By Tina Tidmore
In 1912, Woodrow Wilson was elected the U.S. president, scientists were discovering vitamins, the First Balkan War started, and a baby girl was born in Clay. She was given the name “Evelyn Tucker,” and at a party on Nov. 18, she celebrated 100 years of living and thriving.
Evelyn Self talks with Dana Clayton, one of the many people in Clay who share fond memories with her. Photo by Tina Tidmore
“Even my parents would have been flabbergasted to see I lived to 100,” she said.
For two hours, friends and family came one after another to express happiness at seeing her smile and hearing her laughter at the Clay United Methodist Church. Even after all that activity, she still had the mental alertness and stamina to answer questions about the dates of special events in her life.
“The main thing is I like to see people coming for something like this, instead of a funeral,” said Lola “Doll” Self, who has known the birthday lady for years.
Many Selfs attended the party, as Evelyn Tucker married into the Self family, descendants of original Clay settlers. This is also true of her sister, Christine Self. Both Evelyn and her sister ended up changing their last names from “Tucker” to “Self” through marriage.
Evelyn Self’s mother was a Wear, Clay’s other original settler family. Thus, in Clay, the Selfs, Wears, Tuckers and other families became intertwined through marriages over many generations, even down to this day.
Although having no living descendants, due to her daughter dying from lung cancer without having any children, Evelyn Self has nieces and other relatives that make sure she has what she needs at the Fair Haven Nursing Home in Irondale, where she now lives.
She grew up in the Tucker Circle area, off of Old Springville Road close to the State Farm office and Church of Christ church. “Water was real important then,” Self said in explaining why her family settled close to the beginning of Turkey Creek.
In those days, around World War I and soon after, Old Springville Road was a dirt road and many people in the area traveled to Birmingham for jobs and major shopping.
The Ford Model T was being produced, but in rural areas of Alabama, including Clay, Self remembers that many rode their horse and buggy to Eastlake where they caught the trolley into Birmingham.
“Today we have our own transportation,” Self said. But walking far distances was also common. Self remembered walking from Clay to Palmerdale to stay with others on the night her brother was born.
After moving away for a few years, Self moved back to Clay when she married in 1929. She soon gave birth to a girl, but she continued to do office work off and on at Furniture Credit Association, Self said.
Partly, this was because her husband struggled to find regular work, Self said
. For many Americans who depended on farming or related industries, the 1920s were turbulent after a “boom” during World War I because Europeans fighting instead of growing crops and a “bubble” from U.S. farmer overexpansion and production when European farming recovered faster than expected.
Then, the “bust” in the American agricultural industry started when the real average income per farm fell 73 percent in 1920-1921, according to the Economic History Association. Farm foreclosures went up and farmland values went down during the 1920s.
“Agriculture was not the only sector experiencing difficulties in the twenties,” the history association states. “Other industries, such as textiles, boots and shoes and coal mining also experienced trying times.”
This pre-Great Depression economic struggle affected many in Clay and caused many women to work outside the home.
After the Great Depression, the men went off to fight in World War II, which brought more women into the workforce.
In 1948, Evelyn Self was offered and took the job of managing the new lunchroom at Clay school. This development resulted from the 1946 National School Lunch Act providing subsidies for nutritional school lunches, while also propping up food prices by absorbing farm surpluses.
Self was the obvious choice for Clay school’s new lunch program because she had previously volunteered in providing lunch to the school children.
In 1948, Self was part of 22 percent of married women in the labor force, according to the U.S. Division of Labor Workforce Statistics. Although her husband had by then found regular work, she kept working. “After you have that money coming in,” Self said, “it’s hard to give it up.”
Soon, she was offered a job downtown, managing a cafeteria serving people in the UAB area. By herself, she drove her car back and forth to work in Birmingham until her retirement in 1973.
Since then, she has remained active, including at the Clay Senior Activity Center. Hanging prominently on her wall in her room at the nursing home is the plaque from the center that reads: “Oldest Survivor & Charter Member.”
Reflections and Advice
Self has seen many changes and gained many insights while living on earth for a century.
She said she wants to see growth in Clay. However, she wants Clay to keep its identity and sense of community. “I don’t want to see Clay fade,” she said.
When asked about regrets, Self only mentions one. “I wish I had gone to college,” she said. “I would have become a teacher and my retirement would have been better.”
“You need to plan for retirement,” Self urged this reporter.
“If you get an education, you’ll go further,” Self said. She noted that college education was not as available to her parents’ generation. “Now you can borrow to go to school,” she said. “If a person is educated, they will keep a clean house.”
Self saw her mother, brothers and daughter die of cancer, many of them from rectal cancer or related conditions. “I did see the day they got rid of TB,” she said in reference to the bacterial disease, tuberculosis. “I hope the same will happen with cancer.”
“We’re depending on the government a lot,” Self observed. “That might not be too good. We need to take care of ourselves.”
When asked if she sees human society advancing or declining, she said she sees both. “Our moral structure is going down,” Self said. “We got to do something on that. If you ask me, that will bring about other things.”
She also thinks many parents do too much for their adult children.
“Let them root for themselves,” Self said. “That’s how they learn.”
One advancement she has seen is in nutrition. On that note, she mentioned the wild game she used to eat and mentioned she would like to have some squirrel and dumplings that she hasn’t had in a long time.
