The Old Denham Place

Pictured: Alice Easterly Roberts in front of the old Denham house, 2008.

By Alice Monica Easterly Roberts
    John Caston Denham was born on March 6, 1874.  Monica Belle Sommers was born about 1877.  John and Monica were married in March of 1897. While courting, he and Monica were both members of the Bethel Methodist Church.  Sitting in the front pew, John said he could always tell when Monica entered the church.  She walked fast and her high heeled shoes were loud on the wooden floors.  He dared not turn around and look.  “Indeed, it was impolite,” he said.  
    Besides being employed at ESSO Standard Oil, John was a carpenter, brick layer, pipe fitter, and machinist.  He received a special commendation at Harding Field (Ryan) Airport in Baton Rouge during World War II from the Army for the performance of his duties there.  He was the oldest employee at the field during those years.
    John built the Denham home on Deerford Road for his new bride.  All five of their children were born there.  There were three daughters: Vivian, Alice (my mother), and Dorothy; and two sons: Glenn and Julius.  
    As I recall, the old home was nicely furnished.  There were three bedrooms, living and dining rooms, kitchen, breakfast nook, hall, proposed bathroom and two porches.  An inviting porch swing hung from the wrap around front porch. 
    Vivian, the oldest child, died of tuberculosis at age 29 in 1925.  Vivian played a pump organ that was to forever remain silent after her death.  The original price of the organ when new was $8.00.  Kerosene lamps sat on round posts on each side of the organ.  Unfortunately, mice ruined the old organ, as I discovered on a return trip to the home in the 1960’s. 
    Kitty-cornered in the same room as the organ was an iron tester bed with mosquito netting and half canopy.  It was the front bedroom.  The middle bedroom had a large, very dark wood four poster bed with a full red canopy with ball fringe trim.  It was high off the floor and a bit of a climb for a young child.  I was afraid of the bed and have foggy memories of sleeping in it.  
    The only storage in the kitchen was a large pie safe that John built and painted a dark green.  Ornate designs were made with nail holes in metal panels on each side of the safe and on the doors.  There was water in the kitchen, piped in from an outdoor cistern.  No other plumbing was in the home.  The small bathroom had only a wash stand and chamber pot.  
    When I was a child, the breakfast nook was a really fun place to play, as well as eat.  Many were the delicious home cooked meals served on the round oak table with matching chairs and buffet in the dining room.  Like most southern homes, the yard had pecan trees, crape myrtles, various kinds of flowers, and butterflies in abundance.
    John had a detached garage for his 1931 Model A Ford.  His hound dog travelled with him everywhere he went.   Occasionally, he would take my brother Arno to spend a week with him at the old country home.  The dog sat on the front seat with our grandfather.  Arno sat on the back seat.  
    Arno said, and I quote, “My father, Arno Senior, and I were driving by the place one Thanksgiving Day, when most were not working, but enjoying the holiday.  Grandpa was in the field harvesting corn.  He had a horse that pulled a sled between the rows.  He was pulling the corn by hand, and allowed me to try pulling an ear, but I couldn’t break it from the stalk.  Daddy tried, but had difficulty pulling just one ear.  Grandpa, however, made it look easy as he quickly snapped each ear from the stalk and threw it into the sled.”
    My trips to the old home slowed down after my grandparents passed away.  When I was 12, my family moved west of the Mississippi.  It was too far away for frequent visits.  When I returned, I was married.  By then the property belonged to Julius Denham.  Nothing was the same.  The gravel roads through the long and lonely wooded areas that lead to the old home were now paved, and the traffic was heavy and fast.  Due to logging and many new homes, most of the wooded sections were open land.
    When I think of my most precious, late mother, Alice Denham Easterly, and her commitment to Christ, I think how she led her children into a far greater, everlasting inheritance (the old home was torn down this year –ed.).  Her favorite Bible passage was John 14: 2-3, “In My Father’s house are many mansions; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you.  And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you unto Myself; that where I am, there you may be also.” That promise has already been fulfilled for her, two of her children, and our Daddy.  To be joint heirs with Christ is an inheritance for eternity and is the only one worth living for. My inheritance, my peace, our family circle, will be unbroken.