Alberta Brown is known in the

Newtown community for her sumptuous southern-style Sunday throw downs – a big

roast seasoned to the bone, a large pot of collards, long pans of buttery yams,

melt in your mouth mac-n-cheese and moist cornbread with crispy edges.

 It is as if a small army of

people are dinner guests. Extended family members, church friends and drop-ins

are part of the platoon stopping in for a plate. Brown’s family members were

sharecroppers from Alachua County. They moved to Palmetto and found work

picking tomatoes and green beans. Brown later worked as a live-in on Siesta Key

for a physician’s family. She took care of the couple’s little girl. When help

was no longer needed, she followed in her sister’s footsteps, training to

become a cook. The position at her next job evolved into more. Jane Bancroft

Cook, heir to the Dow Jones & Company family enterprise was looking for a

cook. Through a recommendation from a previous employer, Cook met a tall,

soft-spoken woman and hired her on the spot. Brown recalls the interview that

day. “She looked at me and said, ‘oh, you’re beautiful.’” What followed was a

friendship with Cook until her death in 2002 and a lifelong kinship with the

family that remains today.