Eiler Grey and Troops

The family room is awash with electrical cords, guitars, and teenagers. I ought to have written on here on schedule Wednesday night--because I have had to wait my turn to use my computer today. (A computer is a necessity for today’s kids.) I accidently found myself on MySpace before I got on here.

Freeport High School’s yearbook, which just came out yesterday, is on the dining room table, and we‘ve been enjoying it. Suitcases and clothes are strewn in bedrooms. The piano is no longer longing for a pianist. Videos are being shot as speech kids do their thing. In other words, Woodsong is one cool place this hot summer weekend.

Jeannie, Leslie, Elijah and buddies Rachel, Chad, and Sam all arrived at 1:30 this morning. They had broken up their long trip down from Freeport by stopping at Charleston’s coffee house, so Leslie could sing at the open mic there.

At the moment, we all have on our black Eiler Grey T-shirts that Rachel designed for Leslie, who sings under the stage name Eiler Grey. Pretty soon we are heading to The Mix in Carterville, where Eiler Grey will be in concert tonight. (Tomorrow night will be at Common Grounds in Carbondale.) Jeannie is picking up Samuel. Aunt Vickie is dropping off Geri Ann and Allison as they travel back from Carbondale. I told Geri Ann if they want to spend night, we still have some couches and the floor available.

Teenagers are invigorating to me--their humor and energy are exciting and pleasing. I have always thought that if the energy in a high school hallway between classes could be bottled up, we could send half the population to the moon AND solve the world’s problems.

Gerald is engrossed keeping up with Gerry and the Southern Force’s 18-and-under girls softball team in Oklahoma City. Despite falling into the losers’ bracket fairly early on, Southern Force just keeps winning. (In a double elimination tourney, one more loss and we are out.) That will be the first thing I want to know when we get home from The Mix: did we win tonight?

We Got a Rain!

The heat has been terrible, and we really have needed a rain. Gerald hauled 8 loads of water in a 200-gallon tank yesterday morning to water his garden and trees. Although he is still coughing terribly with his summer cold, he was up before five, going after the paper; and as soon as he ate breakfast, he was out gardening and gathering produce.

Because I caught his summer cold and am feeling even worse in the morning than I always do, I slept as near to 8 a.m. as I could. I excuse my late sleeping because I work late. (I call readingt/writing my work.) I keep trying to change my schedule to match Gerald’s a little more closely--but nature created me to wake up feeling terrible and to really get a second wind after supper when the house quiets, the phone stops ringing, meals are over for the day, etc.

Because of his cold and not feeling well, Gerald wanted to run to Cape Girardeau and do some errands. He wanted me to go along to search for the Big Barn area on the Mississippi River levee area. I had other plans for things I needed to do, but because I felt so bad from the summer cold, I figured that might be a profitable way to spend the day. If not profitable, at least enjoyable to chum with Gerald. We crawled into the pick-up and were off by mid-morning headed to the Mississippi Bottoms.

After we had visited with his brother Garry and nephew Kerry up by Running Lake on the Rendleman farm that Kerry leases, we went back to Route 3 and turned west at Ware towards the farm we leased so many years ago. Before we got there, however, we turned south at the old Roy Brimm place, where I used to pick up the daughter for our G.A. organization at Ware Church. The Brimm house is gone as are so many houses we used to know. I do not know who lives there now in the new house.

Gerald was of the opinion that what he thought was the Howard Davie dairy operation (a large long building still standing there from those old days) was the vicinity where the Big Barn School used to be. But he really was not sure. We realized we needed to find some older people to ask questions about where the school had been. (As we understand it, Big Barn was near Willard’s Landing.) Was there a big big barn there before the Big Barn School was built? The levee has changed the terrain from earlier eras. You certainly could not see the river from there. Too many trees and too many miles yet to the river.

We drove on south on the 1946 (or was it 1948) levee that Gerald remembered being built and making more water holes on the river side as dirt was scooped out to create the large levee replacing earlier inadequate ones. In the sloughs, I once had a glimpse of at least l0 lovely white cranes having a party at one water area.

Eventually we came to a multitude of tractors and equipment making hay from the sides of the levee. Some place in here further west on the river bank had once been the Hamburg Landing. In fact, in the 1960s, Gerald had hauled grain and sold to a local group who put corn on barges there before the group went bankrupt. With the heavy leaves on the trees, we never once saw the Mississippi River. Back on Route 146, we took the Old Cape Road toward the beutiful Cape bridge. That was a new itinerary for me and one Gerald had not driven for a long time.

We went on to Cape and Jackson. For lunch Gerald took us to a barbecue place a friend had recently introduced him to. We did our errands, filled the truck with cheaper Missouri gas, and were back on Route 146 in the Ware bottoms when we saw sprinkles of rain on the windshield. Unfortunately the sprinkles did not last long. Gerald laughed that probably not many people could brag about driving through rain.

Imagine our amazement when we got to our home territory and found it raining so hard, cars were pulling off. We had to go see the crops up at Wayside Farm, of course, and water was filling the ditches and even running over the highway a bit at one point. Probably three or four inches of rain had fallen in a very short time, and a couple of inches here at Woodsong.. The thick bright green corn and soybeans were reaching skyward as happy as we were at this blessing of water fot them to greedily drink from the earth. Coughing as he went up the stairs, Gerald went to bed early and slept well. A few hours later, I followed when I finished the novel I was reading.

River to River with Marilyn Schild

A welcome phone call invited me to go with Marilyn Schild on Route 146 to retrace the Cherokee Trail of Tears from the Ohio to the Mississippi. For years, I have wanted to do this, so I was delighted. I would not even have to drive! Gerald was interested in our proposed adventure, and that made me feel important and invigorated to have such an exciting day planned for yesterday.

We met up at the Kroger parking lot promptly at nine and were off down Route 57 to Route 24 to Vienna and were on the Trail of Tears at Route 146. At Golconda, we drove by the painted mural and then up on the levee enjoying our view of the Ohio but imagining hordes of Cherokee leaving behind the sadness of Hopkinsville. There flags at graves of their revered leaders White Path and Fly Smith told them of one more loss that this forced march had cost them.

We drove up to Buell House and the Davidson cabin and looked into windows before climbing back in Marilyn’s vehicle to leave Golconda behind. We passed two different bridges over swampy creek areas with cypress growing and wondered which or if both were ones requiring corduroy roads to be built for the 1838 caravans to continue. We passed through Vienna and West Vienna and remembered some of the stories associated there. Next we saw the fragile barn on the north side of Route 146, which contains the log structure of the Bridges Tavern, recently put on the list of endangered sites by the Landmarks Preservation Council of Illinois. Pleasant Grove Church was a couple miles up the road--also on the north.

Going on to Union County, we soon saw Mt. Pleasant Road, and Marilyn headed up it. I had a briefcase along full of saved articles, documents, maps, and books--and I usually found information after we had already passed the site. However, Jon Musgrave’s photo of the house at Mt. Pleasant that had been a wayside store was in my hands. There was no doubt when we came to the columned brick home. Resisting any desire to disturb the residents, Marilyn headed up the tree-covered lane behind that probably still looked much like it did in 1838 although by the time the December detachments passed through, the road was probably a molasses of mud and the trees would have been leafless. We were grateful for her SUV that allowed us to go to the lane’s dead end and envious of the folks camping there.

Back to Route 146, we hurried to eat at the Potato Barn only to find the parking lot crammed with the luncheon crowd. Not wanting too much of a delay, we decided to eat on our way back from the end of the Trail. On around the square in Jonesboro, I imagined that the bank was still Winstead Davie’s store. On down Willard’s Ferry Landing Road, I nodded down Cook Street, where I lived as a child and where some detachments went up and over Pansy Hill and some were turned away.

We kept going to the Dutch Creek, Sand Dug Hill, Clear Creek area where thousands had been penned up unable to get across the Mississippi River. Without proper clothes, moccasins, nor blankets, here the detachments of native preachers Rev. Stephen Foreman and Rev. Jesse Bushyhead and the white assistant conductor Rev. Evan Jones met up. I tried to hear the many prayers and songs praising God that were sent Heavenward here as the Christians held their Sunday services in freezing weather and suffered illness and death.

Going onto Ware, we went on as far as the levee (again an area where I once lived). We knew Willard’s Landing used to be over there somewhere on the riverside. When we lived in the Mississippi bottoms a half century ago, people used to refer to Big Barn as though, of course, anyone knew where Big Barn used to be. Yet no one ever showed me exactly where it was or how to get there, so I was unable to show Marilyn further.

We traveled on down 146 to Reynoldsville to take the Old Cape Road home. I wanted Marilyn to see Mission Valley Church and Fair City and Ronald and Deborah Charles’ Trail of Tears dude ranch. Enjoying the same beautiful hills Gerald and I had traveled less than two weeks before and going past Lyerla Lake and the hunting lodge there that Marilyn and her late husband had traveled to on their motorcycles when her son hunted there, we journeyed on to Route 127 and back up to the Jonesboro Square.

A co-worker of Marilyn had praised a Mexican restaurant there, and we were hungry and decided to try it. The eatery we found open turned out to be a Columbian restaurant, not Mexican, and located in the dry goods side of the old Clingingsmith Store where my parents bought me school shoes as a child. In pleasant surroundings, we enjoyed a delicious meal and a gregarious host who had traveled all over the world before leaving New York City’s Fifth Avenue to move to Jonesboro.

Enjoying a day on the Trail of Tears is always shadowed by a sense of shame at man’s inhumanity to man and the strong wish that the Cherokee could have experienced it differently.

Searching for Trails

When Gerald went to Cape Girardeau for a tractor part on Monday morning, I tagged along.

We had often traversed Route 146 from Jonesboro to Ware when we lived in the Mississippi bottoms. A few summers ago, we had driven slowly, stopped often, and searched ditches diligently for the Trail of Tears marker we both remembered. A photograph of the marker by the late Geneva Wiggs had been on the 2000 summer issue of Saga of Southern Illinois. Carole Watkins, who had grown up in that area, was emailing me directions from California assuring me the marker was there. She had just seen it that summer. Finally, she sent me her photographs to prove it. But the marker was gone. No one seems to know what happened to it.

The identical marker (both put up by the state in 1935) had long before disappeared from the more eastern area on Route 146. When Interstate 57 went in, King Neptune’s grave was moved to the Trail of Tears rest stop on the northbound traffic side; evidently the Trail of Tears marker near it had already been stolen. Sadly (and almost inconceivably), the Trail of Tears rest stops carry no information about the Trail of Tears.

But on Monday, Gerald and I were looking for the Trail of Tear routes that went south of Route 146. Recently we had been studying Marie Exter’s 1994 maps that she had shared with Geneva Wiggs, who had shared copies with me. Learning from Robin Roberts about the Lakota Sundance held in the open area south of the water plant, we wanted to see the trails that evidently led to Hamburg Landing three-and-a-half miles south of Willard’s Landing on the Mississippi River.

The detachments going to Willard’s Landing had used the route we call Route 146 and were stranded in the area of Dutch Creek, Sand Dug Hill (not dug yet), and Clear Creek before the sloughs stopped them from going on over to the Mississippi River where ice floes made getting across the river impossible for three or more weeks.

Darrell Dexter in his Saga article felt the various detachments used all the ferries on the river at that time--the two Willard brother ferries (sometimes called by their predecessor’s name of Green’s Ferry, the ferry at Hamburg Landing with Bainbridge Ferry coming over from the Missouri side to the sandbar there, and finally Smith’s Ferry leading to Cape Girardeau. It would take two or three days to ferry a detachment of l000 people across the Big River.

For Gerald this travel on Berryville Road past Lockard Chapel Church was a trip back to his boyhood. Almost every farmhouse we saw, he could remember visiting there or knowing the people back then. We had actually traveled these same roads with our friends Tom and Lois (Ferrell) Doctor a few years back--but then we were looking for traces of Lois’s ancestors--not traces of the Cherokee.

We could not resist going up to where Atwood Tower used to be. Gerald remembered the days he spent in the tower with his uncle Francis Wenger. They’d leave Uncle Francis’ car or truck at the home of Louie Kelley’s sister and walk the rest of the way when the road was not passable. Gerald said a day spent in the tower watching for smoke could become a very boring day. I bet he or his brothers livened it up for Uncle Francis, who had some sort of instrument that he could use to pinpoint the location of a fire and send word to the firefighters. Fortunately, we did not meet any other vehicles since the gravel road was not built for two cars to pass.

Although we found no traces we could recognize, we were impressed with the breath-taking steepness and beauty of the tree-covered hillsides. It was a stunning wilderness and a beautiful drive with slim but tall leafy trees reaching up trying to find sunlight. Yet I thought how difficult it must have been for the hungry Cherokee to look for game in those steep hillsides.

We went to the dead end of another road searching for a possible passage to Route 146 going south from Ware, but the road turned into a path Gerald’s pickup could not take. We had to go back and across Dutch Creek to Route 146 going south, where we crossed Dutch Creek again. Dutch Creek runs north and under the bridge on 146; and finally up above the old Morgan School area, it runs into Clear Creek, which runs south. (I hope I got that right--Gerald kept trying to explain it to me.)

We came home using the Old Cape Road with a brief side trip through Mission Valley country. From the road signs there, I guess that little village, which is known for producing both brains and musicians, may be called Fair City. I would love to attend the church there some Sunday.

But when we were growing up, we had heard that area referred to as either Ubydam Hollow or Ibedam Hollow. Like most people, I was never sure which dam hollow people were talking about, and I am not sure I had ever visited those hollows before. It was peaceful and lovely.

We continued on by Lyerla Lake and somehow onto Airport Road (which I understand is where Tickie Norris and a friend would light their plane in the old days) and finally came back out by Lockard Chapel and back to Route 146.

A brief visit with Geneva Wiggs’ daughter Billie Kaye to return some photographs made the day complete.

Summer Good-byes

Summer Good-byes

For breakfast, I met my friend Deb Tucker at the new KB Barbecue (which us old timers will probably still be calling Pulleys for the next ten years). Deb and husband are leaving by train to go the beautiful scenic route from Chicago to the state of Washington to visit his mother. Deb and I needed to have a final visit since it will be a few weeks before our schedules allow another get together.

Tonight Gerald and I took granddaughter Erin out to supper before she leaves in the morning for the 766-mile trip to Texas A & M at College Station. Since it was her farewell meal, we let her choose the restaurant, and she chose Benny‘s. It seems only yesterday we were there welcoming her home from college. It has been so nice having her around this summer. We are going to miss her.

She was on her way to another friend’s house after our supper to say goodbye and celebrate the friend’s birthday a day early. We went on to to Katherine and Dave’s house as Gerald had made copies of a photograph of all ten cousins taken up at Jeannie’s house last November. Tara had given us the photo in a special frame for Christmas, and Erin requested a copy, so Gerald made Katherine one too.

Summer brings opportunities for visits with friends and loved ones, but they must end with goodbyes. I have always realized that one reason I write is in rebellion against the transiency of life. I want to capture and hold the moments and make them permanent--without goodbyes. Gerald’s photographs do the same for us. We can hold the precious moments in our hands and see it all again.

Bun, Charlene, Collin

Instead of writing here on Wedesday night, I keep getting later and later in the week. When Audrey Biby phoned Saturday afternoon with the sad news of her father's death--just after he had fixed Audrey and Alan hamburgers for lunch and they had had a good time together--I thought I would write after his Tuesday funeral about the good life of William Martin "Bun" Handkins.

How Gerald has enjoyed visiting with Bun and hearing about his work in the coal mines as a very young man--being in charge of the mules down there. Of course, he stayed in the mines through all the later technology. Gerald never came home from Bun's house without having his spirits lifted. Bun would insist on feeding Gerald cashews or something and getting him a drink of ice water. Gerald would try to tell him to let him do it, but Bun wanted to serve him that water--even though the walk to the kitchen sometimes made him shaky.

The last time I visited with him, he was admitting that maybe he needed to accept Audrey and Alan's repeated invitation to come live with them. "If you can't keep care of things, maybe you better move on," he explained. But by the time Gerald visited him next, Bun thought surely he could stay one more winter in his own home that he loved so well.

He would have been 94 at the end of this month, and he still was going up and down the stairs to the basement, riding his tractor, driving his pickup to town, and relishing life. His niece down the road checked on him every afternoon and fed him many home-cooked meals. Gerald will miss hearing Bun brag on brother Kenny's expertise on the dozer and on our son-in-law's crops and straight rows. Not long ago, Bun had made a special stop by McDonald's just to check up on Kenny. We will miss his dropping by the farm. A good life well lived continues to be a joy.

On Sunday afternoon, we got a call about the death of Gerald's first cousin Charlene Givens. She was 79 and had been quite ill for a long time. She was always a favorite. We were saddened all over again. However, like Bun, Charlene had lived a very useful and full life and had loved many people and made many of us happy with her enthusiasm and concern. I will never forget her smile nor her laugh.

Then, however, we learned of the death of a young man in a truck accident on Sunday morning. He left behind a wife and baby girl. Although we had never met Collin Petty, we knew his parents and sister. When our granddaughter rented his grandmother's former home, Collin had been kind to her. We had prayed for Collin's daddy when he was so ill.

Many years ago, we had grieved the tragic accident of his aunt's young husband Joey Rumfelt down in the Ware community in the Mississippi bottoms. Joey was Ken and Opal's nephew and the cousin of our children's cousin, and he too left behind a young wife and baby. Ware Baptist Church was so crowded with mourners that I remember thinking what if the floor caved in.

Now this family had to go through all this again. Our hearts ache for them. The death of those of us who are at the end times of our lives is both appropriate and expected, and we often consider it a good thing even as we grieve. (When my adored father died, I really was not even able to allow myself to fully grieve for a couple of years because when I would start to grieve, I would feel selfish for wanting him to stay on earth.)

But it is much more difficult to process the unexpected death of a young parent and a beloved son who we feel has so much to live for. We have had too many of these difficult accidents in our area as well as the loss of our young service people in Korea, Viet Nam, and now Iraq. When I work on family history, I do not feel sad about the deaths that I record of older people. Oddly, I don't think we ever quite get over the sadness of those who die young.

We find ourselves still grieving for Charlene's mother who died of a stroke at age 26 when Charlene was only four. I still grieve for my mother's mother who died when my mother was six. No, that is not exactly correct. I grieve that my mother and siblings had to grow up without their mother. It meant so much to Mother when she visited Uncle Henry in the Mt. Vernon hospital and went in to help a patient in the next room who was calling for a nurse who did not come--and Mother found out that elderly person had known her mother! Such a small tie--but it meant a great deal to one deprived of a mother.

I still grieve the death of Gerald's uncle Oard Glasco, who was murdered before any of us were even born. A bunch of rowdies crashed a teenage party. (And I sometimes grieve for those rowdies, who were never convicted but had to live with this knowledge all their lives.)

Our children always grieved the death of Gerald's baby brother Clay, who died before Gerald or his siblings were born. Elijah Clay Eiler carries his name. I comfort myself that those who die young do not usually have to experience the grief of death of their loved ones--nor any other of life's hardships or illnesses they might have had to experience if their adulthood continued. It is important to realize we better express love and appreciation while we can. Those are the memories we cherish.

Catching Up

The rains continue, and I am using the rainy days to catch up on bill paying and correspondence. And laundry. I still have all the guest bedroom linens to go. And I finished All the Pretty Horses.

I’d cleaned the magazine racks and carried the magazines to the car trunk intending to take them to the Veterans Hospital as I do every so often. Just as I was ready to leave the house this afternoon, the sunny weather turned to a deluge--our previous rains had been gentle. I figured I would have to postpone getting the magazines out of the trunk--but late in the afternoon, the rain had completely stopped and I completed that recycling task.

When Erin dropped in for lunch yesterday, I’d already planned to use all the left-over veggies in the fridge, so I did not change the menu--just added a few more of the frozen strips of chicken breasts to be braised in olive oil. I still had a few leftover cookies from Don and Ernestine’s visit to feed her. This afternoon I went grocery shopping to replenish our empty fridge and pantry.

Gerald is still trying to figure out what some grandkid did to his TV controller. It keeps being locked on “record” and the Disney Channel, and then he can’t get to channel he needs. He had graciously turned his big-screen TV in the family room over to the children full time while they were here, but the after effects are a bit much since he would really like to watch his news shows and softball games. Ha.

His garden looks great after the rains. Actually, it looked good before. For both our sakes, I am glad it is smaller this year. We had our first zucchini while Don and Ernestine were here and I made a vegetable casserole. Since then, I’ve added a whole one to our evening soup. Yet already I have two more than we can eat on the kitchen counter. Guess I will have to think about making zucchini bread for the freezer.

Wyoming Visitors

Because of brother Ken's diagnosis of leukemia, the only sister of the four Glasco brothers came for two weeks back in February to visit with all of us, but most especially to visit Kenny. She promised him she'd be back to breakfast with him. And she and Don are here now to fulfill that promise.

After a trip through New Mexico, Texas, and Oklahoma, the Gambles arrived at brother Garry and Ginger's house in the Mississippi bottoms Wednesday afternoon. This is the home farm where Ernestine grew up. After failing to make telephone contact with Gerald and Ken, the two brothers from Union County took the Gambles to Ullin for supper at the barbecue place they are fond of. However, the next morning, thirteen of us gathered at the Marion Cracker Barrell. The four brothers, who look so much alike, are well known by waitresses there, who seem to enjoy bringing them extra biscuits and gravy.

Jeannie and two daughters delayed their parting for Freeport in order to see her Aunt Ernestine and Uncle Don. And she got to see her local cousins Tim and Kerry to boot.

After returning to Union County and visiting more with Garry and Ginger and then on to Keith and Barbara's farm for a visit, the Gambles arrived at Woodsong last night. I had already had to leave for Writers Guild, so I did not get to visit with them again until after the meeting, but that gave Gerald time for a good visit. If they had gotten here earlier, I would have tried to get them to go with me to hear romance writer Bobbi Smith since both Don and Ernestine are excellent writers.

I came home happily babbling about Bobbi Smith's great talk, Don shared anecdotes about his creative writing students at Rock Springs, and Ernestine told funny library stories. They both read little Cecelie's first grade manuscript from last year about the death of her neighbor, who had favored her with friendship and tea parties. We all looked at the great pictures Don had already printed out at Garry's house of the five Glasco siblings at breakfast and an adorable picture of Cecelie that Ernestine had taken. There's an extra to send to Jeannie.

Today Don and Ernestine have gone in to spend the day in Marion with Ken and Opal--the real reason for their visit right now. Happily, after three chemo treatments and 75 days in the hospital this spring, Ken has gotten great reports with white blood cells and platelets high. We are rejoicing.

Hot dogs! Hot dogs! Hot dogs!

When the grandkids come to Woodsong, it is difficult to know what their newest tastes in food have become. Sometimes something they liked the year before no longer entices them. Nevertheless, I know they usually like kid menus better than the menus I serve when their parents are here.

Even desserts and snacks are sometimes difficult to figure out. I had baked a few cookies (from a prepared dough) before they came, and I don't think they touched a one. Gerald and I probably ate those few cookies as we did the banana pudding. I had meant to have the kids make some more cookies from the simple-to-bake cookie dough, but then decided that might not be a good activity for them if they didn't like the cookies. The angel food cakes went over great and so did the vanilla pudding. And the moose tracks ice cream!

Although they did not seem to enjoy the hamburgers, the hot dogs were well received. Thus, early in the week, we had hot dogs for lunch two different days. Not that Gerald and I should be eating hot dogs, but I didn't get alternate menus prepared for us. We also had bacon twice for the supper menu since I can count on Trent and Samuel being very happy if I fry bacon. (I don't fix bacon for Gerald and me often either.)

Well, Friday came and the end of Vacation Bible School activities. As has not infrequently happened down through the years, the VBS picnic fell on our wedding anniversary. Gerald made a point to come to the church pavilion to eat picnic with the grandkids to celebrate our 51 years together. Of coure, Jo Barger had lots more goodies to go with the hot dogs and it was a delicious meal.

The kids were invited to the Cullys to swim that afternoon and had worked up an appetite--so I reheated macroni and cheese from an earlier meal and set out a bowl of peaches to feed them a substantial snack. I knew they might be too hungry if they had to wait for supper at the tailgate party that Samuel's church was having in town for the close of their VBS.

Although Samuel came out to play every afternoon--thanks to Vera Pulley who brought him out, he went to VBS at his own church. We enjoyed the program Sam and his VBS friends gave for the parents and grandparents and then went out to the church parking lot for a supper of grilled HOT DOGS. And our kids happily ate their share. I was still satisfied from the mac/cheese snack and skipped the hot dogs. But Gerald and I felt we had celebrated our 51st wedding anniversary in style. We can have steak anytime, but celebrating with grandchildren at their activities can't be beaten.

The Trail of Tears from River to River at the GSSI Spring Conference

Genealogists of Southern Illinois spent a beautiful spring day June 9th remembering some of the horrors of a brutal cold winter in this area over 166 years ago. At that time, approximately 11,000 Cherokee trekked from the Ohio River to the Mississippi River on their way to Indian Territory.

The Board of the Illinois Chapter of the Trail of Tears presented a morning-long symposium at the Spring Conference of the Genealogical Society of Southern Illinois at John A. Logan College in Carterville. Conference Chair Mike Brush indicated that the large crowd in attendance was evidence of the interest that has developed in the area for information on the Trail of Tears.

Despite the absence of two panelists due to illness, not a minute was wasted to convey as much information as possible about the tragic story of the forced removal of the Five Civilized Tribes from their homeland. The audience was encouraged to join the Trail of Tears Association and help the Illinois Chapter to discover the exact route of the Trail, collect the stories of the Cherokee who were left behind in this state, and memorialize both the ones who died and the ones who endured the cruel march.

As moderator. after introducing the TOTA Board, I gave a brief background of the attitudes and events leading up to the Indian Removal Act in 1830 and the United States Senate’s ratifying by one vote in 1836 the fraudulent Treaty of New Echota.

Illinois chapter president Sandy Boaz, a charter member of both the national TOTA in 1993 and the Illinois Chapter in 2003, explained the role of the TOTA in helping the National Park Service in the creation, development, and interpretation of the Trail of Tears National Historic Trail established by Congress in 1987.

After a brief break for the audience, Harvey Henson of the Southern Illinois University at Carbondale geology department, gave a power point presentation telling about the ongoing remote sensing project at Camp Ground Cumberland Presbyterian Church Cemetery in Union County. Oral tradition has passed down that a large area of the cemetery was where Mr. George Hileman allowed the Cherokees camping there to bury their dead that dreadful winter. The SIUC work is confirming the exact location of those graves.

Next Joe Crabb told of the Cherokees coming across the Ohio River from Kentucky into Golconda and had the crowd laughing at the evaluation of the Golconda residents found in Rev. Daniel S. Butrick’s journal. Joe gave his educated guess as to where the Trail went through Pope County explaining that he was convinced that some used the roadway through his farm.

Gary Hacker took over to share what is known about the location of the Trail through Johnson County. He talked about sites known as Gillespie, McCorkle Creek, Vienna, Dutchman Creek, West Vienna, Hezekiah West, Cypress, Ferne Clyffe, and Cache Bottoms, He explained how the Illinois Chapter had secured legislation in November to make Route 146 a designated historic trail for the state and his efforts now to obtain appropriate signage. With help from Juanita Whiteside, the Illinois Chapter has succeeded in getting Bridges Tavern (still existing inside a barn on north side of 146) put on the Landmarks Preservation Council of Illinois’ current list of endangered sites.

Sandy Boaz discussed the Trail beginning at the Union County line. Her ancestor George Hileman had allowed the Indians to camp on his farm and chop the woods there for their firewood. He had previously buried two of his small children in the field where they were camping, and they were allowed to bury their dead there too. In was in the 1850s that Mr. Hileman donated land for the church and its cemetery. She talked about the Cherokee going through Jonesboro and onto Dutch Creek where the floes preventing crossing on the Mississippi River caused groups to stop. There were probably 8000 backed up for over a month between the two rivers.

While eating their box lunches, many chose to listen to Marion Mitchell’s power point presentation on the Indians in Illinois during the time when the British encouraged them to make war on pioneer settlers.

The afternoon ended with the powerful historically accurate dramatic portrayal by Tony Girard enacting the service of a common soldier during Cherokee round-up in Georgia. After the fictional soldier’s enlistment was up, he then signed on as a teamster with a contractor traveling with the Cherokee. By the time he reached the Mississippi River, he could take no more of the death and disease he had to observe.

Several audience members stayed on to meet with former GSSI president Phillip Stucker, who was visiting from Texas. He gave another power point rendition of the Trail of Tears Association and answered genealogical questions in the room where there was a display of notebooks and materials on the Trail.

Visiting Jeannie's Family at Freeport

Since Gerald had softball tournaments on his mind, he was quite agreeable when I casually noted that if I went home with the Eilers from Aidan's party, I could stay a week with them. Then he could come up as planned for Elijah's 8th grade graduation and pick me up. I kept meaning to call Jeannie and see how their schedule would be this last week of school. But last Thursday night, I fell asleep on the couch and failed to call her before their bedtime. With two working parents and three children in different school and numerous activities, their lives are incredibly busy, and I worried that one more person in the house could be the burden that broke the camel's schedule.

At this point I decided not to come up here, but a couple of things worked together to cause me to at least throw the idea out to Jeannie. We were set to leave in a hour or so to spend Friday night with the Taylors, when I finally reached Jeannie. Since I would be car-less, I knew I could not help with transportation, but I told her maybe I could help somehow while here. "Just come up and we'll have fun," she encouraged. And we have had.

After the parade, program, indoor picnic, straightening her art room for the next day by removing the now dried paper heads, and catch-up chores for Jeannie and Rick on Memorial Day, we were getting ready for bed and discussing the next day and week when Jeannie gasped and said, "Oh, I've not made arrangements for Cecelie's getting to school. Her baby sitter had to be out-of-town this week."

In the crowded over-full weekend busyness, it had slipped her mind. And there I was in Freeport delighted to be able to walk to and from school with one of the prettiest and sweetest blond second graders in the universe. Jeannie has a small picture in her home that says, "In all thy ways acknowledge him and he shall direct thy paths." Proverbs 3:6. Suddenly I felt directed and right where I was supposed to be.

The last two nights we have gone down to Freeport's majestic Masonic Temple for the area theatrical awards established by Dan Stevens of the local AdPix newspapers--Village Voices and Freeport Focus. With a theatre arts background himself, Stevens appreciates all the excellent directors in the local high schools here in Northwestern Illinois. He knows how much work and personal sacrifice such teachers make to see a play or musical to completion. He wanted something done for the theater students similar to conference all-star programs for athletes.

With the two-night donation of the Masonic Temple for rehearsal on Tuesday and the award show on Wednesday, Stevens was able to offer proscenium arch experience to some high school students who had only previously performed in a gymnasium, where probably only the first few rows of the audience saw much of their performance. Now here they were in costume and putting on an excerpt from their school's musical where John Philip Sousa,Elvis, and many other notables have performed. How in the world kids remembered lines from last fall is beyond my comprehension, but these players are extremely talented and versatile enough to do whatever is required of them.

I thoroughly enjoyed seeing my granddaughter Leslie rehearse on Tuesday and remembered again the fun we had last fall when ten cousins--counting Aidan--descended on her backstage after one performance. Then on Wednesday night we saw not only Freeport's scene from Pajama Game, but also EPC's (Eastland and Pearl City combined) Charlie Brown, Warren High School's excerpt from Seussical, Orangeville High School's from Hello Dolly, and Acquin High School's from Guys and Dolls . While the judges exited to decide which school received the 2007 traveling trophy, we saw a slide presentation of all the schools' year in theater.

The evening began with a recognition of all the directors from these six schools spreading across the stage and receiving a check for their school's program. A bright red cloth was pulled away to reveal a table full of trophies to be presented for various aspects of theatrical production as well as for individual performances. Recognition was given for make-up, lighting, costumes, an original play written by a local director, best special effect, best set design, and a Bright Star Award for a returning student.

Individual awards included male and female leads in musicals and plays and also male and female supporting roles in musicals and plays. This allowed 32 students to be highlighted with individual pictures in the beautiful program booklet, and each time the individual trophy was awarded, photos of all four of those particular nominees were on the large screen in front of us.

Other students were seen in the collection of play/musical photographs in the program booklets, but I hope we were all aware that many hard-working students weren't able to be recognized. Some danced, sang, and acted with great talent and enthusiasm in smaller parts and made the shows what they were, but their names were not the noticed ones except by their families, neighbors, and classmates. Other students climbed ladders, hammered boards, did make-up, and performed other work and often were not even seen by the audience. These are the students who really deserve praise.

Naturally I was pleased when Freeport won the traveling trophy, but I have to admit the biggest thrill for me was when Leslie was given the trophy for the Musical Female Lead. Although I had seen none of the other schools' musicals, I had to wish her nominated cohart Ryan Werntz had gotten the top male award because they played off each other so well.

I know how hard Leslie works, and I was delighted be there and see her receive this recognition of her work. Leslie acknowledges her talent is God-given, but I know that she has made every effort that her gift is not wasted. Her mother recognized that even as a toddler that Leslie would act out whatever she was telling about. As Jeannie heard her daughter singing, she recognized something very special, and she made sure this child lived in the midst of good music and videos and productions by talented performers.

I have to be grateful to the efforts of Jeannie's entire family for all the fun I am having in Freeport. For two evenings, schedules have necessarily focused on Leslie, but I have seen nothing but acceptance on her siblings' parts. But then they know their parents are equally committed to them and the development of their gifts. Frankly, I can barely wait to see Elijah walk the boards at Freeport High School next year.

Ahoy, Mate!

Two or three years ago our son Gerry brought his dad a large open boat he had been using for fishing down in Mexico on the ocean. After the vibration eventually wore and broke the ribs on the bottom of the boat, they were welded. The guides said the boat was no longer safe on the ocean, so Gerry brought it home.

Needing a plug and some other repair, the boat sat behind Gerald’s shop. This spring Gerry brought back an outboard motor for his dad, and Gerald has spent his spare time this week to get the boat ready to use with the motor.

This afternoon he made his maiden voyage, but he had to leave his project because we needed to hurry to the softball tournament at Harrisburg. After our heartbreaking loss to Pope County and their great pitcher, we tried to cheer ourselves up with dinner in Harrisburg at the best Kentucky Fried Chicken buffet in the Midwest. It was fun seeing friends from Crab Orchard and Johnston City. Then in the parking lot as we left, we enjoyed walking around and viewing the three vintage Model A’s that belonged to a group, who’d come from Indiana to eat.

Gerald was itching to get back to his boat floating. I hitched a ride with him, and together we enjoyed the lake with its evening sounds of frogs and katydids, geese, and fish flopping. In the past, when we rode on the lake, it was with Gerald peddling the paddle boat, so having a motor do the work was a new experience with a new kind of steering.

I liked going close to the island and seeing all the vegetation there that we cannot see from the house. Honeysuckle climbs high into the many trees on the lake side, and the thick green growth of wildness is pleasing. As we entered the channel Gerald created a couple of summers ago in order to make the island, Gerald had to learn new skills in steering the boat, but we had a smooth ride. That side of the island is more civilized looking with daisies on the bank mixed with the grasses there. We passed by the many ducks and geese and saw the gosling we thought had disappeared--it is already at that awkward adolescent stage.

Finally after a few rounds, Gerald threw in the anchor and fished awhile throwing back the two he caught. It was dark now, and we headed back to the house.

Nature's Beauty and Human Creativity Make Life Good

Honeysuckle perfumes the air, and blooming daisies are waiting to be picked to tell me whether or not he loves me. However, a recent report on the radio that ticks seem to be more prevalent than usual this spring will probably keep me out of the fields. I will just have to believe Gerald rather than the daisies.

I am terrified of ticks. Mostly because of lyme disease and Rocky Mountain fever, but also just the idea of the little critter daring to attach itself to me or a loved one and suck blood sickens me. Gerald is out in weeds and woods and fields all the time, and he had his first attached tick several weeks ago. However, I was calmly sitting at the breakfast table on a recent morning reading my newspaper as usual one morning, and I felt a tickle. There on my arm was a little visitor. Fortunately he was still quite easy to get rid of. Evidently Gerald had carried it to the table on the paper when he walked down the lane and back to get the newspaper as he does every morning.

Country living does have its drawbacks, but those are overshadowed by the great beauty that surrounds us these glorious spring days.

Tonight I will be going to Southern Illinois Writers Guild to hear Cheryl Ranchino Trench talk to us. After a career in marketing, writing, radio and business, she has started her own company as a marketing consultant called Communications 8, and I am eager to hear about this career during her retirement.

I'll leave Woodsong early to do errands on the way to Carterville and may even pick up Roberta Shrake, who is using this cool afternoon to gather books from her garage to donate to a local school. Roberta wants to go tonight if she has time and energy left after her garage duties. If she does not make it tonight, maybe she can go next month to hear Bobbi Smith, a romance writer. I’ve not read any of Smith’s romances, but I heard her talk at our guild’s 2004 conference, and I definitely want to hear her again.

We have great diversity of writers from all genres in the guild, and something I have learned from all the diverse program personalities we have heard down through the years is that there is more in common among good writers than differences because of genres. All of us can learn from each other regardless of our interests. I have also learned that most writers are involved in other artistic endeavors in addition to writing--often they are great visual artists, photographers, musicians, crafters, or actors. The need to express and the principles of art flow from one area of talent to the other, and I am always inspired by speakers who share their experiences and expertise.

Hummingbirds Return from Mexico, and I Made it to Southern Recycling!

My guilt level shot up Sunday afternoon when I saw hummingbirds on the deck looking for supper. Here they had made it all the way to Mexico and back, and I had failed to have their sugar water ready for them. The next day I looked up our two feeders stored over winter in the garage. Yesterday I finally made their treat and hung a feeder on each end of the deck.

Sitting on the swing there last night reading, the little birds kept the air humming with their fast-beating wings. At the same time, the martins were chirping and swooping by from their perches on the nearby house. At the edge of the lawn, the geese were making their nightly noise as they zoomed in flight across the lake usually in sets of three. Frankly, I did not read very many pages as I watched and listened to the evening show.

Earlier in the evening, Gerald planned to haul our trash to the burning pit he created northeast of our house in the meadow. After loading it all on the “mule,” he noticed the seven deer feasting there and called to me to check them out. So before I sat on the deck, I sat on the front porch watching the deer. They bravely stayed there as they watched Gerald approaching and didn‘t budge until he was almost upon them with his vehicle. Then they all gracefully loped south.

I’ve been planting a few flowers around the large rocks Gerald placed beside his shop on the edge of our front yard. Not too many of the flowers we planted last summer survived. As I poke around planting, I jump every once in awhile when I suddenly realize that what looks like grey mud is moving. We have several fat frogs making a home there, and once I get over the startle, I love seeing them.

Since I had a Trail of Tears Association Board meeting this evening in Carbondale, I used the trip to get some errands done. I stopped in Marion at our daughter’s, and then went on to get a stuffed pretzel at The Mix in Carterville for a quick lunch. Next, I checked out Barnes and Noble on the edge of Carbondale and bought a book by Roger Lipe that I had been wanting. Then I spent a happy hour wondering through Hobby Lobby giving my eyes a feast and thinking of possible future Christmas gifts.

My main goal, however, was to finish the task I did not accomplish the day of our last TOTA Board meeting. I have a rule that I should not drive extra to recycle since using gas might defeat any help to the environment. However, since our Marion recycling center burnt, the accumulation of glass in our garage was really bugging me. Back in March, I loaded the trunk with my two large boxes of glass needing to be discarded, and confidently started to the north side of Carbondale, where two or three people had told me Southern Recycling had moved from the days I used to take stuff there when they were in the heart of downtown Carbondale. That day I wondered around in the industrial park and on roads where I thought people meant until I ran out of time and had to quit. I was quite chagrined to have to unload my two boxes of glass back in the garage that night.

Today I allowed plenty of time and armed myself with the address and phone number. I was sure I had just overlooked it somehow before. I had been told you could actually drive inside the building and unload your unwanted debris. Surely, I would find a building that large.

When I did not see it this time either, I stopped and asked a couple of people, but they had never heard of the recycling center. It did not help that I could not read my own handwriting and thought my “W” was an “N” for North. One man, who hadn't heard of Southern Recycling, said he had heard of West Chestnut, but not North Chestnut. He was right, of course.

But a guy working on his truck knew where the recycling center was and gave me good directions, but either he got his left/right mixed up or I did when I heard him, so I wondered out of my way turning right when I should have turned left. I went around a couple of curves as he said--but in the wrong way. By this time, I was out in the country and enjoying the drive at least. I tried not to think what burning gas did to the environment.

Finally, I did what I should have done in the beginning, called the phone number, and got directions. The very friendly voice gave me directions although I realized later she did not know how far north I was when I told her I was in the north side of Carbondale. She said Davies Street would run right into West Chestnut. And it did, but I was way north of anywhere that I could find Davies Street.

Nevertheless, her nice voice and laughter on the phone gave me confidence that the place was about where I had now decided it must be, and I found West Chestnut and the convenient recycling drive-in center. I was immediately helped by an employee there, who turned out to be a neighbor of mine down at Creal Springs. I was glad to meet him, but even gladder to get rid of those boxes of glass and the huge box of newspapers I had accumulated. And gladder yet to know I will not have to look the next time I want to recycle in Carbondale. I still had time for a couple more errands and got to my 6 p.m. meeting on time.

Spring Green is Overwhelming Us!

Our irises are lavishing lavender blooms outside the family room windows. Unplanted fields are rife with the bright yellow of the wild mustard. The rains here have brought forth so much green that driving through the countryside is almost overwhelming with greeness. No wonder I claim each spring that it is my favorite time of the year. (I claim the same in autumn, of course.)

I’ve planted spring petunias in memory of my mother in the flower box that was one of the many gifts my friend Phyllis and her daughter Patti heaped on me over at Pondside Farm back in 2000 when they visited there during her Anna-Joneboro High School class reunion.

One of the two little yellow rose bushes we planted last summer survived the winter, and one did not. I bought a small inexpensive rose plant at the grocery store yesterday to replace it because I am not likely to get to the plant nursery in another town where we bought last summer's bushes. Yellow roses are always in memory of my grandmother Sidney Martin, who had an old-fashioned yellow rose hedge out by the well on the farm. These flowers were tiny button roses that I no longer see anywhere. Years ago I traveled down to the old farm home hoping to get a start of the rose bush and found the person living there had lost that yellow rose to a harsh winter the year before.

Last night after coming home from helping to decorate for our church’s women’s banquet tomorrow night, I realized I should carry the pretty little rose bush over there first before I plant it at Woodsong. Then others can enjoy it. The first time I bought petunias for the flower box, I carted the box in the trunk for outside decoration for that same annual affair, which had a garden theme that year.

This year the theme is “Putting Your Best Foot Forward,” and our volunteer cook, Jo Barger, was there last night with her marvelous collection of Aunt Mae’s vintage dress heels to put on the tables along with candles and Aunt Mae’s and others’ jewelry strung out on the multi-colored pastel clothes. The tables looked beautiful when we left.

The corn is planted.

On Monday Gerald did help Brian some by going to Cyprus to get some kind of harness for some kind of farm machine. That allowed Brian to continue non-stop planting. By Tuesday, Brian was done with his corn planting and heading back to work in Saint Louis. The new planter must have worked well for him to be through so quickly. Gerald also helped our neighbor Scott on Monday, and this coming Monday will help him plant corn over at Ridgeway.

We drove to the softball game at Johnston City yesterday in the rain, but everything was clear to play when we arrived at the ball field. About the fifth inning, it started raining some and like many others, I went to the car to get the umbrella. But it was not needed very long.

After the game, we went by our daughter Katherine’s house to eat a piece of her birthday cake and take a gift. Back home, I tried to get to bed early because I had planned to treat myself to a day with the Union County Writers Group who were having a critique session. I printed out a manuscript for that activity plus a couple of others to submit to publications and tried to get organized for the trip to my home county.

Today I enjoyed a great day at Anna on Friday at Joanne Blakely’s as she invited the group to her home for a day of sharing, critique, lunch, and getting our manuscripts ready for the new anthology deadline coming up. I enjoyed meeting her son Davoss and fellowshipping with the other writers around her table.

After a lovely day at Joanne’s with other writers, I stopped by the post office to mail a manuscript that needed weighing to make sure it was not over the one ounce limit. It was, so I am glad I was cautious. Then onto Country Cupboard to leave more of my books there, and finally out to visit my cousin Mickey, who was at her son and daughter-in-law’s country home.
They have moved into and remodeled one of the beautiful Victorian farmhouses east of Anna on Route 146. When I was a little girl going with Daddy to the farm at Goreville, I always wondered who lived there in those large houses with well-kept lawns and envied whoever it was. At last at age 73, I have finally been to visit in one of these homes. And even more important, I met Taj, Mickey’s new grandson born in October. Almost three now, older brother Camden has grown up considerably since the last time I visited him at his previous neighborhood.

The drive down and back to Union County was lovely, and the day had been a perfect day. Eager to get home, I cut through the country and decided to skip going to the grocery store to buy the items on the list I have carried for a week now. I can do that tomorrow.

Unfortunately, I have not come to the end of a perfect day. The first thing Gerald told me when I went out to his shop to visit a minute was that our great grandson, Aidan, in Aurora was very sick. Gma Vickie took off work early and hurried up there. We prayed for him at supper longer than usual, and he is in my prayers right now.

Good to Be Home!

No matter how much I like to travel nor how much fun we have had, I always feel glad to be home again. Gerald feels the same way.

After a supper yesterday with our granddaughter Erin, her parents, and Geri Ann in South Bend, Indiana, Gerald and I set out for home. Although we had the thought that we would stop and get a motel room if we got too sleepy, I was not surprised that Gerald just kept driving and we ended up at Woodsong shortly after midnight. I was worn out and had not driven a mile, but Gerald seemed to be going stronger each time we stopped for a rest stop.

On our trip up to Freeport to visit with our daughter Jeannie‘s family, Gerald's legs were growing cramped from driving. We impulsively pulled off Interstate 57 and stopped at Mattoon and ran by my brother’s Jim and wife Vivian’s house. I had thought we might stop on the way home, so I had grabbed a photograph for Jim off the dining room chair at Woodsong as we walked out. Gerald had made the photo of Jim’s Anna-Jonesboro Class of 1946 reunion from a clipping my friend Lois in California sent me from our hometown paper.

After a brief visit, we Jim and Vivian's house with me five books richer. Vivian, an avid reader, had a stack of books she had already read and was ready to give away. I also saw her latest quilt top--the 90th one she has made since retirement. I wonder how many books she has read in retirement. I talk about reading--but Vivian accomplishes it.

We checked into the motel near Jeannie’s home that allows us to have the grandkids come over and swim. Unexpectedly the motel was serving soup in their dining room that evening, which was the perfect supper for us since we had eaten a very late lunch at Urbana at the Red Lobster and were still full. We were invited for pizza at Jeannie’s but declined since the soup was so handy and we could use time to unpack and relax. Later Gerald took me over to the Eilers' house to go with them to the Thursday performance of Showtime--the musical extravaganza that Freeport High School puts on each spring. Gerald went back to the motel to rest. Showtime was spectacular and almost incredible to be produced by secondary students. After touring backstage, meeting the director, and congratulating Leslie and a few other cast members, the Eilers dropped me back at the motel for a night’s sleep.

Next morning Gerald was up bright and early although he had not gone to bed until after I got home from the musical. He had already eaten breakfast and been on a morning walk outside by the time he was back in our room polishing his shoes, and I woke up with the bed shaking from his vigorous rubbing of the shoes.

At our request, Jeannie dropped off Cecelie, so we could take her to school, and we thoroughly enjoyed that. Gerald got a picture of our little sweet second grader and her backpack.

Next, we ran over to Carl Sandburg School to see Jeannie’s great (huge) art room. I loved it because it had a concrete floor and looked like a very practical place for kids to do art without fear of upsetting someone by dropping a bit of paint somewhere. (I am always amazed at how many people fail to realize that having a shiny new immaculate art room with pressure to keep it that way destroys children’s creativity.) Of course, Jeannie’s posters urging children to feel free to make mistakes and to experiment re-enforced the creative environment.

After more rest, lunch at a favorite restaurant, and a nap, we were ready for Cecelie and Elijah’s arrival to swim until Rick took us all out to dinner. All except Leslie, who had already gone on to prepare for Showtime, of course. That evening, we saw another wonderful show, and I could tell from his laughter that Gerald enjoyed it as much as I did the night before.

After a brief visit back stage with Leslie and then with the Eilers at their house after the show, we hurried to bed so we could be up and on the road to Notre Dame early the next morning. Having frozen last fall up there and heard then how cold last spring’s softball games were, we were well equipped with blankets, jackets, coats, gloves, etc. However, the sun was blazing hot for the Saturday afternoon‘s double header with the Louisville Cardinals, and we were sunburned quickly. The cold-weather preparation was never taken from the car.

On Sunday after worship at Granger Missionary Church over the border in Michigan, we hurried to the ball field for another double header--this time with the South Florida Bulls. The weather was wonderful with a great breeze along with the sunshine. By this time, I had finally acquired a new supply of sunscreen for this summer, so the Saturday sunburn did not worsen.

After another supper with Erin and family, we were ready to head back to Southern Illinois. One aspect of coming home that I do not like is the re-orientation, which includes skimming the newspapers and collected mail and deleting all the junk emails and quickly trying to digest the important ones. One sign of the times is that we rarely have large numbers of messages on the telephone answering machine while we are gone. With cell phones and emails, we use the house phone less and less.

Double Digit Birthday for Sam

A special double digit birthday for Samuel was celebrated today because he reached 10. It was fun at the small family party tonight to hear him tell about all the wondrous things they did this morning in the new kids’ science class he started at John A. Logan College.

I had trouble believing him when he told that they set their hands on fire! His unblemished hands seemed to deny that. But the teacher had them wash their hands in soapy water to which he had added something that got in the bubbles and flamed up and away when the hands were lit. I can’t remember what it was he added but the men all knew and understood. I wouldn’t want to promote this experiment anyway without that teacher there to supervise. And they cut up a cow’s eye. All kinds of such excitement! I liked hearing about it.

His cousin Trent spent the afternoon with him, and they are already anticipating the Star Wars kid party tomorrow afternoon since they are both Star War fans. Big brother Davie’s gift of a Star War chess set was a big hit tonight.

I’d spent the afternoon at Camp Ground Church listening to local people tell their family stories about family members who participated, observed, or dropped off the Trail of Tears through Southern Illinois. These stories also were wondrous but very sad. We cannot imagine the horrors that were forced upon the five civilized tribes--Seminoles, Creeks, Choctaw, Chickasaw, and Cherokees--as treaties were broken with their nations, and whites took over their property and made them march west against their will to a land they feared--and that was already occupied by other tribes.

Trekking from the Ohio River to the Mississippi River, many of the Cherokee were trapped here because of ice floes on the Mississippi. These stranded groups experienced one of the most gruesome times on the Trail of Tears. Their babies sometimes froze in their arms, their bare feet left blood in the snow, and many who died here could not always be properly buried.

Before there was a Camp Ground Church, there was a wooded knoll at that hillside with five nearby springs. Both Native Americans and early pioneers choose to camp there as they traveled the Lusk Trail from east to west or the main trail south to Fort Massac.

George Hileman was an early farmer who acquired that knoll and surrounding farm land. In 1836 during an epidemic of some sort, he and his wife lost two children and buried them near their home.

Some of the first of the eleven Cherokee detachments going through this region during the Forced Removal got across the Big River before the floes. However, perhaps as many as 8000 were stranded here for weeks. Cherokee were spread out from the Ohio River to Dutch Creek and Clear Creek west of Jonesboro, where the sloughs prevented their camping any closer to the Mississippi.

Many were camping at the Hileman farm--some estimate maybe 3000 were there. The freezing Indians cleared the wooded knoll for firewood for their camp fires. The Hilemans gave them permission to bury their dead in the field where their children were buried. In 1850, he gave land for the church when it was established and soon afterward land for the cemetery that exists around the church today. Mr. Hileman's great great great granddaughter, Sandy Boaz and her husband Dwight are members of the Camp Ground congregation. Sandy worked for 20 years accumulating the evidence and documentation that caused the National Park Service to make Camp Ground Church and Cemetery a certified Trail of Tears site. The hospitality shown by this congregation in this beautiful rural church building is always warm and genuine, which must please Mr. Hileman very much. (Yes, I deliberately used a present tense verb. I think he knows about the present congregation following his example.)

The stories told this afternoon made it clear that the suffering was intense and prolonged long after the Trail of Tears. Leaving their beautiful farms and snug cabins behind and starting over from scratch in Indian Territory, a part of which became the state of Oklahoma in 1906, caused continued economic harm that is still felt today. On the other hand, if hardship makes humans tough, the Cherokee who did not die on the Trail of Tears had proof forever after of how strong they were and how deserving they were of the pride they had in themselves.

Yet just as our service people never get over the war-time horrors they live through, James Mooney discovered when he interviewed the Cherokee many decades later that they too were haunted the rest of their lives by the terrible times in Southern Illinois in that dreadful winter of 1838

Good Friday Morning Musings

Perhaps the Lord knew we needed Easter Sunday to remind us that sometimes the darkest hours are followed by the happiest conclusions.

Spring is always a busy time making adjustments to warmer weather and more outdoor life. I’d just become used to realizing I needed short sleeves to be comfortable at ball games when this present cold snap hit. Now for this weekend at least, I must remember to take a jacket when I leave the farm. Because of all the busyness and some other writing I have been trying to accomplish, I am running late this week writing on Woodsong Notes.

While the Eilers were down last weekend, Elijah helped me place the three or four stuffed bunny rabbits that I use for Easter decorations. As I do every year, I have placed Jane Perr’s beautiful Ukrainian eggs around the shelf that lines the guest bathroom. Actually I had her create the eggs for our children--but I am hanging onto them until I die. Then they can inherit them. In the meantime, I get to enjoy them. Ha.

The ham is in the fridge waiting to be prepared for Sunday dinner. I used up the potatoes that started growing eyes underneath the kitchen sink, and I bought fresh potatoes to peel for the scalloped potatoes. I’ve got to start the layered gelatin salad today. I still need to check the freezer and decide what veggies I’ll serve with the ham and potatoes. I’m trying to get the house in decent shape for holiday guests.

Some years at our annual church egg hunt on Saturday, we’ve given each child a $1 gift certificate to a local eatery. One year we just gave them the dollar bill, so the parents wouldn’t have to take them anywhere, certificates wouldn’t get lost, and the child coould use the money for anything he or she wants instead of just food. We decided to do that again this year, but unlike the previous time, I could not find a bank with brand new fresh bills. I tried two, and I may try a third bank on Saturday morning. Otherwise the kids are stuck with “dirty” money. Ah well. They won’t care as much as I will.

Our daughter Katherine is to come home from Herrin Hospital’s rehab department today. We are grateful that the various therapies have her stronger again. Gerald’s brother Ken and his wife Opal came home Wednesday evening from John Cochran V.A. Hospital in Saint Louis. I think Ken was there 19 days.

After a week at home, Ken must take a third chemo treatment. But yesterday he was out and about drinking coffee with his buddies, looking and sounding great. Gerald has made him some enlarged photos of their father’s hunting hounds to cheer him up. Originally Ken wasn’t allowed flowers at the hospital. I don’t know if that restriction is in place now or not, but I think he’ll like the photos better. And I am sure Opal has plenty of beautiful flowers blooming in their yard to bring inside as she is an avid gardener.

Our daffodils and narcissus have finished blooming. Gerald transplanted them here and on the island from one of our fields where someone had planted them generations ago. The redbud at our house that was so lovely is completely green now. However, the azaleas by the front porch have started blooming, and I hope they will be opened fully by Sunday. Snow flurries outside our window today probably did not help them.

Spring Beauties and Toothwort

Thanks to Karen Frailey, I found out the plant in our woods Sunday was Toothwort. The very next day Joe Crabb of Golconda sent a lovely photo of a flower from his woods and a little story about Cherokee Tears, a legend which various states on the Trail of Tears route credit to different plants on the Trail--supposedly planted there by the tears of the Cherokee as they passed by.

I got all excited and thought our flowers were some of the Illinois Cherokee Tears. But after opening the attachment of Joe’s photo, I saw his flower had five petals while the ones in our woods had only four. The color and blossoms resembled each other--but the leaves were radically different. So I still did not know the name of our flower.

I had gone back last night into the woods to get a fresh plant to press so I could show Karen exactly what ours looked like. Only one plant was at the spot where several were on Sunday (and I had only picked one), but then I found a new patch a little way away. I felt guilty Sunday even picking one flower because Bruce Beasley taught me to leave wild flowers alone--but I think he meant not to dig them up, and I did not.

Oddly, in the Sunday spot, however, now there was some of Joe's Cherokee Tears with the five petals. The flowers of both plants were closed last evening as it was almost after dark, but I put them both in the dictionary to press to send Karen, but now I don't have to, because today Karen sent Joe and me these two websites:
http://www.illinoiswildflowers.info/woodland/plants/spring_beauty.htm and
http://www.usi.edu/science/biology/twinswamps/Dentaria_laciniata.htm.

The answer was clear. Joe’s “Cherokee Tears” were Spring Beauties, and my jagged- tooth leaved plant was Toothwort. And the second trip to the woods showed me we had both plants growing side by side as Karen said they often did.

Our Spring Beauties were whitish-pinkish as Joe's picture was. Not as pink as on the website, but Karen say they vary. Our Toothwort blossoms were about the same whitish-pinkish color as the Spring Beauties but definitely the same four-petals as the photo on the website. The leaves are so distinctive that they cannot be confused.

So then I had to look in dictionary and find out what this "wort" meant--old English word meaning "herb" or "plant." I definitely like the name "Spring Beauty" better than "Toothwort." Sounds too much like a cure for toothache.

The highways and byways in Southern Illinois are stunning with redbud abloom replacing the white blossoms on the now-greening pear trees. Where yellow daffodils lined one spot on a country road last week, there are now white narcissus instead. However, we still saw a few daffodils yesterday as Gerald and I drove to Hafer on an errand before the Johnston City softball game with Warren High School. Everything was so fresh and green that it was a beautiful drive on an early spring day.

Springtime Begins

Daffodils are blooming along our country roadsides where someone long ago planted them, and now they have spread over great areas. We are drinking sassafras tea. Gerald has found two duck nests with a single egg in them. The martins have returned and are perched on the houses chirping happily. Spring is definitely here.

I guess yesterday was the first day of spring this year. One of our dictionaries says the equinox occurs around March 21; another dictionary says March 22. But on someone’s website, I saw that yesterday was that first day of spring this year.

Regardless of the exact date, I welcomed spring today by cleaning out the henbit from the day lily bed and re-mulching it. Fortunately henbit is easily pulled. The occasional wild onion had deep roots and was harder to pull or dig out. Almost impossible to get out is the grass I allowed to establish itself in some of the clumps of day lily. Not only do I have trouble distinguishing between the lily leaves and the grass, but the grass roots wind around the day lily. It is tough to remove. It was past suppertime, so I finally gave up on the last clump. I will have to try it again at another time.

We are watching the end-of-the-season volleyball games and first-of-the season softball games. Switching over from winter activities to the new season’s responsibilities makes it yet another busy time on the farm. And tomorrow is Gerald’s birthday, so he and the brothers are deciding where they will eat breakfast in the morning.

Ken won’t be eating with them yet. He had to return for more chemo last Friday after a week at home. This time there was a bed at John Cochran Veterans Hospital, so he and Opal are there this week. Although he has done extremely well, this continued chemo is standard treatment we understand. He was started with two bags of the milder chemo. Right now he is the harsher chemo, and as often happens, he is running a temp. Nevertheless, so far, so good. He hopes to be back home again this weekend. He still has one of the same doctors that he had at Barnes.

Gerald and I had talked that we could take any of the local children, who could go, to supper for Gerald’s birthday after we watch the Johnston City-Nashville softball game at Johnston City tomorrow night. We’ve just realized, however, that the Salukis will be playing at 6:10 tomorrow night, so we don’t think anyone will want to go to supper right then. HMMM.

A Sad Loss in Southern Illinois: Jim Jung

Last night I was tired and did not have anything special to write about and needed to finish another writing assignment, so I decided I'd blog tonight instead. I knew tonight was our Southern Illinois Writers Guild meeting, and I was looking forward to hearing Dr. Ronald Ray Schmeck speak on his novel about the Pennsylvania Dutch--the fancy Dutch that he grew up among, so I figured I would have lots to write about.

It was indeed a good meeting and the program very interesting. I learned a great deal. It turns out that the "fancy Dutch" are Lutheran or Moravian, and the "plain Dutch" are the Amish. The German origin seems to be their connection. I have just checked out Dr. Schmeck's website--by following his instructions and googling his name, which took me to his website. I had not realized until tonight that the Pennsylvania Dutch were as distinctive as they were in language differences. It was only after I'd heard Dr. Schmeck talk about his book at the Union County Writers Group fest that I knew there were "fancy Dutch."

Some of the cultural differences that Dr. Schmeck talks about did not strike me as that different from the rural culture here in Southern Illinois. Many of us related to the hog butchering chapter in his book that he read from. And the thriftiness and making things last and enjoying hard work.

But these Pennsylvania immigrants seemed to have hung onto their language differences more than many have done. People occasionally spoke German in my mother's home too, but there was no trace of it in her speech. Perhaps because her father had left his family behind in Evansville, Indiana, and with her mother's early death, the father did not have occasion to speak much German.

Although much younger than me, Dr. Schmeck sounded as if he went to college with a very distinct dialect. Now he has reproduced it for us in his novel. Our Amish friends in Marion, Kentucky, speak beautifully perfect English even though their family language in the home is a form of German, and their children do not learn English until they start grade school.

My heart was very heavy tonight, however, so it was difficult to enjoy our meeting in the normal way. We had just gotten word from Ruby Jung that her husband Jim Jung, publisher of the local nature almanac, passed away at 11:30 this morning. Ruby, our treasurer and our anthology editor for the past two or three years and one of our most diligent and faithful members, had let us know not much over a week ago that Jim had finally gotten a diagnois: Stage 4 lung cancer. Last week he had completed his first two chemo treatments, and I had dropped by their house to pick up covers for our latest anthologies to keep Ruby from fretting about them. I did not stay very long because she was listening for Jim every minute I was there and then friends came by--one of them a young woman who was one of the 21 "nieces and nephews"--children of friends that Jim had mentored down through the years. Jim loved children. He had just completed his latest book and the new almanac was out. Many hearts are heavy tonight at this great loss in our region.

A Trip to Saint Louis: More on Ken

Speaking of medical research, Gerald got to be a part of it today since his cardiologist connected him with some lovely folk at Washington University who were doing cat scans and MRIs today to train doctors from all over (Puerto Rico, Peru, many states on some newer stronger machines).

We traveled up for that experience, and I felt good Gerald was helping in research. One nurse told us that procedures that used to take four hours now take less than an hour. There is no question that research has brought some amazing results. We met in the Cortex building, and it was beautiful. This was their first time in this building, and the nurse told Mary Ellen and me that they were working out all the logistics, but we were impressed at how the training/testing seemed to be running. Mary Ellen and Brian came in for a brief visit and lunch with us.

After lunch we drove over to Barnes to visit with Ken and Opal at the Siteman Center. Ken looked good. And so did Opal, who sleeps on a couch in his room and has been right there almost every minute during the treatment. They’ve been hospital bound for a month now as of today. Ken’s fourth week of treatment is almost over. He may be going home this weekend.

Unfortunately their daughter Joyce will be having two surgeries on an eye on Monday at Barnes: cataract removed and a retina repaired. Kyna will be taking her up. Fortunately, Kyna will be on spring break as all our Williamson County schools will be next week. Opal stayed with Joyce for her last surgery--she has had many because of diabetes. The doctors tell Joyce she needs to have both these surgeries on Monday for the health of her eyes--even though they will not make her see any better. (And as Opal said, hopefully they will not make her see any worse.)

Good News for the Glasco Family

A phone call from our brother Keith last evening reported that the “main honcho” had visited Ken at Barnes yesterday afternoon to give a report on the blood marrow tests given last Thursday. The news was good.

I am so ignorant about all this blood stuff--white cells, red cells, blood marrow, chemo--I am not going to say any more than that for fear of being incorrect. The important thing is it was good news.

I have always been embarrassed when friends talked about this sort of thing because I knew I did not understand what they were talking about, and furthermore, I knew the fact that I did not understand was one more piece of evidence that life is unfair. So many parents and grandparents know all about this. I have always been very grateful for my ignorance although ashamed of it.

When our oldest daughter was three or so, we took her from the Illinois side of the river where we farmed in the Mississippi bottoms to Cape Girardeau to shop for a new winter coat. It was an exciting expedition for us because she had older cousins on both sides of the family, and we were fortunate to have beautiful clothes handed down to us. On our tight budget, we were grateful. Nevertheless, it was fun to shop for something brand new.

Suddenly, however, our sales clerk was in tears and had to rush away from us. She came back in a few minutes apologetically explaining that her niece just our daughter’s age had cancer. I still get a lump in my throat when I think of that little girl I never knew. Nor have I forgotten that recognition of the unfairness of life. Unfortunately, many events since then have reinforced that awareness.

The first death I was aware of as a child was my grandmother’s when I was six, and I first heard the word cancer. During all my grade school years, I wanted to be a scientist/doctor, and I wanted to help find a cure for cancer. But childhood ambitions fade, and I did not enter that scientific world. I had an aunt on both sides of my family have cancer and a cousin, but all three lived away and I learned little from their ordeals.

In fact, I felt our family had been unusually free of cancer for many many years until our niece died on New Year’s Day 2002. Again, however, Trudi lived in Texas, and I learned little about the disease itself from that sad loss. Trudi had lymphoma and had been declared in remission and told she could go back to work just a month before her death. She applied and received a part-time job as a registered nurse, but never got to do it because almost immediately she was very ill. There was another completely different cancer lurking in her body that the doctors said they did not know about.

In a way since we have had so few cancer cases, we should not have been surprised to have a family member diagnosed with leukemia. But when a healthy person suddenly becomes ill, it is difficult for the mind to adjust to that knowledge. It seems unbelievable. Visiting a friend this afternoon whose husband has just been diagnosed with lung cancer, I sensed her feeling of wonder that suddenly this healthy man is now taking chemo and their lives are so altered. She is busy learning all that goes with this diagnosis.

Although I failed to do anything with my childhood ambition to find a cure for cancer, I am very grateful for those who stayed the course and have spent their lives studying, observing, experimenting, and discovering not one cure but many cures for all the diseases we call cancer. How much better the odds are today than they were five years ago. I can think of no vocation that deserves more honor from the rest of us than the medical researcher.

The Sad Life and Times of Reverend Stephen Foreman and Other Humans

A sad rainy day in our nation with tornadoes killing a seven-year-old girl in Missouri and striking a high school in Alabama with young people still trapped there at dusk. While I did not watch TV a lot today, when I did, I usually ended up in tears.

Gerald was away from the farm all day as he had an appointment in Carbondale to receive a replacement for his new hearing aid that evidently fell out of his ear while on a walk all over the farm and into the woods a few Sundays ago. He also had his eyes checked and made the trip to Union County (where people just west of Jonesboro on the Berryville Road had awful wind damage) to figure out taxes with Doug Hileman. He lunched at the Kroger store in Anna with his brother Keith and nephew Tim. That was a new one to me--that you could sit down and eat a meal at the grocery store.

Here at the farm, it was rainy and overcast all day. I cheered myself up by starting the day sending brightly colored greeting cards to some shut-ins. And I paid a couple of bills. I walked down to the mailbox in pleasant weather to mail them even though puddles were abundant and the air was heavy with the morning’s earlier rain.

Next I went to the office and did some filing--with 20 or 30 more days of it, I would be caught up on my filing. Then I would need to start going through all the old stuff in the filing drawers and pitching out. Ah well.

I read through a couple of magazines in the afternoon and was able to start a give-away pile of them. Again, in 20 or 30 days, I could get ride of all the old magazines in the house.

I did a mite of writing on some small projects already started--thus, managing to avoid the hard stuff that I should really be concentrating on. I tell myself that the minute I get the large table in my office cleared off, I will be ready to go to work. And I think I will be.

I haven’t been completely off track. I have been doing some review reading and have also finished three books about Cherokee--two of them children’s books. One of the children's book was about the TOT but the other about a Cherokee boy in Tennessee in the 1930s. Since it was written by a white writer, who pretended to be part Cherokee, it is perhaps more accurate about a white child living in the mountains than about a Cherokee child. (I may want to review it sometime, but I am still contemplating this book.)

The new The Life and Times of Reverend Stephen Foreman by his great granddaughter Cooleela Faulkner was fascinating. I learned many new things from it and am still digesting what I learned. I find it impossible to understand how this man could accept human slavery with seemingly no fretfulness. At least he expressed no concerns in his dairy about slavery. Because the Cherokee census of 1835 did not show his owning slaves, I had not known he owned slaves, so he is less a hero to me than he once was.

Although his journal about the Trail was burned in a fire of his home, Faulkner’s book publishes his journal writing during the Civil War era in Oklahoma. Of course, I need the early journal for my work. Yet I am very glad to have read this revealing book with the valuable writings of this respected Cherokee leader.

The material in the book was originally submitted by Faulkner to the University of Oklahoma as her thesis for her masters degree in history. Fortunately, the work has finally been published in beautiful hard back book by the Cherokee Heritage Press, a division of the Cherokee National Historical Society. It can be ordered from the Cherokee Heritage Center, P.O. Box 515, Tahlequah, OK 74465. Their phone number is (918) 456-6007.

No one could have had a more difficult life than Foreman--and many other Cherokee. Yet the people in Enterprise, Alabama, tonight know the same human misery. And the people in Iraq and Afgahanistan and so many other places in our world including Walter Reed Hospital filled with brave young men trying to regain a semblance of normal life. There is no escaping the tragedies that cause grief to the human heart. I can keep the TV off, but I still know the misery is there. It is there everyday in many places. I do not want to be uncaring about the misery. Nor do I want to dwell on it so much that I become depressed and a burden to others with self-created misery. Learning to handle one's own pain and the pain of others and yet continue to be aware of all the beauty and goodness also all around us is one of the greatest challenges of human life.

Good-bye Little Sis

"Our" little sister, Ernestine, left Saint Louis today for the flight home to Salt Lake City, where her husband Don would meet her for the drive back to Rock Springs, Wyoming. After cereal, juice, and coffee here at Woodsong, Gerald took her up to see Kenny again at the Siteman Cancer Center at Barnes.

Gerald came home with much enthusiasm at how good Ken was looking. He is close to two weeks into the treatment now. The last time Gerald, Keith, and Ernestine were up there, Ken had been full of extra fluid. But with gallons drained before today, Ken is through this first crisis, and his doctors say he is doing even better than they expected. Gerald said the doctor laughingly reminded Kenny he was not 25. But I bet not many 25-year-olds could sit on a dozer all day like he has. And I suspect Kenny could still tramp through the woods coon hunting as good as some 25-year-olds although he did give up hunting quite a while back, I guess because of his arthritis.

After lunch in Saint Louis with Mary Ellen and Brian, final picture taking, and final hugs, Gerald took Ernestine to Lambert, and walked with her as far as he was allowed to go. She was worrying about his driving home in possible ice, and he was worrying about her safe arrival back home. There was lots of rain for him to drive through, but no ice. Our daughter-in-law Vickie is at Palm Springs watching Notre Dame in a softball tourney there, and discussion about the games with Tara kept him awake as he drove home to Woodsong.

Vickie watches a game and makes phone call updates to Gerry in Mexico and Tara in Aurora. Erin had gone one-for-two in hitting during the first game, but unfortunately ND lost. We haven’t heard about the second game’s outcome yet, but I assume we will before the evening is over.

By now Ernestine is probably dining in Salt Lake with Don. Gerald has updated Keith and Garry on their brother, and he has gone up to see his friend "Bun" Handkins to tell him the latest news on Ken.

Battling AML

Gerald's sister Ernestine arrived from Rock Springs, Wyoming, on Tuesday in Saint Louis. Gerald had gone up on Monday, and he met her and took her to the cancer unit at Barnes Hospital to visit their brother Kenny. His intense treatment for Acute Myelogenous Leukemia (AML) started that day.

Our son-in-law Brian picked Ernestine up and took her to their home for the night, and Mary Ellen brought her back to Barnes the next day. We went up to visit Ken on Wednesday and brought Ernestine home with us. He was in good spirits and looked so healthy. The nurses made us very welcome and, of course, we all wore masks and did not touch Ken. Meds had stopped his first touch of nausea right before we arrived.

Some or all of his children and spouses were coming in that evening for a surprise visit for Valentine's Day to celebrate the 15th anniversary of Ken's open-heart surgery. For a few years after the surgery, Opal, Ken's wife whom he was introducing to all his nurses as "Opal--my first wife" would throw a family Valentine party to celebrate the successful surgery.

So the family was surprising Ken and Opal by showing up dressed up in red finery hoping to bring cheer. The tests given on Monday had confirmed that his heart was in good shape for the chemo, which was certainly something to celebrate.

However, that night his temperature went up and he has been battling ever since. The temp will come down and then go up again. Opal and his son, Bryce, bathed him and would bring it down. When it shot up to over 104 degrees, he was packed in ice to bring it down. Next morning it normal and so it has continued up and down. A bad night. A good night. A bad night.

Blood tests were being cultured, and so far, no indication of bacteria causing infection has been found. After the temp went so high, the first two antibiotics were switched off and two new ones are being tried. Family were in and out all weekend helping Opal. We keep telephone chains going trying to keep up with reports on his condition. Sometimes he has been up enough to talk to one of the brothers on the telephone.

Now he is almost through the first week of therapy, which as I understand it--which, of course, I do not--will kill his white blood cells. Then there will be three more weeks of intense treatment. And intense prayers from his loved ones.

The Trail of Tears Through Southern Illinois

Since it is after midnight, I guess I will have to date this January 10. It has been a difficult week with health and family emergencies, but I am not going to dwell on those tonight.

Instead let me share some exciting plans made at the Trail of Tears Association board meeting on Wednesday night. While Gerald attended Geri Ann’s volleyball game at Johnston City, I traveled to Carbondale where we met in the geology conference room on the Southern Illinois University campus.

The first meeting of the Illinois Trail of Tears Association in 2007 will be a very special event. Illinoisans are encouraged to come and share their family stories about the Trail of Tears. At every TOTA meeting, there are people who have descended from Cherokee that for one reason or another dropped off the Trail in Southern Illinois. We need to collect and save these priceless family stories.

This sharing will take place at a very informal meeting at Camp Ground Cumberland Presbyterian Church in Union County starting at 1 p.m. on Saturday, April 14. The public is encouraged to bring letters, documentation, diaries, handed-down oral history, etc. to share in the church sanctuary. Copy facilities will be available for sharing with TOTA. (No one will have to leave material behind.)

For anyone too shy to share publicly, there is the option of a private interview in a classroom. If it is impossible for someone to come and share that day, a later private sharing time can be arranged. Dwight Boaz will be recording by video for those who agree to be taped. It is hoped that this event produces an ongoing collection of oral history helping us to appreciate the historic legacy in our area associated with the Trail.

Harvey Henson of Southern Illinois University Carbondale’s geology department will also be on the cemetery grounds demonstrating a non-invasive way to discover burial sites. The Camp Ground cemetery and church grounds have been certified by the National Park Service as a site where many Cherokee camped on the Trail. Oral tradition has allowed us to know of the burial there in unmarked graves of those who died in that area of the Trail.

There will be displays and information to browse. The Camp Ground Church is serving refreshments to those attending.

The Illinois Trail of Tears Association meets three times a year. The purpose is to discover and share information about the 1838 Trail of Tears through Southern Illinois and to encourage the development and preservation of the Trail. The public is always invited to the meetings.

The summer TOTA meeting will be in Chicago at the Newberry Library on Saturday, June 9, at 1 p.m. Program to be announced. [Correction on February 24: This date has now been changed to June 23 at the Towner's Lounge at Newberry Library.]

The final TOTA meeting of 2007 will be Saturday, October 6, at Golconda, where many of the Cherokee entered our state crossing over the Ohio River on a ferry from Kentucky. Place and program to be announced.

Winter Book Fair on February 3 at Mall

Sometime during the night we got our first snow to really cover the ground. A very light snow even so, and it was all over by the time we woke up and looked out the windows.

It was slick enough that Gerald was willing to take me to John A. Logan College, where I was to pick up our Southern Illinois Writers Guild anthologies. Now our SIWG members can sell them at the Winter Book Fair at the Illinois Centre Mall this Saturday from 10 to 4. In fact, Gerald wanted to take the truck--partly because of the slick country roads and partly to keep the car clean. That was very generous since he has just washed his truck, and it came back from this trip dirty.

SIWG is a student organization at JALC as well open to the public. Established in 1982, SIWG has been active ever since although there were a couple of times that leadership moved and membership waned. We have been especially proud of several students who have participated in the Guild this past year. The students are very stimulating to nonstudent members, and I like to think that they can learn from older writers' experiences.

The rolling suitcase with the anthologies had been stored at the college following our participation in the AutumnFest, where SIWG had a table and authors sold their books and the anthologies. The anthologies had ended up in the upstairs storage room called "The Cage" because of the locked wire fences there protecting stored items. A student worker graciously took us up to retrieve our suitcase, and now I need to inventory what is inside in the morning.

After a couple of early anthologies produced during the beginning years, the Guild's efforts for a third one failed. Finally Carol Cross became our president, and she carried an anthology to completion in 2002. She did much more than her share of the typing and work and so did her husband Bud. Anne-Marie Legan, Hua-ling Hu, Jim Smith, and others helped her, but she was the one who got the job done. This first new effort contained poems, articles, short stories, drama by SIWG members, and it sold well for the $5 fee charged.

Inspired by that success, others have continued the editing work including Joanna Gray, Laura Warfel, Ruby Jung, Phil West, and Roger Poppen. Many members have their first publication credit through the anthology. Roger has been elected editor for the next anthology and he is already hard at work. The Guild accepted his idea of our sponsoring a contest in connection with the next anthology and opening to members and nonmembers alike. You can check the contest out at this site: http://lists.topica.com/lists/crwropps/read/message.html?mid=812599670&sort=d&start=5167>.

We are very pleased that the fifth anthology--now called The Writer's Voice Annual--is hot off the press and will be offered to the public for the first time this Saturday at the second annual Winter Book Fair at the Illinois Centre Mall from l0 to 4.

It will be an exciting day for book lovers to have the opportunity to meet all their favorite local authors in the center court. Many authors will also be reading from their works on the stage there. I have been sniffling and coughing all week since I woke up with a cold Monday morning, but I intend to be well enough to read by Saturday! I don't want to miss this special day.