Monday.-September 19 at 6:30 PM in Camden

I have updated my presentation for the Ouachita County Historical Society. For those of you who will be able to come to the meeting in Camden at 6:30 PM on Monday, September 19, please know that the presentation will be conversational, informal, and open for others to share stories, memories of Camden prior to the 1960's.
I'll have a PowerPoint to entertain you with pictures and a few stories.
Location: on the OCHS campus at the Ingham Library. How many of you remember actually going to that little library that was located at the corner of Harrison and Washington?
I'll have copies of The House on Harrison Street and several CD/DVDs. The book is $25 and the CD is $10.
A friend asked this question:  Did George L Ritchie serve during the Civil War?
The answer is "Yes." It's documented in Chapter 7, Note 1 in the book. The group he was with, etc. is noted and the information is included in Uncle George's obituary.

A Bunch of Boards and a Ton of Nails

The 'original' Thomas Gordon
Buried on home land near Atlanta

A house is a bunch of boards and a ton of nails. It's the living that goes on in the house that solidifies the memories. The House on Harrison Street is packed with memories, documented stories,  a tale of the Gordon Family and the Ritchie Family. 

Thomas Bullock Gordon Land Grant

The families start their journey during Revolutionary War time and move from the Carolinas through Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, and into Arkansas. Gordon married Tooke and Ritchie married Campbell, both in the Black Belt of Alabama, an area that called to farmers with its soil, weather, and opportunity. Rumblings of war sent many families from Alabama toward Arkansas and west of the Mississippi River. 

Nana and Me
Mildred Gordon Horne and MJD

My research began with questions, followed my mother's and grandmother's hand-written genealogy, and culminated in a volume that ends in August of 1959, when my grandmother's house on Harrison Street burned. Gracious OCHS leaders helped me with many details and have added some information since the book was published. I'm so grateful to them.
It was fabulous growing up in Camden during those years. Walking to the Methodist church, walking to the Ingham Library housed in the little whitewashed building facing Washington Street, watching the Camden Hotel being built, picking up pecans in our back yard and watching the squirrels scamper across the Court House lawn...I love talking about those times and sharing my research.

Will you join me for a Festival of Memories as they relate to the Gordon-Ritchie Saga as detailed in The House on Harrison Street. I'll have the books if you want to buy one and I'll also bring a DVD / CD of photos.
OCHS Meeting - at the Ingham Library building on the OCHS property. Check for times for the meeting on that Monday evening - September 19, 2016.