A Place That Matters

        Ancestral places are what shaped my ancestors, their lives, and the lives of their children. So is it possible to choose one that matters more than any of the other places? It isn’t possible for me. So instead, I am going to do a little play on words for this week’s post.  The place that matters most to me is the grey matter in my brain that hold the memories of all these places.

        I remember Atlantic City, where my mom and grandparents lived. What grand times we had there, with days at the beach, supper at the Morton Hotel, walks on the boardwalk, buying salt water taffy (whose was the original?), Mr Peanut, the rolling chairs, sleeping in my grandmother’s room with the window open and smelling the breeze from the ocean. It was an amazing time. Of course this was before gambling was started, and most of the old hotels and buildings were torn down to make way for the casinos. Such a great loss. 

  

Atlantic City boardwalk, 1960's?

I remember the summer road trips we took to Tennessee from Brookside NJ. It was Mom, Dad, my brothers and myself in a car without air conditioning  - 3 days there and 3 days back. Of course we had to go in the summer when school was out. These trips were to see my Dad’s parents, his sister and my cousins who lived in the little town of Spring City. 

Of course these trips were in my childhood. More recently, when I took up family history, I have come to learn so much more about my parents’ ancestors, and where they were born, lived their lives and died. 

Nine years ago I took a trip by myself to the Philadelphia area, and drove to the small  village of Harleysville, PA, named after my 4th great grandfather. I visited so many cemeteries there in Montgomery Couty, all with familiar family surnames like Harley, Sower, Alderfer, Landes, Becker, and so many more. I had supper at the Harleysville Hotel, met a third cousin there, and marveled at the old timbers inside from the original structure 300 years old. Even just looking at a map of the area showed so many roads and buildings named after my maternal ancestors, who lived there many decades before the Revolutionary War.

My dad’s ancestors have a mountain named after them in Cumberland county, TN, where the Hinch family moved to from Kentucky around 1825. I have to stop and pinch myself sometime that this was 200 years ago! I remember the time my brother Jim and I drove up that old Hinch Mountain Road, not really sure if we would make it, and if we could find the old Hinch Cemetery up there. I still have the video of the GPS saying we were on Hinch Mountain Rd. I remember feeling so excited that we were doing this, and knowing our dad would be thrilled. We did not find the cemetery that year, but we did the next time with the help of a local person who knew the area well. And we have been back many times. 

Brady, Bear Den and Hinch Mountains

Since that time, my brother and I have visited many other cemeteries in the mountains there. And let me tell you, it never gets old. As in Pennsylvania, our ancestors have lived in Bledsoe and Cumberland counties TN, since 1800 or before. Many of them fought in the Revolutionary War and the War of 1812, and the Civil War as well. 

Charles Thurman (4X G-Grandfather) Revolutionary War Patriot

Before closing, I also need to mention Hendersonville NC where my parents retired and lived for many years there. Of course I visited there many times, and it always feels like a second home town to me. And of course my own home town Brookside, NJ, where my brothers and I lived an almost idyllic childhood. 

The memories that my grey matter hold of all the places I hold dear is the place that matters most to me.