A Rose For Mama

About the Book

A Rose For Mama is a religious play that I wrote as a Mother’s Day play for my church several years ago.

The novel is about the trials of a Black widowed mother of three, living in the south in the years prior to integration. She had a passion for roses, and as these beautiful flowers are grown in several colors, so is her spirit and character. With very little education, she survived on strong faith in God Whom she loved with all her heart; steadfast love for her children and warm memories of a perfect marriage with a perfect husband. She tried to fulfill the dreams for her children that she and her husband had.. But when she found out that her oldest son was involved in criminal behavior which could land him in jail, she confronted him. He arrogantly and defiantly resisted her and left home, never to be seen or heard from for many years. During all those years, she constantly prayed and kept the faith that God would take care of him and bring him back home to her.

The other two children grew up and made her proud, but she never wavered in the faith that her oldest child would someday come back home. Her prayers were eventually answered. Her son did come home, a changed man, and just when she needed him most; proof that the Bible is true: “The effective fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much.” (James 5:16; KJV)

About the Author

Born June 14, 1932 in rural Homerville, Georgia, the sixth child of Corine and Jesse B. Grover, Sr., a Baptist Preacher. . My mother died in 1936 and in 1938 my father moved the family to Jacksonville, Florida where I grew up. In my young childhood, 11 years old, I began singing gospel songs on church programs and soon progressed to concerts within the city as well as out of state, becoming the city’s youngest and one of its leading gospel singers.

Before and during the civil rights movement I worked in the law office of Ernest D. Jackson, Sr., now deceased. I was one of only two Black legal secretaries in Jacksonville at that time. There I got the chance to meet congressmen, Senators and other politicians; but one famous person that I remember most is the late Justice Thurgood Marshall. He worked with our office many times when he was Chief Legal Defense Counsel for the NAACP giving us access to his vast civil rights knowledge and wisdom. I admire him greatly.

I moved to Lowell, Massachusetts in 1972 with two young children, ending a 13- year old marriage. A single mother for eight years, I married for the second time in 1980. One son was born to that marriage.