Keep Praying Gate City

This sign is displayed in response to an event that occurred last month at a football game at Gate City High School. Before the game began on September 11, a prayer was delivered by a student member of the school's Fellowship of Christian Athletes during a ceremony that included a moment of silence for a Sullivan South (opposing team) football player who died earlier in the season and a remembrance of the victims of the 9/11 terrorist attacks. This prayer resulted in Gate City High School receiving a letter from the Virginia chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union. In the letter, the ACLU informed the school that it believed the prayer was unconstitutional and asked for the practice to cease immediately. According to Rebecca Glenberg, Legal Director for the ACLU of Virginia, the ACLU and the person who filed the complaint did not object in any way to the memorial services, just the prayer. Glenberg wrote in her letter, "After a moment of silence to honor a deceased football player (to which we have no objection), the student delivered a prayer which concluded in, 'In Jesus' name, Amen'."

"We were just trying to reach out and honor (Sullivan South)," school principal Greg Ervin said. "This was a special case - we wanted to honor our neighboring community and the memory of 9/11, and I was proud of my students for doing so."

The students reacted to the letter by producing more than 1,000 T-shirts, which they planned to wear to a later game. The front of the T-shirts shows the school's initials, a cross, and the words, "I still pray..." On the back is, "In Jesus' name." The ACLU of Virginia's Executive Director Kent Willis asked the principal at Gate City High School to honor the free speech rights of students to protest the ACLU at the school's football game. He said, "This means that Gate City High School officials may not permit sectarian prayers over the public address sytem at football games, but that they must allow students to protest the ACLU's effort to stop those prayers." Willis further stated that free speech demands that the government allow individuals to express their views.

Excuse me - I thought the student was exercising her right to free speech on September 11.

Freedom of religion does not mean freedom from religion. The United States Constitution, Amendment 1 states, "Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof." Pat Robertson explains it thusly: "In the days of the Constitution, an established religion meant just what my forefathers fought about in Virginia. An established religion was a religion where the state paid the clergy and where there were civil liabilities to those who did not belong to that religion; where such things as marriages could only be performed with a blessing of a particular church; where, unless a person was a member thereof, he or she was denied the right to hold public office, etc. That's an established religion." He continues, "But in no way would that have been considered by the framers of our Constitution to prohibit a child from saying grace in the first grade or kindergarten over milk and cookies."

When a Wall Street Journal / NBC News poll conducted October 22-25 asked Americans if they believed the United States was on the right track, wrong track, in mixed conditions or undecided, 52% responded that the country is headed down the wrong road. Really? Well, if you're waiting for somebody to do something about it, remember YOU ARE SOMEBODY.

Snap out of it, America!

Brown Mountain

Daddy has long talked of a song he used to hear about the Brown Mountain Lights. We chose the weekend in early October to try out his new knee on a road trip and also see if we could find Brown Mountain. Jim, Daddy, and I traveled to North Carolina and found an overlook near Linville Falls called Wiseman's View. Jim pushed Daddy's transport chair down the paved trail toward the overlook. We were disappointed when we reached the end of the trail because the viewpoint was not handicapped accessible. The scenery was spectacular and Brown Mountain could be seen in the distance, however Daddy wasn't able to see it from there. Jim pushed Daddy back up the trail and we loaded up in the car again. We got on the Blue Ridge Parkway and headed south toward Asheville, stopping at overlooks along the way including one where we could see Mount Mitchell, the highest point east of the Mississippi River. After lunch in Asheville, we went on to Morganton and found a road called Brown Mountain Beach Road. We followed this road to a recreational area popular with ATV riders. It was too close to the mountain to actually be able to see it so again we continued on our journey. As we were climbing a mountain back toward Linville, we came upon an overlook near Jonas Ridge where we all could easily see Brown Mountain. The view (shown above) was spectacular. Daddy enjoyed the trip, he fared well, and he looked forward to hitting the road again.

I Owe My Soul To the Company Store

Trammel, Virginia, was a coal mining town that was built by the Virginia Banner Coal Corporation in 1917. The last spike of the Carolina, Clinchfield, and Ohio Railway, which was completed in 1915, had been driven near here.

In the 1970s, coal resources started drying up and coal companies began laying off employees. The economic conditions hit coal mining towns hard. The company that owned Trammel eventually went out of business and became an estate. In 1985, the estate decided to sell the town, including 50 homes, the company store, post office, and water and cable systems. All were put on the auction block. Local residents, most of whom were unemployed and disabled, banded together with the help of churches and foundations to raise money and form a homeowners association. They purchased the auctioned homes and saved their town.

While their efforts gave them possession of their homes, conditions have not improved in Trammel. There are no businesses or industries and therefore no jobs. Unemployment is extremely high. Many of the residents are elderly and depend on black lung compensation or social security. The economic outlook for the residents of Trammel is grim.

Information from In Motion Magazine and Dickenson County by Victoria L. Osborne & Dr. Ralph Stanley.

Mahala Mullins' House

Mahala Collins was born in 1824 and died in 1898 in Hancock Co., TN. She married John Mullins. Mahala was probably the most famous Melungeon in the Newman's Ridge area. Haley, as she was called, openly sold moonshine in her log house high on Newman's Ridge. Legend has it she weighed about 600 pounds, but most people agree her weight was actually around 400 pounds. Another legend tells that, since her house was built on the Tennessee-Virginia line, when the Tennessee authorities came looking for her she would go to the Virginia side of the house and when the Virginia authorities came she would go to the Tennessee side. In reality, her house was in Tennessee about two miles from the Virginia line. She undoubtedly was too large to be taken out of the house if the authorities tried to arrest her. One deputy reportedly told the sheriff, "She's cetchable, but not fetchable."

When Haley died, she was carried from the house through an opening left in the wall for a chimney. According to one source, she was buried in her bed which had the legs removed and boards added to the sides to form a coffin. Another source claims she was buried in a piano crate. She now rests in a small cemetery that had been started with the deaths of some of her infant children.

According to an affidavit signed by Haley's son, Reuben, Solomon D. Collins (Haley's father) was a full-blooded Cherokee Indian. The affidavit states that "Solomon Collins is said to crossed into Tennessee and married Jincy Goins and settled there because he was afraid the chief would kill him if he returned to the tribe."

Mahala Mullins' house was moved to the Vardy community and is now open to the public. Newman's Ridge can be seen behind the house in the photo above. Haley's brother, Bailey Collins, was my g-g-grandfather.

Clinch River Bluff

In April 1777, a group of young Indian men devised a plan to lure the militiamen from Blackmore's Fort in southwest Virginia. They climbed Copper Ridge and the bluff (shown here) across Clinch River from the fort. They could see inside the fort from this vantage point. One of the men climbed a cedar tree while the others hid in smaller shrubs. At daybreak, the brave in the tree cupped his hands and gobbled like a male turkey. He repeated this call every five or ten minutes. When the militiamen heard this, they imagined how good that turkey would taste for breakfast.

As they were planning how to climb the bluff and retrieve their meal, an older, wiser man named Matthew Gray advised them to leave the turkey alone if they wanted to keep their scalps. He took some of the militiamen to the river and had them splash around to distract the Indian party. While this was going on, Gray took his long rifle and one that belonged to another man and sneaked down to the river. He forded the Clinch, climbed Copper Ridge and the bluff behind the Indian party where he waited until the next 'turkey' call from the young man in the tree. At that moment, his shot rang out and the Indian crashed to the ground with a lead ball in his head.

With the Indian party in pursuit, Gray ran for his life to the ford where he crossed the Clinch back toward the fort. The militiamen gave him cover as he dashed up the river bank and through the gate. The war party, unable to besiege the fort, turned toward Castle's Woods (modern-day Castlewood). Gray grabbed two rifles, jumped on a fast horse, and headed off toward the party. Firing a shot to confuse them, he sped past the war party and made it to Castle's Woods in time to warn the settlers who sought shelter at Moore's Fort.

Source: "Benge!" by Lawrence J. Fleenor, Jr.

Jett Ford

On April 6, 1794, Chief Benge and six warriors raided the home of Sarah Livingston near Mendota, Virginia. They killed Sarah in her garden where she was working. They tomahawked three children, killing one of them. They set fire to the Livingston home, forcing those inside to come out. They took three women, two men, and three children hostage and retreated across the North Fork of the Holston River here at this location. They stopped for a while near the home of Abraham Fulkerson where they watched as settlers had gathered there for a house raising. When they continued on, they crossed Clinch Mountain at Hamilton Gap. At nightfall, they camped at Copper Creek.

Source: "Benge!" by Lawrence J. Fleenor, Jr.

Abraham Fulkerson House

From the application for National Register of Historic Places: "The two-story Fulkerson-Hilton House, built around 1800, is of mixed log construction consisting of oak, pine, and poplar hewn logs. The logs are joined using half-dovetail notching. The house rests on a limestone foundation on its original site. The south side of the house, which is the front, has a roofed veranda that was added in 1936. In 1949, a kitchen and dining room shed-roof extension was added to the north side of the house. At present, the exterior of the house is covered with yellow-poplar siding painted white. The west side of the house has a two-story sandstone chimney. Single-beaded tongue and groove vertical boards divide the interior of both floors of the log portion of this house. In addition, the two log rooms constituting the first floor are lined with similar tongue and groove boards. The two upstairs rooms are not lined. The lean-to added in 1949 is of frame construction with a sheetrock interior. Both rooms have pine floors and are structurally unaltered to this day."

The house was built by frontier settler Abraham Fulkerson for whom the Fulkerson District of Scott County, VA, is named. Fulkerson, who "fought in the American Revolution, purchased the designated land in 1782, and subsequently operated a mill there before becoming one of the first Scott County commissioners at the time of the creation of the county in 1814."

Frontier preacher Samuel Hilton "established two Baptist churches in the area and purchased the designated land and house in 1816. The Fulkersons and Hiltons intermarried, and the house remained in possession of their heirs . . . until 1871." Samuel's grandson, Enos Bird Hilton, built a house nearby that would serve as a post office, thus establishing the name of "Hilton's."