Ollie and Dorothy Caldwell

They are both gone now, but how can we forget them!?  I have never been in a more loving home, full of joy and laughter.

I trekked across the country for my first visit with Ollie and Dorothy some years ago, arriving in Arkansas just before dinner time.  Directions  to the Caldwell Ranch were confusing to me and I passed the house by several times.  Finally, I saw someone standing in a driveway and stopped to ask if he knew where the ranch was — he said with a big grin, “You have arrived.  This is it.”  And he pointed ‘over yonder’ to a gate with the sign above it!

Such wonderful memories of time with these two family sages.  Showing Ollie that I was not a city gal by driving his tractor all over the field to help feed the Pet Cows.  Picking okra from the big garden.  Backing the tractor into the barn crooked, and then locking old Tex in the barn with it — how Ollie laughed at my parking job!  Watching Ollie stammer and fiddle while trying to tell me that old Mr. Horry, the Black Angus bull that I adored, had been sold to the hamburger factory!

Dorothy’s Charlie Pride Pie and the picnics she always made when we went up to the cemetery in the hills.  Her strength and good cheer in the face of adversity.  Her persistence and tenacity in maintaining a household and caring for her family after being somewhat crippled with a stroke.  Such a role model.  Such good memories.

Ollie D. Caldwell
Born 2 August 1923  in Gladstone, Garland Co AR
Died 2 May 2009 in Malvern, Clark Co AR

Dorothy Farmer Caldwell
Born 22 October 1923 in Cornersville, Lincoln Co AR
Died 8 June 2007 in Malvern, Clark Co AR