Flossie was
born May 24, 1913, near Ennis, Texas. Her
parents were Louis and Emma Jaresh
Dolezalek. She had four brothers and
sisters: Bill, Emma, Edward, and Mildred.
In 1916, the Dolezalek
family moved to a farm west of Dorchester.
When Flossie
was old enough, she attended the two-room
Sperry School, where she read books in a
language that at first she didn't
understand. The family spoke Czech at home.
After completing the ninth grade, Flossie had
to stay at home to work in the fields and
house.
While Flossie was quite young,
she looked after her younger brother Edward,
sometimes endangering him in the process.
Such as the time she was sawing wood and sat
Edward on the end of the log that fell off,
not realizing he would fall too. By the time
she was 10 or 12, she was milking cows and
hoeing crops. But she always had time to put
down her hoe or cotton sack to pin curl a
friend's hair right there in the field or
make a dress for them.
At 20, Flossie went to Dallas to
work as a cook and housekeeper, earning
about a $1 a day. On her days off, Flossie took
violin lessons, went to dances, or came home
to Dorchester on the Interurban. She also
managed to break her arm while
roller-skating in the backyard at night much
to the chagrin of the neighborhood doctor
who had to get up in the middle of the night
to set her arm.
On December 21, 1942, Flossie
married Army Pvt. Fred Tesar, the adopted
son of neighbors Gabriel and Emilie Skrhak
Horak. Shortly aftr their marriage, Fred was
shipped overseas. About a year later, Flossie went
to work at the North American airplane plant
in Grand Prairie. There she "bucked rivets"
for 2½ years, making a then-phenomenal wage
of $65 a week. She lived in Urbandale with
her sister and brother-in-law, Emma and Joe
Ruzicka and rode to work with Joe on his
motorcycle.
During the 2½ years Fred was
overseas, Flossie
and Fred saved their wages and when Fred
came home in 1945, they bought the Rifenberg
farm near Southmayd. The dilapidated old
farmhouse didn't have running water or
electricity, and younger family members said
the house "leaned". But, in time,
improvements were made and it became the
home where they raised their two daughters
with affection and gentle discipline.
Flossie's
almost boundless energy suited her life as a
farm wife. She fed her family with food from
the farm - chicken, beef, pork, duck,
jams, jellies, preserves, fruit, vegetables,
milk, cream, and butter. She dressed her
family in homemade clothes, sewing
everything from pajamas and underclothes to
Sunday dresses and swimsuits.
After a drought in the mid 1950s,
it was obvious that one bale of cotton
wouldn't cover the family's expenses for the
coming year and Flossie
began working outside the home. At first she
worked seasonally at Bryce's Pickle Plant
but later found permanent work painting
fishing lures at Whopper Stopper. Although
the work was strenuous, exacting, and dirty,
she took pride in her ability to mix paint
and match colors. She worked there until she
retired in 1983 at the age of 70.
When Fred died unexpectedly in
1972, she sold the cattle and farm equipment
but refused to leave the country home she
had shared with Fred. Although she oversaw
the farms, kept a garden, mowed her large
yard, and even traveled a bit; her real love
was quilting.
She often embroidered the date
and the phrase "remember me" on her quilts.
When she could no longer quilt, she liked to
imagine that her friends and family would
indeed remember her by celebrating her life
rather than mourning her death. She died
February 26, 2005 in Richardson, Texas.
