Ancestor Archives: Nancy Jane Roark (1889-1953) Part One:

by Rocky Macy

(Special Note:   I wrote the following sketch of the life of my maternal grandmother, Nancy Jane “Siss” (ROARK) SREAVES on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of her birth, May 18th, 1989.  At that time it ran in my weekly genealogy column, “Rootbound in the Hills” which was running in several newspapers in southwest Missouri, northeast Oklahoma, and northwest Arkansas.  It is being repeated here today as it originally ran in 1989.  Tomorrow a more detailed profile of my grandmother will run in this same space.)

Nancy Jane “Siss” ROARK:

One of the rewarding aspects of writing this column is having the opportunity to occasionally digress through my own family history.  It is a pleasure and a privilege to be able to highlight the lives of my forebears who did so much, often in quiet ways, for their friends and neighbors and family.

Last October “Rootbound” carried a special remembrance of my grandfather, Dan SREAVES of Seneca, on what would have been his one hundredth birthday.  Now, a scant six months later, comes another family milestone - for it was a century ago this week that “Siss,” Dan’s wife and the center of his life, came into this world.

Nancy Jane “Siss” ROARK was born to Samuel James and Nancy Anthaline (SCABROUGH) ROARK in McDonald County, Missouri, on May 18th, 1889, the middle child of a family of nine.  Though probably sharing the same dreams that many children have of travel and adventure, she and most of her brothers and sisters were destined to spend their lives in the Missouri Ozarks.

Siss met Dan sometime in the early part of the twentieth century.  The couple married in McDonald County on March 12th, 1913, and settled down to the quiet rigors of farm life on a place just south of the Newton County line.  Their married life was happy, lasting nearly forty years and producing seven fine children.

Although life on the farm was agreeable with Siss, early on she showed a preference for indoor work.  Embroidery was one of her specialities, as was cooking.  Siss prepared a big country breakfast and dinner (lunch) each day.  In fact, the first two meals of the day were generally so large that there were sufficient leftovers to take care of supper.

When Siss did work outside, she could often be found in her garden, an attractive mixture of flowers and vegetables.  She was proud of her dahlias, and equally pleased with the fact that much of the family’s food supply was homegrown.  And Siss had definite ideas on when to plant.  The seeds needed to go in the ground on specific days, regardless of the weather or her husband’s friendly advice to the contrary.

Siss SREAVES was a very religious woman and a good neighbor.  She served as a midwife, helping in insure that her friends’ children entered the world as safely as possible.  The SREAVES table was always available to others, especially after church on Sunday when the children took it for granted that their parents would bring home guests for the noon meal.  

It was on a Sunday after church in the late 1930’s when Siss organized one of the biggest parties that the folks on Swars Prairie had ever witnessed.  She and her daughters had picked blackberries that spring to earn money for a very special gift for Dan’s birthday.  They took their secret “pin money” and used it to have an enlargement made of a small photograph of Dan’s mother.

When Dan’s birthday rolled around that October, Siss and the kids were ready!  Using some false pretense, she kept Dan at church after Sunday morning services were over, allowing everyone in the community time to gather at the SREAVES home.  And gather they did!  There are still people around who relate with amazement the stories of all the many neighbors that were assembled to celebrate Dan’s birthday.  The feasting and good times lasted well into the evening.

Siss started suffering mild strokes in the 1930’s soon after he last child was born.  But being the tenacious farm woman that she was, Siss held onto life for another twenty years.  Though often ill, she was able to see each of her children through to maturity, and she had the opportunity to know many of her grandchildren.

I was just shy of being five-years-old when Siss SREAVES passed away in 1953.  And though my memories of the time preceding her death are few and faded, I can still see my grandmother, quiet and caring, sitting down at a family gathering to share a piece of pie with her little grandson.  We ate with our hands (perhaps the table service had already been packed away), and shared a moment - a moment that has stayed with me as a subtle and enduring reminder of a gentle woman who spent a lifetime caring for others.  

It is a legacy that I treasure.