One of the more colorful characters dotting the history of Okeechobee County is a lady known to many of the residents as Aunt Merida (Merry Day) Raulerson. Nearly 100 years old when she passed away, the contributed nursing and midwifery skills that shaped Okeechobee into the community it is today.

Merida Drawdy was born on November 26, 1879 in Charleston County, Georgia. Her parents, George V. and Emily Drawdy, moved their family to Columbia County when she was six weeks old. The next move was to Polk’ County around the turn of the century to Cow Creek, a settlement of alligators and coon hunters near the county line between what is now St. Lucie and Okeechobee counties.

Her father took up the hunting trade, and the alligator and coon hides were transported by oxcart to Fort Pierce for sale. He sought a better life for the family and made still another move to Fort Drum into what came to be known as the "Old Collier Place."

When Merida was 15, a young man from Basinger came to visit the Drawdy home. He liked Merida’s cooking so much he returned several times, and before long he had asked her to cook for him permanently. Merida was just 16 when she married William Raulerson in 1895 at her father’s Fort Drum home. The young couple moved into their own new home at Basinger. Several of their eight children were born there. One of those sons, the late Ossie Raulerson said the family moved to Okeechobee in 1910.

Kyle Van Landingham’s book, "History of Okeechobee County," relates her worth in the community.

"She soon became an indispensable member of the Tantie settlement as a midwife. She was officially licensed in that capacity in 1913 and during her long career delivered over 500 babies, unassisted. With only a third grade education, Merida received her medical training through years of experience in primitive conditions. She used neither rubber gloves nor forceps, but reported she had never lost a baby." The book states.

Other members of her family had also moved from Fort Drum to Okeechobee (renamed from Tantie).

When the county was formed in 1917, Merida’s brother, Smith Drawdy, was the first sheriff.

In a 1971 news article and interview with Aunt Merida in the Sebring News, she said that she always went where she was needed, whether it was an obstetrical case, pneumonia, influenza or something else.

Never knowing the conditions she might have to work under, she learned to carry sterilized clothing, receiving blankets and sufficient drugs.

Old Dr. Hubbard arrived in Okeechobee and found this young woman had a talent that went even beyond his in looking out for the sick. He once said that before he could get to a patient, she would have done all that was necessary.

Dr. Anna Darrow (Doc Anner) arrived and provided Aunt Merida with additional training, especially with the rules of sanitation, stated he 1971 interview. It has been said that between these two women, they did more good than all the missionaries who have come and gone in Okeechobee County.

For more than 40 years Aunt Merida was often the sole source of medical care available to the early settlers in this area. Many of those living here today owe their very existence to her. Many of them were brought into the world by her.

When the first hospital was built in Okeechobee, the first patient in it would have gone without competent nursing had Merida not been in town. The hospital was hardly completed, when a man was severely injured. Dr. Leon Eiseman was the only doctor in town, and he called Aunt Merida and asked her if she could be at the hospital by the time the patient arrived. Thankfully the man survived with this early version of "trauma care."