Our New Car

The following week Sue, Jimmy and Danny moved to St. Petersburg where he worked for Belk’s department store.  We didn’t see them as much after they moved.   

Brenda’s broken arm had healed so Mom took he to the hospital to have the cast taken off.  The man taking the plaster cast off used an electric saw but had the blade set too deep and put a six inch long gash in Brenda’s arm so when she came home her arm was all bandaged up.

Larry, David, Brenda, Mom and English Ford

With us kids getting older and having more things to attend Mom and Dad decided to get a second car.  Betty and Billy earlier that year bought a used Ford Anglia and when Dad found how cheap they were and decided to buy one.  The 1959 Ford Anglia was made in England, so we always called it the English Ford.  It was a funny looking car, small and boxy with two doors, a four-cylinder, 36 horsepower engine and a three-speed stick shift.  In early September Dad put $100 down and got a loan from the Campus Credit Union for $1500 to pay for the rest. The Campus Credit Union at the University had just opened, and Dad was one of the first to sign up with account number 750.  Dad used the same account sixty years later.  Dad would every other week go to the Credit Union to get cash or some other business and the year before he died, I would sometimes go with him.  When the teller would ask for his account number he would tell her 750 and, if it was a new teller, she would not believe him and ask him a second time and so Dad would tell her again and she would be surprised to find it correct.  Most of the time though the tellers knew Dad so well they would immediately say “Hello Mr. Mixson” when he walked up.  We drove to Jacksonville in the ’55 Chevy to pick up the English Ford and afterwards we went to the Jacksonville Zoo and had lunch at the Burger King which we kids really liked for we seldom ate out.   We still had the English Ford in 1969 when Brenda was learning to drive.  I remember Dad getting in the car with her in the driveway to teacher her how to use the stick shift and she kept stalling out the engine while my brother and I were watching the whole time laughing which frustrated Brenda even more.  I think she was mad at David and I for a week afterwards and even to this day she gets irritated with David or me if we bring it up.

Right: Larry, Corky, Carole, David; sitting in water: Danah, Brenda, Vandy.

The last Sunday in August we all went to Sunday School then came home and Mom fixed a real good dinner of fried chicken, mashed potatoes, fresh squash, green beans from Grandma’s garden and a Jell-O salad.  Mom loved Jell-O salads, all different colors, red, green orange and they would have different fruit in them, sometimes fresh strawberries, but more often a can of mixed fruit.  Sunday “dinner” was always around one o’clock after we got home from church or if we only went to Sunday School at noon.  Dinner any other time of the week was in the evening at six PM.   After dinner we went to see Dad’s brother Adrian, his wife Dotty and their kids, my first cousins, Adrian junior who we called Buddy, Rosie named after our grandmother Rosalie, and Gary.  Buddy was three years older than me, Rosie one and Gary three years younger.  After spending and hour or so with them we went out to see Betty and Billy and their kids.

Last Updated: 03-12-2024

September