Favorite Photo

This weeks' writing prompt was "Favorite Photo", I have a lot of these so I started doing the computer equivalent of 'thumbing through' some of them until I got to one that brought back a really happy memory. 

This photo was shared on a Facebook account by Dennie Sheehan of Unionville MO whose step grandmother was a sister of my several times great ancestor and whose wife is a cousin to my Mom.  Dennie is a sort of photo-journalist and history collector for the town and many people send him clippings from old newspapers and photos etc.

When I copied this photo from his Facebook page it was a memory of my grandmothers' that I was thinking of.  

I had gone back to Unionville in the late summer/early fall of 2014.  My mother was living with her mother and grandma was looking forward to turning 102 that month.  I was there to supply 'muscle', as my petite 80 year old mother could no longer lift grandma enough to get her out of the house and into the car.  Grandma's favorite thing to do at this point was to take drives to the places she remembered...and she had lived in this community/area since birth, she remembered a lot of places.

I could get grandma down the steps and into the car, and then we took many fun drives.  The drive that this photo brought to my mind was one we took to Greencastle MO where Grandma was born and lived in until she was about 12.  They had lost the family farm and were forced to move.  They moved to a place that was close to the town of Elko, about one long day of wagon travel away. They had 3 wagon-loads to move.  Starting out at the site of the old home (it was there when I was little but no longer), we drove the path that grandma remembered:

    There was a road part of the way but in some places we went overland with no roads. I was my dad's helper and I was to drive one wagon and two of the boys would drive the other 2 wagons.  I was told not to get off the wagon or leave it anywhere. Looking back that was a safety precaution, but at the time it was a command!  It took us from early morning until after dark to get there and while we stopped here and there and the boys got off the wagons and went into the woods to relieve themselves, I stayed on that wagon as ordered.  My mom said I was almost sick from holding my bladder

I had never heard the story before and it was very funny the way Grandma told it.  But I looked around at the woods and the empty acres and was more impressed than ever with her abilities.  I could only imagine how that must have felt as a young girl with a huge responsibility. No wonder she was such an amazing woman, she just did things without ever thinking she couldn't.  As we went along she would point out landmarks and places they saw on their journey.  When we got to the Elko area, there was nothing left of the old town but there was a large cattle operation there.  So many of the little villages/towns that had sprung up here and there are gone now.  The humid climate and time have taken most of the buildings.  The vegetation covers the open spots and only old-timers and historians remember them...and genealogists of course!

Grandma lived to see 102, and passed away in her sleep, 2 months later, at home surrounded by her family.