My paternal grandmother, Cora 'Dale' Dodd, was the 8th child and 3rd daughter born to John Henry Dodd (20 Jun 1864 - 1 Sep 1943) and Mary Caroline Bragg (9 Dec 1866 - 25 Sep 1909) on Wednesday, 5 Oct 1898, in Jumping Branch, Summers County, WV.

She lost her mother just 10 days shy of her 11th birthday in 1909. Then her father remarried on Sunday, 26 Jun 1910, to Florence E Bowden.

Sometime during my grandmother's 12th year her father moved most of the family to the Winter Park, FL area where they were active parts in establishing the First Baptist Church of Winter Park. My grandmother and siblings were charter members of that church.

Cora 'Dale' Dodd married Bergy 'Roy' Sloniger on Tuesday, 20 May 1919.

Dale and Roy had 4 children together: Roscoe Edwin (born Thursday, 22 Apr 1920), William Henry 'Bill' (born Friday, 3 Mar 1922), Helen Stella (born Friday, 13 Aug 1926) and my father, George Raymond 'Ray' (born Tuesday, 4 Apr 1933).

I lived with Granny off and on during my 19th, 20th and 21st years of life and would come back to spend my last half of my pregnancy with my first child living with her. We weren't just grandmother and granddaughter - we were friends and pals. We could (and did) talk about everything you can imagine and subjects you wouldn't begin to imagine that we might discuss.

Sometime shortly after my daughter was born on my father's birthday in 1978, Granny began to inch away from us bit by bit, though we never noticed it in the beginning and, in truth, I was married to a US Navy sailor who got out of the Navy and went back in so I lived far away when it really became noticeable that she was within the clutches of Alzheimer's Disease.

We lost Granny physically on Thursday, 12 May 1988, but we had lost her within the damaged cells of her brain several years before we lost what was left of her.

There is no way that I can adequately express how much this marvelous woman meant to me and what a debt of gratitude I owe her for all that she gave to me just by being herself. To say that she is sorely missed is a gross understatement of fact but there I will leave it. God bless and keep you, dearest Granny!