Not much to say on this Friday.

Gettin' ready to go over to Temple to get dad, to take him to our regular feed. All of us went down to Austin yesterday to eat at Papasito's, so this will be our second big feed in as many days. Probably take him to the drivin' range after, and let him give me some tips.

been stayin' up late recently scannin' old pictures and storin' then away. Here's an old one to give you somethin' to look at.



That's my great grandfather on the far left. He's the guy who came to Texas from Alabama after the Civil War. The others are his sons and daughters. My grandfather is the guy, fourth from the right, with his hat off. This old man W.S.S., was a Bastard and a half, or at least that's the story my dad tells me. He'd come to Texas in the 1870s and made good money, somehow, so that when this picture was taken he was a big land owner with lots of sharecroppers working his property. When his first wife died (my great grandmother), he married another woman. When he died, she was set up to get all his property. She sold it all and took the cash to California. My Grandfather got $200. He could have taken care of everyone, but in stead he treated them like crap and they all ended up becoming sharecroppers. He's buried in a cemetery in Salado, next to his first wife, but none of the other family is buried with him. So here's how my dad grew up...



Poor as hell, picking cotton on land my Grandfather farmed for another man (Dad is the kid in the middle). My Grandfather didn't have his own place till my dad started to send his salary home from the Army, so they could start making payments. Thank God for the Second World War, is all I can say, and the opportunities it brought to guys like my dad to build a better life.



Update: Talked to dad on the way to the feed last night. He confirmed that I'd gotten a figure wrong. He said that his folks had gotten $500 from granddad Wilson's estate after his death. His dad and uncles had worked their fathers land for years as sharecroppers, and thought they'd get a share of the land when he died. The second wife liquidated the property, shared out the money to the family, and then took the lions share of it and split to California. Dad said he remembered seeing his father crying over the issue after the fact, and his mom consoling him, telling him that $500 was better than $400. So my Grandfather went to work as a 'cropper for a man named Holland, at a place called Summers Mill, which is where my father grew up. It's a beautiful place. One of these days I'll go over and take pictures of it and show them to you.