"Poems To Ponder" by Alva Rice

Alva Rice produced one small, self-published collection of poetry to my knowledge which was printed in 1965, two years before his death. The printing company was Young Publications in Appalachia, Virginia. The book contains roughly 30 poems about life in Eastern Kentucky with some leaning toward being nature poetry and others which are reflections of family life including one which talks about young boys playing, most likely at some family affair. Rice used a lot of rhyme and sometimes exercied a bit of poetic license with regard to his rhymes. None of the poems are remarkable for the level of talent they show but they are a good look into every day family life in Johnson County Kentucky in the middle of the twentieth century. In particluar, Rice mentions a place called Little Mine Creek. I found the copy of the book which I own in a local Goodwill Store and bought it since I have a great deal of trouble ignoring anything which can be said to be autographed and this one is inscribed "Your Frien, Alva", and in the same handwriting contains the name Escom Chandler. The fly leaf of the book also contains the names of his wife Erma Maxine and three daughters Alice Evelyn, Mary Kathryn, and Betty Lou. As I often do when I encounter such self-published books, I did a quick internet search and located the burial place of Alva Rice and his wife in the Price Cemetery in Johnson County Kentucky. I also located a Find A Grave memorial for a fourth daughter, Phyllis Deane Rice, who died in a car wreck according to her tombstone at the age of 13 in 1957, ten years before the publication of his book of poems.

"Kentucky's Last Frontier" by Henry P. Scalf--Reflections On The Book

 

Henry P. Scalf was a newspaperman, genealogist, and Appalachian writer who lived from 1902 until 1979.  For many years, he worked for the "Floyd County Times" in Prestonsburg, Kentucky, and wrote on nearly every subject that a small courthouse town newspaper might cover.  He was also an avid student of the history of Eastern Kentucky and wrote and published several works which ranged from several pamphlet sized works including one about Jenny Wiley, an early Eastern Kentucky pioneer woman who was captured by and escaped from a band of native Americans, and about a half dozen genealogical books during his lifetime.  Much of his writing, documents, and books are in the Special Collections Department at the University Of Pikeville Library which I have used more than once in my research. I own one of his dozen or so self-published genealogical books about the Stepp-Stapp Families of America.  His best work was done in the fields of newspaper writing and genealogy.  Most of his books and pamphlets were self published in small editions and can be difficult to locate on the open market.  

I was able to purchase an autographed copy of the book we are discussing here, "Kentucky's Last Frontier" which was self published as a hardback in 1966 with a foreword by the eminent Kentucky historian Thomas D. Clark.  My copy of the book was part of the estate of another Kentucky newspaper writer, Helen Price Stacy and I was lucky enough to buy several works by other regional writers from her collections after they had passed into the hands of a friend who buys and sells antiques.  The book covers a "12-county area, centered by the Big Sandy, Licking, and North Fork Kentucky rivers...With a few southeastern counties of the state, it constituted "Kentucky's Last Frontier."  My copy is, sadly, not in great condition but due to the difficulty of finding a copy in any condition, I was glad to find it.  The book covers a large segment of the history of Eastern Kentucky from the times of early settlement to about 1955 or so.  It is possibly, at least partially, derived from earlier newspaper articles written by Scalf.  While the book is a wonderful resource for the student of Eastern Kentucky and Appalachian history, it does have several weaknesses including Scalf's unique style of documentation of sources and inclusion of notes.  Many times in the book, quotations are not clearly identified in the text and there is a section of notes which covers 109 pages in the back of the book and the notes are not cited in the text by any currently recognized system.  But these issues are offset by the fact that the Bibliography is 6 pages long and well documented.  Any reader with the desire to read all those documented sources would have a strong background in the history of the region up to the time this book was published.  

The book is composed of 25 chapters which are presented chronologically from an opening chapter about the geologic and prehistoric origins of the region to the final chapter about, in part, the widespread coal, oil, and gas extraction in the region which has served to greatly damage the beauty of the land.  There is a fine discussion of the consequences of the 1957 flood which devastated the region and, until the recent Eastern Kentucky flooding of the summer of 2022.  While the book can be a slow read, it is well worth the effort to find and read a copy if you are a student of either Eastern Kentucky or Appalachian History.  I know that there are copies in both the University of Pikeville library and at the library of Big Sandy Community and Technical College.  I suspect there might also be a copy in the collections of the Johnson County Library in Paintsville since they own a large, publicly available but non-circulating regional books.   I hope you can locate a copy if you are interested in the area which it covers. 

How Much Did You Waste On Memorial Day Flowers?

 

For all my life, I have watched the majority of people in Appalachia spend a great deal of money, often money they don't really have available for trivial spending, for flowers to decorate graves on Memorial Day.  Let me say, first and foremost, I have nothing against Memorial Day or the reasons for it.  But the waste of much needed money to decorate graves, often the graves of distant relatives, relatives the buyer never actually knew, relatives they didn't really like or get along with, is simply waste, unwise spending, and spending which never should take place. I haven't spent money on grave decoration in many years, not because I can't afford it, but because it is wasteful.  I honestly believe that my own parents and grandparents, now long dead, would tell me if they could that they would rather see me put my money to rational uses in my own family, never put flowers on their graves, and live a useful, productive, honest life in tribute to the things they taught me while they were living in the case of my parents and maternal grandparents, whom I knew, and in the case of the paternal grandparents whom I never met since they were both dead more than ten years before I was born.  

 

I have seen at least one of my siblings spend money they did not have, could not afford, and should not have spent, to decorate numerous graves every year of their life.  I am certain that sibling's children are doing the same thing.  I grew up in a large extended family in which both sets of my grandparents and my father raised large numbers of children under tough, but not totally poverty stricken circumstances.  My paternal grandparents raised ten children in a log house in the head of a hollow in Mousie, Kentucky.  They farmed, hunted, fished, and did whatever was necessary to raise those ten children and I never heard my father or any of my aunts or uncles ever say they went hungry once in their lives.  My maternal grandparents raised eight children to adulthood and lost two as small children.  They were poor but never hungry according to the stories I heard from my mother, grandparents, and aunts and uncles.  It took several years for my maternal grandparents to rake and scrape to save enough money to buy a small subsistence farm of their own but their children never went hungry due to the hard work of the entire family.  My father raised nine children from his two marriages and worked in the log woods, coal mines, and farmed until he got together enough money in his fifties to buy a small country store when his first wife grew too ill from an unspecified neurological disease to care for a home and the one son they still had at home.  My father remarried to my mother who had one daughter at the time and they subsequently had me and raised us both to adulthood in the country store which he built after he decided to move from his first location.  I never had a hungry day in my life.  I am certain my parents and grandparents would tell me to save my money, put it to good use in my own family, and not waste it on Memorial Day flowers for their graves.  What about your own Appalachian ancestors?  What would they say to you about Memorial Day flowers if they could?  

Cemetery Traipsin' With Alexander Allen--September 5, 2019

Roger D. Hicks At Collins Cemetery--Photo by Alexander Allen

Yesterday, September 5, 2019, I spent a large part of the day doing what I like to call cemetery traipsin' with Alexander Allen in Floyd and Knott Counties in Eastern Kentucky.  Alex is a distant cousin on the Allen side of my family, only in his early twenties, and actually very interested in and actively involved in local history, family history, and genealogy.  It is highly encouraging and positive to see anyone Alex's age who is this interested in these issues of genealogy and historic preservation.  I think I know a lot about the cemeteries of Eastern Kentucky, some in Southern West Virginia, and a few others scattered over a few other states.  I have personally added more than 3,000 memorials to Find A Grave and photographed more than 650 graves for the website.  As my Find A Grave profile states, I have wandered through cemeteries in a great deal of the country and grew up within sight of three in Knott County. But I have to admit that Alex, especially for his age, has a large store of knowledge about cemeteries in Eastern Kentucky. Alex and I were going to some cemeteries each of us know well but neither of us knew all of them or all of the necessary information about them. We intended to take each other to a few which were important to both of us and share some information about them and the people buried there.  We started at the Manns-Allen Cemetery on Steele's Creek near Wayland in Floyd County.  This cemetery is located on a fairy high point on the left side of Steele's Creek about a mile and a half up the creek from Wayland and less than a half mile from the place where my parents operated a country store from 1945 to 1957 before moving to a new store at Dema on Beaver Creek in Knott County. It is at the mouth of a little hollow, which so far as I know has no name, and is the location where a couple named Bill and Goldie Stegall lived for many years.  I lived the first six years of my life on Steele's Creek and I had never been on that cemetery.  I do not remember ever being told that several members of our extended family were buried there.  What is a real shame about it is the fact that my maternal great-grandmother Hester Allen is buried there.  For the first time in my life, I visited the grave of my great-grandmother.  That cemetery is becoming badly overgrown and one section of it does not appear to have been mowed or cleaned up in many years.  At least one tree has fallen over a couple of graves. Another grave has a grape vine growing out of it and the base of the vine is nearly as big as my wrist.  Alex says he has dealt with the Floyd County Judge Executive recently about another cemetery and that official will sometimes send county inmates to clean up cemeteries.  Alex also states that each cemetery has to be placed on a list and they are done on a first come, first served basis which is the appropriate policy for such work.  Another friend has also told me recently that Floyd County inmates are also used sometimes to dig graves for families which cannot afford to pay for graves to be dug and I witnessed that practice not long ago when the nephew of some friends died whose parents were quite poor.  That issue of paying to dig graves irks me and always will.  I was an adult before I ever saw anybody paid to dig a grave in Eastern Kentucky.  When I was growing up, the family, friends, and neighbors always dug graves and nearly everyone would have considered it to be a travesty for anyone to accept money for such work. I would go so far as to say that most of the adults I knew in my childhood would have assisted in digging a grave for their avowed enemies if the need arose.  In that time and place, they would have done the work and never uttered one negative word about the person with whom they had disagreed in life.  

Ella Hicks Tombstone, Collins Cemetery--Photo by Alexander Allen

We traveled further up Beaver Creek beyond Wayland to the Collins Cemetery #1 which is located on the west side of Beaver Creek about a mile below the Knott County line.  I have known about this cemetery all my life and can remember a time when it was clearly visible from the highway nearly an eighth of a mile away on the other side of the creek.  But neither Alex or I had ever been on this cemetery despite the fact that both of us have family members and others we have known about buried in this spot.  It is a large cemetery with more than a hundred graves on it.  One hundred and thirty six graves on this cemetery have actually been documented on Find A Grave but I suspect that there are probably several more which were missed by the person who did most of those memorials.  This cemetery sits well up on the hillside and, if it were in good shape, commands an incredible view of a sizeable section of Right Beaver Creek with large mountains in every direction, no visible strip mine damage, obvious evidence of elk in the area which also means there has to be other wild game population, and the scene is generally quiet and peaceful without a great deal of noise from the visible highway.  When I say that the Manns-Allen Cemetery is "badly overgrown", that statement does not hold a light to the deplorable condition of the Collins Cemetery.  At one time, it was considered a major non-commercial public cemetery along the Beaver Creek, Floyd and Knott county border area and many outstanding members of the community have been buried there over the last one hundred years or more.  But today the cemetery is at best a briar patch with trees growing randomly all over the area and jungle might be a more apt descriptor.  The cemetery has a still functional chain link fence around it which is in good condition.  But elk are bedding down in the brush all over the cemetery. There are several monuments which have been turned over and one or two are broken.  I suspect that elk may have caused most of this damage since all livestock and wild animals will sometimes need to scratch themselves on the first available solid object.  A tall grave marker is no fitting scratching post for an elk weighing more than 500 pounds. It also appears that at one time someone had installed an electric fence charger in the vain hope that it would deter the elk from entering the cemetery.  But even if the electric was functional, the elk would simply raise their front ends and launch themselves over the fence. I actually stepped into a grave that was sunken to about knee depth because I was working my way around the cemetery and wending my way through briars, weeds, grapevines, and other brush which was over my head in many places.  I was pushing and weaving my way through a large mat of vegetation and literally pushed through and before I could see where I was I had stepped into the sunken grave up to my knees.  That one grave was the only one we found which was noticeably sunken although more could be hidden in the brush patches into which we never waded. 

Edgar Hicks Tombstone--Photo by Alexander Allen

Alex and I slowly worked our way through the majority of the cemetery and found probably most of the graves which are marked with formal granite or marble markers.  But we also frequently stumbled over semi-sunken sandstone markers for graves which might or might not be susceptible to rubbing in order to learn who is buried in them. Most of these sandstone markers have slowly sunk into the earth and little is visible of many of them. I have never done rubbing on grave markers and I realize that I should attempt to learn.  But, in spite of all these problems with brush, briars, and trees, both Alex and I were able to find some graves which were important to us.  I was able to locate the graves of my maternal aunt and uncle, Ella and Edgar Hicks, who had died tragically as children.  Just a few days before she would have turned three, my aunt Ella woke up one frosty October morning in 1922, just 11 days before what would have been her third birthday, and backed up against the hearth catching her nightgown on fire.  She died as a result of severe burns.  I had heard the story dozens of times as a child but I do not remember ever being told where she and my uncle Edgar were buried.   My uncle Edgar died at the age of ten in 1936 of what I always heard described as "a fever".  He had apparently been perfectly healthy until just a few days before his death.  My mother, the firstborn of my grandparents' children, was 22 years old when her brother Edgar died. She had been 8 when her little sister Ella died.  I am glad to say that I have finally been able to visit their graves.

Roger D. Hicks at the graves of Ella and Edgar Hicks--Photo by Alexander Allen

After we left the Collins Cemetery, Alex and I traveled further up Beaver Creek to Dema to visit the Turner Cemetery where both of us have several members of our extended family buried.  I grew up within sight of this cemetery, played on it with my friends as a child, attended traditional Old Regular Baptist Memorial Meetings there, and was first exposed there to the fine old Appalachian tradition of digging graves without pay for family, friends, neighbors, and total strangers.  I often refer to one old man, Alonzo "Lonzo" Bradley, I knew who lived his entire life on a hillside farm between the Turner Cemetery, the Pigman and Slone Cemetery, and the Collins Cemetery and always appeared in front of a deceased person's house the morning after they died with his tools in his hands ready to help dig the grave.  I often say that I have seen that old man insist that a grave be perfect, absolutely vertical and rectangular, without odd projections or holes in its walls, and dug with respect for the dead.  He firmly believed that the last decent and respectful thing we the living can do for the dead is to provide them with a perfectly dug grave which has been rendered with love and respect. I have seen that old man use his drinking water and dirt from the grave to make mud balls to fill holes in the sides of a grave where a rock had fallen out or been removed.  I will always remember him in his bib overalls with an old crumpled hat on his head climbing in and out of a grave until it perfectly suited his expectations. If good works and charity can get anyone into Heaven, you can rest assured that Lonzo Bradley is there resting from digging hundreds of graves for his neighbors and friends over his 76 years.

Alex had visited the Turner Cemetery but did not have much of the personal information I have about the individuals who are buried there.  I had personally known the majority of people who have been buried there over the last sixty years.  Alex and I started at the gate and walked the entire cemetery and I told him the stories I know about the people buried there.  The cemetery contains the graves of three very significant preachers in the Old Regular Baptist Church: E. Hawk Moore whom I have written about on this blog; Clabe Mosley, who lived to be 102 whom I have also written about, and who is perhaps the most famous Old Regular Baptist preacher in the history of the denomination; and, Hawley Warrens who lived within sight of the cemetery and was also a significant preacher in the denomination.  I suspect I will also eventually write a blog post about what I remember of Hawley Warrens. 

Turner Cemetery Sign--Photo by kestryll on Find A Grave 

As we were leaving the cemetery, we encountered Roy Huff and his wife, Priscilla Gail "Dockey" Huff, who do the lawn mowing and care of the cemetery and have done so for about twenty years.  Let me state for the record that this cemetery is always in excellent condition compared to most non-commercial cemeteries in Appalachia.  Roy does an excellent job despite the fact that he is nearly 80 and has had coronary bypass surgery.  Roy and Dockie do this work year in and year out, receiving only donations, and completing the work regardless of the income they may or may not receive for it. In many ways, Roy Huff has stepped into the empty shoes of Lonzo Bradley.  They say they mow the cemetery roughly a half dozen times a year.  And if you have read about the previous two cemeteries we visited on this day, you know that this is an exception.  If you know this cemetery, have loved ones buried there, or simply want to do a good deed, send them a check at the address on the sign in the photo below.  I can assure you the money will be used for the good of the cemetery and Roy and Dockie are completely honest.  I have known them since 1957.  We talked outside the cemetery near my truck for probably fifteen minutes before we left them to do their work.

One interesting portion of the talk which Alex and I had with Roy and Dockie was an almost verbatim repeat of a conversation which I had with Alex only minutes before.  I had been telling Alex about an incredible, perhaps two hundred year old oak tree which used to grow in the center of the cemetery and eventually died and was cut down.  It grew near four graves at the highest point of the cemetery which are only marked with rocks.  One of those graves is outlined with cut stones which are very similar in size, shape, and cut to the classic hand cut stone steps we often see at old mountain homes.  The other three have only large sandstone rocks on them.   When I was growing up, the prevalent tale in the area was that this grave with the cut rocks was "the grave of an old Indian".  Today I know better.  Native Americans did not bury their dead in that fashion.  What I had been telling Alex was that no one in my lifetime had ever been able to make a statement about who the four people buried in those graves might have been.  During our discussion with Roy and Dockie, Roy suddenly and spontaneously brought up that magnificent old oak tree and the four graves near it.  He went on to tell Alex virtually the same story I had only minutes earlier.  He also holds a view similar to mine that those people must actually be some of the first white settlers in the area of Dema and were probably the first people ever buried in the Turner Cemetery.

After we left the cemetery, we traveled to Garrett, Kentucky, and had lunch at the Garrett Fountain which serves mostly sandwiches, fries, and onion rings. The food is acceptable but not outstanding.  Then we went back to Glo and I visited with Alex's maternal grandfather Sam Bradley for awhile before heading back home.   

Wayland Kentucky Historical Society Trip And Research

Last Saturday, February 23, 2019, I took  a trip to Wayland, Kentucky, in Floyd County to do some research in the Wayland Historical Society records and to meet and spend time with two newly learned cousins on the Allen side of my genealogy.  Sam Bradley and his grandson Alexander Allen, who are both interested in genealogy, coal camp and UMWA history, and the history of the Floyd, Knott, and Wayland areas.  We met and spent about two hours or so searching the records in the Elkhorn Coal Company personnel files which were miraculously saved from being lost by the fortunate accident of having been found in an abandoned building by someone with enough foresight to donate them to the historical society.  The Wayland Historical Society is located in the Wayland, Kentucky, city hall and it also has decent museum of probably close to 2,000 square feet with a large, but somewhat disorganized collection of items related to the history of the coal camps in the area and to the growth of Wayland.  

We spent a lot of time getting to know each other, sharing our common political ideas in favor of democracy, trade unionism, and Democratic politics.  I was amazed to find the personnel records of several members of my family including my father, Ballard Hicks; my maternal grandfather, Woots Hicks; my maternal uncle, Mabry Hicks; my maternal uncle by marriage, Corbett "Carbide" Terry; and several others whom I had known when I was a child.  I was able to copy these records and will use them to further my knowledge of my own genealogy; the history of Wayland, Beaver Creek, and Floyd County; and the history of the United Mine Workers in Eastern Kentucky. Since Sam Bradley and I knew dozens of people in common it was both wonderful to share stories and a bit confusing to realize that we are roughly the same age and had never met.  I look forward to returning to the historical society to research further in their collections and spend more time with Sam Bradley and Alexander Allen.  

I would strongly recommend that anyone who likes to learn about the history of the coal industry, Beaver Creek, Wayland, Floyd County, or the United Mine Workers contact the Wayland Historical Society and schedule a time to visit there and possibly research their collection.  I do have some misgivings that the historical society has a small number of members, appears to not necessarily be well funded, and could be dealt with less favorably by future administrations in city hall.  If you find it in your heart to do so, it would greatly appreciated if you could make a donation, however small, to the Wayland Kentucky Historical Society.  Here is their contact information if you should find it in your heart to mail them a contribution, call for access to their records, or simply send them a post card to say thank you for working to preserve the history of Eastern Kentucky.  2662 KY Route 7, Wayland, Kentucky, 41666, (606) 358-9471.

My Appalachian DNA

For several years, my wife and I talked intermittently about having our DNA analyzed but never seemed to get around to it.  Finally, last summer, we both sent off DNA kits to Ancestry DNA.  After about six weeks, we got the results back and much like everyone else who has DNA analysis done, we found a couple of surprises.  I had heard a far too common Eastern Kentucky rumor, prevarication, and old wives' tale that my paternal third great-grandfather, Aulse Hicks, had been the son of a man named Charles Renatus Hicks, who had been the first mixed blood chief of the Eastern Band Of Cherokee.  There had always been two schools of thought about this purported connection.  Most of us who had done much in depth genealogical research leaned strongly toward the opinion that there was far too insufficient proof to justify the common belief and there was too much geographical distance between the well known homes of Charles Renatus Hicks in Spring Place, Georgia, and the area of Western Virginia from which Aulse Hicks emigrated to Prestonsburg, KY, about 1790 to 1810.  In the misguided attempt to connect Aulse Hicks to Chief Charles Renatus Hicks, various people had tried to change Aulse's first name from Aulse to Austin or Augustus despite the fact that every piece of paper he ever signed in Floyd County Kentucky as a minister and well known man had been signed Aulse.  There has also never been found a list of the names of the children of Chief Charles Renatus Hicks which listed either an Aulse, Austin, or Augustus.  In my own mind, I was clearly convinced that the connection between the two was purely the work of too many overly active imaginations which wanted to fulfill the oft repeated Appalachian fantasy of "being descended from a full blooded Cherokee Indian".  I freely admit that as I learned more about Chief Charles Renatus Hicks I grew to respect him highly as a successful man in a difficult world.  I would have loved to learn that I was descended from a man who was the first mixed blood Chief of The Eastern Band of Cherokee, who was bilingual and wrote and spoke both English and Cherokee, acted as a primary interpreter for the tribe and the US military, served as a primary sub-chief for many years, owned one of the largest private libraries in the country as an Indian, and died as the Primary Chief of the tribe.  But I knew better and my DNA analysis proved me correct.  

My Father, Ballard Hicks, Photo By Roger D. Hicks

At this point, I will burst bubbles of fantasy for many descendants of Aulse Hicks and other Hicks' in Eastern Kentucky that they are "descended from a full blood Cherokee Indian".  My genealogy is Hicks on both sides.  My father was Ballard Hicks, a second great grandson of Aulse Hicks with the documentation to prove it.  My mother was Mellie Hicks, the granddaughter of Hence Hicks, whose name I have also seen misspelled and misconstrued in various ways in order to support the Chief Charles Renatus Hicks fantasy.  I have seen Hence Hicks mistakenly identified as being named Henderson or Hensley when I knew numerous people in my childhood who knew him well. He was a well known ambush murder victim in 1935 and every public record about him calls him only one name, Hence Hicks.  Both sides of my family were in Knott County in the late 1700's to early 1800's.  I have always said that I am lucky I wasn't born with a square head and that I suspect that if the truth can ever be proven it is highly likely that "grandpa" came through the Cumberland Gap alone.  By that I mean that I suspect that our original ancestor to emigrate to Kentucky came into the region very early in the settlement process, had a large family which dispersed widely, and eventually converged again to intermarry a few generations later after all family memory and the nearly non-existent record keeping of the time had completely forgotten about any family connections three or four generations in the past.  

Now let's get to the results of the DNA Analysis and burst some of those bubbles.  The first, and most painful bubble to be burst involves Native American DNA.  I, Roger D. Hicks, well-documented third great grandson of Aulse Hicks and a Hicks on both sides,  have absolutely no Native American DNA.  The major aspect of the analysis that was not a surprise also confirmed what most Eastern Kentucky genealogists have believed for years.  Ninety-eight percent of my DNA came from Europe and seventy-seven percent of it came from Great Britain and Ireland.  That was no surprise whatsoever.  But there were a couple of other minor surprises and two fairly major surprises left in the DNA. I have seven percent DNA from Scandinavia.  I also have two percent DNA from the Iberian Peninsula and less than one percent each from Finland/Northwest Russia and Eastern Europe.  But the bigger surprise was that I have less than one percent DNA from each of Southern Asia and Nigeria.  Since I have learned of the connections to Southern Asia and Nigeria, I have tried to imagine just how that interaction took place at a time which must have been at least eight or ten generations in the past, roughly two hundred years or more.  With most of my DNA coming from Europe and Great Britain in particular, someone in my far distant bloodlines had to be a bit of a world traveler.  Was an ancient grandfather a sailor who followed the canvas to points in Africa and Asia?  Was an ancient grandmother a slave who was raped by a slave trader?  Or did a pair of my distant ancestors both find themselves stranded in isolation somewhere in a place and time where the most logical response for their own good was to assume an interracial marriage?  I doubt that I will ever find the answers unless the religion of some group of my ancestors or another is correct and we all end up in a common hereafter either sitting around a cooking fire in the darkness, sailing a common vessel on seas yet unknown, or sharing iced tea on a shady porch and telling the stories in whichever place of exactly how we all came to be.  Sorry about all those bubbles!  

Woots Hicks Cemetery Photo by Roger D. Hicks