The Slow Lane

It has been a while since L and I have focused on Glover genealogy research.  During a recent trip  to the mountains we focused.  We are still re-discovering bits and pieces of information gathered over the years and trying to organize the information, documents, and analyze how it all fits together.

Where we have been unable to find definitive information in the search for my ancestors is documenting the previous residence or family connection of Thomas Glover (my great, great grandfather) who was first listed in the Cumberland County census in 1810.  We have found some clues about  where Thomas  Glover was prior to 1810, but have not found documents that specifically say who his father was or where he came from. 

There was a Thomas Glover listed in the 1800 census in Nash County whose age fits the age of the Thomas Glover in Cumberland in 1810.  There is also a deed showing a Thomas Glover in Nash County who sold his “share of his father’s land” (95 acres) to John Glover in 1803.  There is an older Thomas Glover in Nash County who purchased 380 acres of land in 1785.  This Thomas Glover died about 1791 without a will.  The inheritance law at that time specified that land owned by the deceased be divided equally among his sons.  We believe that Thomas of Nash had four sons: John, Thomas, William, and Benjamin.  We have not found any information that contradicts this theory as the basis for our belief that Thomas of Cumberland is the son of Thomas of Nash.

In May of 2009, at the National Genealogical Society conference in Raleigh, I had a Y-DNA test to see if I could find a match among other Glovers to show which Glovers I might be related to.  I did not have a match with any other Glover among the Glover Surname Project members.  One way to confirm my connection with Thomas of Nash would be to find another male Glover descending from Thomas of Nash who can take the Y-DNA test to compare results of our tests.  With that in mind, L and I began to research the census records for other sons of Thomas of Nash. 

We focused on Benjamin who was born about the same year that his father Thomas of Nash died, 1791.  We found his son Yancy and Yancy’s son, George, and George’s son, Lumas, and Lumas’s son, C.  C was 5 years old in the 1930 census, the latest census data available.  We looked at death records and found that C’s brother died in 2004 and also found an obituary for his brother that mentioned a surviving brother, C of Raleigh.  We found that C lives down the street from us in Raleigh about a mile away. 

L and I visited them recently at their home and found C and his wife V (pictured at left) to be “like family”: friendly, welcoming, and having many common experiences including that we like  fried chicken and bar-b-que.  I am excited to have found a likely fourth cousin who is a neighbor and is fast becoming a new friend.  I am further excited that he is willing to take the Y-DNA test. 

I guess I’ll never have the same passion for genealogy research as L, but now more than ever, I am happy that we can share our  excitement as we continue looking for my Glover ancestors.

These are the farmers, including L’s brothers and nephews and others who work with them.  They interrupted their morning meeting to pose for a picture (i.e. they stood up from their 5-gallon “bucket seats” and paused the discussion of farming issues and other major topics).

There was plenty of work  to be done:

Putting liners in the peanut combine chutes to cover holes created by rust or wear.

Checking nozzles on the sprayer and adjusting or replacing chains on the corn combine.

Weighing bushels of deer corn for personal use or to sell.

Inspecting cotton fields for spider mites.

Sometimes after working hard all day, there are creative uses of farm equipment to just have fun.

Repairing Peanut Combine Chutes

Checking Sprayer and Corn Combine

Bagging Deer Corn

After Work Fun: A Water Slide

L and I attended a concert at the Ashe Arts Center and enjoyed one of the best concerts I’ve ever attended. Ken K. switched easily from hammered dulcimer to fiddle.  I did not know that a hammered dulcimer could sound like multiple instruments playing at once.  The tone was most pleasant even though at times the composition could be intense.  There were about 100 people at the Arts Center and when asked how many played the hammered dulcimer, there may have been 20 or more hands. 

But not only did Ken K. play solo pieces, he had also invited some “locals” to join him.  There was a couple (Ruth and Steve Smith).  Ruth played the hammered dulcimer and Steve played guitar (and banjo for one piece).  The trio performed beautiful music together.  There was also another “local” (Michael Bell) who played hammered dulcimer and piano.  These “locals” were also very good musicians and performed well together.  I was very impressed by Michael Bell’s ability to switch back and forth between the piano and dulcimer.

Another “local” (who teaches people to play hammered dulcimer, name not remembered) joined the other four for a finale piece.  There were 3 hammered dulcimers, one fiddle, and one banjo/guitar. 

With my total lack of musical ability, I just don’t understand how anyone can be so talented and skilled in musical performance, but I’m sure glad other people have figured it out and are willing to share it.  The other thing about this concert is that the volume was just right for my hearing aids to work at their best. 

Ken Kolodner is a musician who plays all over the US.  If he’s performing near you, I recommend you go hear him.  At least check out his website:   http://www.kenkolodner.com/

Last weekend, L and I had a great time hosting a visit from our granddaughters.  They enjoyed  playing and cooling off in the sprinkler.

What can be more fun than helping Grandma make bisquits?  The bisquits were part of the lunch for both girls’ families and it’s clear the girls like eating bisquits also.  One of our family favorites is bisquits with butter and a slice of tomato.  The girls like bisquits better in other ways, including “plain”.

Grandpa and granddaughters take a break while all three of us are holding our “lovies”.

I invited Ulncle Bo to ride with me to the mountains this week.  I picked him up Wednesday morning in Burlington about 9:00.  We stopped in Wilkesboro for lunch and made it to our place about 12:30.  After the trailer and Blazer were unloaded, we looked at the garden and around the house to see what we had done since Bo and Calvin were there in October a couple of years ago.  Then we settled in to enjoy the cool air and nice breeze.  We were sitting on the deck about 4:30 when L called.  It was 75 degrees at that point on the deck with a good breeze.  L reported that in Raleigh it was 98 to 102 degrees.  What a nice difference!  Wednesday night we ate good seafood at Mountainaire.  Thursday morning we ate Ashe county cheese toast and at lunch, we ate family style at Shatley Springs.  It was a nice relaxing couple of days for both of us.

Bo is using his cane as he walks and still recovers from falling and breaking his leg in November.  He’s slowly regaining strength and stamina to get back to two of the things he loves to do, ball room dancing and playing golf.

One of his life-long activities is crocheting.  After he broke his leg, Bo hasn’t been able to dance or play golf, but he has continued to crochet.  He recently was interviewed about his crocheting for a news feature on High Point TV called “Roy’s Folks”.  He says it was 1 minute and 51 seconds long.  He also said the TV interview did not show 2 of his prized crocheted  pieces: “The Last Supper” and “The Lord’s Prayer”.  He now has them framed and I took these pictures. 

Bo’s crocheting is a special gift and his crocheted artwork has been generously given to many special people and donated for fundraising projects to many agencies, such as Hospice, who have provided help to many more people.  Occasionally, he has taken orders and sold some pieces, but primarily it has brought much pleasure to him and served as a way for him to give to others.

We had a good visit.

The annual “Christmas in July” festival was held on July 3 this year as July 4 was on Sunday. On Friday, we went with neighbors Sue and Jim, Sybil and Billy to the Ashe Outreach Fish Fry and stopped back in West Jefferson for the opening of the festival and listened to the music for a while.

Then L and I went back on Saturday and walked up and down the 2 streets with vendor booths including some local agencies and service agencies. There were a lot of craft booths. We were hungry by 11:30 and I got my big Polish sausage for lunch. The music stage was busy with one group/band after another and so was the dance stage. There were lots of people at the festival.

We like going to Como and we like going to reunions. We did both three times in June.  In addition, we visited with aunts, cousins, friends, and former college roommates for each of us who were not at either reunion.  I made a fourth trip to Como to get corn and we got that in the freezer the next day.  We enjoyed it all, but we agree that it was a busier schedule than we want to maintain on a two-week  basis.

The first reunion was Homecoming at Buckhorn Baptist Church.  This is L’s home church and the church where we got married.  L saw many people she had not seen for years, and we saw many family and friends.  The event was well planned and executed with about 400 in attendance. 

The second reunion was the “Howell Get-Together” at the Como community building.  This is an annual event in June on the Saturday nearest Jake Howell’s birthday.  It was begun when his children were the next generation.  This year his grandchildren, L and her cousins, were the oldest of those attending.  The first picture is of the cousins who were present this year, including R. who lives in Austin, Texas. 

The second picture is of the cousins and spouses who were present.

The third picture is of  the children of the cousins and  their families.

It is always good to see everybody and to eat the good food brought by all the good cooks in the family.  For my part, I have especially enjoyed John’s black walnut cake.

The third reunion was L’s 50th high school class reunion.  This is an event that puts your age in perspective.  It’s hard not to feel old.  This event was held at Whitley’s restaurant in Murfreesboro.  Members of the classes of ’59 and ’61 were invited.  Many memories were revisited.

How important is TV to us? That is a question behind many of our daily decisions and future preparations. On the one hand, it seems simple to just decide not to watch TV period. We’ve never been comfortable going that far. We have tried to minimize spending on TV technology. I don’t remember that we’ve ever had more than one TV at a time before we had two houses. Now we feel we need a TV at each house. In Raleigh, we had basic cable for many years which gave us the local network channels and a clear picture from our local PBS channel, WUNC.  When TV broadcasts switched to digital, we bought a converter box and small flat digital antenna for each house and gave up cable in Raleigh.  Over the air TV reception has been satisfactory in Raleigh even though we sometimes need to move or turn the antenna to avoid temporary reception problems.

Our question became more focused on  the mountain house as we spend more time there and reception has become more of a problem.  We were dependably getting only two stations, CBS and NBC both from Charlotte.  WUNC signal has been much more “iffy” and had become a good picture or no signal (blank screen) with one minute of signal and five minutes of no signal alternating.  We wanted a dependable signal from WUNC and decided it would be nice to get a station from the triad.  So, we bought and installed an outside antenna.  Now we get about the same number of channels as we get in Raleigh.  Now we only have to decide when to turn on the TV and whether there is anything interesting or important enough to watch. 

I confess that I’m more of a TV watcher than L.  Mostly, I tend to watch news, weather, or a program that looks intersting on WUNC-TV or WUNC-Explorer Channel.  Two programs I like to watch are on WUNC, the News Hour on week nights and Washington Week on Friday night.  However, we turn off the TV during dinner which often happens during the News Hour, and on Friday it’s not unusual to be away from home or to be doing something else that takes priority.  I feel comforted by the fact that I can watch News Hour and Washington week on the computer the next day, but I’ve rarely done that.  I do read a couple of news sources on the computer frequently.  I usually can stay up late enough to watch the 10 o’clock news and weather now that we have that option, but 11 o’clock is too late.

I should mention that I do sometimes watch sports on TV, but mostly basketball and football and mostly Wake Forest or ACC games.

So, after all that rambling, the bottom line is that we invested in the antenna and now we have the option to watch TV or not.