From about 1952-58, my family lived in the tiny Coryell County town of Ogelsby.  The area was first settled in the 1850's, but, did not become a town until the year 1882.  That was when the Texas-St. Louis Railroad came through.  Ogelsby was at one time a thriving community with several churches, stores, it's own school, grist  mills and cotton gin.  By the time we moved there in the 1950's it had only about 300 people.  The downtown had become pretty much a street of empty buildings, except for the local grocery and the post office.  The cotton gin, however,  was still operating.  It was a small friendly community where everyone knew their neighbor and all their neighbors business. 
The first house we lived in there had belonged to my dad's Uncle Loyd and Aunt Nita Thompson.  We had a pump in the kitchen and an outhouse in the back yard.  ( Way out in the yard!!)  I remember bathing in a galvanized washtub in the kitchen ( filled from a kettle on the stove) and warming myself by the kitchen oven.  I loved that old stove.  It was one of those green and creme colored ranges with the oven on one side and the burners on the other.  Mom used to stand us on a chair in front of the open oven door to dress us.
We lived right up the hill from Great Grandpa Noah and Grandma Mary ( Moore) Thompson. She was always a blessing to me.  Such a lady, even if she did dip snuff, and she did!!  A tiny lady with long black hair, wound up and secured to her head with combs.  She would sit on a footstool and let her hair loose for me to brush.  It was so beautiful and smelled wonderful.  She caught rainwater to rinse her hair in.  That was before the days of creme rinse.
Grandpa Noah was a big man with a gruff voice and a bushy grey mustache that curled up on the ends. He kept the tips waxed and rolled them between his fingers. Grandpa was a man of few words. He was always kind to us.  I will admit I was always a little afraid of him.  He looked so big to such a little girl as myself.  I was always impressed by the way he could put his arm on the top of the refrigerator and lean on it. Of course, refrigerators were not all that big then, but to me they seemed awfully tall.
We were at their house in 1953  when a very bad tornado came through Coryell County.  It went on into Waco and did a lot of serious damage. ( Uncle Jack Shipman's first wife, Joyce (Meirs), was working in Waco that day and was killed when the building collapsed on her. )  Mom, my sister, myself and daddy's little brother, Uncle Robbie were at Grandma Mary's when the rain hit.  Grandma Mary, Grandpa Noah and Great Aunt Jennie ( grandma's sister) ran for the storm cellar.  They tried to get us to join them. I was all for that!  But mom wanted to go home.   We ran for home to get in our storm cellar!!  It was raining and blowing so hard we could hardly make it up the hill.  The dirt road was all mud.  My feet sunk in the mud so deep I screamed for mom to carry me.  She grabbed me by the arm and pulled me along behind her up the hill. ( I was to big for her to carry.)  The mud had sucked my shoes off my feet..  Uncle Robbie carrying my sister, mom pulling me , we struggled against the tornadic winds.  We finally made it to the storm cellar in our yard.  Mom and Rob were trying to hold the door closed.  Even with the bar across the door the wind pulled so hard it kept jerking them up in the air.  I was terrified.  Someone came to the door and began pounding and calling for us to open up the door.  That really scared me and I started to cry.  My little sister was clinging to me shaking so hard I thought she was about to come apart.  Mom opened the door and there stood Grandpa Jeff.  We were so glad to see someone big and strong.  He sat down on the stoop and held the door secure until the storm passed.  Our little town was mostly spared, but Waco, just 30 miles away was devastated.
I have many happy memories of Ogelsby.  It was in that old house, on a cold winter evening, that I first gave my heart to the Lord.  I was only five years old, but I remember it like it was yesterday.  We went to church in McGreagor at the Assembly of God.  Bro. Bob Whitworth was pastor.  I think we had been to church that night.  I remember laying in bed thinking about what Bro. Whitworth had said .  I began to realize it was not enough to be a good little girl who's parents knew God and went to church.  Everyone has to go to the Lord on their on and ask Him into their heart.  I climbed out of that big old iron bed I shared with my sister and knelt in my flannel gown by the bedside.  My forehead rested on the cotton mattress and my little nose touched the cold iron bedsprings.  I ask Jesus to be my Lord that night, and I have never been alone since.  Many times , were it not for Him, I would have been lost.  He has always  been there for me.