06 April 2011

In Which I Am Chased By Dogs

     Yesterday I went on a road trip to Elbert County, Georgia, which is about 80 miles from where I live. My Craft family ancestors lived here from at least 1800 until my Grandfather moved away in the early 1950s.  I hoped to find two new graves, visit some previously known ones, see my Great-Grandparent's house, and go to the local library.  I won't go into too many details but will hit the highlights... and this'll still be long!

     First: Gas is way too expensive but I tracked it and I got 29.7 miles per gallon. I'll consider that a win.

     Second: It's not an adventure until you get lost at least once. Though with my sister's GPS were never actually got lost - we just ended up doing some things out of order.

     Third: My Great-Grandparent's former house. I don't know who lives there now, but they have a little Chihuahua type dog that likes to chase cars down the road. It's a small house, but when I showed the photo to my dad he confirmed it was the correct one.





     Fourth: Rock Branch Baptist Church. Apparently my Craft ancestors were considered part of the "Rock Branch Community" of Elbert County though they were a five minute walk from Hart County. I'd been to this cemetery years ago, before I realized just how many of my ancestors were buried here. This time I got all the headstone photos (I hope). Here, I'm posing with William Anderson Craft's grave.

     Fifth: The Elbert County Public Library. They have a pretty darn good genealogy section (and a bathroom!). They had a book about the Craft family, but it seemed to be some random OK/AR branch that had nothing to do with me. I did find a few books on the Powell and Taylor families. One of these is a book available on Google in "snippet" view, so it was nice to be able to see the whole book. I was also hoping to use the library records to find the grave of Willis Craft (1809-1874). I think he's buried on his old land. The library did have a cemetery book with a map showing his grave, but there weren't any roads in the area on the map. Given my time constraints, I figured I'd try to find the grave another day.

     Sixth: Montevideo is pronounced Mount Video.

     Seventh: Craft Road. We headed back to my Great-Grandparent's house which sits on a road named after them. I got out to pose with the street sign. Apparently I took too long and the dogs across the street took offense. I had eight (8!!!) dogs heading toward me so I ran back to the car (where everyone else already was). Apparently the look on my face was priceless.


     Eighth: We went to Cokesbury UMC where my Great-Great Craft Grandparents are buried. I was also hoping to find the grave of an infant G-Uncle, but no luck

     Ninth: The Georgia Guidestones. This was the touristy part of our trip. These are some random stones put up by an anonymous person with some strange message about population and nature. I think they just found the price of granite in "the granite capital of the world" too hard to resist and decided to have some fun (joking). They're pretty neat.


     Tenth: The email waiting for me at home. But that's another post because this one is too long already!

7 comments:

Carol said...

Those little dogs were not going to hurt you, they were just hurrying over to say, HI Craft person, glad to meet cha!

OK, sorry, but that photo of the dogs is just toooooooooooo cute!

Sounds like you had a great time and some pretty good results.

Amy Coffin, MLIS said...

Love the highlights and photos. Sounds like a great trip!

Sheri Fenley said...

Sounds like a research trip I would take (and have! LOL)

Great story.

Debbie said...

What a wonderful trip! Except the dogs. 'Though it did look like they just wanted to meet a new friend.

Michelle Goodrum said...

I love this story, especially the dog photos. They really look like the neighborhood kids coming over to meet their new best friend! But I don't blame you for taking cover. It can be overwhelming to have 8 or 9 new best friends all at once!

Charley "Apple" Grabowski said...

A great trip! I would have run too, even those little guys have teeth!

Magda said...

This is a great post ! It had me laughing all day . The surprises one finds in doing genealogies makes some worthwhile experiences !

Magda

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