Tennessee

Last Weekend, my older brother Norris and I took a research trip to Tennessee. The East Tennessee Historical Society has a very nice museum in Knoxville that was having an exhibit of local pots made between 1800 and 1900. There are about 200 pots in the show and it is very well attributed and displayed. I was not allowed to take pictures inside the show but I did sneak one from the door for you as well as "LEGAL" shots of pots in the permanent collection. We were also able to go upstairs and review books, census, and property records of our ancestors.I was able to place my GGG grandfather in Tennessee in 1809 for sure but probably earlier.


We also visited the Museum of Appalachia and saw lots of nicely reconstructed cabins and implements of frontier life including a 750 gallon pot.


A visit to the Campbell County Historical Society yielded a deathbed letter from my great grandfather and a lovely tribute to him when he retired from office as county judge in 1921. He had been a scout for Burnside in the Civil War captured , wounded and exchanged several times. After the war he was elected Clerk of Courts and later Judge for 60 years of continuous service. Accounts say he was the most beloved kind and generous man in the county. We saw a mention that he owned a plot in the Jacksboro cemetery so off we went on another hunt. After about 30 minutes, we found his and his wife's graves atop a hillside overlooking the Cumberland
 Mountains.

On our last day, we drove up to the Cumberland Gap and climbed the trail to the pinnacle overlook whre we saw the Gap that led to Ky. and the Powell Valley that our ancestors took to get to Tennessee.