I pray that you will bear with me today as I have something that I would like to share. As you can see it is quite lengthy but this is a story that left me broken but yet inspired. Perhaps you will better understand the reason for my posting at the end.
I was intrigued by the photograph, "Migrant Mother", and started “googling” to get a better understanding of its origin. The picture is the face of a 32-year old woman, which reflects the pain and misery of a life filled with hardship and heartache. Yet, on the other hand, it is the face of a brave woman.
Florence Owens Thompson came from Oklahoma to California in December 1923. She, her husband and three children arrived in Shafter CA on New Years Eve 1924. Her first house was small and in poor condition; however, she saw in it a promise of living the American dream. Her husband Cleo was a frail man who had suffered a near death fight with pneumonia at age 21 which had left his lungs weak and a target to any germ but his determination to support his family overrode his health condition. In 1925 Florence and Cleo moved to Porterville where he and his brothers found good jobs at good wages in the sawmill. Later they would move north to Oroville to work in the mill there - that mill burnt down in 1927, and once again they moved. This time to Merced Falls, a place which consisted of 5-6 streets, a store and a school. The people were kind and caring, and life was good. September 1929, Florence gave birth to the fifth of her 10 children; shortly thereafter came the Wall Street Crash, followed by the Great Depression. The mill shut down in 1931, with Cleo losing his job. Since there was no other work, it meant moving to join the migrant workers laboring in California’s fields and orchards.
Their migration was back to Oroville where Cleo joined his sisters and brothers in the fields. All the families shared a little cabin that had no indoor plumbing so each evening it was off to the Feather River to clean off the day's dirt and grim. One night Cleo began feeling ill after picking peaches that day in the orchards. It was hot and hard for him to breathe inside the cabin so he moved outside onto a cot on the porch. By the next morning, he had a high fever. Florence nursed him as best she could for there was no money for doctors or medicine. On the fourth night he and Florence talked way into the morning, then she kissed him and went into the cabin. The next morning Cleo, age 32, was gone. He was buried in Oroville in an unmarked pauper's grave. That same afternoon, his family met to discuss what to do and who would take what child of Cleo's to raise. Florence waited outside as the family made their choices. Then they came outside to tell Florence their decisions but Florence spoke first: "I know what you want to do, but it's not right and I'm not going to let you, any of you take Cleo's kids. I made a promise to Cleo to see his kids raised, and I'm going to keep that promise." Cleo's sister argued that they only wanted to help - to relieve her of the burden of trying to raise the children by herself. Florence said, "Then help me. Be my sisters and my brothers. Be the uncles and the aunts they need. But I'm their mother and they'll stay with me."
During the next two years, Florence stayed near Oroville while the family followed the crops. In winter 1933, Florence told the family she was expecting. The family was in a uproar and her refusing to tell the father’s name, went to her mother’s in Oklahoma along with her six children to have the baby. She returned to California the following year with the children, less the sick baby which she left with her mother. She joined migrant workers in the San Joaquin valley - going from one town and field to another, from one camp to the next.
In 1935, Jim Hill joined the family and cared for Florence and her children. The next year, they headed to harvest the pea crops around Nipomo. As they got close to the camp, the car which was already overheated lost its water pump, and they barely coasted into the camp only to find out that a freak cold snap had killed the peas the night before so there would be no work. Everyone that could, had left the camp. Needing to get the car fixed so they could travel on, Florence’s 9-year son accidentally put a screwdriver through the radiator while removing the water pump. Jim and Troy left the next morning to find car parts with what little money they had. The same day Florence was moved to a different camp a mile or so away. This camp was on sandy soil rather than the adobe soil of the first camp but the car couldn’t be moved so Florence left a message with the people who remained in the first camp to tell Jim and Troy, when they returned, where she was.
Florence sat up her tent at the entrance to the new camp because she didn't want Jim and Troy to miss her. Setting up camp in that spot meant a long walk to get water and she would be in danger if the camp was attacked, but it was where she wanted to wait. How long she sat there is unknown. I wonder if her mind traveled to the past, of promises lost and broken. Perhaps she thought of what was in store for the infant in her arms or her young girls. Perhaps her thoughts were on Cleo, and his unfulfilled dreams. Soon reality struck when her son and Jim didn’t return. She sold a tent to buy food, lived on frozen vegetables from the fields, and birds her children killed. She even sold the tires off their old car to survive. There’s where Dorthea Lange came into the picture. Lange was working for the Farm Security Administration, documenting the plight of the migrant worker. She took pictures, with Florence’s permission, by promising they would never be published. However, the very next day the promise was broken, and Florence's picture was front-page news (revealing the hunger/needs of camp people). Florence's oldest son was living with Uncle Bill in Shafter, and selling newspapers. When he picked up the day's papers to sell, he saw his mother's picture. He ran to his uncle who quickly got in his car and headed off to rescue Florence. (Within three days after the publication, cars and trucks arrived at migrant camps with food and supplies. People were fed, given clothing and helped with car repairs. Doctors cared for the sick and weak. Many received jobs. It was a miracle of love and giving.)
Now, here’s why I told this story. It is, in part, a parallel to God’s church. We wait as Florence waited but for a different ending. In our walk with the Lord, we suffer afflictions, we are bruised/wounded, we hunger, we thirst, we have an enemy that tries to take our children, and we travel the roads of despair and heartache. We have set our tent, visible for all to see, in the hopes that our Loved One will see us when He returns. I just believe that if we hold on and wait at life’s gate, someday He will come walking down the road. It is then that we will be safe, rescued from the happenings of life, and our American Dream (which is Heaven) will be recognized as we walk on streets of gold and behold the mansion He has promised us.
"Oh, this old world is not my home, I'm just a passing through..."
Quit complaining!!
