A Land Remembered Characters

Tobias: The first gen­er­a­tion’s main char­ac­ter. He became rich from cat­tle herd­ing and lat­er an orange grove. He gets malar­ia from an attack of sev­er­al hun­dred thou­sand ‘skeeters’, but is healed (tem­porar­i­ly) by Mia­mi Bil­lie, an Indi­an med­i­cine man. Died near the end of Zech’s piece of the book when he became too weak from the cold to fight his malar­ia when he tried to save orange trees from a freeze. (He is the last ghost to appear to Solomon, his grandson.)

Emma: Tobi­as’s wife. Her main occu­pa­tion is cook­ing for all the men with the help of Pearlie Mae and Glen­da. She nev­er com­plains. Every­body loves her. She dies from a heart attack a few years before Tobias does.

Zech: The 2nd gen­er­a­tion’s main char­ac­ter. He lived a some­what lone­ly life away from oth­er chil­dren and had two dogs, Nip and Tuck who were trag­i­cal­ly killed, and a Marsh tacky horse named Ish­mael. He mar­ries Glen­da and has the son Solomon, called Sol. He has an affair with an Indi­an woman named Tawan­da, which results in anoth­er son, Toby Cypress. Zech is an expe­ri­enced gun­man and horserid­er and kills sev­er­al ban­dits. When get­ting revenge his foot is shot and he is weak­er till his death in a horserid­ing acci­dent and drowns.

Glen­da: Zech’s wife. She seems more of a tomboy in her adult­hood and gives birth to 2 chil­dren through­out her life, but she has a mis­car­riage with the first one. Sad­ly she dies near the end of Zech’s life when she’s impaled by a bull, then Zech shoots the bull out of rage.

Solomon: The 3rd gen­er­a­tion’s main char­ac­ter. He lived a sad life of pow­er. After his father’s death he became pow­er hun­gry, want­i­ng to leave a mark with his mon­ey and the busi­ness his fam­i­ly start­ed. He calls him­self, “the least of the MacIveys.” Even­tu­al­ly he finds Bon­nie, a young wait­ress, and changes. After her death in a hur­ri­cane and a reunion with Toby he even­tu­al­ly real­izes the destruc­tion his greed has brought upon the land. He goes to Pun­ta Ras­sa to live his last days. He dies of a heart attack at the end of the book.

Bon­nie: Solomon’s love inter­est. She’s the daugh­ter of an abu­sive father and is hired by Solomon as a house­wife. The two live togeth­er for almost sev­en years. They final­ly admit they want to get mar­ried as she and Sol are in the roof rafters try­ing to ride out a hur­ri­cane. She is ripped away from Sol and is count­ed among the 2000 dead. Sol lat­er dis­likes the lake which car­ried their house away and dikes it.

Skil­lit: A black for­mer slave. He is encoun­tered by Tobias after slav­ery was banned, wear­ing only a pair of feed sack pants. He had nowhere to go, and was on the run when Tobias’ dogs found him hid­ing in a hole. Tobias hires him. He is a great help in catch­ing cows, since he is much stronger than all the oth­er cat­tle drovers. He even­tu­al­ly mar­ries Pearlie Mae, a for­mer slave, and leaves to start a farm. Skil­lit only appears two more times in the book: when he returns for Tobi­as’s funer­al and when Sol remem­bers all the peo­ple in his life.

Pearlie Mae:  A black for­mer slave. Though half his age, she mar­ries Skil­lit and gives birth to five children.

Frog: A hired work­er, for­mer town drunk. Bon­zo and he began work­ing for Tobias for their first suc­cess­ful mis­sion. Frog is seen as almost a broth­er to Tobias and he is always a help. He dies from being impaled by the same bull that killed Glen­da, and is buried next to Tobias and Emma. As he lays dying he asks Sol if his grave­stone can read “Frog MacIvey” and Sol agrees claim­ing he would have done that anyway.

Bon­zo: A hired work­er, for­mer town drunk. He says lit­tle, com­pared to Frog. He dies from malar­ia ear­ly in the book.

Lester: A hired work­er that Zech hired to replace Bonzo.

Tawan­da: Zech’s Semi­nole Indi­an mis­tress. He only sees her three times. The first time when he and his father deliv­er cows to the Indi­an vil­lage, the sec­ond when Zech comes to get two new hors­es, the third when he vis­its the vil­lage again. When they come to Tobias’ funer­al, Tawan­da’s par­ents inform Zech of her death dur­ing child­birth. Zech buys a head­stone for her that reads “Tawan­da McIvey, Beloved”.

Toby: Son of Tawan­da and Zech. He was ridiculed by the chil­dren in his vil­lage because of his white father, but was respect­ed by the adults because of his MacIvey blood. When Zech vis­its the vil­lage, the two bond. When he is 15, he sees his father again, now with his oth­er son, Sol, and the two broth­ers start to bond. Toby lat­er becomes the vil­lage chief and has three chil­dren with his wife, Min­nie. He comes to hate Sol for ruin­ing the for­est, and the two avoid con­tact for almost half a cen­tu­ry. He sees Sol again when Sol is about to die, mak­ing his peace with his halfbrother.

Min­nie: Toby’s wife she was seen twice, once when Sol had come back to tell Toby of Zech’s death and anoth­er when Sol came to make piece with Toby before they die she was in her twen­ty’s when she came in and she gave birth to three kids.

From the A Land Remem­bered entry in Wikipedia.