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The Lunenburg-Nottoway Retired Teachers Association continues to spotlight its membership. During the month of February, Florence Marie King Oliver of Crewe was spotlighted. Oliver graduated from Nottoway Training School in 1949. Upon graduating from Hampton Institute in 1954, she spearheaded her professional career in 1954 teaching math at Sussex County Training School. Later, while traveling with her military husband and raising four children, Oliver’s approximately 33 -year professional teaching career encompassed teaching in Tacoma, Washington, at Luther H. Foster, Lunenburg High School, in Mt. Clemens, Michigan, then back to Lunenburg Junior High School in 1970 and retiring in 1991. 

As a teenager, about 80 years ago, Oliver, under the guidance of her aunt, learned to crochet and gradually developed a hobby in crocheting doll clothing. Even now at age 91, in her spare time she still enjoys crocheting outfits for her collection of dolls. Her collection includes special memories/occasions dolls (bed décor, weddings, Christmas with Mr. and Mrs. Claus, etc.), self-painted ceramic dolls (Booker T. Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Frederick Douglas, etc.), gift dolls (Caribbean, image of mother, reversibles, etc.) and two-in-one dolls (dolls dressed in layered outfits – displayed on easel). Some of her scrap yarn was used to make bookmark worms. 

The majority of Oliver’s doll collection has been donated to family members, friends, and given as door prizes for special events. In 2015 LNRTA President Ruby Ingram, one of Oliver’s former students, was gifted a doll with the attached proverbial inscription: “Whosoever keepeth his mouth and tongue keeps his soul from trouble.” Her son has made a colorful PowerPoint presentation of Oliver’s doll collection to share at family and community gatherings. Her teaching, hobbies, church and community involvement have touched many lives over the years