden was from a good family in East Texas, by all accounts he was red-headed and somewhat high tempered. Grandma remember being at an all-day picnic in Day County when a friend of her fathers was shot and killed by a rancher. She remembered her Mamma (Mattie) chasing after her father and begging him not to get his pistol, but he did and later shot and killed the rancher. This was in the early 1900's and law enforcement was growing stronger (even in Oklahoma territory). He was sentenced for a short stay in Oklahoma Territorial Prison, but died of pneumonia while there.

Grandma's youngest brother, Uncle Walter, was well liked by all the family. As a young man, he fell out of a wooden, oil derrick near Borger, Texas, and was broken up pretty bad. He later took the outlaw path and was sentenced to Alcatraz, where he was stabbed with a home-made knife and was later transfered from The Rock to a prison hospital in Springfield, Missouri, where he died.

Grandma's other brother, Uncle Simpson Bearden, became a succesful farmer and was well thought of in his community. He was a Mason and a church goer. I remember when he was elderly, he lost a leg due to diabetes. They didn't recommend anyone his age getting a wooden leg, but he demanded it and learned to walk on it. Later, he lost his other leg to the same disease. I'll always remember his determination and spirit. He had looked forward to Oklahoma having a deer season for so long that he was determined to make that first season's hunt. I remember Dad and one of my Uncle's (Elmer Harrison) strapping Uncle Simp's wheelchair in the bed of Uncle Elmer's old, green, Chevy pickup and parking it in a tree row in some brush. Uncle Simp sat for hours but didn't get a shot.

Grandma McEntire's mother, Mattie, remarried to a man named Bob Whinery and they produced a son, Uncle Dick Whinery and two grandsons. One became a doctor and the other an undertaker, we used to joke about one getting you when you came and the other when you went.

Grandma had a lot of heartbreak in her life and this surely accounts for her strong faith in Christ. My early memories center around huge family meals cooked on a wood stove and when she wasn't working or visiting with family, she would be reading her bible or praying for her children and grandchildren. I'm sure a lot of her prayers were fruitful.

I remember as a small boy, telling her the old joke about St. Peter tellng a new arrival in heaven to please be quite as they neared the Church of Christ bretheren because they thought they were the only ones in heaven. Grandma, though a devout Church of Christ member, laughed with me.

Marrying into the rowdy McEntire clan (most Baptist and musicians) must have been quite a trial for her. Grandma had twelve children and three died as infants. All her nine surviving children loved her deeply and shared her faith. Some have gone on to be with her in heaven, as we all will in God's time, Amen.