By Sherri Hicks
I am officially a “grandma.” Well, I have been since March 2, 2012, but our oldest son Wade adopted the little boy named Ethan and the paperwork was completed this week.
Ethan is eight years old and says he needs to be nine before he can learn to spell “Prater” which is his last name now. Ethan’s mother Jessie and Wade were married two years ago.
They had a family reunion at the Jenny Wiley Campground this past Memorial Day Weekend. I actually got to go down to Kentucky and visit with a few people. I went down with my brother Dale Hicks.
We were at Montgomery Baptist Church at the creek to see our cousin Pauline Patrick be baptized. Pauline is Rex Patrick’s sister. Then, the Patrick reunion was there at the shed, so we got to visit with all the people who used to live there on Montgomery Creek. This did include a lot of people from Stroh, Ind., and Wolcottville, Ind. We saw Larry Patrick, his wife Jan and her mother Nanny Back. All the Amburgey family was there including John, Ray, and all their sisters.
I had planned to stop and see Alonzo Combs on Montgomery Creek, but time got away and it was dark by the time we visited the grave sites. Brother and I walked to the head of Big Branch Ball Road there at Bearville to show him where our dad’s grandpa Randall was buried. This was the Terry and Hicks Cemetery. The road was terrible and we had to walk at least 1/4 a mile through black mud and ruts to get there.
Earl Terry made the sign that is on the cemetery. His mother is buried there. He has passed on two years ago. No one had visited the gravesites this year.
Back in the days, people made graveyards on the hillside near their homes or on their properties for their families to take care of. You have to keep showing the younger generations where these sites are so they won’t be forgotten or abandoned. Remember the past!
God bless all.
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