Elinor Brown-Earle

Elinor Brown-Earle

By Cathy Holt

“I tell the kids ‘Get the best education you can get, and practice good manners. These two things will take you a long way.’”

Mrs. Earle is in her element at the after-school program of Lee Walker Heights, correcting one child’s manners, tying another one’s shoes, helping another with homework. She has been a lifelong community activist. Born and raised in Asheville, she went to Livingston Street Elementary School (now the Reid Center), then Hill Street Middle School, then Stephens Lee High, graduating in 1961.



At
age 18, she registered to vote, began working with the Young Democrats,
and has been registering people to vote ever since. By now she has
signed up at least 600; she also helps get out the vote.


“All my life
I’ve been interested in helping the elderly, doing whatever I could do
for them,” she recalled. “Whether it was taking them to the polls,
running errands, combing their hair, going to the store for them,
giving them rides to the doctor’s office-I just tried to help.”


She worked as a laboratory technician at several hospitals, and later owned her own maid service business for over five years.


After getting
married and having children, she became involved in the kids’ schools.
They live in Fletcher, but her daughter wanted to attend Asheville
schools. For years, she volunteered with kids. “Then, in 1998, they
were looking for a worker for the Youthful HAND (Housing Against
Narcotics & Drugs), and I applied. I love it here at the Community
Center, because the parents are right here in the neighborhood. If a
child needs more discipline than I can give, I go over to the home and
talk with the parents.”


“I tell anyone
that if I can be with these kids for 3 years, I can turn them around.
From the first group I worked with in the program, two are now in
college.” She told the story of one girl, a sixth grader, reading at
third grade level. “She needed tutoring, personal caring, hygiene. She
had a dandruff problem. I took her to a beautician, who agreed to do
her hair once a week. Self-esteem is such an important issue. She was
like my second daughter. She’s in her third year of college now! I
don’t make all the money in the world, but I stay here because I know
what these kids can do!” she exclaimed.


Katherine Brown,
her mother, taught her “always give 101%,” and she has lived by
that—not only working with the children after school, but frequently
attending school functions, having lunch with the students, and after
her own six-hour shift, driving one of the youngsters home. In the
Summer Enrichment program, she makes sure that the kids learn to swim.
When she perceives a need, she spends her own money. She has even
bought beds for children who were sleeping on the floor. “People say
these kids are bad,” she commented. “But of course they act out in
school, if they haven’t slept all night long.”


“I tell the kids, ‘Get the best education you can get, and practice good manners. These two things will take you a long way.’”


She is proud of being married for 34 years to Curtis Roy Earle, and very proud of her two children for finishing college.


“I’m here for
the kids,” she concluded. “And we need more volunteers, more funding.
I’d love to have a choir here, dance lessons. We need an art &
crafts volunteer for the summer. Above all, the kids need people to
encourage them and be there for them.”