Let my father tell you a story

February 4, 2025

Let me give you the setting for the telling of this story. My daughters and I and my parents were in their “summer kitchen” in Americus, Georgia. Think hot summer evening! We had just finished our supper which was probably fried catfish and hushpuppies, and maybe some ladyfinger peas from my dad’s garden. I took out my small recorder and laid it on the table. I asked my dad some questions—and he told stories. When I returned home, I transcribed the stories and, hence, we have this story in his own words.

One of my favorite pictures of the Summer Kitchen. Daddy with his coffee buddies.

School Principal in Bellville

by Frank Kirkland

I dropped out of Mercer [University] for a year to get out of debt. [He did return to Mercer when he had a family of six and a full-time pastorate. He persevered and went on to get his seminary degree when I was a junior in high school.]

I got to preaching in Meldrum once a month down there—it was a quarter-time church. We rented a little ole house. Then, a half-time church up near Pembroke called me and I was preaching only three Sundays a month—and teaching school. This is how that played out.

I was going into Savannah to see about finding a job and took you and Clay [my twin brother] to my folks and your mother so I could go to Savannah.

Daddy said—now this was Saturday afternoon: “Let’s go see if we can see Durbens.”

What was his first name?

Mother: “Clarence.”

Might have been Clarence. Well, anyway, we went down to Claxton and that’s when everybody went to town, it was Saturday afternoon—visitation time. And here was Mr. Durbens, just there, visiting like everybody else. And Daddy introduced him to me. He was the county school superintendent. Daddy said, “We’ve swapped teachers.” Daddy was on the local school board in Tatnall County, and this was Avans County. He said: “We’ve swapped teachers. Let’s just go see if he has something.” So, he introduced me and said: “He’s got three years at Mercer. We just came to see if you maybe needed a teacher.”

He said: “No, Mr. Walter, I don’t, but I need a principal out at Bellville.” A principal!

Claire: “And how old were you then, like 21?”

I think so.

Rebecca: “Oh my gosh! 21 and a principal?”

The plan was that the principal was in charge of everything—the lunchroom and the meals and everything. But worst of all, he taught math and had 8 th and 9 th grades together and was the homeroom teacher for them. [The war had just ended and there was a shortage of men in the work force.]

Claire: “Did he give you the job on the spot?”

On the spot!

Mother: “That was Saturday, and he went to work Monday. “

He said planning week starts Monday. I’ll take you up there and introduce you to the teachers and you can take off and move during that first week. Now can you imagine this? The teachers are all there waiting for him to come and they come up there and he introduces me, and he goes out. That’s it. And I panicked, almost, but I thought of: “Why not show me around the building?” Well, I hadn’t seen around the building so that was pretty logical. So, I know what they must have said when they got together. “You know, that kid doesn’t know anything.” They showed me over the building, and I was thinking all this time: “What do I do next?”

I said: “Well, I know all of you have plans to make so I’m going back up here to the office.” It was a mess. I impressed them because I cleaned up the mess. The former principal had some problems, and I don’t think they were all of his making, but I think he just kind of walked out in disgust. Anyway, I threw away a bunch of stuff that I imagine ought to have been kept, but they were impressed. But I had that math hanging over me. I thought: “I’ll never handle that.” Well, I found out that the 7 th grade teacher had been—get this—principal of a bigger school than this several years back. She could have given me all kinds of grief. But we made a deal. I’ll take the 7 th grade English if you’ll take the math and she was a math major in college, and, oh, that saved me

Mother: “And guess who kept the records and planned the meals for lunchroom? Take the money, figure up how much money it was and take care of it and add it up at the end of the lunch and turn it in?”

[The end]

I love this story of Daddy getting the job just when he needed it and Mother assisting him with the lunchroom duties. I typed it so my family could be reminded that there is Someone looking out for us just when we need it.