The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
City resident marks 110th birthday
Moved here 93 years ago from Virginia
MIDDLETOWN » A longtime city woman celebrated her 110th birthday late last month.
On May 23, Elsie Mae (Moody) Davis, who was born on May 23, 1907, in Norfolk, Virginia, turned 110 years old.
She is the daughter of Daisy and Charlie Moody of North Carolina and mother of Virginia L. Townes, Faith M. Jackson, Lisa M. (Davis) Willis, Timothy J. Davis, all of Connecticut; and the Rev. Guy A. Calvert of Jensen Beach, Florida. She has five grandchildren, nine great-grandchildren, nine great-greatgrandchildren and many nieces and nephews, according to her family.
Davis attended Abraham Lincoln School in Norfolk, and remembers one teacher in particular, Evelyn Vaughn, because she was nice, kind and she liked the way she wore her hair, Davis said. The school was segregated and only blacks and those mixed of mixed race attended, according to her family.
When her mother passed away, Davis went to stay with an aunt in Philadelphia. She traveled back and forth between Philadelphia to Virginia, until her brother, James Edward Moody Sr., sent for her at 17 and she relocated to Middletown. Her brother came to Connecticut to make bricks, like many from the South, and worked for the Kane Brickyard on Newfield Street.
Davis has one a niece, Daisy Mae Moody, deceased, six nephews, Charlie Moody, James Edward Moody Jr., (“Cup”), Jimmy Moody, Bernie Moody, all deceased; Wardell Moody of Middletown and Robert L. Moody of Sacramento, California.
Her first job once relocating to Middletown was babysitting for the Byerly family and she worked at Snow White Laundry. She loved to sew and did so freestyle without the use of patterns, her family said. She worked at Middlesex Hospital as a nurse’s aide and was known for the distinction of designing their first nurse’s cap.
In 1934, at 27, she married the late John “Buck” Davis, who was highly regarded in the community. He owned the Goodwill Social Club and later purchased the Commodore Macdonough Inn, a historical site in the city of Middletown, providing live entertainment and a restaurant atmosphere for minorities and others in the community.
Davis and her husband raised and served as foster parents to more than 25 foster care children for over 20 years. They were members of the True Vine Holiness Church in Portland. Then she attended the Cross Street AME Zion Church. She currently is a member of the Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church of Middletown.
In October 2016, Davis was interviewed by Middlesex County Historical Society Executive Director Debbie Shapiro and Professor Gina Ulysse from Wesleyan University in preserving the history of African-American migration to the North and Middletown.
When her mother passed away, Davis went to stay with an aunt in Philadelphia. She traveled back and forth between Philadelphia to Virginia, until her brother, James Edward Moody Sr., sent for her at 17 and she relocated to Middletown. Her brother came to Connecticut to make bricks, like many from the South, and worked for the Kane Brickyard on Newfield Street.