Top: Four generations: the man standing on the left is my mother's father. His father is seated. The man on the right is mom's brother and the baby is his first-born son. That son is someone I have only seen about twice in my life. He is about 10 years older than I am, so this photo was taken around 1931-2, I think.

My mother's father was a farmer, with cattle, sheep, pigs, chickens and a full complement of crops. He also taught school in a one-room schoolhouse; most of his children were his pupils at some point.

The 2nd time I saw that baby, I was about 26 or 27, back home visiting my family with my first child. This guy was visiting from California, and the main thing I remember was his description of the last earthquake he experienced. He said he and his wife were in bed early one morning, and he heard one of his children screaming in fright. When he jumped out of bed to run down the hall, the floor of the hallway began to heave and he said it looked like waves rolling on shore from the ocean. He compared it to the fun house at the state fair, or walking on an old swinging bridge that someone is violently shaking. (Note to self: ask Californians how they can risk going through that?)


Second pic: The policeman is another of my mother's brothers, with his family. That young boy was killed in a motorcycle accident when I was 5 (1946) and some of you may remember reading the post where I talked about him. His daughter was sort of on the fringes of the family for years, and she was another person I hardly knew. He was already divorced from this wife by the time I was born, so I barely knew her either.




3rd: this cute little guy is the son of the man standing on the right in the top pic, and younger brother to the baby. I found his obit in my hometown paper 2 weeks ago. He was 63. I had not seen him or his brothers since my father's funeral.












This is Hawk's Nest State Park Overlook, in southern West Virginia. This pic was taken sometime in the 1930's. This park was little more than an hour away from my hometown, and my parents used to drive there on Sunday afternoons at least twice a year. Somewhere I have some more recent photos of this view, and it might be nice to see what changes have occurred.

Here is a more recent photo of Hawk's Nest:

http://cs101.wvu.edu/media/1/10/11/Hawks%20Nest%20State%20Park.jpg