Wednesday, November 18, 2009

Celebration in Shreveport, Louisiana

The Louisiana Arts Council for several Louisiana districts held a Celebration of the 80th Anniversay of the Great Depression at the Artspace Center, Shreveport, Louisiana. Mother and I were honored to be invited to be speakers at this celebration on Nov. 14th. Mama was unable to attend, but Aunt Sue and Suzanne went with me to Shreveport that beautiful sunny Saturday. We did some shopping on the way and got into Shreveport about 1:00 but had a little trouble finding the Artspace Center. As it turned out we had been passing it by on Texas Street several times in our search but the building was not marked well enough to see the name on the front of the building.

When we got our table set up with books ready to sell, we joined the group of authors and speakers there for the program. It was very interesting to hear about other people's books and their lives or the subjects about which they wrote, many including people or times during the Great Depression. After I gave a review of our book "Sharecropping in North Louisiana: A Family's Struggle Through the Great Depression," Aunt Sue read the chapter about the Flood of 1927 and shared with the group mama's oil painting of the syrup mill. A fun time was had by all.

Friday, November 6, 2009

November book events attended

This week has been a busy one for me and Mama as we traveled to book events in Louisiana and Arkansas. Wednesday morning we drove to Minden, LA, and met with the library staff there and talked about our book and signed them afterwards.

That afternoon we drove to Jonesboro, LA, where we had a room full of ladies who listened to us read from the book and then asked questions of us about mama's growing-up years. It was a wonderful time had by all...refreshments included. Thank you to the ladies at both libraries who hosted those events.

Friday, Nov. 6th, we drove to Magnolia, AR, to the Columbia County Library and spoke to a room full of students from the area schools. There were 4th graders, 5th graders and 6th graders in attendance as well as a number of adults. The room was full and the questions were wonderful. The students listened to us read from the book, then questioned us about the way mama and her family lived during the 20s, 30s and 40s. We sure had a nice time there. Thank you Laura, Dana and Dennis. You were perfect host and hostesses.