Friday Focus: Great-Grandfather (Dad's Dad's Dad)

We've already asked you to write down stories and memories of your father and your father's father (your grandfather). This week, the assignment is to create a narrative around your great-grandfather on your dad's dad's side.

That would be the guy at top right...

Not many of us have the opportunity to spend a significant amount of time with our great-grandparents. I know that I met a few of mine, but most of my memories of them come from family tales and photo albums.

My father's father's father, Dan Acuff (1868-1928), died half a century before I was born, so I never even had a chance to meet him (neither did my father). From what little I've been able to research, he seems like he would have a tale or two to tell.

Dan Acuff was born on 5 April 1868 in or near Grainger County, Tennessee. He was the sixth child of farmer Enos Acuff (1831–1889) and his wife Martha Burgess (b. ca. 1830–d. aft. 1880).

In 1896, 28-year-old Dan, along with his unmarried sisters Kate and Vallie, moved to the “gap of Log Mountain” and bought a store from a Mr. Loftis, according to notes written by my grandfather Claude.^[i] Log Mountain lies northwest of Washburn, Tennessee, and there is a major gap at Williams Creek; this is a likely location for the gap referred to in Claude’s notes. On the 1900 Census, Dan is listed as a merchant, 25-year-old Vallie as a saleswoman, and 40-year-old Kate as “keeping house” in their shared rental home.

On a Wednesday morning in the fall of 1902^[ii], Dan (now 34 years old) and 20-year-old Nora Laverna Capps, the younger sister of two married women living in Washburn, traveled to Knoxville to be married at the courthouse there. According to family notes, the officiant was a Marian Fitzgerald, perhaps a justice of the peace.^[iii] This author surmises that the wedding may have been a hasty affair, as Nora was about three months pregnant at the time; this may also explain why the ceremony was not performed in a local church or in the Grainger County courthouse.

Massengill Gristmill on Buffalo Creek. Photo taken circa 20 February 1939. Along with Dan Acuff’s store and a blacksmith shop operated by Hack Yates, the Massengill Mill was the central feature in the small rural community of Buffalo Springs (Grainger County, Tenn).

In the early years of their marriage, Dan sold his store at Washburn and he, Nora, and their daughter Dale moved south across Clinch Mountain to the Buffalo Springs area.^[iv] The family lived above Dan’s new store there, until sometime after 1920, when they were able to build a farmhouse along Owl Hole Gap Road, a little more than a mile north of the store.^[v]

Following a three-week illness, Dan Acuff died on 9 April 1928 at the age of 60 years and four days; his cause of death is listed as a hemorrhage of the bladder^[vi], although prostate cancer was believed to be the underlying disease. He was buried the next day in the Buffalo Baptist Church Cemetery, Grainger County, Tennessee.

Dan's story raises lots of questions for me. I presume his stores were both general mercantile stores, but did he have a particular type of goods that he was knowledgeable about? How did the son of farmer come to own a store?

How did he come to meet my great-grandmother Nora? Was she a regular visitor to the Log Mountain store? Did she spend a lot of time with her married sisters instead of with her parents?

Was there a reason behind Dan's sisters Kate and Vallie still being single at the ages of 40 and 25, respectively? It certainly doesn't seem to fit the norms of the area and time.

More research is in order to answer these questions adequately; until then, I'll just have to re-examine the information I do have and see if anything else pops out. There's a story there - I just need to find it!

What do you know of your great-grandfather? What sort of work did he do? Are there any family stories about him that your children would enjoy reading about - if so, write them down!

---

[i] Notecards written by Claude B Acuff and transcribed in August 2001 by Zeb Acuff. Cards held by Hazel Acuff at time of transcription.

[ii] Knox County Archives Marriage Index. http://knoxrooms.sirsi.net/rooms/portal/page/22187_Marriage_Index Accessed 23 October 2012

[iii] Claude Acuff notecards transcribed by Zeb Acuff.

[iv] 1910 Census for Dan Acuff, 5^th Civil District, Grainger County, Tennessee; SD 1, ED 6, sheet 1A.

[v] Notes by Zeb Acuff from Conversation with Hazel Lea Acuff and John Acuff; July 4, 2011, 197 Thurman Watson Road, Rutledge, TN

[vi] Death certificate for Dan Acuff, died 9 April 1928. State of Tennessee Certificate of Death #11227

Friday Focus: Paternal Grandfather

This week's assignment is to record memories of your paternal grandfather, your dad's dad. Often, we grow up visiting our grandparents on a regular basis - that was certainly the case for my mom's side of the family. Other times, however, a grandparent can be a mystery to us, either because of death or separation of some type.

I come from a long line of Acuff men who never had the opportunity to meet their paternal grandfather. I was born in 1978, three years after my grandfather Claude died. My father John was born in 1945; his grandfather (Claude's father) Dan Acuff died in 1928. Claude, being born in 1911, never met his grandfather Enos Acuff, who passed in 1889. Dan's grandfather Claiborne Acuff died in 1867, just a year before Dan was born.

Admittedly, we Acuff men tend to have children later in life (I am the first direct-line Acuff in five generations to have a child before his thirtieth birthday), but it's still a punch in the gut to never have the chance to meet your grandfather. Thankfully we have broken the streak: my dad has gotten to not only meet but enjoy multiple visits with all three (so far) of his grandchildren.

John (b1945), Azariah (b2012), Isaac (b2006), and Zeb (b1978) Acuff

Everything I know about my grandfather Claude Burgess Acuff (1911-1975) I've had to learn secondhand (more about that here). Here are some of the highlights - see if they spark any similar thoughts of your own paternal grandfather (and then write them down!):

• Claude was preparing to attend medical school, but his father's death when Claude was just 16 years old made that dream a financial impossibility. He made his career working as a metallurgist for Alcoa, retiring a few years before his own death. 
• Some of my own interests apparently run in the family - my grandfather researched genealogy (I have some of his notecards), enjoyed photography enough to include plans for a darkroom in the house that he built upon retirement, and reportedly was quite talented musically. Claude’s niece, Mary Burgess (Green) Parker, recalls “fun times, including when her uncle, Claude Acuff, and his friends would sit in a circle in the old living room and have a ‘musical’.” According to his son John, Claude “had a good ear” and could play just about any instrument. John and Hazel (Claude's wife; my grandmother) specifically remember that he played violin/fiddle, guitar, trombone, mandolin, and banjo. 
• Claude grew up in East Tennessee, but his position with Alcoa moved him and his family to Central Pennsylvania just a few years after his son (my dad) John was born. Claude would drive his wife and son back to Tennessee every year to spend summers with family; after his retirement, Claude and Hazel moved back to Tennessee, building a house next door to his childhood home.

What memories do you have of your paternal grandfather? Did you get to spend time with him at all? Did he live near to you growing up, or was there a physical distance between you? Are there any traits of his that you see reflected in yourself?

Mary Parker quote taken from Biographical Sketch of Mary Burgess Green Parker (Article #117, page 45). Grainger County, Tennessee and Its People, 1796-1998. Published 1998 by Grainger County Heritage Book Committee. LC#98-84037 

Father Knows Best

This week’s Friday Focus prompt is all about dear old Dad.

Society (that is, the media) portrays a wide range of images of fatherhood. I promised myself, though, that I wouldn’t go on a rant. I’ll just say that I suspect most of you have experiences with fathers that don’t match the television portrayal of Ozzie Nelson, Cliff Huxtable, Al Bundy, or Raymond Barone.

Whether you are a dad or know a dad, what does the term “fatherhood” mean to you? Did you grow up with a stand-offish, reserved Father or a playful, involved Dad? What did you call your male parent—Dad, Daddy, Father, Pop—and how does that name reflect your feelings toward him?

Aside from your biological father, did you have other older men that you considered father figures in your life? Why?

Chopp'n Wood With Dad by Clearly Ambiguous CC BY 2.0

If you have children, how has your father’s parenting style influenced your own? As I get older, I see more and more of my own dad in myself and in how I treat my kids. At the same time, I can understand my dad better and can find specific ways to consciously diverge from the way I was raised.

Take a few moments and jot down memories of fatherhood from your own life. Some typically father-ish things to think about are:

• Camping
• Sports, whether playing or attending games
• Fishing
• Fixing cars or other household repairs
• Visiting Dad’s workplace
• Yard work (mowing, raking leaves, trimming trees)
• Cooking, especially outdoors (anyone get their dad a King of the Grill apron?)
• Keeping secrets from Mom, usually of potentially dangerous activities
• One-on-one outings
• Learning to drive
• Having your first beer 

---

I grew up with a stay-at-home dad in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Mom had the better paying job (by far), and so Dad raised me and my sister until she started first grade. I don’t have many specific memories from my first half-decade of life, but I know that Dad used to help out in our kindergarten classroom and volunteer around the school. One time, for some reason we were talking about buttermilk in kindergarten class, and my teacher asked how many of my fellow five-year-olds had ever had buttermilk (keep in mind this was a suburban school in the Mid-Atlantic; there’s probably still not much buttermilk consumption there today three decades later). Nearly every hand shot up. My skeptical father, in a proto-dad-joke moment, stepped in and asked how many of the kids had ever had bubonic plague—same response.

A dozen years later, my dad and I formed another strong memory during a late summer trip. I was in the midst of my college search and we decided to take a road trip through North Carolina to check out three schools. Dad rented a Sebring convertible and the two of us headed out, cruising down the Skyline Drive and stopping in to visit his mom in East Tennessee. We even took Grandmother for a drive with the top down – an eighty-something woman with a bandanna in her hair rolling through the back roads and mountain passes of the Smokies. I don’t remember much about any of the colleges (I ended up choosing my hometown University of Delaware – literally across the street from my house), but I do remember that convertible!

Father & Son by Nicolas Bffd CC BY-SA 2.0

Now it’s your turn. Share in the comments your memories of being a dad or of being raised by a dad. Don’t be afraid that your memory is too small; just write it down so you’ll have it and you can build a narrative down the road.