Sue New was born in 1931 in Union Co., Strong, AR. Her parents had also been born 
there. Her father was an orphan from age 9 and his oldest brother and oldest sister kept him part time and had very little training or teaching. Neither parent had much education, but their two daughters were convinced their parents were as good as any, and better than most. They were special.
Her parents moved from Strong, AR to a place deep in the country of Richland, Parish, LA , where the second daughter was born when Sue was 3 1/2. Sue begin school at age 6, and rode a bus the seven miles to school in the little town of Hollyridge. On that first day someone told a teacher that Sue was a singer. That is still a mystery. Nevertheless, her 
first grade teacher engaged a 12th grader to walk her to each class room to sing “Maple on the Hill.”
When Sue was in the fourth grade her parents settled in Bastrop, LA, just before Mr. Roosevelt declared we were in war. Her father’s oldest brother was an officer in Bastrop Police Department and since Sue’s dad was not in health, he used his influence to get his brother a job that was a benefit to the military.
In Sue’s 11th grade a new boy had moved to Bastrop with his family and he entered in the 12th. Sue had never had a date in her life at age 15 when she met the new boy in town and even though he liked her, he walked home from school with her every afternoon, that was just about the only dating they did. He ate supper with Sue’s family every evening that school year. After Ed graduated, he went to work in Texas City, TX, where the ships 
had exploded in April of that year, 1947. When Ed came back to see his sick father in October, he asked Sue to marry. Her father felt a little relief at not having to feed him anymore! Her parents loved Ed and especially her mother, calling Ed the son she never had. He loved her, too, calling her mother, and after Sue’s father died at age 58, Ed was always there for his mother-in-law until she died.
Ed and Sue married in 1947 and within an 8 year period, 4 boys were welcomed in to their lives. Ed and Sue never missed attending Church and neither did their boys. He became a minister in 1953 and most of their life together was spent primarily in service to the Lord and to others.
Sue and her family settled in Texas in 1962. Their sons married. The families brought 13 grandchildren to Sue and her husband, and from those grandchildren came 24 great grandchildren. Sue’s third son, Robert, died at age 47 of a massive coronary, leaving 5 children. Sue’s beloved Ed died in 2004 a few days after a massive stroke. In 2006, her oldest son died at age 58 of a coronary.
While the heartaches and grief come of necessity from such life changing events, there seems to be a coat of ‘safety’ clinging to Sue’s shoulders. Blessings are all around her. Had it not been for her special friends, she says she could not even imagine it. She adds a word of “Thanks” to you for passing by this site and possibly reading these words and the words of the novel she wrote.
