This clipping of an obituary for Lydia Meeks Grissom Coley is found in a scrapbook kept by Savannah Powell Farmer (1908-1996). I have not been able to source the newspaper or its date of publication, but it does not appear to have come from the Wilson Daily Times.
Many thanks to Levolyre Farmer Pitt for sharing her mother’s scrapbook!
UPDATE, 4 September 2025: the clipping was from 30 March 1946 Norfolk Journal and Guide!
Many thanks to you for your outstanding and tireless work! To see the face of my great grandmother is truly a miracle!
My mother, then Patricia Garner, daughter of Vivian Garner, was “kidnapped” by her Aunts Dorothy Parker and Ruth Ward from a family in Pittsburgh that she lived with while her mother was building a career in Chicago with the U.S. government.
They brought her to Wilson to live with her grandmother Lydia Weeks Grissom Coley – she was about ten when her grandmother passed away.
It was during the funeral of my own grandmother Vivian Garner – that I learned of a shameful secret of Lydia Meeks Grissom Coley – a cousin Louise, skilled chef of the local school cafeteria (she taught me the way to make her famous chicken and pastry) – said that my great grandmother was the product of a forced union of the plantation owner’s son and her mother (Susie?) who was also the plantation owner’s daughter. I’ve lost track of which era this happened, but many family members were there when Louise told the story and confirmed it.
You’re quite welcome!!
Hi,I hope every everybody is well! I consider most from Wilson /Orange/Johnston /Roberson/Granville County family. Lisa , I want to say to you thank you so very much for putting stories in history, tangible history to our ancestors.. whether we know they are ancestors or not!!!
and all those counties are where my family is from. I grew up in Wilson(i’m in my 60s) I am very heavily into Genealogy. I’m on Ancestry GED match other sites for this post. I would like to say that my great grand grandmother was a Meeks! her parents were Meeks ( family at Stagville plantation. Her Morgan lines, Orange County, but not on a plantation, possibly by way of Robeson, North Carolina. I have a beautiful picture of her. (from people who knew her said she had long hair straight down to her back,blue eyes and looked TriRacial. She was feisty. She didn’t take any crap from anybody.)It’s the only picture in our family ,existing. from what I’m finding her story was happy but sad ending so I’m wondering if this person in your blog is connected to my great grandmother and her Meek’s family, My great grandmother married a Forsyth from Wilson County.
Lisa, there are so many people that you post about that are my direct can, including famed Rev Woodard,(One of the 1st Blk Church),Mollie Hagan married to John Richardson ( my 2xgreats). The Thompson/Dew/Farmer/Gillispe. Mary Rich and Alex Forsyth are my 3x greats. Nelson Thompson and Melvina Farmer are my 2greats… so many! You help bring their lives into reality!! You help add small missing pieces to our Ancestry so I wanna tell you thank you so very much. There’s a lot of information that I don’t have small information that can connect to dots to some of my family connected to another family that I don’t know how I’m connected to and I’ve been searching for over 8yrs!!! and most times I have more information than my DNA matches on Ancestry and then others don’t have their tree built up. They only have like eight people in their tree, so it’s can be very frustrating and I look for guidance and look for people who have records because even with records, you need to have DNA because DNA is always right and records can be fabricated by the person telling the stories or giving the information so DNA is always a positive back up and I’m connected to so many other families that I do not know how I’m connected to them through my lines so definitely thank you for being one of the resources that I can try to connect some dots because my family oh my goodness I also found out my mom and dad are somehow connected by a distant ancestor maybe two I have some ideas but then I keep going down so many freaking rabbit holes…Lol
I can relate to your passion. You sound like a lot of us that are connected to this blog…steadily reading and trying to connect the dots of our ancestral lives, known and unknown. I, like you and hundreds of others , am so grateful for the tremendous time and effort Lisa puts in this legacy work .