Firemen's Fourth: Ready, Set, Celebrate!

FOUNDED IN AMERICA’S 200TH YEAR, IN THE SPIRIT OF ‘76

THURSDAY, JULY 1, 2021 • ONEIDA, TENNESSEE A PUBLICATION OF LIBERTY PRESS INC.

Firemen’s Fourth: Ready, set, celebrate! HUNTSVILLE — The itin- for the most part, this year’s erary for the annual Firemen’s festival will look much like it did Fourth Festival: An all-you-can- before the pandemic disrup- eat pancake breakfast beginning IN A NUTSHELL tion. at 7 a.m., the New River Run The Town of Huntsville’s “We’re still not going to con- 5K/10K also beginning at 7 a.m., Firemen’s Fourth Festival will gregate three or four thousand the Independence Day parade begin with an all-you-can-eat, people at a time,” Huntsville at 7 p.m., and fireworks to cap it $5 pancake breakfast at 7 a.m., Mayor Dennis Jeffers said of all off around 10 p.m. the New River Run at 7 a.m., the decision to not include live That’s the lineup for Sunday, the 4th of July parade at 7 entertainment in this year’s July 4, as the town and its fire- p.m., and fireworks at 10 p.m., line-up. Canned music will be all on Sunday. There will be no fighters mark a renewal of the live entertainment this year. playing throughout the day, region’s longest-standing 4th of however. July tradition. No live entertainment also After a year of interruption means there will also be no due to covid, the Firemen’s will be no live entertainment, Fourth is mostly back to normal for example, and the parade is for 2021. It won’t be exactly the The Sharp family float is a mainstay in the Town of Huntsville’s Fire- at night instead of in its tradi- See HUNTSVILLE, page A6 same as it was in 2019 — there men’s Fourth Festival parade. BEN GARRETT/INDEPENDENT HERALD tional morning time slot — but,

PREHISTORIC SCOTT COUNTY The earliest Scott Countians lived here more than a thousand years before Christ was born — and Scott High students have the artifacts to prove it

BEN GARRETT/INDEPENDENT HERALD Along about the same time, a would eventually become the Many self-taught historians Prehistoric people By BEN GARRETT young Virginian named Richard area’s main thoroughfares — like are familiar with the Cherokee are pictured in a [email protected] Harve Slaven moved to the No U.S. Hwy. 27, and the Monticello that roamed the region, using it replica rockshelter Business Creek valley and settled Road, and others. as a hunting ground, temporarily built by Scott High ometime around 1800 — on a piece of land granted to him But long before that — nearly taking up residence, and in some students at the nobody knows the exact by the Kentucky government. 3,000 years, in fact — humans had cases marrying into the earliest Museum of Scott date — a North Carolin- Those two men are believed settled Scott County. white families that were settling County in Hunts- ian named Mikel “Grand to have been Scott County’s first These prehistoric people and here. ville. Mikey” Low moved his white settlers. It had only been their way of life was the subject of But the first prehistoric people Sfamily to Smokey Creek and set- a few decades since the first a presentation by Scott High an- tled on a piece of land granted to long hunters and explorers had thropology teacher Gary Sexton at him by the government of North ventured through the region, the Museum of Scott County last MUSEUM Carolina. traveling old Indian trails that week. See , page A6

OUR BACK YARD WWI hero Alvin York’s Wolf River Valley home PAGE A16

PENNIE SUE BUNCH, AGE 70 DAVID DUNCAN (CONT.) JANIS OWENS, 80

Penelope “Pennie” Sue Bunch departed this life on Thurs- Services: Friends may visit with the Duncan family on Janis Fae (Jig) Mason Owens went to be with the Lord on day, June 24, 2021, at Park West Medical Center in Knoxville, Wednesday, June 23, 2021, fr