a note from John:
Judy Reagan sent me a collection of vignettes tracing the history and friendship between her family and the Coffey family. This posting is the second of three in the series. Click here to read the first vignette and learn more of the backstory.
Margaretta brings Hazel to Big Spring
Margaretta had met “Coffey” (as everyone called John Askew) at Baylor, and they married and moved to Big Spring for school jobs after graduation. They convinced Hazel to travel by train to Big Spring in 1929 in order to work in the lab at Bivings and Barcus Hospital (later Malone-Hogan Hospital). Our mom had completed the requirements to become a medical laboratory technician (Texas license #27, if memory serves). After living some time in Big Spring and then in Lubbock, Hazel met our dad, Horace Burney Reagan, the son of early Big Spring settlers, and they married in 1931, making their home in Big Spring.
Support Group
Long before the term “support group” was fashioned, the Coffeys and the Reagans were faithful friends to one another through all the changes in their lives.
For years, the Coffeys and the Reagans lived just a few blocks apart in Big Spring. One of the really touching stories in the Reagan family history is the help Margaretta gave our family when we were quarantined in 1949 after Frances developed polio.
Despite the quarantine and the universal fear of that virus, Margaretta’s faithfulness and friendship led her to do all of our family’s laundry during the quarantine. The bundles were passed back and forth through our window, then Margaretta must have taken them to a laundromat and used the now-primitive (then-luxurious) mangle washers and now-primitive (then luxurious) hand wringers to complete our family’s task in addition to doing her own family’s laundry.
Gobble and Wobble
Several neighboring West Texas couples (the Coffeys, the Reagans, Sherman & Ila Smith—all of Big Spring, and Phil & Zelma Berry of Stanton, plus at one point Ira & Lillian Williams and Fay & Hilma Harding) formed their small dinner club, named (doubtless by Margaretta) as “Gobble & Wobble”.
For decades, these couples gathered with their most delicious covered dishes, stuffed themselves and visited, laughed and cried and worried and always supported one another. From time to time, their growing children attended these events, the kids ranging in age from Bob Tom Coffey as the eldest through Ross Reagan as the youngest.
In various configurations, these families occasionally took trips or vacations or hunting trips together. Ross remembers at least one deer hunting trip with Coffey as one of the hunters.
“Famous” Sayings
Our parents repeatedly quoted Margaretta. As a little girl, Judy (whose expected birth was to be on Margaretta’s birthday—but was delayed a bit) thought our family must be famous to know such a funny person. One statement frequently quoted was “That is the most important odor I ever odored.” In our childhood this was usually said by our dad to comment on one of the numerous skunk odors we encountered in West Texas.
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