Pike County, Kentucky 1821-1983 Historical Papers Number Five
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Pike County, Kentucky 1821-1983 Historical Papers Number Five Original Publication of the Pike County Historical Society, Inc. Pikeville, Kentucky Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2013 http://archive.org/details/pikecountykentuc05pike Pike County, Kentucky 1821-1983 Historical Papers, Number Five In memory of Dr. Leonard Ward Roberts Original Publication of the Pike County Historical Society, Inc. Pikeville, Kentucky 1983 Reprinted Pikeville College 2002 pu *& . % Z3 Co 11129 Pleasant Ridge Road, Utica.KY 42376 1-270-275^1075 1-800-285-4075 5ammcpuMaol.com TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction 4 In Memoriam A Poem by Connie Ratliff 5 Biography A Section Reserved for Dr. Leonard Ward Roberts. It includes Tributes, Pictures, and a Story which Could be Autobiographical for Leonard AND Other Mountain Boys. 6-13 A Poem by William McKinley Justice and an Article, a Poem and Pictures Submitted by His Daughter, Alice Kinder. 14, 15 A Biography of Richard Keesee by Clyde Runyon. 15-17 History The 1810 Floyd County Census by Claire Kelly 17-24 The 1 840 Pike County Census by Dorcas Hobbs 24-29 Some Records of Dr. W.H. C.Johnson (1849-1942) 30,31 The Roll of Company "E" of the 39th Mounted Infantry Volunteers of the Union Army in "The War Between the States" 31-33 A Pike County Voting Report for 1868, Transcribed by Faye Burke 33-44 A Mortality Schedule by Dorcas Hobbs 45 Cemetery Listings Dils, Lesley, Hamilton, Phillips, and Robinett 46-52 Genealogy Clevinger-Ramey; Elswicks, with Two Pictures; Osborns, with Two Pictures; Roberts, One Picture; Smith, with Five Pictures; and Taylor. 53-74 Miscellany Pictures: Clara Saad, Tennis Players 75, 76 Baseball by Alice Kinder 76-78 The Story of the Band by Frank Forsyth, Sr. 79-84 Dils Residence 85 Poem by Gayle Compton 86 History of Pike County Chamber of Commerce 87, 88 Installation of the Pike County Elected Officials 89 City of Pikeville 90 First National Bank 91 W. B. Call, Inc. 92 Subject Index of Pike County Papers 93-95 In Closing A Touching Letter 96- 1 00 3 INTRODUCTION The Pike County Historical Society continues its printing program with this collection of articles and pictures. Most members have helped the new president and his committee get this memorial issue ready for publication in the same year the former president, Dr. Roberts, met his untimely death in a traffic accident. The book is arranged by biography, history, cemetery listings, genealogy and miscellany. We wish to thank everyone who has loaned us materials; particularly, the grieving Roberts family. The tributes remind us that telling about this "giant" among men could be compared to the proverbial story of several blind men exploring an elephant and trying to describe it by what they felt. Each man could only communicate what he knew and the truth became evi- dent. Namely, the whole was greater than the sum of all its parts. The maps are to show researchers which counties they might find information about their families. The oldest division of Eastern Kentucky is shown as Bayless Hardin's map of 1792. It is found in the First Census of Kentucky: 1790 by Charles B. Heineman, published by the Genealogical Publishing Company in 1971. The Floyd County map of 1799 was made by Henry P. Scalf in 1950 and published in his East Kentuckian in March, 1966. The other map is from a highway map of about 1980. EDITING COMMITTEE: Eldon "Jack" May, President Ruth May Dorcas Hobbs Anna Forsyth Edith Thornbury Marie Justice Claire Kelly Former presidents who have nurtured the publishing program of the Society: (Left to right) George T. Thornbury, Dr. Leonard W. Roberts, Claire (Coleman) Kelly, and Frank J. Forsyth, Sr. — In Memoriam A kind man, a master of the art Of storytelling, he had a heart Full of love for everyone around him, To make him truly happy, one needed only surround him With people, and give him a chance to share His wealth of stories and of living experiences beyond compare He appreciated talent in others too, About our mountain heritage, he had a point of view That made one proud indeed to be A part of the mountain culture, for he Saw beauty and promise in all things, and, with others wanted to share These were the qualities that made Dr. Roberts a rare And treasured friend, who'll be sadly missed By those of us who knew him. Who could resist The charm of his stories about our mountain land? Our Lord loved him too, so He leaned down and took his hand. Written with deep affection and genuine respect to the memory of Dr. Leonard Roberts. May his Eternal Bed be covered by a Blanket of Heaven's Brightest Stars! Connie Ratliff No captive audience! Children of all ages enjoyed Leonard Roberts' folk tales. By LOYAL JONES Leonard Roberts From "The News Letter" of 1912-1983 The Appalachian Center, Berea College, Spring 1983 If you ever heard Leonard Roberts relate a tale, at the Pine Mountain Settlement School. The result you know he was a truly unique man. During the tell- of Leonard's Ph.D. labors was the book South from ing, which involved episodes strung together to make Hell-fer-Sartin, published by the University of Ken- wonderfully long narratives, you would become tucky Press. He went on to write and edit many aware that he enjoyed his stories more than anyone in others: / Bought Me a Dog; Nippy and the Yankee his audience. Often he would be overcome by the Doodle; Up Cutshin and Down Greasy; The Sang humor or the absurdity of his tale, and he would Branch Settlers: Folksongs and Tales of a Kentucky pause to snicker or laugh outright and slap his leg, all Mountain Family; Old Greasybeard: Tales from the the while regarding his audience slyly and wisely. He Cumberland Gap; and In the Pine: Selected Ken- remained a boy, full of fun and perceptiveness. In tucky Folksongs (with C. Buell Agey). The Sang many ways, actually, he seemed the essence of Jack, Branch Settlers, published for the American Folklore the character in the tales with which he delighted Society by the University of Texas Press in 1974, was generations of listeners. his best-known work and a model of its kind. The This past April 29, Leonard—writer, folklorist, subject was the cultural life of the Couch family of publisher and teacher—was killed in a highway acci- southeastern Kentucky and southwest Virginia, in- dent near his home at Stanville, Ky. A pioneer collec- cluding their tales, riddles and songs. tor of folklore, he earned the first doctorate in the After receiving his Ph.D., Leonard taught and subject ever granted by the University of Kentucky. headed departments of English or languages at This achievement followed a varied series of life and several colleges—Piedmont in Georgia, Union and educational experiences. Born on Toler Creek in Morehead in Kentucky, West Virginia Wesleyan and Floyd County, Ky., he dropped out of high school in finally Pikeville in Kentucky, where he established 1930 to join the Army, and he mastered enough the Appalachian Studies Center. At Pikeville he music to play in the 21st Infantry band at Schofield published Twigs (later Cumberlands), a literary Barracks in Hawaii. When he finished high school at magazine, and edited and published many books the age of 23, he went to Berea College, where he through the college press —books on subjects like the won a degree in English and also excelled in the Hatfield-McCoy feud, books by mountain poets such javelin and low hurdles. After teaching in high school as Lillie Chaffin and Sylvia Auxier, and works of and junior college, he took a partially finished novel history, folklore and genealogy. off to the University of Iowa, studying creative The man was always a delight, laconic at first writing and receiving a master's degree. Teaching meeting but with a twinkle and a lurking smile. In his followed in wartime Army and Navy programs at the lectures he often dropped into his narrative style, University of North Carolina and North Carolina complete with storyteller's inflections, but State. underneath was a thorough knowledge of literature Leonard Roberts reached a real turning point as a and culture. He was a scholar's scholar, always at teacher of English in the Foundation School of Berea work on a project, editing someone else's work, College. Although he had grown up in the midst of scouting for the moldering manuscript that might sh- the folk-tale tradition of the Appalachians, he ed new light on some pet subject. His last scholarly became aware for the first time of the richness of this endeavor was the editing of a book on John C.C. tradition and of its social and aesthetic value for our Mayo, the eastern Kentucky entrepreneur who built own day. His students were his instructors. Wishing an empire out of the infamous "broad form" to help them write expressively, he encouraged them mineral deeds, assembling a large and wealthy group to put down the tales they had heard from their of capitalists to exploit the riches of the region. families. The results were so fascinating to him that Although Leonard was a folklorist, his interests ran he invited himself home with the students, to places deeper and wider than the collecting of tales and like Hell-fer-Sartin and Cutshin and Greasy Creeks, songs, and he edited and published books of general where he recorded songs, tales, riddles and life stories importance to Appalachia. on rather primitive equipment.