Area families inducted into Century Farm Program
HAPPY HOLLOW — Mary Jo Shaw-Tillery and Kenneth Sanson share more than a fence line. They are third cousins, tracing their roots back to Thomas Allen Mabry, who settled more than 100 years ago in this small Faulkner County community located at the intersection of what are now Arkansas 36 and Arkansas 287.
Mary Jo and Kenneth are neighbors. They continue to farm the land that has been passed down by Mabry and his descendants. Mary Jo calls her 40-acre farm Mabry Farm, which was established in 1851. Kenneth calls his 40-acre farm Kenneth Sanson Farm, which was established in 1856.
Mary Jo and Kenneth are among the 58 recent inductees from 31 counties honored through the Arkansas Agriculture Department’s 2015 Century Farm Program. They joined other inductees for a ceremony Oct. 29 at the state Capitol in Little Rock. Arkansas Agriculture Secretary Wes Ward welcomed them, and Gov. Asa Hutchinson thanked them for keeping their farms in the family for at least 100 years.
Mary Jo and Kenneth’s grandmothers were sisters, children of Thomas Allen Mabry’s son James Thomas Allen “Little Jim” Mabry and his wife, Mary Elizabeth Wilmoth Mabry.
Mary Jo is the granddaughter of Martha Jane Mabry Bass. Kenneth is the grandson of Mary Susan “Mollie” Mabry Harrod.
Following is a closer look at the two farms:
MABRY FARM
Mabry Farm was passed down from Mary Jo’s grandmother (Martha Jane Mabry Bass) to her mother, Zola Gertrude Bass Shaw, who died in 1998, then to Mary Jo and her daughter, Charissa Tillery.
Mary Jo and Charissa continue to raise beef cattle on the farm, which now totals 136 acres.
“When my mom died, my dad (Thomas F. ‘Tommy’ Shaw) deeded the farm to me and Charissa because we had helped keep [my mom] here at home before she
died,” Mary Jo said.
Mary Jo’s parents had a dairy farm previously.
“When [her dad] got to where he couldn’t handle the dairy farm, I took it over,” Mary Jo said. “I didn’t mind. I had worked in an office before, and I would much rather milk cows than work in an office.
“So when mom got down, they sold the dairy, and we started raising beef cattle.”
Mary Jo, 75, has been married to Frank Tillery, 80, for 53 years. They also have a son, Mark.
Charissa, 40, teaches science at Conway Junior High School and Conway High School. She built her own house on the family farm.
“I never wanted to live anywhere else,” she said with a smile.
Mark, 52, studied mechanics at Petit Jean Vo-Tech, now the University of Arkansas Community College at Morrilton. He and his wife, Debbie, live in Springhill. Mark has a stepson, Dustin Jennings, 21, from a previous marriage.
Mary Jo graduated from Enola High School and attended one year at Central Baptist College before she married.
KENNETH SANSON
FARM Kenneth, 86, bought the 40 acres that were part of the old Mabry Farm in 1954 from his great-aunt, Rena Ordell Mabry. Rena was a sister to Kenneth and Mary Jo’s grandmothers and never married.
Kenneth said Thomas Allen Mabry joined the Arkansas militia and went off to fight in the Civil War “and never came back.”
“We don’t know what happened to him,” Kenneth said. “We do know that he is buried in Bowling Green, Kentucky.
“As the story goes, when Thomas A. left to join the militia, he told a friend his will. In other words, he had an oral will. But his daughter was a witness to it. When he didn’t come back from the war, his friend wrote up the will, and it stood up in court.
“That wouldn’t happen today.”
harissa Tillery said Thomas A. Mabry served in Company E, 10th Arkansas Infantry, and is buried in a mass grave. Information on findagrave.com states Mabry died of measles while stationed at Camp Beauregard, Kentucky, near Bowling Green, and is buried in a mass grave along with other soldiers who died of disease during the winter of 1861.
“The heirs of Thomas A. Mabry deeded this 40 acres to J.T. [John Thomas Allen “Little Jim”] Mabry, who I knew as Jim,” Kenneth said, adding that the family signed the land over to Rena after Jim died because she had lived with him and took care of him.
Kenneth said his great-grandfather deeded onehalf acre of the 40 acres to the Happy Hollow Baptist Church, which still exists.
Kenneth is the son of the late Archie William Sanson and Viola Susan Harrod Sanson, who was a daughter of Mary Susan “Mollie” Mabry Harrod.
“I’ve lived around here all my life,” Kenneth said.
He graduated from Enola High School and attended Arkansas State Teachers College, now the University of Central Arkansas, in Conway. He taught welding at Petit Jean Vo-Tech for 25 years.
His wife, Peggy, 83, who is from Springhill, graduated from ASTC and taught at Enola High School for 30 years.
“We’ve lived on the farm all our lives,” Kenneth said, adding they used to live across the highway from where they live now. “We did other things to be able to maintain the farm.
“We were weekend farmers for a long time.”
The Sansons, who celebrated their 65th wedding anniversary Tuesday, have three children — Jimmy Sanson, 63, of the Liberty community; Debbie Creswell, 61, of Conway; and Karen Simon, 60, of the Saltillo community. The couple also have nine grandchildren and 14 great-grandchildren.
Kenneth and Peggy now own 800 acres. Someday their children, who now take care of the cattle, will inherit the property.
“They already know all of that,” Peggy said, adding that their son, Jimmy, will inherit the 40 acres that has been designated a Century Farm.
Applications for 2016 Century Farms will open in February. To qualify as a 2016 Century Farm inductee, family farms must be owned by the family for 100 years as of Dec. 31, 2015, and at least 10 acres of the original land acquisition must remain in use and make a financial contribution to the farm’s overall income.
For more information on the Arkansas Century Farm Program, visit aad.arkansas. gov.