...Pertaining to Easter

      On Easter Sunday in 1938, my father Richard V. Shields, Jr. of Pelahatchie, MS married my mother Erma Belle Paschal in Bessemer, AL.  My family believes that the derivation of the name Shields likely comes from the Scotch-Irish folk who probably were armorers.  We know that the definition of Paschal means pertaining to Easter, which made the choice of the wedding date for the bride most appropriate.

     The couple made their way to Moss Point, MS and became the parents of two sons.  In 1948, they added a daughter to the family and shortly before my sister’s  birth, my mother contracted Bell’s Palsy which effected the nerves on one side of her face. On Easter Sunday of that year, an aunt, my father’s sister, in Mobile, AL visited my mother and the new addition to the family and brought, as a gift, a rose bush.  We always referred to the rose as the Aunt Mary Rose, but years later an attempt to determine the correct name left us reasonably sure that it was a heirloom tea rose, cream in color, named the Paschal rose.  Pretty appropriate, don’t you think?  But, wait, there’s more.  The new daughter was named Lenore Paschal Shields.

     While the rose was not particularly outstanding when open in full bloom, the bud shapes and colors were perfect!  And the bush was prolific in putting out new plants from the root system.  We dug the new volunteer plants and shared them with friends and neighbors throughout the county and far beyond.  At one time, everyone in my neighborhood had one of these roses in their yard.

      But roses are somewhat like people.  Some just get old and die.  Others contract some malady.  And when Hurricane Katrina came in 2005 and covered the vast majority of the bushes with salt water…though only for a short while…it was the death knell for the Aunt Mary/Paschal rose.  We couldn’t find a single survivor.

     A few years ago, neighbors Joe and Sarah May found a small rose bush nestled in high weeds on one of the higher places on the boundary of their property. It should be noted that their property was ones of the most saturated by the storm.  They began to pamper the bush and feed it.  It survived and grew.

      Today is Easter Sunday, 2014…sixty-six years after the introduction of the rose to Moss Point.  As I got ready for church this morning, a visitor came to my door.  Sarah May.  And she had company.  On this Easter Sunday, the rose decided to open its first bloom.  Pertaining to Easter.  How cool is that?  I wore the rose on my lapel to church.

      I suppose that should be a sufficient way to end this story, but I had one more decision to make.  What should I do with the single bloom?  It didn’t take to much effort to make the correct…actually, the only possible decision.  I gave it to my granddaughter. Clare Paschal Baumhauer.

     But Easter is a special day and harbors other special memories.

     As and old friend and I were talking about the events of the Easter rose, I was reminded of yet another Easter Sunday tradition in Moss Point and many other cities and towns across the land.  The Easter sunrise service.

     There used to be two ways in which the communities around us celebrated the resurrection of Christ on Easter Sunday.  Neither of these ways paid homage to the pomp of the Easter parades and the clothing finery that usually accompanies the holiday where families, particularly the ladies, use the date as justification for buying new clothes for each family member and insure that all of the family is at church well before time for sermon and seated in as conspicuous a pew location as possible.  On this Sunday, they don’t mind taking seats much closer to the front of the church than they normally do.  This allows them a longer walk when they exit following the sermon.  Longer walks mean more exposure.  But this practice takes place several hours after sunrise.

     At sunrise, the first opportunity to recognize the celebration of the resurrection was to attend the service hosted by the Lutheran Church that was held at the old drive-in theater.  This was the way that my mother often began the day and her children were often with her.  I don’t remember my father attending this service but as an Elder in the Presbyterian Church, he was certain to be present at the regular eleven o’clock service.  Mama and the kids were not only excused from the need to dress for the occasion and usually attended in outfits that could hardly be considered finery.  They wore their pajamas.  The old station wagon slowly drove down the side street that bounded Jerry Lee’s Grocery and eased past the booth that would have been selling tickets had a movie been playing.  Mama would find one of the less conjested areas for parking  just in case someone  parked nearby actually cared to look and see what others were wearing.  This never seemed to matter much since the attendance was always pretty sparse and the fact that many of the speakers that we would take off of the poles and bring into our car to be hung from the driver’s window didn’t work and we had to move around to find one that functioned.  That done, the service would be held and the cars would leave the dusty parking lot and head home so that the kids could begin preparation for attending the regular morning services for their respective churches and the mothers could put the finishing touched on Easter dinners.

     Moss Point got its name because it is located on the confluence of the Pascagoula River and the Escatawpa River.  Hence, Moss Point adopted the marketing moniker, the River City.  My earliest memories of Easter sunrises were held on the bank of an offshoot of the Escatawpa that was located only a short distance from the City Hall.  There was a small sand bar that was located between stands of marsh grass and weeds that provided an adequate and comfortable location for worshipers to sit in their lawn chairs brought from home or to stand if they preferred.  And its location to the river provided the perfect angle to view a magnificent sunrise. 
For some reason, as the town changed, there were several years when the service was held about a mile and a half away on the banks of the Pascagoula river that towered a good six or eight feet above the river and provided more and better seating possibilities but far worse views of a sunrise to remember the Son rise.



     But my favorite and most vivid memory of Easter Sunrise Services was to be years later when, for some reason that I can’t recall, neither of the two locations were available.  We are talking about the 1960’s.  Canceling a church service was not an option.  Canceling an Easter service would have been a heresy.  But where could it be held?  The football stadium was suggested.  It faced the wrong direction, but no one had a better idea.  A person was selected to approach the school superintendent and get permission so that the location could be made official and communicated throughout the community.  And then the word came back. DENIED!

     Unbelievable!  But a rationale came back with the verdict.  The superintendent posited that if he should grant the request for usage and was later approached with a similar request for different and more controversial purposes, he would have no grounds for denial.  Therefore, he chose the policy that he would grant usage to no one.

     With Easter fast approaching and no viable alternative in sight, word of the denial filtered back to my mother who was in the early stages of her battle with a form of muscular dystrophy.  She never said a word to anyone.  Quietly, she shuffled to the telephone and called the office of the superintendent and asked for an appointment.  When asked the nature of her business, she replied, “it’s personal”.  Her appointment was scheduled for the following Tuesday. at two o’clock.

      The office was located one block from my mother’s house and directly across the street from the football stadium.  At five minute’s until two on a sunny Tuesday afternoon, Erma Shields, dressed in her plastic braces and pants suit, presented herself to the school secretary.  Being tardy was never an option for an old school teacher.  It was an option for the administrator who kept her waiting for almost a half hour before he had his secretary usher her in and offer her a seat.

     “Good afternoon, Mrs. Shields.  What can I do for you today?”

     “Actually, I’m here to do something for you.\

     “I don’t understand.

     “It’s my understanding that you denied a request to use the stadium for the sunrise service.  Is that correct?

     “It is.  I believe that this would open the door to many other requests that we would be unable to manage.

     “So that leads me to believe that you think you are empowered to grant or deny usage to the stadium.

     “As superintendent of the school, I do have that power and responsibility.

     “And that brings me to the purpose of my visit.  Perhaps you are unaware that the land on which the stadium is built was deeded by the Dantzler family, not to the school but  to the children of the city of Moss Point, with the provision that should they ever be denied access or usage, the land would revert back to the donors.  Is that your intention?  Because if it is, I’m certainly willing to help you publicize your intention.”

     In the next few weeks, two things happened.  One was an accelerated effort on the part of several lawyers, working with the heirs of the Dantzler family, to negotiate revisions to the language of the gift that would grant control over the stadium to the school administration.  The second was that on a beautiful Easter morning, the sun rose directly behind several hundred worshipers seated in the bleachers of the stadium named after L. N. Dantzler I.
 
     And my mother smiled and said no more about it.

     And that’s the way I’ll remember it.