Wednesday, April 22, 2020

Handlin Tombstones at White's Chapel Cemetery

If you love genealogy you will always find walking through cemeteries a fun and exciting experience.  There are always interesting and mysterious stones that will need a little research.  Such as the Joseph Turner Handlin tombstone at White's Chapel Cemetery, located on State Hwy. 297 a few miles before you get to the the little community of Tolu.


Joseph was married to Catherine Trimble, daughter of James Trimble and Margarette Gillespie from South Carolina.  They were married Oct.16, 1828 in Livingston County, KY. 

Joseph's stone has a lengthy inscription of it:  
Deed of reserve Dec. 8th, 1854 A.D. to David Kimsey as follows:  One acre on the north side of public road in the corner of the field in the square front around the grave of my wife bounded as follows:  Recorded in Deed Book C, Page 631.
This stone was erected Feb. 2, 1949 by Divonis Worten M. D. Pawhuska, Okla.

I've always wondered who Divonis Worten was and why he erected this excellent history tombstone.

Through searching on Ancestry, I found that Divonis Worten was married to Addie Stalions of Livingston, Co.  Her parents, James R. and Julia Kidd Stalions, are buried in the Carrsville Cemetery.

Divonis Worten died in 1956 and is buried at Pawhuska, Okla, and wife Addie died 1956 and is buried at Forest Hill Cemetery in Memphis Tenn.

Although this solved my mystery of Divonis Worten, I still haven't found his connected to Joseph Handlin and why he would have erected this nice stone. 

Monday, April 13, 2020

Days Of The Crayne Grocery Stores


Remembering the good old days of our hometown of Crayne.  The days when all you needed was in walking distance of your home.   Here are a few of the old grocery stores.


Dorroh Bros. store was located near the railroad track on the northern end of our community.

James Franklin Dorroh came to Crayne and went to work for a Mr. Glenn.  He soon purchased the building and stock of good, and he spent his life in this business.

Later his sons and daughter operated the business from around 1892 to the late 1940's.

Pictured left to right:  Eugene and Robert Dorroh.



This is the Brown's General Store, Walter and Lois Brown.

 Dully Baird is resting on the bench.

Those wonderful old wooden store benches, what memories they bring back. 

This building burned in 1959.

Wednesday, April 1, 2020

Marion Once Had Pony Sales

A 1958 Special Edition of the Press says "Welcome" to Visitors. A special edition of the Press was prepared for the expected 1,000 visitors that would be coming to Marion for the Shetland Pony Sales. City and county information was gathered and printed in this edition of the paper.  Here is a small part of the information taken from the April 18th, and April 24, 1958 Presses.
***




Lingang to Hold Open House For Shetland Pony Sales.
April 20th will be "Open House" at the new sale barn for West Kentucky Pony Sales, J. W. Lingang, owner. Work was continuing at the sale barn this week, putting the finishing touches on the structure that is expected to draw up to 1,000 visitors to Marion for the three day sale next week.

An open house for residents of the Marion area was held at the barn earlier and several hundred people took advantage of the occasion to view the facilities. They saw miniature stalls, identical in every way with an ordinary horse's stall except they were scaled down to a Shetland's size. 

Many stopped to view a trainer clipping a pony in the clipping room.

Several ponies were already on hand, and visitors unfamiliar with the breed examined them to see just what size they were and how they differed from other equines.

The building, formerly a racetrack barn, has undergone a complete face lifting and more buildings, including a snack bar, lounges and the sale ring, have been added to it. The sale area itself contains 300 theater-type seats from which buyers can view ponies as they are led in.

All buildings are faced with Livingston County building stone. A small ticket house and pillar enclosing a mail box, both also of stone form a gate to the property.

The sale is officially recognized by the American Shetland Pony Club, Inc., a group dedicated to the protection and improvement of the breed. Shetlands are America's third most popular equine breed, according to the club's magazine, The American Shetland Pony Journal. The Breed was founded 70 years ago when the American Shetland Pony Club was created, launching a studbook and protecting names.
***
West Kentucky Pony Sales barn just north of the Marion city limits hummed with activity yesterday as final preparations were underway for the first day of the spring sale. J. W. Lingang, owner, estimated some 200 ponies were already on hand early Wednesday afternoon. Some 30 people from 13 states had registered at the desk manned by Mrs. Joe Travis at that time, and many other were on had who had not yet registered.

Among the visitors who had already registered were Perry and Dale Carlile of Perry, Okla., who conduct the world's largest pone sale, and Gene and Oliver Lowery, of Nebraska City, Neb., owners of a Shetland stallion that sold for $60,000 at that sale some two weeks ago.

Spectators also inspected the snack bar, which will be operated through the sale by Marion's American Legion Auxiliary. The sale area was also open, with tiers of theater-type seats rising on two sides flanking the auctioneer's podium.

A number of visitors to the sale will be sleeping in private homes in Marion, offered by the public to help take care of the overflow from commercial hotels and tourist courts.
 ***
Do not have the date this business closed.  The building in later years became Gibson Livestock Sales.  It was a big operation for several years.  Most all local and surrounding area farmers took their cattle here for sales.   It was really nice to have this for local farmers.  It's been close now for several years.  Livingston County Livestock Barns is where most farmers have to take their cattle now to sale.  Another nice convenient place of business that Marion has lost over the years.
***
I once had a beautiful set of salt and pepper shakers that were made in the shape of ponies, that was purchased at the Pony Sales gift shop.  As many things go, they got lost somewhere in my lifetime.  Would be nice to have now for a souvenir of this past history of our county.