Walking down Memory Lane

This week my sister flew in on business  for the second time in six months and I decided that this would be a great opportunity to see some of the old past. So, after calling our brother, Roy and our sister in law, Renea, to invite them on our family quest  , we headed out early on Tuesday on our road trip….
Our first stop was in Natchez, Mississippi. There we met at Our Aunt Phyllis's  house. Aunt Phyllis is 95 years old, still sharp as a whip , and still has a wonderful sense of humor. I hope I can be like that should I live to be that age.

 
Margie and I arrived right around noon and had a great visit catching up with our Aunt and soon Roy and Renea arrived, where the four of us had the chance to ask a lot of questions filling in blanks in the family genealogy .
 
That night we camped out  in our brothers motor home under the Natchez, Mississippi bridge, on the River. It was beautiful there. I was able to get in a early morning  3 mile walk/run along the Mississippi before continuing on our trip on Wednesday.Our next stop was in Roxie, Mississippi, where we toured the town of which we visited all our childhood. We visited our Grandparents old house which had been restored . I sat on that porch so many times, swinging with my grandfather Pap. I have blogged before on how I can still hear those crows, along with the whip wills and Bob Whites as we swung silently in the crisp mornings.

 Tryed to see our Aunt Jewell who lives across the street from the Roxie house, but she was gone to a funeral.We also walked along the town ,which is closed down now. Roxie is a real ghost town now. The old drug store that I purchased many ice cream cones as a child is boarded up. The little gas station where we bought 10 cent cokes in a bottle  as kids is no longer in service. We were able to visit the graveyards in Roxie and since that is one of my hobby's, I was excited to share that time with my sister and brother.




John Valery Harrigill

As the day grew to an end, Margie and I traveled on to Jackson , Mississippi and Roy and Renea went back towards Florida.  We arrived at our Aunt Myrtis’s house where we continued our quest for finding out more family answers from the past. Aunt Myrtis gave us several photos and many dates to go with information we needed to fill in  some blanks in our genealogy.  From there, we ended the day spending the night with our Aunt Louvenia who also  lives in Jackson.
We really had a good time there. Aunt Louvenia is 85 years old and a joy to be around. Our mother always loved staying with her when she was in Jackson. Aunt Louvenia  kept us laughing with her stories, shared photos with us as well as family history. Her daughter, Edith , also came over and spent several hours with us. They were both a delight to be with.

Thursday  morning, Margie and I headed to downtown Jackson to the Mississippi State Capital to research a photo taken of our mother in 1952 with the two oldest Confederate Soldiers. We were able to find the exact spot and talked to an historian for the state who was very helpful.
  She sent us to the Archives building where we spent several hours going through newspaper articles in quest of the one that goes with the photo.   I will be making another trip next month to spend a weekend gathering more family information that are in the Mississippi archives.
What a rewarding trip this was. Just getting to visit with my brother and sister
for the second time in six months was really a blessing, but to take a walk down memory lane  with them was more rewarding. Our relatives are aging in years and will not be with us much longer. I wish I listened more to their stories as I was growing up because they have lived long lives and experienced so much. I love working on our family genealogy  for twenty plus years now and hope that generations to come will continue my quest.