“The difference between the impossible and the possible lies in a person’s determination.” ~Tommy Lasorda
The initial interest that led to my research into the history of several of my books was sparked by a determined person. I dove into history books and online articles to find out more about someone who believed something that no one else had tried could be done and then they went and did it.
I often say that perseverance is one of the most important things a writer can have. I have certainly persevered through a lot of years of writing to come up with a variety of stories.
My family has always said I have a stubborn streak. While they aren’t usually saying that to be complimentary, stubbornness can come in handy at time. That screw that won’t come undone. That puzzle that is hard to solve. That burnt spot on your stove or favorite pan that takes a lot of scrubbing. That math problem that seems unsolvable. A piano tune where your fingers can’t seem to hit the right notes. That story where you can’t figure out what happens next. All of these can sometimes be solved, fixed, figured out by some stubborn thinking or the old adage if at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.
For my new story, A Chance for Kallie Mae, I met a woman in my research who not only had the determination to get something done, she also had the insistent belief and enthusiasm to get others to line up with her to get it done.
While Cora Wilson Stewart doesn’t have a big part in my written story, she had a big part in the historical background of the story. Her determination to eliminate illiteracy in her corner of the world, the mountain county where she was superintendent of schools, made a difference in many lives.
At that time educators didn’t think adults could learn the way children could. So, if an adult missed out on school, they were not given a second chance to learn. Stewart changed that.
A mountain woman whose daughter had moved to another state had often asked Stewart to read her daughter’s letters to her and to write back. When she hadn’t asked her to do that for a while, Stewart asked why. The woman told her she’d taught herself to read and write. That inspired Stewart to start her Moonlight Schools to teach adults in her county.
In order to do that, she managed to share her determined vision with the 50 plus one-room school teachers in the county. They volunteered to come back to teach adults at night after teaching children during the day. The idea to eliminate illiteracy in the county spread and became a goal for nearly everyone in the county.
People with the same desire to learn to read and have more education as my characters do in my story came down out of the hills by the hundreds along paths lighted by moonlight to attend these schools at night. Before long, Stewart was counting those who still did not know how to read in the single digits.
But Stewart didn’t stop with her local people. The idea of Moonlight Schools and adult education spread, first through the mountain counties, and then through the state, and finally all across the country. Stewart campaigned for adult education with politicians and newspaper editors. She traveled wherever she was asked to champion the idea of adult education. When America entered World War I in 1917, she heard that many of the soldiers were illiterate and she got literacy classes started for them before they were sent overseas.
Through the determination of one woman, perhaps inspired by the determined mountain woman teaching herself to read from a primer, many people’s lives were changed. For the first time, they could sign their names to documents they now could read. They didn’t just have to trust the officials or be embarrassed to have to make an X for their signature.
Determination can be contagious, and I think it was in Rowan County when the first Moonlight Schools were opened on the night of the first full moon in September. Men and women of all ages like you see in this picture of a Moonlight School came to be taught and to learn. That too took determination.
I’m having my book party Saturday, July 18th, at 1:30 p.m. here in my hometown, Lawrenceburg, KY at the Anderson County Public Library. You can see more about it on my News & Events page here on my website. If you live close enough, I hope you can come.
I might just focus my book talk on how some of my stories were inspired by someone with determination. Then I had to be determined to write those stories and not give up even in those years when I was not having success in writing. But the stories still came and I still wrote.
How important do you think persistence and determination is in your life?
As always, thank you for reading.