The year was 1930, and in an era where very few women had any college education, Olive walked across the stage and received her master's in divinity. She had worked hard for this moment, and had dreams of working full time as a minister.
Life, however, set her on a different course, as she fell in love with a veteran and settled down with him in rural Indiana to raise a family. A year later, their first child, a daughter, was born, and they would have four more in the span of the next 13 years. She raised her daughters to be independent women, yet not so much so as to alienate the significant others in their lives, and she raised her children with a firm faith in Christ and an emphasis on the importance of a quality education. She helped work the magic of the Indiana clay, and bring up the rich golden ears of corn that were the family's bread and butter. She battled the epilepsy that tore her body apart from time to time and tragically cosst her the life of one of her children who died when she seized in the middle of the night and rolled over on him.
When I knew her, she was bent and grey, but the wisdom was unmistakable. She was a gentle woman, a balance to her husband's harshness, a leader and a feminist in every true sense of the word.
She was my grandmother, and my youngest bears her name.
signing off,
Gideon MacLeish