We're sitting here, of a Saturday morning in Dove’s house trying to marshal a few paragraphs dearest, kindest, gentlest and finest persons we have ever known.
We call it "Dove's house" advisedly because she drew the plans for same and superintended the building of it upon the lot out here on Wetherbee Street, which was left to her by her sainted Mother.
Old Stuff, but naturally, has helped keep the payments against the mortgage, but it was Louise Eskrigge Crump who worried with the builders, the painters, plumbers and paper-hangers, and who made a home out of this house from the very minute when she and this writer took up residence within its walls.
And now Miss Dove, having kept the faith, and having finished her course, is gone from us, though bodily only because every square foot of this house's floor space, and every cubic inch of its atmosphere is supercharged with her spiritual influence that shall not die.
She was a grand girl, steeped in charity and compassion, conscious always of human frailties in her fellowmen, and ever both anxious and willing to help the halt, the lame and the blind.
There wasn't a selfish bone in her body, and not one time in her trek through this vale of tears did she take the other side of the street from, or close her eyes to, deprivation and distress.
Blessed with a fine and active mind, and endowed with a backlog of energy, Dove was a natural in the newsroom. She could turn more copy in half a day than most of us do in a week. She was a natural on the news beats, too, where she enjoyed the confidence and trust of all concerned.
Does Elder Jere Nash recall the advice he gave someone, many years ago, a person who had been trying in vain to get a story run, thus and so, in the local paper for days on end, quote, "Listen Mister, as you know there's a War on, but I'll tell you, like I've told everyone else in your predicament, the only thing you need do is see Louise Crump"', end quote.
So people saw her, across the years, or telephoned her at home across the hours of her supposed free-time, to ask for journalistic favors, like the search for a lost dog, or the placement of an unwanted kitten, the wording of announcement of a baby's birth, or engagement; a debut or a death, and so on ad infinitum.
During her long and wasting illness, when most of us were sensing the sad knowledge that her time was nigh, there were scores of people who would have rallied to her side, people who had turned to her in their times of trouble and never once found her with an unreceptive ear.
So her sick-room was filled with flowers, cards, letters and telegrams, and now, some three days after her passing, the visitors and the long-distance telephone calls are still coming through (like one just then from Evelyn Fox in Hampton, Virginia, and one last night from Mary Augusta in Alexandria, and later on today we know there'll be one from Mary Adams in Greenwood).
And now we sit alone in Dove's house, well maybe not entirely so, because "Llewellyn" (better known as "Shag") her little Welsh terrier is keeping us company, and how can anyone be all that lonely in a house so filled with memories? The books on the shelves, the pictures on the wall, the curtains on the windows, the crull-work fresco near the ceiling in the den, the little kitchen where we cooked her breakfasts, and she cooked our suppers all through the years, the untidy pile of papers beside this typewriter, which Dove, a most tidy person, has tolerated since time ain't long. Which calls to mind yet one more facet of a character beyond reproach.
And now, in closing for a while, let us quote from Judge Bill Keady's telegram of condolence (from Washington) as follows: "Dorothy and I extend our sympathy at this sad time and share the loss of your many friends at the passing of Dove. She will always be remembered as a great lady. May God comfort and sustain you."
And from Florence Ogden in Rosedale, quote:
"You. have my deepest sympathy in the loss of your beloved Dove. Her many friends share your grief at the loss of talented Mississippian." End quote..
Dove would have loved both these tributes.
