Audrey Mae SpencerSpencer Historical CemeteryHenry Straight / William Spencer Family Cemetery
Vaughn Historical CemeterySpencers of East Greenwich, RI
6 November 2002

Heather: Did I tell you that Douglas is setting up a website, called Mother Mac? He is so busy with water aerobic classes but he is trying to get the site set up.

Audrey: “I’ll be world famous after a while”. (Laughter)

Heather: You are famous with us because of your artistic work and that is all that matters when you get right down to it.

11 November 2002

Kelsey Ann MacDonald

Audrey’s Great-Granddaughter

Kelsey Ann MacDonald

Born November 11, 2002
Proud Parents are Tonya (née Paolilli) and Mark MacDonald

13 November 2002

Heather: Well, what are you doing this Wednesday morning?

Audrey: I’m sitting here reading the newspaper. It is raining. I read and sleep and that is about it! I’ve been so busy. I read a book and then I think again about how we should be reading it several times before it all sinks in. So I read it again and sure enough, I learn something new every time. Oh, I’ve had my blood work done and I am fine.

13 November 2002

Heather: What will you be doing for Thanksgiving?

Audrey: Well, my taster is not too good, my (sense of) smell is not too good and I don’t hear as good as I should, but my eyes are good! I can read!

There is a newspaper article on shoats’ milk. (in the picture) It’s looks like a goat?

* Baby pigs are shoats.

13 November 2002

Heather: I never heard or read anything about shoats’ milk.

Audrey: Crystal is watching the four babies this morning. All four of them are running around now. They have four big rooms at their home.

Oh, the kitty is asleep on the back of the couch and Buddy, the dog, is sleeping on Crystal’s bed.

13 November 2002

Heather: Did you ask Vaughn to take you to the library’?

Audrey: No, not yet. I’m not ready to go to the library now. When I go there, they leave me sitting there for two hours while I read in the large print section. I love to read. Spencer and Vaughn, they ride me around a lot in West Greenwich. The places I knew have changed so much that I wouldn’t recognize them.

13 November 2002

Heather: When did you begin reading?

Sketched by Audrey, Geraniums on the windowsill

Audrey: When I was 10 years old, I belonged to the Anthony Library Association. We had an old fashioned desk with an opening down (pull down) desktop and the bottom of the desk had books. Mother (Mary Jane Vaughn Spencer) was a great reader. She would sit in the rocking chair by the window and see who was coming in the back of the house. She had geraniums on the windowsill in back of the washing machine and they looked so beautiful. She would have my father’s supper ready and (she would) jump up when she saw him coming home.

Before bed, we would all have crackers and milk. Still that’s all I eat (crackers and milk) and I dip a spoon in the jelly.

13 November 2002

Heather: How did you get to the Anthony Library building?

Postcard of Audrey and her mother standing in front of their home on Washington Street in Coventry, RI

Audrey: The trolley train went by the front yard (at 742 Washington Street). You could not park a car there because of the trolley. Two houses down was the stop for the Trolley. The trolley went from Knotty Oak to Arctic and turned around and came back. Maisie, I and her mother went to Rocky Point on the trolley car. The side was opened in summer. The gate was closed so the people would not fall out. My mother did not care much for walking around.

My Mother was as tall as Aunt Edith (Audrey’s older sister). I was taller.

Heather: Mother, in those days, a tall woman was not considered as pretty as a shorter woman. But you were pretty. You just happened to get the tall gene. Your mother and your sister didn’t. That is why you did not think you were pretty. You were pretty, but you were tall. Standing next to your mother and Edith, you are a head taller than them, but still you were much shorter than Grampa. I could never understand why you said you were not pretty. Now I know why!

20 November 2002

Heather: Hi Mother. How are you this week?

Audrey and Milton’s home, 420 East Greenwich Avenue, West Warwick, Rhode Island

“Aunt” Jeannie Campbell and her sister, Di Wicks

Audrey: I went to Spen and Bren’s house for the weekend. I go in and sit down in comfort. Julie now lives on Amanda Street with two other girls. Brenda takes medicine all the time, and she looks good, even though her stomach swells. We (Spen, Brenda and all) went to Doreen’s house for dinner. We had a lovely meal. David was puttering around his house. They have a three-sided room with half the wall being a TV. (When you kids were little) I had a big, old house. I didn’t know any better then. I didn’t feel put down at all. We had plenty of room and it was fine. Aunt Jeannie (Jeannie Campbell)* next door was just like another mother to me. Aunt Jeannie was an angel in disguise. She took care of everybody. Her husband (or son I can not remember which) was killed in a train accident going to the First World Fair in New York. Franklin, her first son, died. However, Aunt Di, Jeannie’s sister, was a pain in the neck. She had her mouth going. She was cross.  She was always coming into the house with a broom.

*Aunt Jeannie was not a blood relative, but we all called her aunt because she was so great to all of us.  Her name was Jeannie Campbell.  Her husband was killed in a train accident returning from the World’s Fair in 1939, I believe.
20 November 2002

Heather: So what books would you like me to find in large print?

Audrey: B.J. Chute wrote three books, Weeping Willow and another book with the title of a girl’s name and I can’t remember the third book right now. She writes so beautifully and every sentence you love to read it. I could read it two or three times. She lived in New England and wrote around 1950.