It's a 3 State Day

We started the day in South Dakota, Drove through Wyoming and ended up at the Battle of Little Bighorn in Montana. Here I am standing with the place they call "Last Stand Hill", which was where George Armstrong Custer Died.
It's very educational, At this National Cemetery they put the Markers where every soldier fell when he died. These stones are scattered over a 5 mile radius! And the Indians, Red Cloud of the Lakota, the Cheyene and the Sioux Indians were all against Custer and the 7th Calvary. This battle took place while the rest of the Country were celebrating the 100 year anniversary of Independence and the unveiling of the Telephone unveiled by Alexander Graham Bell!

This is the car driver, he is a good driver, doing 80 most of the time, standing in front of the Monument erected for the Battle.

Mt. Rushmore Trip

We got to Keystone, South Dakota about 5 pm tonight. Just long enough to see it was a cute, touristy little town. We stopped to eat, after we checked into the Super 8 motel, at a place called Ruby's, decorated up as an old fashioned Brothel, we had ribs and they were delicious.

Then we heard about a Rainger Program located at the Ranger station below Mt. Rushmore, so we went. Its a beautiful place, They had a 10 minute talk, then a 20 minute movie on the 4 presidents who are carved into the mountain. At the end of the program, they invited all Vetrans who were in the audience to come up on stage to help lower the American Flag. Thats The picture below.
This next photo is of all the Veterans who were in attendance.

After the movie finished, they light up the mountain, so, here is a photo of Mt. Rushmore at night, pretty cool!

North Carolina Travel Log Day 5

Today was a great day! Why, because I spent it in the 'Old Buncombe' Genealogcial Society Library while Larry Golfed with people from NY. I researched the whole day and they had 'make your own sandwich' makings for lunch so I didn't have to leave their library. It was as big as the ORFHC! The ladies were very knowledgable and kind.

After Larry came to pick me up we came back to the room, and then decided we had to do some laundry. Well, the laundry mat is one freeway ramp away, so we loaded the clothes in the car and went to see a movie. We say "Angels and Demons" and it was very good! If you get the chance, go see it, just close your eyes at the murder scenes- the first one is awful.

After the show, we went to the Laundry mat and started our wash, then walked down the little walk to a pizza place and had some pizza (we have had some very nice meals out and just felt like somthing not quite so filling tonight), after eating, we went back to the Laundry Mat and changed our clothes to the dryer and went back down the mall walk to the liquor store and got ice cream bars. Back to the Laundry and folded clothes. Now we are home and I'm not doing any more genealogy on this trip!

North Carolina Travel Log Day 3

Well, did anyone ever say "Mom can't get enough of dead people"? If so, your wrong. I am now saturated. I have 4 books, hundreds of stories and videos to prove I have been 'home'. Today we went to Guilford College where I had a relative named Dr. Algie Newlin who was a History Professor there for many years and he used to write to me in the 1970's. I still have those letters in my file. While in the research room, I found another distant relative related to me through the Lindley line. If your Quaker, you just might be related to your own daddy!

Then we went and got my photo taken at at a street sign named BRAXTON Lane. We went back and met with Judy and John Braxton where John told stories and Judy and Larry played the Dulcimer's. That is a type of musical instament. It's so fun to find a relative on ever corner.

North Carolina Travel Log day 2

Today was a great day. Larry and I went to North Carolina University Chapel Hill where I did some research for Sara Ward, my client.

Then we went to Duke University and WOW what a compass. After that we went to visit with John and Judy Braxton. John Braxton married Judy Braxton. So they are double Braxtons. Sounds like my Taber's doesn't it??? Well, because they are from William Braxton also, they have TONS of stuff to share, I don't know if I will ever catch up! Anyway, it's late and I need to get to bed now, but look for an update tomorrow!

North Carolina Travel Log, day 1

Today, we got up and lookie looed through North Carolina University at Chapel Hill. Pretty impressive.

Then we drove out to meet and spend the day with my 4th cousin, 1x removed. I had never met him before, but it was really nice. For a 73 year old guy, his is pretty good looking and so is his wife. His name is Howard T. Braxton, born and raised in NC along with all the relatives of our Braxton Ancestors.

First of all, he has in his possession the first and original land grant issued to our William Braxton in 1756 from John of Carteret Lord Grandville. That was really cool. Then Howard and his wife (Shirly) took us around and showed us where everyone had lived, took us to 3 Quaker Churches that all had graveyards of our family and we could go into the churchs and look around because they don't lock up the Churchs around here!

He took us out to the home (that is no longer lived in), that he grew up in and as we went from room to room, I was flabbergasted at all the antiques they had in there that were worth a small fortune! OK, then to top it all off, he opened a trunk and pulled out a Bible that we at first though might have belonged to our earliest ancestor, William Braxton, b: abt 1721, m: 1744 d:1771. Well, it wasn't and had no date page in the front. It was in terrible shape, but really old, so we thought it could be a possibility. But then his wife pulled out a white trash bag from under the bed and said look at this. Well, it was a bible too, about 14" high and 8" wide. It had a cover on it and it looked and felt old. I said it was a special bible but no markings in that Bible either. So we kept poking around and then we took it home to their house, after we went out to dinner and I had a great dinner.

It turns out this IS the "Bigg Bible" as William refered to it in his will which I found in the NC Archives this week. In his will, he states "and I leave my Bigg Bible to my son Thomas. No one seemed to know where it was. But as we opened it up and started looking at it in the light, well, on the front cover, very, very faint it reads: ...son Wm Braxton 15 of June 1742! I squelled in delight when I read this date, because before this someone had said that they had a bible they thought belonged to William, but couldn't have because the date of publication was 1776. Then on the back cover it said: "Thomas Braxton, left to him by his father in the year 1772". So, we solved the proplem of "Where was the Bigg Bible?" I love the Holy Ghost.