Earls Cousins

Found this picture of the Earls First Cousins.  These are the Grandchildren of Jess and Effie Earls, known as Papa or Brother Jess and Mamma (Ma'am-ma).  There is one cousin missing that evidently was not born yet.  I'll try to get the names and pecking order right but feel free to question my analysis!

 

The children of Elmer & Alma (Earls) Riggs - Tallest man in the ball cap is Leamon Riggs (my Dad), to his right Lorene (Riggs) Hendrix and to his left Yvonne (Riggs) Trantham.  Little boy in shorts - Marion Riggs
Pecking Order: Lorene (oldest grandchild), Leamon, Yvonne & Marion

The children of (Jesse) Ray & Nell (Huddleston) Earls - Second tallest man in ball cap is Charles Ray (Son) Earls; to his right, Jesse (Pud) Earls; in front of Pud - Jerry Earls; in front of Jerry - Dillon Earls; Tall girl right in front - Shirley Earls (Von Allmen); Shirley is holding Edwin Earls by the hand
Pecking Order: Son, Pud, Jerry, Shirley, Dillon, Edwin (and not born yet - Brenda)

The children of Hugh Willard & Pauline (Earls) Willard-Capshaw - Middle row-girl on the far right (picture) Kathleen (Kat) (Willard) Dennison and to her right, Phyllisdean (Willard) Sharp
Pecking Order: Kat & Phyllisdean
(Hugh Willard passed away in 1976 and Pauline married a Capshaw but I do not know his first name)

By the way...On my Grandma Alma's obituary it listed another sister to Alma, Ray and Pauline.  When I find the obituary I will post it.

And by the way...I think this picture is taken at the Lost Pond School House where Ray and Nell lived.  The rock building corner in the picture is the corner of the school house.

Your Hometown???

Not "Caahoon"...Tightwad!?  I was working at Windsor Missouri the other day and just had to take a picture of this sign.

Now the other day, my friend, the Reverend Davy Boggs, gave the history of Wartburg, TN on his blog.  I will endeavor to do the same here with the help of Wikipedia and other sources.

It seems the moniker originated from a store keeper that cheated someone in a transaction involving a watermelon (some contend it was a rooster).  So the town was named after the old "Tightwad" that ran the General Store.  But don't think everyone in this little village is a cheapskate.  In a 1988 interview, Mayor Tom Skaggs stated "Tightwad townspeople are generous to a fault."  He made this statement while standing on the corner of Stingy and Miser streets in Tightwad....  The present day village has a bank, which is appropriately named "Tightwad Bank".  The bank building sits on the corner of Scrooge and Skinflint avenues. (I just made that up!)  So...all you Penny-Pinchers out there...hope you enjoyed the history of your hometown!!

Father's Day 2013

We had a good Father's Day with Grandma and Grandpa Bean and all of the Bean offspring.  The picture below, in pecking order, left to right, youngest to oldest - John, Tim, Anna, Tami and Mike.  They were sharing a laugh with the photographer...............

I really appreciate my Mother-in-law and Father-in-law.  They have been a Mom and Dad to me since I lost my Dad in 1985 and Mom in 2006.  Grandma is my "Coffee Drinking" buddy and Grandpa and I keep the yard/garden ship-shape.  I love them so much!

And last but not LEAST...we know who does all the work at these gatherings and gets no credit...The In-laws!  Paula, Dar and I were plum tuckered out from all the dishwashin', cookin', sweepin' and cleanin'!  We were two short with Judy and Dave not able to be there but we hung in there and posed for this photo before going back "to the old salt mine"!

The Christian Troubadours

In the late 1960's, our church at Junction Hill was quite primitive to today's standard.  We had no air conditioning, no PA system and outside toilets.  I guess that was the reason that it made such an impression when we came into church one night and found the "The Christian Troubadours" all set up and ready for a concert.  I can still picture the big speakers on stands, the microphones, the sound board and then,... the music!

I don't know what possessed our Pastor, Brother Harold Essary, to have them come but I told him before he passed that their coming had a profound effect on my life.  It was in this "concert" that my life-long love of music was born.  My Dad bought the record shown above, without us even having a record player to play it on!  My Grandma, Alma Riggs (Momo) gave me an old box record player and I nearly wore out the record playing it.  It was the only one I had!  Then Momo gave me some old gospel records that she had by the Blackwood Brothers and Don & Earl,  Dad bought me some Happy Goodmans and Spear Family records and I kept the ole record player hot!  God has given me a great memory for remembering words to songs and to this day these song come to me and I can sing almost all of the words.  I sang all the time as a boy and now Tami says I have a song for every occasion!  Dad, Ralph and myself would be riding down the road in the truck (I had to sit in the middle cause I was the littlest). Dad didn't talk much so I would sing.  It didn't take long for Ralph to get tired of that so he would start pinching and poking me and whispering for me to "shut up"...so...I would stop singing...and start humming!!!  We came through the 8-track era, into the cassette era, then the CD and now I keep Grooveshark or Pandora on most of the time.  I consider myself an eclectic gospel music listener because I love lots of styles of music (excluding rock and some of the contemporary stuff).

Brother Harold told me he caught some flak for having them come but I assured him that it was in the plan of God.  I thank God for my Mom who encouraged me to sing and Sister Maurine Essary who stood a backward little boy on the piano bench and played for me to sing...And my Brother Ralph that played the banjo while I sang "Old G Chord"!

If you would like to hear a sample of the Christian Troubadours songs you can find them here.

Congratulations Tami!

Congratulations to my wife Tami!  On May 18th she graduated from MSU West Plains with her Associate of Arts in General Studies.  She is now officially a "Smart Aleck"!!  Seriously, she has worked hard, spent late nights-even into the early morning, got frustrated and upset but she has stuck with it and I couldn't be more proud.  She went through the GOAL (Great Opportunities for Adult Learners) program which requires a four-hour class once a week for two years.  I really appreciate the others in her class that have helped and encouraged her.

My niece, Stephanie Riggs, also went through the GOAL program and graduated her AA and I'm really proud of her too!  While I'm at it...our Pastor's daughter, Amber Galiher, graduated with her BS in Elementary Education so I congratulate her also!  JHPC was well represented at this graduation!!

Weed-Eating My Garden

The stars, planets, astoriods and such have aligned this year to keep my garden(s) so wet that I haven't been able to plow or till them up.  Last fall I planted some winter wheat to till under for green manure but when it got just the right height to plow under...please refer to first sentence.  It has finally got dry enough to till but now the wheat is about three feet tall!  So I just broke out the ole weedeater and went to work cutting it down in layered fashion so the pieces would till under good.

Now I explained all this to Tami but she still is snickering and laughing at me for "Weedeating" my garden.  I have consoled myself with the old idiom, "A man's gotta do, what a man's gotta do" so enjoy the pictures and video!

The End Of The Road

Tami went with me on a project I had in Sunrise Beach, Missouri this past week and we had the most interesting drive.  I had ordered the right-of-way plans for Camden County Highway F and they sent me the entire route - from Highway 5 to....the end of the road.  The plans showed the highway ending at the shoreline of the Lake of the Ozarks so we had to check it out and.... "I doggies Lum", it did end at the shoreline!

I didn't intend it this way but a boat went zipping past just as I took the picture.  I think the old gentleman in the picture thought we were game wardens or something!
 

I copied the part of the highway plans that shows Route F going to the shoreline of the Lake of the Ozarks. It shows an elevation line passing through PI station 219+36 which is about at the curve that shows in the first picture. From the PI station the highway proceeds S2°59'E about 200' to "Old Route No. 5" which is approximately between my truck and the old gentleman's truck in the third picture.  Very Interesting!!