knoxcotn-digest Sunday, February 25 2001 Volume 01 : Number 178

 

 

 

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Date: Thu, 22 Feb 2001 23:30:38 EST

From: RMcgi81640@aol.com

Subject: [KnoxCoTN] Gone But Not Forgotten, Volume III

Hi List,

It is finally finished, Gone But Not Forgotten, Volume III "The Family

Cemeteries of South Knox County, Tennessee". This volume covers the are to

the West of Chapman Highway to the County boundary with Blount County or the

Fort Loudon Lake, up to Interstate I-40. Communities included are Choto Bend,

Concord, Ebenezer, Rocky Hill, Lyons Bend, Vestal, Mount Olive, Stock Creek,

and everything between. There are 59 cemeteries including three community

cemeteries, i.e. Concord Masonic, Edgewood & Mount Olive. There are 41 Wills,

and over 100 color photos. Plus I crossed the line into Blount County and

copied 5 cemeteries near the border and had South Knox Families in them. 204

pages plus index's. Cost on this volume is $25.00 plus $4.00 shipping and

handling. Order by Check to Robert McGinnis 1425 Glenoaks Drive Knoxville,

TN 37918. Volume I of the set is still available and covers North Knox

County, Volume II also available covers East Knox County and Volume IV for

the West Knox Area will be ready by the end of April, Cost for these books is

also $25.00 plus $4.00 S & H. Specials are available when bought as a set,

E-mail me for details! Remember, these volume's only contain family and

public cemeteries, The church's will be published separately later this year

and next. Each of those volume's will be 300 pages plus,

Good hunting to each of you!

Robert McGinnis

Maybe now I can get to those Brown Family records!

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Date: Fri, 23 Feb 2001 09:12:50 -0500

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

Subject: [KnoxCoTN] Royalty among us?

This is an interesting observation:

Having royal ancestry is by no means a rare phenomenon. In The Royal

Descents of 500 Immigrants Gary Boyd Roberts lists almost 350 colonial

American immigrants with royal ancestry. These immigrants (pp. xiv, ff.)

"left sizable, often huge, progenies...These 350 are a large enough group

so that living Americans with 50-100 colonial immigrant ancestors in New

England (or Long Island), in Quaker (but not German or Scots-Irish)

Pennsylvania, or in the Tidewater South (but often not the Piedmont,

Shenandoah Valley, or mountainous 'backcountry') can expect to find a

royally descended forebear."

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Date: Fri, 23 Feb 2001 09:05:14 -0500

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

Subject: [KnoxCoTN] Calendars throughout the ages

http://webexhibits.org/calendars

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Date: Fri, 23 Feb 2001 17:33:31 -0500

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

Subject: [KnoxCoTN] Fwd: Moores from Sevier & Knox Co., TN

If you can provide info, please contact Ava Nackman...and share your info

with the rest of us, please!

>From: "Ava H. Nackman" <ava@nackman.com>

>Date: Fri, 23 Feb 2001 15:36:15 -0500

>

>I am descended from Moores from Sevier Co, TN and have been stumped

>for quite a while in trying to trace them. My gggrandmother was a Mary

>Moore who married a George Anderson in Sevier Co in 1858. They eventually

>ended up in Knox Co, but I believe that I found Mary with her family in the

>1850 Census in the Boyd's Creek, Sevier Co. area. At least she was the only

>Mary Moore in the county in that census, and appeared to be the correct

>age(14). If I am correct, her parents were John and Martha, both listed as

>having been born in SC, and siblings at home were Elizabeth (age 19),

>Katherine (age 16), Juda (age 7) and Lucinda (age 5). I know that Lucinda

>later married a Gilbert. I also found George Anderson and Mary Moore

>Anderson living near, or possibly on the land of, John Chandler in the 1860

>Sevier Co Census. I would really appreciate it if you could get this info

>to your friend(s) researching Sevier Co. Moores to see if there is a

>possible connection. Thank you. Ava Nackman

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Date: Sun, 25 Feb 2001 11:49:50 -0500

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

Subject: [KnoxCoTN] 25 Feb 2001 Sunday Afternoon Rocking

Given that my parents started in the flea market/antique business when I

was just about walking, and that I've been working with my mama to

liquidate their inventory for the past three years, this story really hit

home for me -- it's been something that crosses my mind all the

time...especially when I think of the heirlooms from my family and my

husband's that are gone because someone didn't care or, worse, didn't know

we distant kin would have cherished them.

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Today my column is at the request of Shirley Treadway, a reader. She has

wondered at the old jewelry items found at auctions, flea markets, antique

shops…and the story such a piece could tell. She asked me to take the

questions she had, and then weave a story. And so I have…

The Wedding Band (from the "Sunday Afternoon Rocking" series)

1835

The day Daniel placed the gold band on Jane's finger, she twisted and

turned it, gazing with wonder upon it and proud that her husband had kept

his word. They had married in North Carolina and spent the equivalent of

their honeymoon traveling through Cumberland Gap and then down the river by

flat boat. Well she remembered the evening of the promise, when he took her

aside at a brush arbor meeting, and she knew by the determination in his

stance and the serious set of his jaw, that he had come to a

decision. "There ain't nothing for me here, Jane. And I am aiming to

leave. I want you to leave with me. I have not much to give you, but one

day I will have. And when I have made my place, one day I will put a ring

on your finger." And so they had married…without a ring. She made him a

promise the day he kept his. "I will never take it off."

1866

Jane called Tom, her youngest son to her bedside, the day he announced he

would be marrying Lavinia. Well she knew Tom's circumstances…and her

own. "Tom," she told him, "You got five youngins to raise and good it is

Lavinia will take your family on. But I expect you have no money for a

ring, and so I want you to hear me out. I promised your Papa I will never

remove this ring while I am yet living, and I will not. But when I am

gone, I am telling you to remove it. And place it on Lavinia's

finger. You make her a promise, same as your Papa made me. You have not

much to give her, but this ring is a promise you will stick by her same as

she has promised to stick by your youngins."

1895

Lavinia stuck by Tom's family. She raised them, and she raised the ones she

and Tom brought into the world. And Tom kept his promise. He never had a

great deal materially to give her, but he stuck by her, same as she stuck

by his family. All of her young years, Martha watched the golden band

glinting in the sun, the light of a fire, as Lavinia worked. She thought

as the years passed how strange it was that the band never lost its gleam,

its luster…when the hands that wore them told such a different

story. Lavinia's busy hands, the hands the children watched kneading

dough, firmly grasping a hoe, determined in their attack of a wash

board…slowly changed as the years went on. They went from smooth and soft,

to reddened and rough, and finally the busy hands lay gently clasped,

wrinkled and work-worn, on a chest that grew quiet. Martha put the ring away.

1915

Molly loved to sift through the bits of treasures in Mama's trunk, and

sometimes if Mama was not too busy, she would sit beside her and tell her

the stories of the treasures. The pretty blue silk covered box, she told

her, was from the pie supper where she met Papa, and the Indian head penny

was what her uncle had given her the day she was born. And the wedding

ring that just fit on Molly's thumb was her grandmother's. "It was my

Mama's," Martha told her, "And it was my Papa's mother's before that. It

came with a promise each time it was passed, and the day I kept it, I

decided on a promise of my own. It will be passed right on, Molly, and

each time the stories of the promises can be told. It is the story of our

family in this place. One day the ring will be yours." Molly, raised her

bright blue eyes to meet her Mama's, and furrowed her eyebrows in

concentration. "Then, Mama," she proclaimed, "I promise to give it to my

own little girl, and tell her all about Samuel and Jane, and the flat

boat. And about Tom and Lavinia, and the poor little children without a

mama she raised."

1955

Molly never had children, and so she never kept her promise. She kept it

tucked away and now and then would see it and think perhaps she should tell

the story to someone, perhaps Nancy, but somehow that time never

evolved. It was her niece who cleared out the home Molly had known, and

distributed first one thing and then another to those she thought could use

it, keeping only the things she would find useful herself. When she came

upon the wedding ring, she wondered where it had come from, for Molly had

never married. It could not have been Martha's for Martha was buried in

hers. Shrugging her shoulders, Nancy pocketed it and dropped it in her

jewelry box, never intending to wear it, but thinking perhaps one day she

would have it melted down and something made of it.

1995

With Mother in the nursing home, and it obvious she could never come back

home, all Jim knew to do was to clear out her apartment. The bills at the

nursing home were outrageous, and there was no sense wasting what little

money she had on utilities and upkeep for something she was not likely to

ever return to again. He saw no reason to upset her with his decision, and

so did not tell her of her plans. He quietly cleared out her belongings,

storing some, and selling others. Her care fund did not swell a great deal

with the sales, but enough to help. She did have some pieces of jewelry

that fetched a fair price, and a few that really were worth little, but he

sold them as a lump. He saw no reason not to do so, as he had no wife and

no daughters. His brothers assured him the pieces meant nothing to them.

Nancy died and never knew her things were not still as she had left

them. She could not have told the story of the ring anyway.

2001

Shirley stood in front of the jewelry case at an antique mall. A visit to

such a place was as much a walk through time as reading a historical novel,

she thought…for when she held in her hands the bits and pieces of past

lives, she could not help but wonder the stories they could tell. And so

it was, a wedding ring gleamed softly in the light from a nearby

window. And these were the thoughts she had, and the thoughts she wrote to

me: "Obviously well worn. Was there really 'romance' in the eyes of both

the bride and groom when he slipped it on her finger? How much did it

originally cost? Hundreds of minuscule scratches could each tell a story of

the original wearer of that gold wedding ring. How old is it, really? Did

it remain on her finger when the meals were cooked, biscuit dough was

kneaded? Was it there when clothes were hand washed on an old scrub board?

Our great and great-great grandmothers could tell a story, but our

imaginations are vivid as we look upon or hold one of these priceless

rings. Why do descendants, sometimes, inherit something like this, and sell

it at a flea market, or worse yet, throw it away because it may not look

like much?"

Just a bit of imagining…from both Shirley and myself,

jan

Copyright ©2001JanPhilpot

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Thanks, jan)

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End of knoxcotn-digest V1 #178

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