Nellie Higbee was born and grew up in Pittsburgh, PA. In April of 1918 she had typhoid fever. In September of 1937 she was operated on for a tumor in her stomach.

She graduated from high school with honors and married Mark in a double wedding with her sister Ida. She moved with her family to Mobile when she was 20 years old.

November 1944

She was 5’6″ tall, thin, brown eyes, olive complexion.   Very kind hearted and loved pets.  Interested in all crafts, crochet, tat, embroidery, knit and made clothes.  Loved to read.

Played piano by ear and by reading music.  Loved to cook and regularly baked raisin bread when the grandkids were coming over. She regularly made an icing of confectioners sugar and evaporated milk to spread on graham crackers. The grandkid’s favorite was her chocolate oatmeal cookies. This is a scan of that recipe as written by Dorothy.

“Mother’s Oatmeal Cookies”

Nellie’s occasional dry wit was enjoyed by all. Once, when everyone was sitting around her large dining room table for a special holiday meal, she responded to someone’s praise for a particular dish that “well, it was about to go bad so we need to eat it”.

When someone would comment on a dish being hot she regularly responded “my stove is a good one. It gets hot.” Years later this writer realized that her comments were not odd–all gas stoves get hot–but she was remembering the days when a stove was really an inside fire box and some distributed the heat better than others.

She had epileptic seizures as an adult. She died of a stroke after living a quiet life for many years.