By Curt Williams, Founder & Executive Director
It was a beautiful spring afternoon in 1991 when I, along with several key board members (including Dr. Frank), set up a meet and greet with the neighbors of the home that we were proposing to purchase for the first permanent residence of Youth-Reach Houston. Dr. Neil had mentioned to me that the neighbors may not be too keen on a home for troubled boys moving in next to their homes. On the newscasts he was a part of for many years, he had seen neighbors rise up and organize to oppose halfway houses, prisons, and landfills planned for their area. He advised that we head this off by sharing with the neighbors up front what we planned to do and how Youth-Reach operated.
At that meeting was an elderly lady who lived two doors down, Mrs. Edith Downey. Along with several other probable neighbors, Mrs. Downey sat and listened to our vision and our plans. At the end of that time together, every person in attendance welcomed us to the area.
A few weeks after we moved in, I noticed Mrs. Downey struggling to get her worn-out Sears riding mower to power through her grass that had grown quite high. I asked if she needed help, and she said the mower wasn’t working properly. While she went in to get a drink, I pushed the old mower into her garage and rallied all the Youth-Reach boys to come down and get her three acres mowed. It was so high that we had to mow and rake it twice. That night, she called to tell me her grass was now yellow, but I assured her that it would come back beautifully very soon.
A week or two later, I caught her on her old mower again, and I got her off of it, rolled it into the garage, and removed the battery. Later that day, as the boys were again mowing her lawn, with a wry smile, she asked me, “What kind of a man would take the battery from an old woman’s lawn mower?” I unashamedly raised my hand. From then on, Mrs. Downey was retired. She never touched her lawn again, but while the boys were working on her property, she would bake a pan of brownies and give them all too many Dr. Peppers. She would later send them home to us high on sugar. I asked her not to do that anymore. She replied, “When those boys are at my house, they are my boys, and I will do whatever I want for them.” All I could say was, “Yes, ma’am.”
A generation of boys loved and served Mrs. Downey. As she aged, we began to take more care of her, bringing her meals and spending time with her. I cannot count the times I watched the evening news with her, sitting in her den watching her tiny television. When her condition grew dire, somewhere after her 92nd birthday, I called her daughter, who came to take her away. She was going to a nursing home. I carried her to the car, and as I placed her in the seat, she grabbed me by the face. “Am I going to see you again?” she asked. I broke down, and she wiped a tear from my face. “Yes, Edith, you will”, I said. Her reply was quick and witty, “That’s Mrs. Downey to you, young man.” I wept all afternoon.
A few weeks later, we held her funeral. Few were in attendance as most of her contemporaries had beaten her Home. In a season when my own wonderful grandmother was 550 miles away, the Lord gave me a beautiful stand-in. I loved Mrs. Downey, and a few months later, we were able to purchase her property. The home was in poor condition, and we did all we could to rehab it, but a few weeks ago, it was finally demolished. That space on our campus will always be referred to as “Downey” in memory of my dear friend. I imagine I will have to answer to her when I see her again for taking down her dear home, but that’s ok. No one can steal her legacy … No ma’am.
