resuscitated and stabilized. A few days
later, Dr. Carruth put in a pacemaker.
Dr. Carruth, or “Joe” to Mrs. Wilkes,
had been one of her Sunday school
students when his father served as
minister at the First Methodist Church
in Lyons. In 2004, Mrs. Wilkes left the
house she and J.C. had built together
on the farm and moved into town. “The
doctors kept telling me that I needed to
be closer to town with this pacemaker.
They said it would last about ten years
before it would need to be replaced,”
she said. “That was almost twenty-years
ago,” she said with a smile.
Mrs. Wilkes leaned her cane against
the kitchen table and reached for a card
she had just received from President
Carter and his family. She proudly told
me that her daughter Cynthia had
served in the White House all four
years of the Carter administration. In
fact, Cynthia’s husband, Tim Smith,
was a personal aide to President Carter.
I smiled as she spoke of each of her
children’s careers and accomplishments
like any proud mother would do. These
were the memories she holds close to
her heart. No wonder it’s still going
strong, I mused.
Every time one of her children
come for a visit, they always take a
drive out to John Wilkes Road and
other familiar sites around the county.
In 2016, her oldest son Larry spent
four days with his mother doing just
that. Each detail of that time with
him is still etched into her memory. “I
wanted him to leave early enough to
miss the Atlanta traffic on his way back
home, but for some reason, he kept
putting off leaving. Later on, I realized
that he somehow knew it was going to
be the last time we were going to see
each other.”
When he finally got ready to leave,
Larry hugged his mother and went out
to his car. After a moment, he came
back inside and hugged her again. “I
could tell he had been crying,” said Mrs.
Wilkes. “I knew in that moment that
this was the last time I was going to see
my son.”
Larry died a short time later from
an aggressive strain of pneumonia
he developed while in the hospital
to have a pacemaker installed. “I was
so thankful we had those four days
riding around in the country together
remembering things that happened
when he was growing up,” said Mrs.
Wilkes.
A lot has happened since 1924,
the year Merle Wilkes was born. But
the memories she recalled were not
what one might expect. She made
no mention of the hardships of the
Great Depression or of all the many
differences between life now and then.
Instead, the ninety-five-year-old retired
teacher spoke of the people who had
helped her find her way and the joy she
found in helping others.
I recently read a quote by the
famous American journalist Andy
Rooney that said, “Most of us end up
with no more than five or six people
who remember us. Teachers have
thousands of people who remember
them for the rest of their lives.” It’s
true. The only way to end this article is
by saying for us all, “Thank you, Mrs.
Wilkes, for the generations of Toombs
County families you have loved and
helped along the way. It is an honor to
remember you.”
Merle pictured with her
children in April 2014 at her
grandson Alex's wedding.
78 TOOMBS COUNTY MAGAZINE