McDill McCown Gassman

 Author

Born:October 10, 1914, Huntsville, Alabama
Died:November 1971, Rome, Georgia
Buried:Maple Hill Cemetery, Huntsville, Alabama

Notes:

•  A woman with three last names. - Editor's Note

•  "McDill McCown Gassman who now lives in Rome, Georgia, is the author of a book, Daddy Was an Undertaker and Fragments, a volume of poetry." - Matthews

•  Madison County Author of "My Daddy Was an Undertaker" (1952) and "Fragments torn from the whole cloth of life" (1948). - Record

•  Mrs. McDill Gassman
     Mrs. McDill M. Gassman, 115 Malone Drive, died Thursday at 5:30 p.m. in a Rome hospital following an illness of one day.
     Mrs. Gassman was born in Huntsville, Ala., daughter of Mrs. Joseph Albert McCown and the late Mr. McCown but had been a resident of Rome since 1940. She had been state correspondent for the Atlanta Constitution since 1957 and was a free lance writer, having written "Daddy Was An Undertaker" and "Fragments," a book of light verse. Her works appeared in several national publications. She was a member of the First Presbyterian Church of Rome.
     Survivors include her husband, Harold S. Gassman, Rome; one daughter, Mrs. Paul W. Doster, LaGrange; one son, Wade B. Gassman, Athens; her mother, Mrs. J. A. McCown, Huntsville. Ala.; one sister, Miss Helen McCown, Huntsville, Ala. and four grandchildren.      Funeral services will be held Saturday at 11 a.m. in the chapel of Jennings Funeral Home with Rev. Clayton Bell officiating. Interment services will be at 3 p.m. at Maple Hill Cemetery, Huntsville, Ala.
     The body will remain at the funeral home and the family will receive friends there from 7 until 9 p.m. today. - Rome News Tribune

•  She was the first woman speaker at convention of 4,000 members of the National Funeral Directors Association. - Alabama Authors

•  The book is quoted in a person's obituary:
     "In her book, McDill McCown Gassman recalls growing up above a funeral parlor in the 1920s. She writes of returning to her hometown years later, visiting her father's grave and finding a woman standing there. A stranger to the author, the woman was someone her father had helped during a tough time. 'Undertaking, itself, is no easy job, I'm sure,' the woman mused aloud, 'but your daddy gave a glory to it, somehow; him and his big, black Stetson. Bless his heart.'
     Gassman wrote, 'I knew in that moment, with a sweet and solemn knowing, what Daddy had always known; that death is just the gateway to life - and nothing lovely ever dies.'" - Quote


Related Links:

•  Alabama Authors - Profile

•  Find A Grave - Page created by Heather and photos of grave stones by Pamela Moyers.

•  Matthews - Article titled "THE WRITERS GROUP OF HUNTSVILLE, ALABAMA" by Mrs. Luke Matthews in Commemorative Album, Celebrating our City's Sesquicentennial of Progress, Huntsville, Alabama, by James E. Taylor, General Chairman, 1955, page 82.

•  Quote - quote from book. (Originally found at http://amarillo.com/stories/2010/01/13/obi_obit20.shtml.)

•  Record - A Dream Come True: The Story of Madison County and Incidentally of Alabama and the United States, Volume II, by James Record, 1978, page 554.

•  Rome News Tribune - Obituary Rome News Tribune, Nov. 26, 1971.


The Following Pages Link to this Page:
•  Matthews
•  Record