Remembering My Great-Grandmother, Lucille Carter Poole

I never had the chance to meet my great-grandmother, Lucille Carter, but through census records and bits of history, I’ve been piecing together her life. Each detail brings me closer to understanding who she was and the world she grew up in.

Lucille was born on January 6, 1914 in Wake County, North Carolina. Her father, Amos Carter, was just 24 years old, and her mother, Flossie Jones, only 20. At the time, her older brothers Amos Jr. (age 5) and Lawrence (age 3) were already part of the household. Lucille would become the third of six children.

The world looked very different in 1914. Woodrow Wilson was president, World War I had just begun overseas, and only weeks after her birth, Alexander Graham Bell made the first transcontinental phone call. The Coast Guard became its own branch of the military, cars were still considered a luxury, and radio was just beginning to capture people’s imaginations. It was a time of change, both for America and for Lucille’s young family.

Not long after her birth, the Carters moved east to Rocky Mount, NC, where Lucille’s sister Margaret was born in 1917. By the 1920 census, the family was settled there, with Amos Sr. working as a car mechanic for the railroad. Another brother, Elwin, joined the family later that same year.

By the late 1920s, the Carters returned to Wake County, where Lucille’s youngest sister Dorothy was born. In the 1930 census, 15-year-old Lucille is listed with her family at 413 N. Salisbury Street in Raleigh, while her father worked at the planning mill for the steam railroad. The country was in the midst of the Great Depression, though it seems Amos managed to keep steady work.

On April 1, 1934, at just 20 years old, Lucille married Glenn Etheridge Poole. Despite the hard times, they started a family quickly. Their first son, Glenn Wyatt Poole, was born less than a year later, on May 21, 1935. Four years later came Jimmy Ethridge Poole, born June 5, 1939, followed by William “Bill” Poole, born June 8, 1941.

By 1940, the young Poole family was living on Poole Road in Wake County, with Lucille at home caring for her boys while Glenn worked at the A & P warehouse, a produce company.

I don’t know what Lucille’s personality was like, or what she enjoyed in her day-to-day life, but I can picture her: a young woman raising three sons during the Depression and World War II, supporting her husband while keeping the home together. She lived through decades of change — from railroads, electricity, and radio to television and automobiles becoming common.

Lucille lived through world wars, the Great Depression, and an America that was constantly changing. Yet, her most lasting accomplishment wasn’t tied to world events — it was the family she and Glenn created together. From a little girl born in Wake County in 1914 to a grandmother of thirteen by the end of her life.

Though I never met her, learning Lucille’s story makes me feel closer to her and the life she lived. It also makes me long for a chance to sit with her for just one conversation.

What’s one question you wish you could ask an ancestor you never met?—leave it in the comments!