Old times there are not forgotten, but the numbers of the schoolmates from Valley School are dwindling, Dean Blakely said during the annual "Valley Day" reunion held Saturday at the Carrollton Community House.
There are still more than the 49 who showed up for Saturday's love-fest, however. The school building that was atop Valley Hill east of Avalon, is no more, given way to private housing. Memories linger.
Katherine Goss McCaleb of Greenwood, 94, was again the oldest member of the reunion. Houston Campbell of the Valley or Mt. Pisgah community, nipped her heels at 93.
Gail Rico McKnight came with her husband, Alfred "Mac" McKnight. McKnight is from the Delta originally, while Gail is a native Carroll Countian. "I was a member of the last graduating class at Valley, 1967," she said.
After the school closed due to consolidation, students still enrolled went to other area schools to continue their education.
Memorabilia of the school's glory days was displayed, and there were conversations about old times aplenty, as well as a buffet meal and singing, along with spirited music from the keyboard of Valley alum Sue Duke.
Cousins Alice Faye Goss Minyard, 79, and McCaleb shared memories of "making do" with recipes as they were growing up during hard times, when staples meant corn bread and biscuits as well as chocolate syrup and molasses their mothers created in the kitchen, not from sorghum or sugar cane.
There was little of that "store bought food" all around -- as a matter of fact, some of the school buses were also rigged or homemade, but that's another story for another day.
Minyard said her mother would take sugar and brown it in home-churned butter in a skillet, then add water and cook to the consistency desired. That would be the home made molasses, devoured over homemade biscuits or pancakes. The same method was used for making chocolate syrup.
"Mama" was Cecil McDaniel Goss, said Minyard, who lives in Greenwood these days.
She also told of the time her mother sent her and the other children to spend the night at an uncle's house. They walked home the next day in the snow to "find a new baby brother," she said. That was Merle Travis Goss.
Mattie Sansing Mims, who, along with brother the Bro. Joseph Sansing, ramrodded Valley Day, presented McCaleb an cleverly designed cross as her "oldest member of the reunion" prize. Asked if she had a place to put it where she lives, McCaleb, clear blue eyes twinkling, said, "I'll find a place!"
