Smith-Reid, Loreatha, 1937-
Biography
Loreatha Smith-Reid was born in Cotton Plant, Arkansas, in 1937. Her parents were sharecroppers and tenant farmers. Smith had 19 siblings. When she was nine years old, Smith started her first job cleaning houses. Loreatha Smith married Willie Reid. She later moved to Des Moines, Iowa, where she worked at Hotel Fort Des Moines. Smith-Reid later moved to Davenport, where she worked in the emergency room and intensive care unit at Osteopathic Hospital. She began pursuing an education in nursing before having to retire for health reasons. Loreatha Smith-Reid was active in her church and served as a caretaker for her grandchildren.
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Smith-Reid, Loreatha, 2010-05-24
Loreatha Smith-Reid recalls her experiences growing up in Arkansas in a sharecropping family. Smith says she and her 19 siblings picked cotton and started working at a young age to help the family. She recalls that when she was nine years old, she started her first job cleaning houses for the Bowes family. Smith-Reid says that there was a dirty outhouse reserved for the use of “Coloreds” and that the husband, Lehman Bowes, was an angry and violent man who tried to sexually assault one of her sisters. In contrast, Smith says she had a friendly relationship with the white women whose houses she worked in as a child.