We stayed near Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge up in the mountains out of town.  It was so beautiful that we extended for a week.  The towns are too “touristy” but we sure enjoyed the mountains.  We did go to two musicals – one we’d seen in London – Joseph and the Technicolor Dream Coat.

Couldn’t find any more ancestry information at the state archives than the ones that I already had from the internet.  So the next stop was to actually go to the towns where my great grandparents were born and married and my great-great grandparents lived – Loudon and Lenoir City, TN.  The ladies were so gracious about letting me go into the archives and go through the books to look at the actual deeds.   I now have copies of them.  I haven’t been able to read all of it yet because you have to figure out the handwriting, but it is SO interesting.  Here is a sample -

This 10th day of July A.D. 1891 in consideration of the sum of one hundred and fifty dollars to them in hand paid by parties of the second part the receipt acknowledged, granted, bargained, sold and conveyed…..situated in District No 9 County of Loudon and State of Tennessee beginning on a black oak near the widow Keith’s, south 19 east twenty eight poles to a stone conditional corner between Cassy Hartley and B.F. Hartley then with a conditional line made by James M and B.F. Hartley south thirty nine west fifty poles to a stone, then north fifty nine and one fourth west twenty one poles to a stake and large black oak then north twenty three east fifty two poles to a small black oak, then north sixty east nineteen poles to the beginning corner containing ten acres more or less.

I have 3 separate deeds where they bought and sold property – we are already planning to come and spend a month here during another summer and trying to get some help actually finding the properties.  It is such a beautiful area in the  mountains with a river – there used to be no bridge, you had to ride the ferry across but history says many settlers came there by coming down the river – the more I learn, the more interested I get.

Now we’ve moved on to a beautiful place about 15 miles out of Ashville, NC.  We are parked right on the river and it is 61 degrees – it feels so great to walk and bike.  There is a fire pit right in front of us on the river and the RVs on each side of us are from Florida.  We are taking a day just to “catch-up” before going out to see the area.  Even in an RV you have to stop and pay bills, balance checkbooks, do laundry and clean house.

On the way here we stopped by and had breakfast with the Kings – friends from Germany that we hadn’t seen for about 20 years.  He was the base chaplain, I was the choir director and I also taught their daughter, Tracy.  (Our daughter Mikki was also in the class.)  This was my favorite class that I every taught in 41 years in education.  No matter what the assignment they far exceeded my expectations and every day was fun.

We feel so blessed to still have the health and energy to be able to have these wonderful experiences.