But the picture symbolizes more than 50 years of wedded bliss for Cora Smallwood, it also reminds her of the day the marriage began its end. The day after the photo was snapped, Tom Smallwood suffered a stroke.

Mrs. Smallwood tells the story while sitting in her wheelchair at St. Andrew's Place. She tells the background of many black and white photos, many existing only in her memory.

Born May 15, 1905, on Turkey Creek (near Enola), Mrs. Smallwood was one of 12 children of Billy and Martha Dalton Matthews. She describes her childhood home as "a house full of racket."

After moving around a bit, the family settled in the Greenbrier/Springhill area. The Matthews bunch walked two miles every day to the Pleasant Valley school near Wooster.

Mrs. Smallwood especially remembers crossing the creeks in the area as there were few bridges at that time. Someone would push a log across a creek so children could cross. "We couldn't go when the logs were frozen," she explained.

If walking to school were not bad enough, the family walked two miles the other direction to attend church at Springhill.

"We would walk to church in the morning, walk home for lunch, and we'd walk back that evening for singing," Mrs. Smallwood said. The Sabbath, a day of rest, was marked by eight miles of walking.

Her father would carry his children to school in the wagon if it was raining. "My daddy was good to us," she said.

"He'd hook up the wagon and cover it with a wagon sheet. (Neighbor) kids would pile in as he passed by until the wagon filled up."

After attending all of the grade levels offered at Pleasant Valley, Mrs. Smallwood added two miles to her daily walk and went to Wooster school. She finished the 10th grade, which was quite an education for a country girl back then, she said.

Children of wealthier families sometimes went on to college, she explained. As a woman, her options were limited.

"There wasn't anything for a woman to do," she started. "With an education, a woman might get an office job. School teachers didn't make any money."

In 1921, she married Tom Smallwood and began a life of farming and homemaking.

Although they did not bear any children, the Smallwoods "partly raised six," Mrs. Smallwood said.

The children belonged to relatives and neighbors, some deceased. The Smallwoods were not allowed to adopt, Mrs. Smallwood explained, because they did not own land.

The couple bought a Model-T Ford in 1924. "It could have made 20 miles per hour if everything was running right," Mrs. Smallwood said.

About 11 years later, they received electricity. "We thought we had something," she said of the electric lights.

Before electricity, the couple bought an Aladdin coal oil lamp. At $11 the lamp was quite an investment, Mrs. Smallwood explained.

"People would come by and say 'so and so has a new Aladdin lamp.' They would have seen them pass by with it."

The couple made it through the Great Depression together. "It was a bad time, a hard time," Mrs. Smallwood recalled. "You couldn't get nothing without (food) stamps and you had to be desperate to get them."

Times were tough on the farm. In 1938, the Smallwoods planted 12 acres of cotton and produced one bale.

Living on a farm had its advantages, though. "We raised what we ate and ate what we raised," she said.

The couple did have to get food stamps to purchase sugar and coffee. "We never went hungry, but we didn't have fancy things to eat," Mrs. Smallwood said.

Her husband worked for 28 years at Ward's in addition to his farming. His stroke in 1971 left him unable to speak and partially paralyzed. He died in 1975.

Cora Smallwood has outlived all of her siblings. Her sister-in-law, Verna Matthews, comes to visit every other day.

Other visitors bring books and magazines which Mrs. Smallwood keeps under her bed. The brightly colored pages describe the world going on around her.

It is a clear contrast to the world she knew. The world that is captured in the black and white photographs that decorate her half of the room.