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| Memorial Day, 2006 |
| Some of the children who my brothers and I grew up with are no longer alive. These are my recollections of stories heard as a child growing up in the 1950's and 1960s. My aunt Pauline's house was a gathering place for most of the young people. Some I never would have had any association with them otherwise. My cousin Sheila and I were best friends and I spent as much time as I could there. Also after we moved to Louisville when I was 13, I would still spend each summer with my Grandparents (Tilman and Leona Cloud). Jess Pace was a nice kid. He would lend a hand, was friendly. His brother Worley on the other hand was always in trouble. There was a crowd of boys who hung around together as kids and they ended up in trouble as teenagers and adults. There were the Ward brothers, Pace brothers, and 3 Pace cousins. All of them are now gone. One of the ward brothers was shot dead by one of the Pace brothers. A few spent time in prison. One got electricuted stealing copper. There weren't too many male children who grew old and died of natural causes. There were constant dangers of accidents of all kind. This can be expected when most every man carried a gun or drank, got into fights, were killed in car accidents or all terraine vehicle accidents. In my grandfather and greatgrandfathers time there was also lots of illegal things being done in and around Dizney. My great grandfather's brother was found floating face down in the creek or river having been shot to death. My great grandfather, Benjamin Franklin Cloud, and a friend were falsely accused of murder and spent ten years in prison before the real murder and witness confessed on his deathbed. They were then released from prison. My greatgrandfather and his 1st wife Judith Wynn, divorced after he was released and he married his second wife, my greatgrandmother, Martha Shoemaker Cloud. My father carried a pistol and a big yellow pocket knife. There wasn't a person, young or old who would mess with him. I really am surprised that he lived to the old age of 72. He was mean. But if he was your friend there wasn't anything he wouldn't do for you. There were a awful lot of good people who lived in Dizney. In the mid to late 1950s coal was not in demand very much and lots of families moved to Indiana, Ohio, Michigan and other parts of Kentucky. In the 1960s the population could not have been more than a few hundred people. The old people died and the young people moved away. The only ones who remained were too poor to move, too old or just too set in their ways to change. Dizney, formely known as Pumpkin Center in the 1800s, has continued onward for probably two centuries and will probably still be a community long into the next century. What amazes me is how time just keeps rolling along. As a child I never dreamed that I would grow old and things would change and people I love would not be alive anymore. I now have replace my mother as a grandmother, my mother has replaced my grandmothers as a greatgrandmother. Soon another generation will replace me and mom. Our bones will turn to dust and fertalize the soil for future generations as the past generations have. |