Dedicated to the Memory of

 Ethel Medlin Helms

 March 12, 1915 – February 2, 2000

From her loving family:

Pam and Rich Piazza, Eric, and Adrien,

Nola and Joe McCollum, Chris Cunningham, Andrea and Christine,

John and Crystal McCollum, Deborah Helms,

Gary and Libby Helms, Gari, Greg, and Glenna

Our family would like to express our deep appreciation to Jim Church and Olivia Benton for the constant friendship and support they gave to our Mother.

"One of my deepest regrets will always be that I did not finish this book in time for Mama to see and enjoy it."  -  Pam.

Foreword:

When Mama was a girl of 12, she submitted her first poem to the Peter Pan Club – “The Leaves”. Each week, one poem was chosen to win a grand prize of $1.00! In that time, $1.00was a lot of money, and as she submitted more and more poems, and then stories, she accumulated more and more prizes.

Each of the poems and stories here won the prize for that week, and was published in The Monroe Journal. I have copied these from original clippings from this newspaper, which she had saved in her scrapbook. She actually wrote and won prizes for several more of her poems and stories, which are not included because their pages were torn and could not be completely read. I told her this, and she said, “Oh, Pam, just make something up to end it!” Well, I did not have the gift or the courage to even try to make her story or poem end in a way that was not hers and hers alone. – Pam Piazza (3/11/2000)