Stories & Recollections of Etowah . . .
as told by ~ Opal Dalton Parkinson
1924 - 2016, Etowah Native |
Gladiolas and Cattle on Judd Wilson Mountain
The last time I was able to walk and get up to the Judd Wilson house, it was still standing. Somebody kindly fixed it up. Some kids had gone in there one time and vandalized it, and they got it fixed back up. Some of the family, we'd go for a walk or something like that. My daddy owned a big place back up above there and he use to keep cattle in the summer time up there. And of course they had to go in the spring and go around and check the fence where they couldn't get out. We would run them by hand up the mountain and put them in the pasture. Usually on a Sunday afternoon she'd (mother) take us or we'd go with him just to walk up on the mountain to check on the cattle and see if they is OK. We walked Judd Wilson Mountain to have something to do. Looked for bird nests a lot. Hoot owls, whippoorwills. You don't see the bats now and they use to be just in flocks. My father's name was Eli Jerome Dalton, and he was raised in the Edneyville section of the County. They just always said "Judd Wilson Mountain" cause that was the only house up there at that time. Judd Wilson farmed a little bit and made a garden. I knew they growed gladiolas. We had the first car, a touring car, and it was kind of like a truck and it had seats in the back on each side, and canvas. You could roll it up and buckle it up. My mother (Harriet Allison Dalton) always took butter and eggs and anything she had to sell to the boarding houses in Hendersonville on Saturdays. Everybody was out and wanted to go to town and would want to go with them on Saturday. And he (Judd) raised gladiolas. He had the prettiest gladiolas and he always wanted to go to town to sell his gladiolas. They had one boy and his name was Robert. He married Lois Blythe. Her father was a preacher, Carl Blythe (pronounced "Bly"). He pastor'd just about every church in Henderson County. Judd's wife's name was Sue [Susan Fletcher]. [Note: The Wilson family is buried in the Thomas-Fletcher Cemetery.]
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Watch Opal Dalton Parkinson's
Oral History Collected and preserved in 2013 by the Mountain Elder Wisdom Project of the Center for Cultural Preservation, Hendersonville NC Courtesy of www.saveculture.org David Weintraub, Executive Director |
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