Knox County TN mail list

knoxcotn-digest Monday, July 24 2000 Volume 01 : Number 118

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Date: Mon, 24 Jul 2000 18:02:07 -0400

From: "ball2mm" <ball2mm@email.msn.com>

Subject: [KnoxCoTN] Re: Say Hello

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Hello:

I have been doing genealogy since the 1996 First Families BiCentennial =

Celebration Project. I knew the family had never lived anywhere else =

that they talked about, only East TN. What an enjoyment to find =

ancestors and meet family I never knew had existed. I am not an expert =

in any field, but love to share what I have been able to locate.

Moser, Mathes, Lane, Brown, Maskall, Howard, Donohoo, Weir, Glenn, =

Poindexter, Pettitt, Eakins, Jenkins, Hawkins, and Givens in Washington, =

Jefferson, Greene, Grainger, Sevier, Cocke, Blount, and Monroe. We are =

newcomers to Knox County but have been here since the late 1800's and =

early 1900s. =20

My husband has Jefferson and Sevier County lines of Ball, Atchley, =

Mount, French, Cate, Koontz, Williams, Hodge/Hodges, Sasseen, =

Rutherford, Duggan, Campbell, Fine, McNabb. Most of these lines are =

from the Jefferson and Sevier Counties and were in the area when it was =

NC. Our primary location is Dumplin Valley and Piedmont.

Williams ancestors are my newest discovery. Clementine Williams married =

William O Mount and they are buried in Dumplin Cemetery. I have just =

discovered her parents Elisha Houston Williams and Martha Hodges. The =

Williams are Welsh.

I hope someone will recognize some of these names and write to me. My =

address is Ball2mm@msn.com

Marilyn

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<DIV><FONT face=3DArial size=3D2>Hello:</FONT></DIV>

<DIV><FONT face=3DArial size=3D2>I have been doing genealogy since the =

1996 First=20

Families BiCentennial Celebration Project.  I knew the family had =

never=20

lived anywhere else that they talked about, only East TN.  What an=20

enjoyment to find ancestors and meet family I never knew had =

existed.  I am=20

not an expert in any field, but love to share what I have been able to=20

locate.</FONT></DIV>

<DIV><FONT face=3DArial size=3D2>Moser, Mathes, Lane, Brown, Maskall, =

Howard,=20

Donohoo, Weir, Glenn, Poindexter, Pettitt, Eakins, Jenkins, Hawkins, and =

Givens=20

in Washington, Jefferson, Greene, Grainger, Sevier, Cocke, Blount, and=20

Monroe.  We are newcomers to Knox County but have been here since =

the late=20

1800's and early 1900s.  </FONT></DIV>

<DIV><FONT face=3DArial size=3D2>My husband has Jefferson and Sevier =

County lines of=20

Ball, Atchley, Mount, French, Cate, Koontz, Williams, Hodge/Hodges, =

Sasseen,=20

Rutherford,</FONT><FONT face=3DArial size=3D2> Duggan, Campbell, Fine, =

McNabb. =20

Most of these lines are from the Jefferson and Sevier Counties and were =

in the=20

area when it was NC.  Our primary location is</FONT><FONT =

face=3DArial=20

size=3D2> Dumplin Valley and Piedmont.</FONT></DIV>

<DIV><FONT face=3DArial size=3D2>Williams ancestors are my newest=20

discovery.  Clementine Williams married William O Mount and they =

are buried=20

in Dumplin Cemetery.  I have just discovered her parents Elisha =

Houston=20

Williams and Martha Hodges.  The Williams are Welsh.</FONT></DIV>

<DIV><FONT face=3DArial size=3D2>I hope someone will recognize some of =

these names=20

and write to me.  My address is  <A=20

href=3D"mailto:Ball2mm@msn.com">Ball2mm@msn.com</A></FONT></DIV>

<DIV><FONT face=3DArial size=3D2>Marilyn</FONT></DIV>

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Date: Mon, 24 Jul 2000 21:12:22 -0700

From: "Billie R. McNamara" <knox@tngenweb.org>

Subject: [KnoxCoTN] 23 July 2000: Sunday Afternoon Rocking

Note: This is yesterday's column. I have been visiting with family and so

it is a bit late, also next week's column may also come a bit late. Thanks

for your understanding. -jan

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"Worth Remembering" (from the Sunday Afternoon Rocking series)

There are four of the books, thin, ragged, pages yellowed and crumbling

about the edges. There is a Ray's Arithmetic, a geography text, a McGuffey

reader, and a blueback speller, all one needed in the 1880's for an

education. That they were carefully kept all these years is reason enough

to understand their importance, but the McGuffey reader tells the tale

completely and exquisitely. Long ago the danger of it falling apart must

have occurred to my great grandmother, for it has been carefully covered in

red faded cloth, the long ago stitches of a mother's hand evident in the

care taken to preserve the tool for her son's education. The books

belonged to my grandfather, a fatherless boy being raised by a widowed

mother who took in other people's laundry in an attempt to afford her son

the opportunity of walking several miles to school. And manage to do so he

did, all the way to high school, though opportunities for doing so in the

rural Tennessee community were few, and little his mother had to give him.

He showed me the tiny bundle of books long ago when I was a child, and I

marveled at their "thinness" and age. I had no basis for understanding at

the time how dearly these books must have cost for the times and the family

situation, or what great sacrifices had been made that they could be

studied. My grandfather's pride in those books was evident, but I had no

way of realizing why that was so.

In time, with an understanding of the past and my family's situation, I

would marvel at the chance he had, in the situation his family was, both

economically and geographically. I would remember the scene I had noted

throughout my childhood, an elderly man seated in a great old stuffed

chair, Bible spread out in his lap, peering through a magnifying glass to

read the words. And finally I would understand how much he regarded the

sheer ability of comprehending the words he read as a blessing many of his

situation never received. I would remember his obvious interest in so many

things around him, and how when something seemed interesting or noteworthy

to him, he would scribble a notation about it on whatever piece of paper he

had, in a sense "preserving knowledge". Much later, I would be shown the

iron wash kettle my great grandmother had soaked and steamed and scrubbed

the clothing of others in, and I would realize that my grandfather must

have remembered seeing that as a young boy, seeing her exhaustion, her hair

falling in wet sweaty strands about a flushed face, and realized the

sacrifices she made.

In contrast, my other grandfather was illiterate, and deeply longed for the

education he had missed. His family situation was very different, and

there was no one to intervene and see to it that he received one. He was

farmed out at the age of seven, and from that day forth "pulled his own

weight". He was a bright man, a carpenter who could figure in his head

faster than I could figure on paper, but he could not read. He loved books

and so his wife would read to him, long hours in the evening when he came

in exhausted from a day's work. Respect and appreciation for an education

was very much a part of his outlook as well. He understood all too well

what an opportunity it was.

I would begin to realize how that pride in an education had been very much

a part of the family. My grandfather's brother would be killed in World

War I, but before his death he would repeatedly tell the family that should

something happen, his war bonds were to be used for the education of Helen

and Hazel, his young nieces. And so they were. All of my life I heard the

adage, "A good education is something no one can take away", and those

words resounded in my head for many years as an adult. Although none of

the family has achieved great things in terms of scholarship as the world

accepts such today, all of the family surpassed my grandfathers in terms of

an education, just as they intended, and the goals for such seem to grow

with each successive generation. Yet...as the goals have grown, it seems

that the appreciation is lacking. With books and schools and teachers so

readily available, to the extent that anyone who so desires to do so and

plans for such in terms of scholarship even if finances are not available,

can have an education...it seems something is lacking.

I do not have a bundle of school books from my past that I would show my

grandchildren with pride. I have those texts, yes, but deep feeling and

reverence my grandfathers so obviously felt is simply not there. I value

education, and indeed it has been the pivotal point of my career, but a

deep reverence for it as other generations felt is lacking. I can

appreciate where my grandfathers' own deep feelings came from, and I can

understand...but I do not have the same frame of reference. My children

have even less so. Unless one has desperately longed for a thing, seen a

goal as almost impossible and the road to it impassable, one cannot

possibly appreciate what it means.

It seems ironic that the very thing the generations have worked so hard to

make available, an education, should finally be on our doorsteps, and as we

have arrived at the lighted end of the tunnel, few seem to recognize deeply

within the heart that there was ever a tunnel to progress through. It is

sad to know that perhaps the only way such can truly ever be appreciated

again, is to regress and lose the means for the majority of our population

to attend school. Those who remember such days, when a public school

education was not mandatory but cherished, when schools and learned

teachers were not many but few and far between, when a family did not

automatically enroll a student in school but instead often never bothered

to consider such, unable to spare a working body, are not many. That

generation is very nearly gone from us.

I honestly believe that unless a people understands where they have come

from, where their families have been, they may well find themselves

repeating the same lessons. All the more reason for preserving the stories,

finding ways to make the history of our families meaningful to our

children. All the more reason for telling them of the boy whose mother

sweated over an iron kettle to send her son walking several miles to

school, for telling them of the boy who was farmed out at the age of seven

and always longed to have the opportunity to walk several miles to

school. All the more reason for showing them things like a tattered

schoolbook for which a tired anxious mother once stitched carefully a faded

cloth cover...and pointing out the titles a grandmother read to a gifted

and weary carpenter who never was able to find the opportunity to learn to

read.

just a thought,

jan

.________________________________________________

(Note: Afternoon Rocking messages are meant to be passed on, meant to be

shared...simply share as written without alterations...and in entirety.

Thanks, jan)

Sunday Afternoon Rocking columns are distributed weekly on the list Sunday

Rocking. This is not a "reply to" list, and normally only one message per

week will come across it, that being the column. To subscribe send email to

Sundayrocking-subscribe@egroups.com

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End of knoxcotn-digest V1 #118

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