In
1973/1974, the log house was sold to a man from Cuthbert. He
disassembled the house and using the logs, sills, etc., he built a
similar but smaller log house on his property about 3 miles south of
Cuthbert.
J. R.. and I stopped by a few years ago to look at it. The owner
was very accommodating and showed us through the house personally. This
house had a different floor plan and shape from Grandpa's but it did
have the authentic 1880s appearance and had furnishings to match.
During this visit, would you believe, we found, face down on a
shelf in one of the rooms, a picture of Thomas and Eunice and five of
their seven children taken in the front yard of the original log house
in Clay County when Daddy was about eight years old.
How is that for coincidence?
If we were to just stop and think for a minute, we could just
imagine how much time, and work, and sweat, it took to build a log house
in those days.
Each log had to be cut down and
skidded to the building site.
The bark then stripped from the log. The corners notched to fit with
another log at the corners, leaving no crack between it and the log
below. All this while raising a crop and a family. Took a real man to
do all that.
It was very emotional for me to be standing in the house where
Daddy was born and raised and looking at the axe marks on the sills made
by my Grandfather more than a hundred years earlier. Just awesome.
Floyd, the youngest child,
became ill with stomach problems and was sick for several
weeks. His father had several doctors come in to treat him, including
one from Alabama who stayed with the family a good while. None could
make a positive diagnosis and consequently could not provide a
cure for Floyd's problems. He died at approximately age 16.
The excessive medical bills and other adversities caused Tom to
sell his farm to pay his debts. From that time on he moved several times
but continued farming until age and health forced him to stop.
home
of his son, Olin, in