Wednesday, July 6, 2016

Price Family Reunion - 2016


Our last family reunion was held in Tennessee in 2013. For the 2016 reunion we returned to Alabama where my parents, Ladell and Reva Price spent their final years and were buried. We had held several reunions in Alabama over the years, primarily because it was convenient for my mother who survived my father by almost 26 years; it is also a most convenient location for my brother Clarence and his descendants who live in and around Arley, Alabama.

Reunion planning was handled by a group of Ladell and Reva's grandchildren, known collectively as “the cousins.” Clarence was undergoing treatment for cancer at the time and the cousins did an excellent job of selecting a venue, the Addison, Alabama Community Center, and steering attendees away from his house. We were close enough to Arley to visit with Clarence a few at a time and he was able to spend some time with everyone at the meeting place in Addison.

Rosemary and I planned our trip carefully so as to both minimize long travel days and make the trip as short as possible. We drove 506 miles to Santa Rosa, New Mexico on the first day. Santa Rosa was selected because it was approximately a third of the way to Memphis where we would stop for a two-day visit with Rosemary's sister Jeannine Dorfman and her husband Mark.

About 20 miles west of Albuquerque, at the 66 Casino and Hotel. we crossed the Rio Puerco, a tributary of the Rio Grande. The Rio Puerco is an intermittent stream and would easily be crossed without notice except for the old Parker Thru Truss bridge1 located alongside the present Interstate 40 Highway. The old bridge (right), now closed to vehicular traffic, is listed on the National Register of Historic Places.
I passed this way often while working in the area and often promised myself that someday I would stop and look more closely at the old structure. Now the time had come; we made a rest stop at the casino and then crossed the interstate and parked at the old bridge. Rosemary waited in the car while I satisfied my urge to walk across the bridge. In the photograph below, taken looking east toward Albuquerque, our car can be seen just on the other side. The truck seen at right is headed west on I-40. The red canopy seen at left is at a gas station located on old Highway 66.

Rio Puerco Bridge located 20 miles west of Albuquerque
We crossed the Rio Grande, continued straight through Albuquerque and were soon headed up the canyon south of Sandia Mountain that would take us out of the Rio Grande Valley. The highway through Albuquerque has been improved in recent years and we cruised all the way through the city and up the canyon to Sedillo with the cruise control set at 65 miles per hour. At Sedillo the speed limit again increased to the states normal freeway limit of 75 MPH. We were in Santa Rosa about an hour and a half later.

Being no fan of Mexican food nor of what passes for American cuisine in small-town New Mexico, I usually arrange to stay in Albuquerque and then drive to Amarillo the next day when making a trip back east. However, much to my surprise we found a new restaurant named Annies had opened just up the street from the Holiday Inn Express where we were staying. With an attentive staff and a wide selection of well-prepared food, it is a welcome addition to the sparse culinary landscape between Albuquerque and Amarillo. Another surprise at Santa Rosa was half a dozen Tesla Charging Stations (left) tucked neatly into the corner of the Holiday Inn Express parking lot. Strangely enough, cars were parked at all of the charging stations but not a single Tesla was anywhere in sight. Why, indeed, were charging stations for such expensive cars even installed at a moderately-priced motel.

The next day, our second day on the road, we drove 430 miles to Midwest City just east of Oklahoma City. Along the way we noted again, as we had last year, the graceful wind turbines, their rotors spinning lazily in the wind, that dot the landscape through the western Texas Panhandle. They began to appear soon after we entered Texas and were a constant presence along the northern side of the interstate for the next fifty miles or so, almost to the outskirts of Amarillo.

We stopped in Amarillo at the Texas Welcome Center where we were greeted by a very friendly robin. He looked us over carefully and, apparently deciding we were not a threat, volunteered to pose for a picture (right).

As we made our way east from Amarillo we encountered more windmills, in one instance a large group of mills that were all still. We were not sure whether this was due to maintenance on the feeder to the grid or because it was a new group not yet placed into service. Whatever the reason they were still idle when we made the return trip several days later.

At about mile marker 129 we stopped at a rest area devoted to telling the story of old Route 66. I had traveled the old route over the years and watched as it was gradually replaced by the Interstate Highway System, I-55 from Chicago to Saint Louis, I-44 from Saint Louis to Oklahoma City and I-40 from Oklahoma City to Los Angeles. I drove Route 66 from Los Angeles to Oklahoma City when transferred from the USS Thetis Bay to Great Lakes Naval Training Center in 1959.

That 1959 trip is reported in my book A Little Work and Some Luck, page 1672 as follows:

I had been authorized a 30-day delay in reporting to my new duty station. Intending to take full advantage of that delay, I picked up my car and pointed it toward East Tennessee for a family visit before reporting in at Great Lakes. Leaving Los Angeles on Route 66, I followed it all the way to Oklahoma City, then took Route 62 to Henryetta, OK, Route 266 to Warner, OK, Route 64 to Memphis, Route 70 to Crossville, TN, and State Hwy 68 to Tellico Plains, TN where the family were still living on the small farm that I had bought a few years before.

Three years later, after completing my tour of duty at the Naval training Center and attending Officers Candidate School at Newport Road Island, I again drove on sections of Route 66 while returning to the west coast. This trip is reported in A Little Work and Some Luck, page 1923 as follows:

After finishing OCS in early December, I loaded up the old Corvair and headed for the West Coast and duty aboard the USS General W.A. Mann. I remember that I canceled plans to stop at Great Lakes to say hello to my old shipmates when I heard that a terrible snowstorm was about to hit the area. On reaching the Chicago area, I quickly headed south on I-55 toward Saint Louis, stopping overnight to visit an old girlfriend in Carbondale, IL and then took Route 66 through Missouri. Along the way, I found several stretches of I-44 had been completed through Missouri, greatly expediting my progress, and on entering Oklahoma, was able to take the Will Rogers Turnpike to Tulsa. I can’t remember whether the Turner Turnpike from Tulsa to Oklahoma City had been completed; however, the way to go from there was definitely on route 66, which I took all the way to Flagstaff. I decided, instead of continuing west on Route 66 from Flagstaff, to cut south on Hwy 89A (then a US Route) and US 89 to Wickenburg and continue on into the Los Angeles area on US 60.

A plaque (seen below) posted at the mile marker 129 rest area neatly summed up the history of the old road.

Plaque posted at the mile marker 129 rest area in Texas
We had been too early to eat lunch in Amarillo, so set our sites on the Portobello Restaurant in Elk City, Oklahoma. The Portobello is a very good Italian restaurant that we had eaten at before and always enjoyed. Alas, it was Sunday and the restaurant was closed on both Sunday and Monday. We continued for another 25 miles to eat at Montana Mike's in Clinton. After lunch we drove an additional 92 miles to our destination at Midwest City near Tinker air Force Base.

On the third day we drove another 454 miles to arrive at the Holiday Inn Express Medical Center in Memphis. I had made all of our reservations for this trip at the same hotel chain to maximize award points, selecting Holiday Inn Express because of their generally consistent offering which routinely includes a microwave and refrigerator, free Wi-Fi and a good continental breakfast service. With that said the Memphis Medical Center facility is one of their older facilities and is showing its age. The rooms are on the small side, some come without microwave and refrigerator and there is no guest laundry.

Despite these deficiencies, we normally choose to stay here when visiting in Memphis because the motel is conveniently located and because the staff are friendly and accommodating. During this stay we found that the light bulbs in our room were old 15-watt compact fluorescents that gave out a faint yellowish light, totally unsuited for reading. Maintenance, however, quickly replaced them with 13-watt, 900-lumen bulbs that were quite adequate.

We arrived in Memphis in time for an afternoon nap before being picked up by Rosemary's sister and her husband for a delayed birthday dinner for me. My 84th birthday had been a week earlier and Mark and Jeannine treated us to Dinner at the Cottage Restaurant, located on Union Avenue, just a few blocks down the street from our motel. I had a vegetable plate that included green beans, squash casserole, turnip greens and pinto beans. The meal was delicious and had left overs for lunch the next day.

As can be seen from the enthusiastic diners shown in the photograph (below), I was not alone in finding the meal delicious.

Left to right: Jeannine Dorfman, Mark Dorfman and Rosemary Price – the photographer's plate is shown in the foreground
Mark has Crohn's disease among other ailments, is on oxygen, and gets around in a wheelchair. The wheelchair he uses, a lightweight folding affair, has small wheels which makes it hard to push the chair up even a slight incline. Making matters even worse, the heavy oxygen tank must be transported along with him. Eventually, sooner rather than later, he will need a motorized wheelchair and a carrier that can be attached to a vehicle. Jeannine is simply unable to push him around without danger of injuring herself or losing control of the chair on an incline.

Rosemary and Jeannine spent the next day sorting through some of their mother's belongings that had been kept in storage since her death. They had decided that it was finally time to let go of some of the personal keepsakes.
For dinner we drove about 13 miles to Bartlett, Tennessee to eat at the Side Porch Steak House. The Side Porch is a favorite place to eat for Mark and Jeannine. And despite the name I was able to put together a decent meal by judicious selections from the appetizers and side dishes. It does have one major drawback in that the wheelchair ramp is located in the rear and entrance to the dining area is through a cluttered storage closet. To make matters even worse, only one handicapped parking spot was available and we wound up parking at the bottom of a hill and pushing Mark's wheelchair back up the hill, an almost impossible task. In retrospect we should have unloaded him in the parking lot near the ramp before proceeding to an available parking spot below.

The meal turned out to be well worth the effort, however, and we had a most enjoyable evening. The diners, except for the author who also served as photographer, are shown in the mirror reflection below.

Dining at the Side Porch Steak House in Bartlett, Tennessee – shown left to right in the mirror are Rosemary Price, Jeannine Dorfman and Mark Dorfman – Mark is also shown in the foreground at right.
Rosemary and Jeannine spent another day sorting through their mother's belongings while I found a place to repair a defective hearing aid. Hearing and Balance Centers of West Tennessee did the work and seemed almost apologetic to charge me $100 to replace a receiver; meanwhile, I was quite pleased that it didn't cost more than that.

The next day we slept in late before starting our leisurely 200-mile drive to Jasper, Alabama where we were staying for the reunion. The most direct route is Interstate 22, a road that replaced US Hwy 78 from Birmingham, Alabama to Byhalia, Mississippi. The only difficult part of the drive is the short remaining stretch of old Hwy 78 between the end of I-22 and the junction of Hwy 78 with I-240 in Memphis. Part of this seventeen-mile section is always heavily congested by truck traffic, much of it to and from the BNSF Intermodal Facility located on Lamar (US Hwy 78) just north of E Shelby Drive. I-22 was started in the 1060s as Corridor X by the Appalachian Regional Commission. The Corridor X road was built to interstate standards and was eventually designated Interstate 22.

Once past the congested area at Memphis, we zipped right along at a 70-MPH pace, counting down the towns as we went – Byhalia, Holly Springs, Potts Camp, Hickory Flat, Myrtle, New Albany and numerous others, most of which we had driven through on old Hwy 78 in years past. When we crossed the Tennessee-Tombigbee Waterway at Fulton, we knew we were approaching the Alabama state line. Just a few miles beyond the state line we came to a junction with US Hwy 278. A sign proclaimed it to be the exit for Hamilton (north on Hwy 278) and Guin (south on Hwy 278). Then, just a few yards away, standing all by itself, another sign proclaimed this to also be the exit to Gu-Win. Gu-Win is an incorporated town of with a population of 181 (as of 1 July 2015)4 is located along US Hwy 43 (formerly a part of Hwy 78) about half way between the towns of Guin and Winfield. According to a Wikipedia article5 the town was incorporated in 1956 to avoid annexation by the town of Guin. The town chose the name of a local drive-in theater, the “Gu-Win,” which was itself apparently derived from the local towns of Guin and Winfield.

We were staying at a brand new Holiday Inn Express in Jasper. It was so new in fact that our original reservation in Jasper had been at another location. We arrived in the early afternoon having arranged for an early check in. The first thing I noticed was a very confusing sign (left) posted near the elevators. The arrows for the Fitness Center, Guest Laundry and Restroom seemed to point the basement. However, there was no basement. I finally learned that, a least in this motel, a down arrow means to go left.

The next odd thing we noticed about this new facility was the height of the beds (right). With beds this high the facility really should issue step ladders. It causes one to wonder just who came up with such an outlandish arrangement and why no one caught the problem early enough to lower the beds to a reasonable height. Was no one in charge? We finally solved the problem by commandeering a chair from the breakfast room for Rosemary to use as a ladder.

After checking in we ate lunch at the Ruby Tuesday's Restaurant. The restaurant was a great disappointment for me: it no longer featured crab cakes, my favorite Ruby Tuesday's offering and could not even provide a vegetable patty for a burger.

We had arrived on Thursday giving those arranging for the reunion all day Friday to make final preparations. Diana who was driving down from Washington, DC in her refurbished Chevy S-10 pickup arrived late in the evening and immediately retired for the night. Rick and Julia, along with their friends, Jim and Amy Wallace, drove all the way from Joplin that day and also did not get in until late. The next day I drove to Clarence's house and went blackberry picking with Sydney (left), Christi's daughter.

It was really hot and we got diverted to the shade along the creek and didn't pick a lot of berries. However, we did find a bigleaf magnolia (cowcumber) tree (below left) growing alongside the creek along with a fruit (below right) that had fallen off the tree before ripening. Had it not fallen off before ripening, the fruit would have been expected to turn a deep red color.

Bigleaf magnolia (cowcumber) tree Immature cowcumber fruit
Returning from the shade along the creek, we picked a few more berries before the sun drove us from the pasture. On our way back to the house we walked in the shade provided by trees growing along the fenceline back to the gate and crawled over.

The pasture fenceline on our left as we proceeded along the lane toward the house was completely overgrown with kudzu (below), an invasive species introduced to the United States at the Japanese pavilion during the Philadelphia Continental Exposition in 1876. In the 1930s and 1940s, farmers in the southern United States were given about eight dollars an acre to plant the vine in an effort to prevent topsoil erosion. It is said that over a million acres were covered with kudzu under this program. As a legume, Kudzu increases the nitrogen of the soil while its deep taproots improve the topsoil by transferring minerals from the subsoil.6

Kudzu growing along the lane
I have been told that the flower (right) of the kudzu plant is used to make a jelly that tastes similar to grape jelly. However, I grew up in the south where kudzu is prominent and never noted the plant to produce many flowers. I really wonder whether the effort would be worthwhile.

Some of the “cousins” were scheduled to arrive late in the morning on the day of the reunion; others, Christi and those who had arrived the day before, were assigned to arrive at the Addison Community Center. I arrived with this first group because I was assigned to set up a computer and scanner to scan any old photographs the attendees might make available for sharing.

Three of the “cousins,” Laura, Diana and Christi are shown below preparing lunch assisted by Samantha, Rosemary and Joyce. “Cousin” Connie Branam was assigned other duties and Mandy Bracken was ill.

Preparing lunch (left to right) are: Samantha Price, Rosemary Price, Laura Melillo, Diana Price (green shirt), Christi O'Rear (right front) and Joyce Melillo (red shirt)
I had set my laptop computer up at a table in the corner of the kitchen and was busy scanning photographs provided by my sister Alice.

The photograph scanning operation. Diana supervising from her corner, Ellis wondering what went wrong and Alice supplying photographs and identities - photograph by Julia
Other people started to arrive and Rosemary tried to photograph as many of the attendees as she possibly could. Due primarily to her efforts, augmented by other sources, I wound up with individual photographs of most attendees. These are presented below starting with a shot of Bridgette Denson's daughter, Alexis Thompson (left) and followed by other photographs, some of individuals, some of small groups.

Breonna Denson                       Samantha Price
Bridgette Denson's                 Steve Price's daughter
daughter

Briley Denson                            Kalandra Thompson
Bridgette Denson's son           Bridgette Denson's
                                                     stepdaughter
Gayla Price and Kalandra Thompson (Gayla's step-granddaughter)
Destiny Thompson                   Matthew Price
Bridgette Denson's                  Steve Price's son
stepdaughter
Taylor Price                               Bridgette Denson
Matthew Price's wife              Melissa Price Vaughn's
                                                     daughter
Left to right: Diana, Julia and Rosemary Price (Ellis Price's wife and daughters)
Lane Price                                  Connie Branam
Matthew Price's son               Alice Akins' daughter
Laura Melillo                             Joyce Price Melillo
Joyce Melillo's daughter         Married to Bart Melillo
Jim and Amy Wallace (Rick and Julia's friends from Joplin, Missouri)
Alice Price Akins                       Diana Price
Married to Julius Akins           Partnered with Mary
                                                     McClanahan

Lexi Price (Matthew Price's    Andy Branam
daughter shown with her       Alice Akins' son-in-law
grandfather Steve Price
Andy and Connie Branam– Melissa Vaughn shown at right
Denise Price                              Steve Price
Steve Price's wife                    Clarence Price's son
George Hendon                        Vickie Price Hendon
Married to Victoria Price        Clarence Price's daughter
 Hendon 
Clarence Price, Alice Price Akins, Gayla Smith Price and Joyce Price Melillo
Brian Akins                                Cindy Akins
Alice Price Akins' son               Brian Akins' wife

Christi Price O'Rear                  Christi O'Rear
Shown holding Alexis              Shown with her daughter
Thompson                                  Sydney
George and Vickie Hendon
Around the middle of the afternoon, people started drifting away but I did manage to gather Steve and his family for a group photograph before everyone scattered.

Left to right: Matthew Price (Steve's son), Lane Price (Matthew's son), Steve Price (Clarence's son), Denise Price (Steve's wife), Samantha Price (Steve's daughter), Garrett Cutcher (Samantha's boyfriend), Lexi Price (Matthew's daughter) and Taylor Price (Matthew's wife)
Melissa's granddaughter, Alexis Thompson, needed some food for the road. She had burned a lot of energy during the reunion. Although I never noted that she moved any faster than the other kids at the event, she was absolutely everywhere I looked. Melissa (right) is shown preparing her food as Alexis waits with her attention focused on something outside the door.

Diana and Rosemary, along with Julia and Rick and their friends Jim and Amy, headed back to the motel in Jasper. I lingered to pack up my computer and scanner and to bring Joyce and Laura back to the hotel after Laura helped with the cleanup. However, it was decided, probably because everyone thought I must be getting tired, that Christi would return them to the motel instead and I was free to go.

Amy, never having seen kudzu (left) before, stopped on the way to admire a thick-growing stand that had taken over the road bank.

Meanwhile, traveling alone back to Jasper, I decided to stop at the Arley Christian Congregational Church Cemetery and visit my parents grave site (below left). My brother Calvin, their youngest son, is also buried there (below right).

Gravestone for Jamel              Gravestone for Gerald
Ladell and Reva Wicker          Calvin Price
Price                                            Son of Ladell and Reva Price
The entire cemetery was immaculately groomed and every gravestone was decorated with an individual bouquet of flowers. When I saw this, it brought to mind an old southern custom, a spring gathering to honor the dead. It was called Decoration Day and was described as an “All-Day Singing with Dinner on the Ground.” It was a day to clean and decorate cemeteries. Some think it was the predecessor of our modern Memorial Day7. However, it was not restricted to honoring the war dead; it included all the dead. On the other hand, the Civil War, although three-quarters of a century past when I was born, was still a current event in the south and the graves of those veterans, along with those of the First World War, received special attention. I do not remember any differentiation between Union and Rebel Civil War dead. This is not surprising because East Tennesseans fought on both sides in that war.

The photograph (below) provides a view of the cemetery as it appeared at the time of my visit on 25 June 2016.

Cemetery at the Arley Christian Congregational Church in Arley, Alabama
A number of the clan were staying overnight in Jasper and I wanted us to get together for dinner at Cafe Bill's. Laura and Joyce had still not arrived because Christi had been unavoidably detained and I decided to drive back to Arley and pick them up at her house. By the time we were gathered Christi was free to join us and would bring Sydney with her. We were all seated at a single table with two extra places for Christi and Sydney. Chef Bill's, a family-owned and operated restaurant belonging to a couple who were originally from Joplin, Missouri. They feature a good selection of food and an attentive staff. A photograph of the diners (below) was taken by either Jim or Amy Wallace, neither of whom are shown.

Left to right: Rick Allison, Julia Price-Allison, Andy Branam, Connie Branam, Ellis Price, Joyce Melillo, Laura Melillo, Christs O'Rear and Sydney O'Rear
We were all leaving at various times the next morning so made no attempt to gather for breakfast on the 26.” However, Diana did show up for a last-minute photograph (right) with her mother. We also saw various other members of the group as we were checking out.

We filled up at a nearby service station, set the GPS for Van Buren, Arkansas, where we had a reservation for that night, and were on our way home by 0745.

We stopped just across the state border to visit the music-themed Mississippi Welcome Station on I-22. A Sign proclaims the state to be the “Birthplace of America's Music.” The facility has another sign honoring country singer Tammy Wynette and a poster of Elvis Presley. There are several well-appointed, music-themed rooms in the facility. The photograph (below) shows one of these.

Music room display at the Mississippi Welcome Station on I-22
As already noted, we planned to stop at Van Buren, Arkansas for the night; that was a drive of almost 500 miles, so we contented ourselves with only a few short stops along the way. One of these was at a favorite rest area in Arkansas that always sports a gorgeous array of flowers in the spring and summer seasons; another was at a Petro Truck Stop where their trademark Iron Skillet cafeterias always serve a delicious array of dishes.

Our stay at the Holiday Inn Express in Van Buren, Arkansas was acceptable only because of the location. It is very convenient for those traveling through. There was a single employee on duty when we arrived and I never saw more than a single employee at any one time during our stay. A handy pre-printed plastic was employed whenever the desk clerk responded to quest needs that required leaving the desk. During these times anyone could walk in or out of the facility. There was always a car parked permanently under the portico making it very inconvenient for guests checking in or out. When we checked out the next morning, there was a very long wait for a luggage cart. The manager on duty claimed that the facility had four, but I checked all floors and didn't find one available and didn't see more than one at any time. If four carts really are provided they were obviously being retained in individual rooms until the occupants needed them. They must have repeat guests who understood the system.

We stayed at Amarillo, Texas on the 27th and then drove to Gallup, New Mexico on the 28.” While traveling through New Mexico we stopped at Grants, just after passing through the El Malpais lava bed, where I photographed Rosemary (left) posing behind a lava rock with a piece of a petrified wood in the foreground.

We had leftovers for dinner in Gallup and never left the motel. The drive on home the next day was the shortest of the entire trip and we were home by early afternoon.

1 http://www.skellyloy.com/bctb/eng.htm
2 Available at www.createspace.com/3781793
3
4 http://alabama.hometownlocator.com/al/marion/gu-win.cfm
5 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gu-Win,_Alabama
6 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kudzu

7http://www.npr.org/2011/05/28/136742729/decoration-day-the-southern-way-to-honor-the-dead