Our Grimes reunion

Today was the annual Grimes reunion when we gather to honor the memory of our James Shorter and Malissia Tillis Grimes ancestors. The reunion started during WWI when their oldest son John was leaving to serve in WWI. It was also her birthday that week-end in October when they were telling Uncle John good-bye. Fortunately for him, the war ended soon after and he did not have to fight. He was the oldest of 14 children and needed on the farm.


The family continued to meet every year the first Sunday in October to celebrate grandmother Grimes birthday. I remember going to the reunions when I was young, getting to play with cousins that I seldom saw except at the reunion. The reunion fell by the wayside when Grandmother died at the age of 92 in 1952. We lived near her the last few years of her life and I got to know her very well. I wanted to take piano lessons and we didn't have a piano so I would walk to her house to practice. She always came into the living room to listen to me practice. Now that's a very sweet, loving great grandmother to suffer through a 10-12-year old practicing the piano.

A few years later, my Aunt spearheaded a campaign to renew the reunion. She invited some of her first cousins to help and they had a reunion in my aunt's yard for a few years. Later they started meeting at civic rooms or churches. Pictured here are some of the children of James Shorter and Malissia Grimes. My grandmother Fannie Wilson is on the front row, right end. In 1998 the reunion was held the first Saturday of October, outdoors at the new picnic pavilion behind New Ebenezer Church where many of the Grimes are buried. James Shorter Grimes was the first person to be buried in the cemetery at New Ebenezer Church when he died from typhoid fever in 1903.


Grandfather Grimes was the son of John William Grimes and Julia Ann Garrett. Today was a special day. We held a grave marking ceremony and placed a marker at the foot of his grave with information about his service in the Civil War. The ceremony was carried out by a local group of United Daughters of the Confederacy. There were men dressed as confederate soldiers who participated in the ceremony. A lady dressed in black placed a wreath on the grave and at the end of the service, the soldiers did a canteen salute. This was very impressive.


Paul Grimes, a great grandson of John William Grimes, participated by reading a biography of his great grandfather's life. Descendants gathered at the tombstone for a photo after the ceremony. These descendants all belong to John W. Grimes son, James Shorter Grimes.

Update for Sept. 20 Blog

Yesterday I went back to the cardiologist and all cardiac tests on Sept. 22 were "normal". I just knew the Dr. was going to set a date for a pacemaker, but I was surprised. My pulse went from the 40's and 50's to 60. While I still have bradycardia and right bundle branch block, the Dr. felt I could wait awhile for the pacemaker. I have to check my pulse often and if it gets below 60 again, I will need to call him. I have felt so good the past week since my heart rate has improved.


And now about Jim's step mother, Mary Logan Gilmer. She passed away early Sunday morning, Sept. 21 in Kannapolis, NC. She never recovered from the stroke she had on 9/11/08. That date will take on more meaning of what happened on the other 9/11.


Jim was already in Harrisburg, NC (Cabarrus County) when she died. Our son Ron drove to Elba from Austin, TX and arrived on Sun. around noon, soon after we got the news of grandmother's death. There was a fear of not being able to find gasoline on the long drive but he made it ok. We couldn't leave to go to NC until Tuesday morning as I had a lot of heart tests scheduled for Monday. We left early on Tues., riding to Harrisburg in Ron's big diesel pick up truck for 10 hours. We met other relatives upon arrival and rested for the funeral the next day.



The funeral took place on Wed., Sept 24, at 4 pm at Harrisburg Presbyterian Church where she was a member for 61 years. Let me go back to Wed. morning when the family all gathered at the funeral home for a private viewing at 11 a.m. She requested in her funeral arrangements that she left behind that only the family see her. Our 3 sons were there and 3 of the 5 granddaughters came. Mary's sister, 2 brothers, and nieces and nephews from KY were there, along with Jim's brother Larry and his wife.


From there we went to the church for lunch prepared by the ladies of the church, Mary's friends. At 2:30 pm we gathered at the church Fellowship Hall for a 3-3:45 visitation prior to the funeral. Jim left Harrisburg after high school in 1952 and only returned for short family visits, so he lost touch with people he had known. He did get to see one of his classmates and even one of his teachers. It was so touching to talk to many of the older people about how they were his mother's "best friends". She was a great volunteer and worked almost every day helping serve lunches to two senior centers.


We went into the church sanctuary at 3:45 pm. The afternoon light was shining on the beautiful dark wood casket with the flowers the family chose to put on the casket. Mary had requested no flowers but a few were placed there. I think the most important part of the sermon was when Jim walked to the pulpit and did a eulogy of his mother (step-mother). He talked about her life and the hard times growing up in KY during the depression, and how she worked hard to get her education. She taught school for many years and some of her elementary school students came to say good-bye to one of their favorite teachers. That was so touching.


A couple of weeks before her death, she mailed her son Larry a copy of her funeral plans. We tried to follow them as she requested, except for the fact that we placed some flowers on top of the casket to ease the burden of staring at the big dark casket.


We went down the street to the church cemetery in the middle of the town of Harrisburg, and she was buried beside her husband J.T., Jim's father. It was a beautiful day and a nice breeze blowing.


Friends came to say good bye and we (the family) all went back to her house. Most people went back home but some of us stayed until the next day (Thurs). Before we left to go back home, Larry asked if we all wanted something to remember her by. She used to paint and several people chose a painting. Our son James wanted a clown picture she had painted and now he has it in his bedroom.


It's still hard to imagine her not being there when we go back to NC to see all our relatives scattered over the state. Soon the house will be sold and there won't be a "home" to go back to.


Someday I will ask Jim for permission to print the eulogy he wrote. It was so touching and everything he said had special memories for her family and close friends.


So long Mary...... rest in peace!

Too Busy to Write in my Blog

There's really no excuse for not writing more often. As you get older "time flies" and you wonder why you didn't get more accomplished. There's more things I want to record for my family before I close out my blog. I plan to print all of the things in my blog to give to my grandchildren someday.

Lately I've been taking lots of naps. This summer I've not had as much energy as in the past. My husband commented recently that he noticed I have not been weeding my flower beds this summer nor deadheading the flowers. I don't think about doing this until it's too hot to go outside. I used to get up at 5:30 am and go outside and work until 7, at which time I wake our son up to start getting ready to leave home around 8, when the van arrives to take him to his workshop. This summer my neighbor and I have been walking for 30 minutes every morning, 6:30 - 7 a.m.

Last month I found out I have a heart problem - pulse too low, in the 40s and 50s. I didn't know that was bad. I figured the lower it is, the better. At least that is usually the case. But not so when your heart rate is slow. So the cardiologist says I need a pacemaker. He said I would feel better but not toplan to go out and run a marathon. But before he installs this equipment, he is sending me for more tests on Monday. He said to plan to spend the day at Flowers Hospital to get a nuclear stress test and an ECHO (ultra sound). I hope they don't find anything else wrong.

I feel ok but do get tired very easy which is not my usual style. I like to keep busy.

And now another event has occurred in our family. Jim's step-mother suffered a massive stroke on Thursday, Sept. llth while attending a senior center event in NC. She never recovered and just yesterday was moved from the hospital to a Hospice House near Concord, NC to spend her final days. The Dr. said that if she lives 7 days (that was last Tues) he would be surprised. This is the 6th day. I expect a phone call any time. My husband Jim and his half brother and his wife from VA have been with her since the day after her stroke. There's so much to take care of as well as visiting with her. She doesn't recognize them and it's so hard for them to see her in this condition. At least she isn't suffering. Our mentally handicapped son James and I will not go to NC until her death. I don't think James could handle all of this and we don't really know how much longer she will live. She spent the week-end with us in the NC mountains this summer at a 50th birthday party for our younger son and she later told me she had the best time of her life. That's how I want to remember her. She is 88 and in excellent health. Didn't have to take any medicine.

Our older son is arriving here tomorrow from Austin, TX to spend a week, and will go to NC to see his grandmother. We will go with him if the timing is right for us to go.

If I didn't have all of this to think about, I probably would be worried about my heart problems. This is on the back burner (worrying) right now. I will go into my "Scarlett" mode and think about that tomorrow.

Friday Night Fever!

Small towns still turn out for high school football games every Friday night in the fall. I don't recall it being so hot at our football games when I was in high school over 55 years ago. I graduated in 1952. What I do remember is how cold it was sometimes and the fog that hung over the football field when the stadium was downtown by the levee. People often refer to the old stadium as "Foggy Bottom". It is still being used by the Elba Recreation Department. Tonight was the 4th game of the year for Elba and they have won all 4.


The year I graduated our football team was great and won every game that year.


I was in the band my junior and senior year and played a clarinet. Travelling to the ball games in the big yellow school bus was so much fun. I remember that we travelled in a Greyhound bus to the National Peanut Festival in Dothan and Mrs. Dorsey rented a suite of rooms at a hotel downtown Dothan so we could rest and get ready to march in the parade.


Another time our band marched in icy cold weather (January I think) at the governor's inauguration in Montgomery (don't remember which Gov.!!) It was so cold I remember my fingers sticking to the metal clarinet.


The band got new uniforms the year before I started playing in the band. I have a photo of our band in 1951 that I will post here when I locate the picture.


What is different at ball games now is the bands don't just play Sousa marches anymore. They do Broadway music and dance on the field. They have color guards and dancers (?) on the field at half time. They have a big truck to haul their instruments, etc. to ball games. We had to load ours on the school bus and walk around them or hold them in your lap.


Oh well, time marches on and there's a vast improvement in the bands of today as compared to those 50 years ago. But I bet we had just as much fun and I know we sounded just as good or better.


The new Elba High School stadium is so nice. The seating is on the side of a hill and the playing field in the center of the "bowl".


You know what I like about the current stadium? There's no smoking allowed so you can breathe nice fresh air. And it's so much fun to greet your friends at the ball game. Many of our friends have grandchildren playing for the Elba team, or cheer leaders or in the band.

Up, Up and Away!

The Unveiling of the Marker at Tiger Town Park was a great success today. The children had fun releasing the colorful balloons at the end of the ceremony.


The two big tents were lifesavers, shielding us from the hot sun. And everybody enjoyed cold bottled water and colorful fans that had the program printed on one side and a photo of the playground on the other side.


Channel 4 from Dothan covered the event and we are looking forward to seeing ourselves on TV tomorrow (Monday).

I'll post some more pictures later this week.

Planning for an event in Tiger Town Park

It seems like I have been planning for over a month for the "Unveiling of a granite monument" at Tiger Town. I have rescheduled the event for this Sunday, Sept 7 at 2 pm at the playground.

When we were doing our fundraising for the playground, we had a category called "Title Sponsors" for anyone or any group or business that donated $10,000 or more. They were told that a permanent marker would be engraved with their names and place near the entrance to the park. The owner of a local monument company and his wife donated a large light gray granite monument and had it engraved on the slanted top side. In front they printed the name of the park "Tiger Town" and dedicated the park to the children of Elba.


This Sunday we will have a "ceremony" and unveil the marker and honor those whose names appear on the marker. We will also be celebrating the 2nd anniversary of the playground.


I will write more about this on Sunday following the event, and include some photos.


Today I'm just writing about "getting ready". You wouldn't think so much preparation has to be made for a ceremony that will only last for about 10-15 minutes. Much of the preparation was made before Aug. 24th when our event was right in the middle of Hurricane Fay and we had so much rain dumped on us for several days. The next Sunday was Labor Day weekend, and it was also bad weather. Our new date is Sept. 7 and there is 30% chance of rain. We will have 2 tents in place and the ceremony will take place even in the rain.


First of all, I wrote letters to the families, businesses, clubs, etc. to be honored to see if they could all have someone present for the event. Sept. 7 is the date of the first Univ of AL home football game; and one of our ardent supporters of the playground will be away. His father was one of the Title Sponsors and he died before we built the playground. His wife will be attending the ceremony along with other family members of the Jack R. Brunson family.

Some members of the Kelley Foods family will be present but they couldn't all be present since two of them are away on Sunday.


Others include National Security Insurance Group, Kiwanis International and Elba Kiwanis Club. Governmental officals include our Mayor, State Senator Jimmy Holley and State Representative Terry Spicer. Our senator and representative were so helping in securing money from the State of AL for our project.


I am getting programs printed on the back of fans, and some other handouts. All of this took time to put together and send to the printer, who just happens to be one of the playground coordinators. She was the one who suggested printing the program on a fan, so people could use them to keep cool.

I needed a cover for the monument and instead of a dark color, I chose bright royal blue with balloons on the front of the cover. I had a hard time making them look like balloons and not lollipops! Two teen-aged children of one of our playground committee members will remove the cover. They have grown up since we started working on the playground in 2005.

I wanted to release balloons at the end of the ceremony as the Carpenters sing that popular Sesame Street song, "Sing a Song". We hope to have a lot of children present to release the helium filled balloons. I bought two helium tanks today. No, I'm not blowing up 60 balloons. I called the high school and asked for some school Ambassadors to come early and blow up the balloons and take care that part of the program. I hope they all show up! They need service hours.


I had a hard time locating the song to use for the balloon release and someone downloaded it for me and I made a CD to use. Now I have to locate a CD player with loud speakers to play the CD.

My brother loaned me a large Coca Cola container to use to put ice in it to cool bottles of water.
I have been looking for water to be on sale and found 24 bottles for $3.50 today at WalMart. I bought 2 cases. There's water fountains at the playground in case we don't have enough bottled water.


The entire cost of this event will be less than $65, which includes 2 Blue Juniper shrubs to place on either side of the monument.


I went to City Hall today to borrow the portable microphone. It's charged and ready to use. I tried it when I got home and didn't know the volume was on high and I almost blasted my family out of the house! Outdoors it won't be that loud I'm sure.


Another friend will take a large table to the site Sunday for us to use to display the architect's drawing of the new additions to the park. These buildings will be built from grant money we recently received and this announcement will be made public by the Mayor at the ceremony.


I just checked off most of the things I had listed to get done before Sunday - except for one thing. I had planned to get some curly ribbon at WalMart to use to tie to the balloons. But they didn't have large rolls. Their small rolls only had enough to wrap a small present, it was shiny, and cost $1.29. I would need a lot of these rolls. I look at other party places and they didn't have any at all. I came home and looked through my Christmas wrapping box, and there was no curly ribbon. I don't know what I will do. My last resort is to visit a florist tomorrow to see if they will sell me some, like they use when they fill helium balloons.


So you see, planning even a simple event takes a lot of time if you want it to be special.


Our local newspaper will be covering the event, and I invited someone to come from Channel 4 in Dothan, our local news station for this area.


Check back Sunday night for more on this important event for the people of Elba.

Searching for My Roots

This week the Today show on NBC is featuring programs on finding your ancestors. Meredith Vieira traveled to the Azores to visit relatives and see the places her grandparents grew up before they came to America to live. Matt Lauer's family escaped from Romania when the Jewish people were being tortured, and came to America. The most touching story was when Ann Curry went to Japan to visit her ancestoral home and some of her mother's family. And Al Roker will visit his roots in the Bahamas where his ancestors were slaves.


This has prompted me to finish working on my "Smith Family Genealogy" which I started typing in 2003! I have an old Smith family genealogy book written in 1903 and I have retyped it on the computer so I can make copies. The old book is small and the paper is crumbling and falling apart. I typed the book on a typewriter in 1980, including more information on my mother's grandfather, William Cole Smith and his big family of 12 children. I plan to put some photos of William Cole's family at the end of the book. The book will contain over 100 single-spaced pages. Creating an index was a big part of doing the book. There is a listing of all the names in the book, and the page numbers where their name appears.

I learned that my Smith ancestors were Quakers from NC. They migrated there from PA, settling near Reidsville, NC on land that John Smith received for his bravery in the French and Indian War. I have a copy of the deed for the land which came from the NC Archives. When we lived in Winston-Salem, NC, we spent several week-ends in the Reidsville area searching for the Smith family cemetery. One day in Feb. we were looking in an area underneath some power lines, and we found the graves of John Smith, his son Samuel, and some others.


The 1903 Smith Family Genealogy was written by J. Fletcher Smith (see photo) a descendant of John and Samuel Smith and he described where the cemetery was located. Eighty years had passed when my sister Chris and I started searching for the graves and some of the landmarks described in the book were still there, which helped us pinpoint the area of the cemetery. I like the passage from the book which J. Fletcher Smith wrote in the early 1900's: "In our hurried life we scarcely realize the conditions as they existed at that time. The log cabins in the midst of vast forests, the constant fear of the Indians, the simple home life with white sanded floors, the spinning wheel, the homespun clothing all pass before our minds as something quaint and beautiful."


Chris and I joined the DAR, using Samuel Smith as our Revolutionary Soldier ancestor. Our DAR chapters helped us put a DAR marker on the graves. A few years we went back to the area for a special gathering of Smith ancestors and the cemetery was still intact. Someone had cleared the area before we came.


Genealogy is fun and you learn a lot about your ancestors. I haven't discovered any famous (or infamous) ancestors yet. Jim learned that one of his cousins, Ben Fortson, was Secretary of State in GA. He is still searching for some Gilmer and Tyner ancestors and has learned a lot about his mother's family, the Carnes. He is also working on my Grimes ancestry.


My maternal and paternal grandparents, grandparents, and great grandparents are all buried in Coffee County. Two great grandparents, William Cole Smith, and John William Grimes were in the Civil War. We are putting a CSA military marker on John William Grimes gravesite when we have the Grimes reunion on October 4th, 2008.


I have 10 American Revolutionary War soldiers as ancestors. My sister Christine researched these and shared the info with me so I could add these to my list of ancestors for the DAR: Samuel Smith, NC; Felix Frederick, NC; James Grimes, Sr., NC; Nathaniel Allen, VA; John Garrett, VA; James Spratling, VA; James Wilson, GA; John Byers, VA; William Cole, VA; Stephen Darden, VA.