LETTER FROM JACK EDWARDS, WALLACE'S SON

Interesting how small the world really is. When I got out of
the Navy in 1967 I went to work for Warren Parker in
Lakeside, CA. driving a truck and hauling hay from the
Imperial Valley to the many dairies in the Lakeside-Santee
area. I know only what I have been told , most of the
family as I grew up in California away from most of them.
Had almost no contact with my family, sometimes I think I
really missed something, but then here we are.

My mother and father, Wallace (Mutt) Edwards and Audrey
Wardlow were married ( I think) in Parkin, Arkansas. I was
told they tried to be share croppers but couldn't even grow a
weed.( not that kind). My dad did a little professional boxing
to make a buck now and then (don't know how he made out,
not quite as well as Ali). My sister Carolyn was born in
Arkansas, folks moved to California when she was still a baby.

Uncle Walter, my dad and Pete's brother, and his wife Reba were
in Imperial Valley, Brawley, I think, so my folks moved out
there to find work. Aunt Reba tells me they mostly drove tractors
in the farming industry, no one really had an education to speak
of, nor any specific skills. In those days, people took whatever
work they could find for whatever wages the employer would
pay, take it or leave it. The whole country was starving and out
of work, tough times for all.

It was quite an adventure for them to leave home, Arkansas
or wherever, and start out for California, having no idea what
they were going to find. Uncle Jake ( Wilton) and his wife
Bea were in the Valley also. They had a few kids, don't know where
they are, maybe still in the Imperial Valley. I think the Aunt's
and Uncle's that migrated the other directions fared a little
better??

My Uncle Buck( John Vernon Wardlow), on my mothers side,
and Aunt Rea (Marie) moved back and forth, Arkansas to California
and back again, a few times. I can remember when people asked
how he found his way, he said: Follow the rabbits hide outs, Arkansas
to California, and the orange peeling's back. Never understood
what he meant until I was older.

Myself and my brother"Bit" Paul were both born in Brawley, we were
quite young, pre-school, when my dad met Barbara Ransdell and
left us. He moved to ElPaso and then on to Tyler, Texas to avoid with
having to deal with supporting us. Barbara had two kids of her own
that he took on instead of us, and as he was a service station
attendant in those days, I'm sure his finances were spread
pretty thin.

We,( me, Carolyn, Bit and my mom) moved to Long
Beach, CA and married a sailor. I think getting married was the
only way my mother had of taking care of us kids, tried it five times,
but, as I said earlier here we are. I think I went to a different school
every year up to high school. Quit school and joined the Navy Sept.
1963.

Had several jobs and a couple businesses since then, these days
I golf( not too well lately), bass fish and ride my Harley, while trying
to do a better job raising my grand- daughter that I did my kids. We
(my wife Sue and Alicia (my grand-daughter) usually travel in the
summer when school is out, but then we are on the school schedule
and stay home here in Glendale, AZ

Your long lost ? Second cousin ?
Jack Edwards