Dr. Ida Stapleton and Rev. Robert Stapleton
Line Fork 1927 – 1947

Stapleton Report – June 1927
“The Doctor was visiting A________ at whose husband’s home ‘The shootin up’ occurred ,,,”

[Gallery of images is not available at this time.]

TRANSCRIPTION:

THE CABIN.

LINE FORK SETTLEMENT.                                                        JUNE 1927.

The Doctor was visiting Alta Lewis Cornett at whose husband’s home “The shootin up” occurred last Fall when we first came down.

She had been up to the Cabin for some baby clothes and rather hoped she might have the Doctor for her assistance at the coming baby party. But she didn’t know what the outcome would be, so when I found Granny Shepherd in attendance I knew how it had been settled. You see they can get her a week or two beforehand and that relieves all anxiety they may have about being alone at the time. Grannie was inclined to talk so I learned a good deal about her career as a midwife.

She began when she was eighteen when her own first baby was a year old. A neighbor was in need of help so “I just did fer her what had been done fer me and little by little I learned more from experience — and I read The Granny Books. I had fourteen babies of my own, several dying in early infancy and I’ve always been glad they died — for see what an awful wicked world this is. Yes, only three lived to grow up and I live with one of my sons — and I have twenty grand children. I always had a doctor to care for me except once when I was alone. Yes, this will be the 1070th baby I have “picked out,” she said.

It was an astonishing statement but it may well be true as she has been doing it for forty-nine years. From all these she had “laid out” but four babies and two mothers. She used some other expressions in telling the fact but I can’t recall it.

She told with pride how a certain doctor had said “If Granny Shepherd gives you up, nobody else can do anything.” Several times the Grannies of several counties had been called to a certain center for an examination as to their fitness and she said “I have a diploma to practice any where in Kentucky. Once we were called and I did not go as I had a woman who needed me and I sent word if they wanted to see me they could come where I was and sure ’nuff one came and saw me caring for that woman and she reasoned I was doing all right.”

One thing, she does not do any after nursing. Recently I called at one of the less favored cabins — a real old log one — where the eighth baby had just arrived a few days previously. The mother was lying across the bed with Jimmy the next in size. He had just awakened from a nap and it was quite evident he had been put to bed without any cleaning up and the flies were swarming over every thing. The “least-one” was covered by a diaper that kept the air as well as the flies out. When Jimmy saw the baby first he called her Dolly — but no name has yet been selected. Little Betty Jane then came in hugging a much battered dolly and I asked her what she was going to call little sister. She replied with the sweetest smile — and she is a very attractive four year old — “I call her ‘Sweet Thing'”.

I urged the mother to take time to get well and strong and she said, “Yes, I don’t aim to do nothing until feel good and stout. I stripped and bathed the baby today (the fourth day) and that about tuckered me out.”

The baby was small but has a wealth of hair (dark) and only nurses three times a day. She said “Sometimes I’m afeard hits sleeping too long.”

I shall get a basket bed for it as soon as possible and also netting. It is a lovely sweet thing.

[signed] Ida S. Stapleton
– The Doctor.

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