Thursday, February 2, 1899
Old Squire Bean, of Langtry, Texas, is evidently a character. He used to be saloon-keeper, justice of the peace, sheriff and everything else. His custom was to hold court sitting on his bar. He was especially proud of his position as justice of the peace. The sign above his barroom door read as follows: “J. Bean, cool beer and justice.”
MRS. VIRGINIA AGNES KELLEY
By common consent, it is believed that one of the most pathetic burial scenes ever witnessed at the Oak Grove Cemetery, near Hillsboro, was when Mrs. Kelley was borne to her grave on a summer day in 1839. She had come to the Little Levels two or three years before with her four fatherless children to live with her aged mother, Mrs. Margaret Price, the second wife of Thomas Price. Their home was the Abram Sybert place, two miles east of Hillsboro.
By over exertion one wash day, Mrs. Kelley was stricken by a very malignant attack of brain fever, of which she died in about one week.
At the close of the burial services, Samuel Henry, her little six year old son, approached Mrs. Elizabeth Miller and said he wanted to go home with her. The kind lady took him to her home and for years cared for him with a motherly kindness, truly and affectionately bestowed. The three others remained for some years with their grandmother. They attended school at the Academy and made a good beginning in their educational course.
About the time Samuel Henry Kelley became grown, he went to California… and opened a store near Los Angeles and seemed to be doing well. One night, early in 1861, his store was broken into by Mexicans. In the effort to repulse them, he was slain, his goods carried off and the building destroyed.
William Scott Kelley, the eldest son, decided to study medicine, and was graduated in fine standing in 1858 by Newton’s Clinical Institute in Cincinnati, Ohio. … He was an enthusiastic Confederate, and was among the first to enlist at the opening of the War Between the States. He was appointed Surgeon General and was at the battle of Wilson’s Creek … He was also in the battle of Lexington, September 20, 1861, in which General Sterling Price received the surrender of three thousand prisoners. Not very long after this occurrence, Dr. Kelley was seized with typhoid pneumonia. He was carried to his home where he died December 11, 1861, and was secretly buried at midnight in his garden. …
The Greenbrier
Everyone who visits the Greenbrier soon observes how the river got its name. There is a tough brier with a green stem, which never dies down, which so effectually stops the progress of a man forcing his way through the undergrowth that it could be well named the Waitabit thorn of West Virginia. In the fields, the young shoots are continually coming up, to the aggravation of the farmer. They are so tough that it makes hoeing corn very tiresome work. It is said that the root of the greenbrier extends down through the ground until it reaches water. A man living on high ground and needing a well took the presence of a greenbrier in his back yard as a good omen. He started to dig his well with it in the centre. The root guided him straight down into the earth, and when the work was abandoned at a depth of sixty feet, the root was still leading down to unknown regions. General Andrew Lewis, a noted surveyor and landowner of his day, named the stream. As a surveyor, he must have had his own experience with the pesky green briers.
A SINGLE STANDARD
In Deed Book No. 3, there is recorded the indenture of the sale of a farm sixty years ago near Academy of 224 1/2 acres by Abraham Sybert and wife to Margaret D. Price, for $800. This is the farm now owned by Henry McCoy. The story connected with this sale will cause every advocate of the single standard to hang his head in shame. When the bargain was completed, James Atlee Price, who was arranging the purchase as a home for his mother, found the seller was unwilling to receive any money but silver dollars in payment for the land. They would not accept either gold or paper. He rode to Lewisburg where, by special arrangement with the bank, he got 800 silver dollars, in a bag, making in all a weight of nearly fifty pounds. This silver he carried back to Pocahotnas on his horse. Arriving at Hillsboro, he was joined by Harry Moffett, who was to umpire the counting match, and together they went to the Sybert home and turned over the money and received the deed. Sybert took the money and went west.
YELK
Miss Ninnie Morgan’s school on Slaty Fork is progressing nicely.
S. M. Gibson is out to Beverly for a load of goods for L. D. Sharp.
Singing at Slaty Fork schoolhouse twice a week, Thursday night and Sunday.
L. D. Sharp is selling ready made clothing at a great reduction since he adopted the cash system.
It snoweth, it freezeth, the sawmill moveth, and the Baughman-Hannah wedding proceedeth all in less than zero.
J. E. Hannah is hacking on his farm north of Slaty Fork. He quit the other day, stuck his axe in a north pole and went to the wedding.
DEATH
Died, at his residence near Dunmore, January 30, John B. McCutcheon, aged about 60 years. He was an estimable citizen, a ruling elder in the Baxter church and made a good record as a faithful Confederate soldier. … His decease was so easy and quiet that no one was present at the moment.
“Behold the upright, for the end of that man is peace.”
