Hartselle native part of Nursing Home Pageant

By Staff
Tracy B. Cieniewicz, Hartselle Enquirer
A Hartselle native now knows how it feels to be treated like royalty.
Quick, 72, of Hanceville was recently crowned the 2006 Ms. Hanceville Nursing and Rehab Queen. She represented the care facility at the 2006 Ms. Alabama Nursing Home Pageant held Aug. 8 at The Wynfrey Hotel in Birmingham.
While Quick did not take home the state title, she was honored to be a top 10 finalist among 63 contestants ages 57 to 101 representing the Alabama Nursing Home Association.
She was also honored to meet American Idol winner Taylor Hicks.
According to pageant guidelines, contestants are judged on the basis of attitude toward life, alertness, personality, ability to show happiness with life in a nursing home, and demonstrated interest and continuing contributions to others.
Quick’s nursing home experience made her the perfect candidate for Hanceville Nursing and Rehab’s representative at the pageant.
When Quick was admitted to Hanceville Nursing and Rehab nearly two years ago, she weighed only 98 pounds and suffered from multiple health problems, including complications with her heart and kidneys.
But Quick, who says she looks and feels healthier than she has in years, credits her recovery and new lease on life to the loving care she receives at Hanceville Nursing and Rehab from medical staff and a special friend--a 14-pound male cat named Lisa Marie.
Quick said Lisa Marie immediately took to her once she arrived at the facility, even sleeping with her each night and sharing gravy with her at breakfast.
When Quick isn’t busy spending time with Lisa Marie, she enjoys a variety of activities at Hanceville Nursing and Rehab. Her favorite pastimes are visiting with older patients, playing bingo, reading, attending chapel services, watching the weekly parade put on by a local daycare, fishing, day trips, helping residents at the facility’s beauty shop, and occasionally answering the facility’s phone.
Hartselle was home for Quick until age 16 when she moved to Ohio to find a good paying job and to leave behind memories of her boyfriend who was pronounced missing in action in Korea.
She and her four siblings, including brother J.E. White of Hartselle, grew up in a sharecroper’s house on the farm of William and Dorothy Hartsell near Bethel Baptist Church.
As teenagers, Quick and her sister, Chris White Pearsall of New York, were carhops at Hartselle’s Hollywood Caf/.
Quick and Pearsall visited Hartselle recently and had breakfast at Weekday’s Deli on Sparkman Street with a dozen of Pearsall’s classmates from the Morgan County High School class of 1953.
They reminisced with the group about growing up in Hartselle, and the sisters reminisced together about fishing in Flint Creek, working on the Hartsell’s farm, and walking through the streets of downtown Hartselle where only one traffic light was perched.
And although Quick doesn’t get to visit Hartselle as often as she would like, she said she thinks of her hometown often.