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We travelled out to the land where the Maxfield School had once been. The master of genealogy, Don Schmidt, told me that under all the overgrowth there was a slanted top rail on the fence. He would walk to school-by this time his family had purchased the school as their home-trying to balance on that top rail. The field is now planted in soy beans.
Don's mother, Dorothy, joined us for lunch and told us stories that she remembered about my family. It turns out that my Great Uncle Ulysses Grant Maxfield was the first grade teacher of Don's dad. Now, this was a peculiar choice of vocation for my Uncle Grant, who had once shot another man in a land dispute; but I would imagine his reputation would help to maintain order in his class. As children, Dorothy and her friends would ride their ponies to town and Grant always rode a horse. If they heard his horse behind them, they would gallop those ponies as hard as they could to get away from him. She later told her father that she was afraid of Uncle Grant and he replied that he would never hurt a fly! But,
she said, he shot that man and when he shot him "he squealed like a pig!" I guess it's a different set of rules when you are protecting your land. ( The man was wounded and Grant , as well as the neighbor, were both arrested. Apparently some agreement was made because no records have been found that indicate a trial.) She also told me that when The Maxfield School went up for auction that my Great Aunt Carol bid against them-not because she had the money or inclination to buy the school, but just because there had always been a rivalry between them. As we were leaving the restaurant (Connie's where you can get a heavenly chicken pot pie special more like chicken and dumplings with gravy and mashed potatoes on top, a side of corn and a salad for under $5) Dorothy looked at me, squeazed my hand and said, "You know your Great Aunts Cora and Carol were redheads, too." I had to admit that I got a little help from my hairdresser on that, and she said, "Oh, I know, but you have the right coloring for it."
It was then time to go to
work at the Stark County Genealogical Society: they are only open from 2 to 4 on Tuesday and 10 to 12 on Saturday morning so I needed to work fast. Again, these are some of the most helpful, pleasant, hardworking, knowledable, and funny people that I have met in a long, long time. I found some answers and some leads which will take me to the Court House on Thursday to dig through records books. By then it was 5 o'clock and Cay and I were family historied up to our eyeballs-so we decided that it was time to do a little wine tasting out at the Indian Creek Vineyard Wine Shop. Fred, our innkeeper, had to leave, so he left us to help ourselves, keep a tab, and remember to close the front door when we left.....you just gotta love Toulon!
Bandit, Fred's dog, and I got to spend a quiet evening alone together, until I discovered FIREFLIES! The wind had come up and Bandit and I decided that I should just have one more glass of red wine. Coming out of the wine shop I saw little flickering lights in the young pine trees. They are like
the most delicate Christmas ligths immaginable.
It has been a remarkable day,
It has been a memorable day.
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Richard
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More/great
The images and descriptions continue to be outstanding. It's killing me. The house sure looks different, but the same. How did all those people live in that house, especially in the wintertime? Of course, that mass of people probably warmed the house just with their presence.