Roots

My mom and dad were born in Georgia. Dad lived in a small community called Red Hill. Mom was from Eastanollee. After many attempts to find work before, during and after the Depression of the 1930’s they ended up in the Art cloth Mill village in Lowell, NC.

Therefore they had family scattered from Mid Georgia to North Carolina.  That called for a couple trips a year to South Carolina and Georgia. In the 1940’s a 150-300 mile trip was a LONG trip. I enjoyed them all. Sometimes I think maybe that is where my traveling blood came from.

Basically I was a town/city boy. The only time we were actually in the country was the three years dad pastored in the country church of High Shoals. Even in the city, mom & dad still had a garden and dad always raised a hog. Most of the time he used someone else’s land and gave them some pork as payment. Dad always fed his own hog, he would never think of leaning on someone to cover his responsibility.

When I see the Girls from the North woods of Wisconsin and the Upper of Michigan, canning and putting up for the winter, I see my mama. Every year of my youth she canned.

Those farm roots ran deep. Dad was from a family of 12 kids, he was the eldest. Before the depression he became a Georgia peanut farmer. raising peanuts on a share basis. The farmer never left my dad. In his life and in his ministry the strength, honesty and integrity of the farmer came out.

Those trips back to the farm of Great Grandpa Hilly were always the highlight of my year. GGrandpa felt like kids should learn to handle a gun early so he trusted me at 6-7 yrs old with his rifle (after a stern-short lecture).

No coddling from Grandpa Hilly, he was a local judge. A little fellow he could lay the law down. But he could also tell a tale as we parched peanuts on the hearth.

I never tired of looking down in his well, yelling and making it echo. I thought it was a mile deep. It was a thrill when I was a allowed to drop the bucket and draw a cold bucket of well water.

Each trip we would drive by the area where he ‘raised a train car load of peanuts one year.’ and near the place where mama’s daddy’s store was. Mama was hi-faluting, her family had a country store, as well as a farm.

All we have is a scrap of an old calendar from Grandpa’s store.  Mama’s daddy was J.S. Lloyd.

(It says The friend making store, trade with me and you will save money)

I have tried to rebuild this calendar I didn’t do too good a job but now I cannot find the finished product. This is what I started with..  I have a better picture somewhere.

 

I cannot find the original picture. It was called ‘Master At Arms’, but I cannot find it.

Nite Shipslog

PS:

I actually know little about my roots. Mama  said we were Scot/Irish,

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I believe I lifted the 1927 from Sonya also. The Isotta Fraschini