Daughters honor Moore’s 100th birthday
Published 5:34 pm Monday, September 8, 2014
By Phoebe Donald Robinson / Community Columnist
On Aug. 31, 2014, Nettie Vonzelle Juzan Moore was honored by daughters Vera Dean Moore Denson and Agnes Moore Pool at a reception to celebrate her 100th birthday at Columbiana Rehabilitation where she resides attended by family and friends.
A memory quilt was on display and all who attended signed quilted flowers that will go on the quilt, made by daughter Agnes. Six people older than 90 attended: Wilma Freeman, Mildred Baldwin, Ernestine Bentley, Buck Falkner, Joe McCormick and Mildred Juzan Pettus.
The Juzan family emigrated from France to the French Colony of Mobile prior to the Revolutionary War. Pool recently joined the Daughters of the American Revolution and traced her roots back to Pierre Gabriel Juzan, born in 1736, who became the Majesty’s Commissioner for the Indians under Spanish Rule.
Pierre Gabrielle’s great grandson Pierre served in the Civil War and was shot during the Battle of Gettysburg, captured and became a POW at Fort Delaware. After the war, he moved to Shelby County and became a Methodist lay minister. Son John William Juzan married Shelby County native Florence Belle Baldwin, and they had seven children. Third born Vonzelle born on Aug. 31, 1914, attended Shelby Springs School.
Vonzelle and her sister Lillian Gertrude “Doll Baby” Moore married first cousins Willis (Bill) Hiram Moore and Henry Moore at a double wedding on July 17, 1933, by Preacher Carlos Cox at Reedy Hand’s house in the Mt. Era community. Vonzelle and Bill had four daughters Mary Ellen Moore Cox (deceased 2012), Helen Odell Moore Falkner (deceased 1956), Vera Dean Moore Benson and Agnes Marie Moore Pool. Bill died in 1992. Today Vonzelle has 11 grandchildren, 13 great-grandchildren, 11 great-great-grandchildren having lost four grandson and two daughters.
Vonzelle was a fabulous cook and known for sewing and quilting.
“Our treats were bananas and baloney,” said daughter Dean. “She made everything else.”
“Vonzelle was known for her long, dark, thick hair, her high temper and outspokenness,” described in the scrapbook by daughter Agnes. “She was known for her Sunday dinner feasts, cathead biscuits with chocolate gravy and eating hot, hot pepper. She was a hardworking woman who was tight and frugal. She could sew and quilt and taught her daughters to sew.