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BY ROZELLA HARDIN
Editorial Director
rozella.hardin@elizabethton.com
Doris Oxendine was a busy woman. She was a wife and mother, but also worked outside the home. She was also a homemaker, who enjoyed helping in the garden and canning the vegetables she and her husband grew in the garden. She cooked for her family of five girls and one son, and when her daughters were young, she made many of their dresses.
Doris died Sept. 16 at the age of 93. She was preceded in death by her husband, William F. Oxendine, and a grandson, Brian Franz.
Doris in her earlier years worked at the Whiteway Grill in Roan Mountain and Sky City in Newland, N.C., which her daughter, Anita, described as a mini Wal-Mart. She then worked at Wal-Mart in Elizabethton until she retired in the 1970s. When she worked at Sky City in Newland, she had the privilege of meeting the stars of the film “Winter People,” a scene of which was filmed at the store. “That was fun for her,” said Anita.
Doris and her husband raised a large garden each summer, and she canned many of the vegetables they grew. She enjoyed cooking, and Anita said the favorite thing she and her sisters enjoyed the most was her meatloaf. “We’ve tried to make it just like she did, but it never tastes as good. She was a wonderful cook,” Anita shared.
One of her mother’s favorite things to do was to attend sports events at Cloudland High School. “She was always there regardless of what sport was being played – football, basketball, baseball. She attended them all.” Some of the daughters played basketball, including Anita and Anna. Billie was a cheerleader. Doris also enjoyed watching her grandchildren play sports.
In addition to Anita, Anna, and Billie, Doris was mother to William Jr., and two older daughters, Mary Franz and Edrie Bristol.
Anita said her mother especially enjoyed football, and attended most of the high school games.
In addition to high school sports, she enjoyed watching sports on television, especially the Atlanta Braves.
In her spare time, which usually came at the end of the day, Doris enjoyed cross-stitching, knitting, and crocheting. And, when her daughters were younger, she would often make them dresses, buying much of her fabric at the old Bemberg outlet store. Anita noted that her daddy worked at Bemberg.
Doris was also active in the Cloudland PTA, when her children were in school, and she was a “church person” said Anita. She had been a member of the Roan Mountain Free Holiness Church for more than 40 years. “It was a smaller church on Hampton Creek, and everyone knew each other,” said Anita.
“Mom stayed busy. She was a people person and enjoyed doing things for her family. She was also a fun person. Mom was a blessed person, and so were we, her children,” said Anita.
Doris Oxendine was buried in the Peters Cemetery on Ripshin Mountain, but she left many cherished memories for her children and grandchildren.