happy april 1st day

Joseph Levi Brewer (September 13, 1936- July 27, 1998)

            J.L., as he was always called by the family, was known as the unluckiest person anyone knew. Relatives always spoke of “Poor Little J.L.” He was the youngest child of Daisy and Arnold Brewer and was barely over a year old when Arnold was killed. When he was three, he broke his shoulder and also developed painful hemorrhoids that plagued him off and on from the time he was four years old. About the time he was old enough, he developed rheumatic fever and was extremely ill for a long time.

            His mother, Daisy, was going to Stair Tech taking a course that would get her a job at Hahn Hussein; his sister Evelyn was fourteen and had to quit school to care for him. As Evelyn said there was always something wrong with J.L. At some point he had to be hospitalized for lead poisoning. He also married a young woman named Wilma Stamps and they had one child, Joey. J.L. worked and lived in Michigan for awhile.

            J.L. cam back to Knoxville  and got a job in construction; he was working on a bridge at the Alcoa exit over Tyson Park when he fell fifty feet and landed on bags of concrete and logs and suffered multiple injuries that no one expected him to survive from. He had a double brain concussion, a broken neck and back as well as both arms and legs were broken and most of his fingers-as well! J.L. was in a coma for eleven days. The doctors did no set the broken bones for weeks and warned the family that he might end up a vegetable if he survived. But survive he did and eventually even was able to walk again- albeit with a limp and went back to work.

            J.L. was also left with a minor speech impediment and an explosive anal unpredictable temper. Unknowingly to J.L. his wife was having an affair with Joyce’s ex-husband and his family found out. One of his sisters actually slapped Wilma around at the hospital when her new boyfriend came around. Evelyn talked to Wilma and persuaded her not to leave and go back to Michigan while J.L. was still critical. So Wilma stayed and the marriage lasted long enough for them to have a second child. J.L. found Wilma with someone else and they got divorced, J.L. never remarried.

            J.L.’s bad luck continued; he was running a service station. A customer came in and asked him ti check his oil. While J.L. was checking the oil the customer started the engine and poor J.L. lost two fingers.  His sister Audrey said J.L. had to have full surgery on his arm because of the initial injury.

            At some point J.L. went back to Michigan where his mother was living despite the fact that he could not get along with her husband B- who was his uncle anyway. J.L. managed to get a job working for General Motors. I don’t know how long he worked there before he had another fall which ended his working days all together. He did get disability and a cash settlement with which he bought a house on Nichols Street in East Knoxville.

            J.L. developed a drinking habit along the way (and no wonder) as well as other health complications which his sisters discovered. Someone told them he was bleeding from the rectum. When they went out he hemorrhaged and was soaked in blood. Over his protests they took him to UT hospital where the doctors found he had colon cancer- the same ailment that killed his mother. J.L. died July 27, 1994 at age 57.