Published: April 30, 2008 11:17 am            

Larue Barnes: Motherly love

Editor’s note: This is part one of a two-part series.



In a video of the 2006 retirement party for Happy Morris, several county officials praised her work as the first nurse Johnson County employed. It was interesting to watch the friends and co-workers who had gathered there. Without exception, they often glanced toward her with concern — as if they wanted to be sure she was all right.

After all, she had been looking after them for 28 years.

There were others, unseen, locked behind cell doors at the Johnson County Correctional Center — the county jail — who would miss the registered nurse who had been their physical and emotional lifeline.

From 1977 to 2006, Happy worked for Johnson County. She served four sheriffs. For the medical examiner, Dr. Arthur Raines, she went on calls and worked at the autopsy table.

Although many duties were emotionally draining, she managed to keep her sense of humor doing other things.

“Most days were far from boring,” she said. “I’ll never forget the day a really excited mentally ill inmate was handcuffed to me, and I was told to walk her to the courthouse. Or the time an inmate asked me for a quarter because he wanted to call God — or when another asked, ‘When you are out, would you run by my house and water my marijuana plants?’

“Sometimes you wonder if you are doing anybody any good, and then a day comes along that really touches your heart.”

She showed me a jewelry box in her home that appeared, on first glance, to be made from slender bamboo shoots.

As she gently pulled out one of its drawers, she explained, “An inmate made this for me out of corny dog sticks. The drawer pulls are acorn halves that he picked up on the jail grounds. And all these crosses inside are made from plastic bags and unraveled socks.

“And this inmate’s drawing of the Twin Towers on 9-11 was stuck up on his cell’s wall with toothpaste. He gave it to me, and I had it framed.”

She said softly, “So many beautiful, creative things that they made just for me.”



A bad beginning

Happy Stephens had good reason to change her mind about her profession when she began nursing school. Things got off to a bad start.

“It was in 1955,” she said. “I had just started my training at John Peter Smith Hospital School of Nursing in Fort Worth. When I saw a little boy with a bad head cut, I passed out. I passed out on two other cases before I realized that when you work with it, it’s not as hard as just observing it.”

Her childhood — typical to others her age who grew up in Cleburne — was also unique.

Margery “Happy” Stephens was adopted by Kelly and Ethel Stephens of Cleburne in December 1936, when she was a month old. Stephens was chief purchasing agent for the store department of the Santa Fe Shops in Cleburne for more than 50 years.

Happy’s older sister, Patsy (also adopted), was 5 years old when her parents told her she would have a baby sister.

“They made Patsy give her two cats away since a baby was coming to the house,” Happy said. “Patsy told me that when I cried so much she told Mother and Daddy she’d rather have her cats back and they could just take me back to Dallas.

“My daddy gave me my nickname, ‘Happy,’ when I was about a year old because I smiled so much. I started to school, thinking that was my real name.”

Her teacher, Miss Mattie Haynes, suspected otherwise. She sent her home two blocks away to get her mother.

“Mother told her my name was Margery. I didn’t know that.”

Her eyes are dark brown and reflect excitement when she speaks. Her words come easily.

“But I stuttered and was tongue-tied when I started to school,” she said. “ I’d get all tangled up trying to tell Mother something, and she’d say, ‘Slow down, Happy, and start all over.’”

She recalls the day she found out she was adopted.

“I was about 6. I was at a friend’s house, playing. I had made her mad. She said, ‘I don’t want to play with you anyway because you are adopted!’

“I ran home, crying. I didn’t know what the word meant, but I sensed it was something bad. When I asked, my parents explained it to me. I don’t know how they thought I could grow up in Cleburne, Texas, without my hearing about it from someone.

“I think it is so important to be told that you were special, that you were picked. If a child hears about their adoption in early childhood they will understand and not be hurt by someone telling them.”



Training to be a nurse

When she graduated from Cleburne High School in 1955, she told her parents she wanted to become a nurse. Her father discouraged her at first but finally agreed to let her go and to pay her way.

She said Fort Worth had three nursing schools then: Harris, St. Joseph and John Peter Smith hospitals. One school taught its nurses to stand when a doctor entered the room.

“Some doctors joked about having to look for their own chairs when we JPS nurses were around. One school’s nurses considered their training superior to ours. Their teachers were outstanding, but I noticed that they had little hands-on training and often asked me to help them. Gradually, they treated me very nicely.

“The schools combined for some lecture classes. I lived in the dorm at JPS, working early in the mornings for two hours at the hospital, doing serology. We took blood first and then learned to give transfusions. Really soon we were inserting gastric tubes by ourselves. It was a quick hands-on training.”

Her nurse supervisor, however, made a shocking assignment.

“We were told that we had to practice putting gastric tubes down each others’ throats, as well. That made us much more compassionate, I think.”

Three days a week, JPS Hospital student nurses rode a bus to Texas Wesleyan University, where they took college classes. They returned for more classes on Saturdays.

They followed doctors on their hospital rounds, taking on more responsibility as their training progressed.

Their work load was heavy, she recalled.

“JPS Hospital is a county hospital. We were very busy, and saw a lot of trauma cases. The doctors were overworked. More than once a woman would be ready to deliver her baby, and the doctor might be with another patient. I had to do it, myself.”

She graduated with a registered nurse diploma from Texas Wesleyan in 1958. She plans to attend the 50 year reunion for the JPS class of 1958 on June 14-15 at the Renaissance Worthington Hotel in Fort Worth.

“I continued to work at JPS Hospital for two months, but I found that they still treated me as a student, so I began work at All Saints.

She had considered becoming a pediatrics nurse, but instead of going back to school, she married Lynn Lemley, an anesthesia student at Harris Hospital.

“When I was pregnant, I was working at All Saints Hospital in Fort Worth. I had seen so many women who were admitted too early during their labor, and I was determined I wasn’t going to do that. I knew it was better for me to walk around during my early labor, so I went on to work when my pains started.

“But when my pains were 4 to 5 minutes apart, my nurse supervisor took me off the floor and sent me to work in the central supply room. I finally left work at 2 p.m. and Brad was born at 3:20 p.m. at Harris Hospital.

“I refused to be sedated during labor. I had seen what could happen to the baby. The doctor works with the mother, leaving the nurse to care for the baby that sometimes has to be aspirated because it is so heavily sedated, too.

“I asked for a caudal block — which was similar to a spinal, but not as heavy. Then, after it was all over, I told them I was ready for a shot!”

They moved to Orange and bought a home, and lived there over a year.

She said she was glad she had not specialized in pediatrics after all.

“After I had a child myself, I don’t think I could have worked with such sick babies and children. It would have upset me too much.”



Returning to Cleburne

After divorcing Lemley, Happy and her son, Brad, moved back to Cleburne. She was a nurse at Johnson County Memorial Hospital for a few years and was offered a job as the office nurse for a local physician.

“Dr. Mason Shiflett was such a Christian gentleman. He prayed for his patients. I worked for him for three years. It wasn’t unusual for me to treat 60 patients on a Saturday — some, of course, were just injections — but he had so many patients.”

Happy married Neal Walls of Cleburne in July 1964. They moved to Barstow, Calif.

“After two years in California, we moved to Arlington. I worked at Arlington Memorial Hospital, and then as a nurse at LTV for three years.”

Back in Cleburne, she returned to Johnson County Memorial Hospital and then served as private nurse to Byron Crosier in his home.

“Neal had three children who lived with their mother and stepfather. When she passed away, the children had to have a home.”

One of those children, Melody Walls Light, said, “My mother, Annice Jagge Walls, died when I was a small child. At that time my brother and sister and I went to live with my dad and stepmother, Happy.

“Happy had one natural born child and overnight — literally — she became the mother of four. She raised all of us as her own. She served us so unselfishly and loved us.”

Happy and Neal divorced after 16 years of marriage.

“Happy remains a continual inspiration to me with the things she has overcome and the lives she has touched,” Melody said. “She has such a servant’s heart.

“She served the people of Johnson County for 28 years, ministering to jail inmates. They talked to her about their lives, their problems and drew for her the most incredible pictures. She has saved every one. She was sometimes their only lifeline as they were incarcerated.

“As the jail grew she was allowed to hire and train many other nurses and grew her staff considerably. She trained correctional officers and taught classes to them on a regular basis.

“Happy is truly a remarkable person, and I can’t imagine what my life would be had it not been for her.”

Happy and Richard Morris married in 1981. She found the happiness she had longed for.

Then, in summer 1990, a new chapter opened in her life’s story. When her son, Brad, had health problems and family medical history was needed, she realized, having been adopted, that she had none.

What she found when she searched for the woman who had given her away changed her life.

Her story will continue next Sunday.



This story was suggested by Melody Walls Light.



Larue Barnes may be reached

at laruebarnes@yahoo.com.

        

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