Comments by great-great-grandson Bryan S. Godfrey:

Lucy Henry Cheek was born November 20, 1861 and raised in the vicinity of Wilson's United Methodist Church, of which she was a member in early life, located on Wilson's Church Road (Route 722) north of its intersection with Route 24 (Shingle Block Road), near the village of Body Camp in southern Bedford County, Virginia. Her family on both sides had been concentrated here or in the nearby Chestnut Fork section for several generations, and her ancestry had earlier roots in Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania. Her mother, Amarilla Jane Mayhew Cheek (1830?-1890), is buried in an unmarked grave, and her father, Henry Byrd Cheek (1830?-1908?), in a marked grave, in the Lewis Burial Ground on the east side of Wilson's Church Road between the church and Route 24, also known as the Lewis-Cheek-Mayhew-Lansdown-Overstreet Family Cemetery, and because both of her parents have siblings and other close relatives buried here in marked graves, and because her maternal grandmother was a Lewis, it seems likely all four of her grandparents are buried here as well. Few graves in Bedford County were marked with tombstones before the twentieth century, and the only reason her father and several others in his generation have marked graves is because they were entitled to free stone markers as Confederate veterans and their family members ordered and erected them long after their deaths in most cases.

The first of the Cheeks in her lineage was her great-great-grandfather William Cheek (1728-1802), born in London, England, who is said to have settled in Virginia before 1769 and was teaching school in Bedford County by 1790, later settling in Wilkes/ Surry County, North Carolina. As a supporter of the British Crown initially, he was arrested and later pardoned for treason during the Revolutionary War and is said to have been an expert mathematician. He was not Lucy's patrilineal ancestor, for based on YDNA and autosomal DNA results among his descendants, it appears his grandson William P. Cheek (1798?-1881), Lucy's paternal grandfather, ancestor of all later Cheeks in Bedford, was fathered by a Creasey/Creasy and took the Cheek surname as an illegitimate son of William's daughter Susanna, and then he married a Creasey, who was probably a cousin (hopefully not his half-sister!).

While serving as a Private and Regimental Teamster with the 28th Regiment, Virginia Infantry, Confederate States Army in the Civil War, Lucy's father was wounded 30 August 1862 in the Second Battle of Manassas when she was nine months old, spending about two years in Confederate hospitals, but survived, returned to battle in the last few months of the war, and lived into his seventies. Lucy was the oldest of six children, conceived shortly before the war began, and because of the war, there was a five year gap between her birth and that of her sister Jimmie in 1866. Her maternal grandparents, James and Nancy Lewis Mayhew, died in the late 1850s before she was born, but she knew her paternal grandparents, William and Nancy Creasey Cheek, he dying in 1881 and she dying after him, both in their eighties.

After her marriage to Berry "Zone" Overstreet on December 30, 1884, Lucy eventually became a member of his family church, Difficult Creek Baptist Church, later renamed Quaker Baptist Church, on Chestnut Fork Road, just across from its intersection with Wilson's Church Road. Zone's father, Jesse Powers Overstreet (1838-1924), was a member, but his mother, Mary Jane Warner Overstreet (1841-1922), was a member of Lucy's church, Wilson's United Methodist. Jesse and Mary lived between these churches on present-day Route 24, on property now part of Skinnell Orchard, and are buried with two of their three daughters in the Overstreet-Crowder-Foster Family Cemetery across the road from their homesite. Lucy's Lewis and Woodford ancestors were early members of the Quaker meeting that was located on the site of what became Difficult Creek Baptist Church, Lower Goose Creek Friends Meeting, and her great-grandfather, George Lewis (1765-1805), is buried in the original cemetery there in an unmarked grave; perhaps his parents, Jehu and Alice Maris Lewis, from Chester County, Pennsylvania, are also, for they deeded the land where the church is located. A photograph of the 1919 baptism of Wren Lee Franklin (1884-1943) in Difficult Creek, by Rev. Henry L. Thomas, shows Lucy and daughter Essie standing in the creek behind the church.

Interestingly, both Zone and Lucy had fathers fighting in the 28th Regiment who were shot but survived. His father, Jesse, was wounded in the Battle of Hatcher's Run outside Petersburg, Virginia on 30 March 1865, just ten days before General Robert E. Lee surrendered at Appomattox.

The most visible geologic landmark for the entire Chestnut Fork-Body Camp area, more recognizable from a distance now as far away as Huddleston to the southeast because of an antenna on top, is Dumpling Mountain, said to have been settled by Lucy's great-great-grandfather William Dowdy (believed to have come from Cumberland County, Virginia and died circa 1795) and partly owned by Zone's patrilineal great-great-grandfather Thomas Overstreet, Jr. (1744-1842), whose parents came from Orange County, Virginia to Bedford circa 1755. An even more well-known and higher mountain, visible not only throughout Bedford County but also from neighboring counties, is the Peaks of Otter, in the northern part of the county, about 20 miles northwest of the Body Camp vicinity. But that part of the county did not have associations with Lucy's ancestors.

Not only did Lucy have the fortune of knowing her parents and paternal grandparents, and later living to be a great-great-grandmother, but her husband Zone had even more living forebears in his lifetime whom she knew, besides his parents who lived into their early eighties into the early 1920s. More than likely, she remembered three of his grandparents and even one great-grandmother, Elizabeth ("Bettie") Gordon Overstreet (1791-1889), who died at Body Camp at age 98, four years after Zone and Lucy's oldest child Herbert, Bettie's great-great-grandson, was born. Bettie was a granddaughter of George Willis, who came from Loudoun County to Bedford around the time several of Lucy's Mayhew and Woodford ancestors did. It is likely that George's wife was a Lucas, a sister of Lucy's great-great-grandmother, Jemima Lucas Mayhew, of Prince George's County, Maryland and Loudoun County, Virginia. Zone was descended from George Willis through both his patrilineal great-grandmother Bettie Gordon Overstreet and through his maternal grandmother, Sarah ("Sally") Updike Warner (1801-1873), a granddaughter of George. If George Willis' wife was a Lucas, then Zone and Lucy were double distant cousins through James Lucas and ? Henry Lucas of Prince George's County, Maryland. An autosomal DNA test through Ancestry.com would have shown a match between them if this theory is correct, but unless the DNA of close living relatives of theirs who are not related other ways could be compared, it is too late for DNA to help much in solving the mystery of whether George Willis did indeed marry a sister of Jemima Lucas Mayhew. The facts that George Willis lived near or adjacent to Jemima's brother Alexander Lucas on Sugar Land Run and the Potomac River in Loudoun, that the names Isabel, Jemima, Mary, and Rebecca were repeatedly used in the Mayhew and Willis families, and that both families settled near one another in Bedford County in the late 1700s, would seem to suggest George Willis married an unidentified daughter of James and ? Henry Lucas.

It is uncertain where or how many different locations Zone and Lucy resided when most of their ten children were born. According to a short article in the "Bedford Democrat," 30 March 1893, the home near Chestnut Fork that they were renting from a Mr. Cooper was destroyed by fire and was uninsured, and this was less than a month after they lost an infant son to pneumonia. Their home after around 1902, built in 1800 (the date having been discovered carved into stone after the home was sold out of the family and restored in the late 1990s), present-day address 1249 Difficult Creek Road (Route 817), was on property owned by Col. David H. Creasy (1809-1891), a relative of hers, and previously owned by a Gilliam family. It appears that only Zone and Lucy's youngest child, Delbert, was born there, in 1903. From letters to creditors, now (2020) in possession of Delbert's daughter Wilma, and photocopied by me, Bryan S. Godfrey, they apparently rented the house and farm for a decade until they were able to buy it around 1913.

Who Col. David H. Creasy was who owned the land and house that Zone and Lucy later owned and lived in is a mystery, for his 1891 death record fails to list his parents, nor have any Creasy wills been found that listed him as a son or other relation. However, because several children of Franklin Creasy and first wife Sidney Newman are listed as among those buried in unmarked graves in the Creasey-Overstreet-Crouch Family Cemetery at the entrance to the farm, and Franklin and Sidney had a daughter Florentine as did David, it is most likely that David was a son of Franklin and Sidney. Franklin was a son of Thomas Creasy and Judith Franklin, and Thomas was almost certainly a brother of John Creasey, Lucy's great-great-grandfather. If this theory is correct, then Col. David H. Creasy was a second cousin of Lucy's paternal grandmother, Nancy D. Creasey Cheek. In spite of the house being a mere log cabin with only two bedrooms, there were slave quarters on the property when the Overstreets purchased it, and son Delbert and his wife Alice lived in one of them when first married.

The home of Zone and Lucy's oldest son Herbert (present-day address 3439 Headen's Bridge Road) was north of the house, across a hollow with a spring that served both families and flows into Difficult Creek. Deeds need to be researched to determine whether Herbert and his wife Bessie (great-grandparents of me, Bryan S. Godfrey) bought their farm from Zone and Lucy shortly after their marriage in 1907, or whether it was an adjoining property not part of the Creasy farm that Zone and Lucy acquired. Or, perhaps it was part of the original Creasy tract that Zone and Lucy did not acquire, as it appears Col. Creasy's landholdings there were far more extensive than the mere hundred or so acres later owned by the Overstreets. In 1915, Herbert and Bessie's original house caught on fire, and they and their three (of eight) children they had at the time (Lucille, Gladys, and Cecil) had to move in with Zone and Lucy next door while Herbert constructed a larger house on the site of the partially burned house. That house is also still in existence, restored by distant cousin Bobby Blankenship after being sold out of the family in 2001.

Tragedy struck in 1918, not only the infamous Spanish influenza epidemic later that year, but in early January, when Zone and Lucy's son Luther was stricken with spinal meningitis. He died at age eighteen and was the second member of the Overstreet family buried in the Creasy family plot at the entrance to the farm, his grave marked by an obelisk which is still there a century later but barely legible. Several infant grandchildren are also buried in the cemetery, one before Luther. Luther's footprints could still be seen in the snow after his burial. In December of that year, distant cousins of Lucy on the Creasey side, whose farm was about a mile away and almost in sight of hers on Headen's Bridge Road, became victims of the flu epidemic as it was waning, when Robert Edward Blankenship (1871-1918) and two of his sons died within three days of one another. Also in 1918, another neighbor and distant cousin of both Zone and Lucy, Estelle Overstreet Chafin (1876-1918), whose husband Elisha's family farm was on Headen's Bridge Road between Herbert and the Blankenships, died in childbirth. The Chafin and Blankenship homes were torn down sometime in the 1990s or early 2000s.

In 1924 and 1925, two events resulted in pictures being taken of Zone, Lucy, and their families and/or neighbors. At a 1924 Difficult Creek Baptist Church homecoming, a panoramic picture was taken of its members, and Zone and Lucy appeared along with most of their offspring. Almost all of the persons pictured were related to one or both of them in some way, and in 1998, there were a couple of people living who were able to identify everyone in the picture, even small children! In 1925, a get-together of their children and grandchildren was held at their home, and formal pictures were taken.

After Zone's death on July 8, 1934 from heart failure at age 70 or 72 (depending on whether you go by one source giving his birthdate as June 16, 1862 or another as July 21, 1863), almost six months before they would have celebrated their fiftieth wedding anniversary, Lucy lived in the house the remainder of her long life. However, she sold the farm to her youngest child Delbert and his wife Alice, who lived there a short time. Then they sold the home and land (100+ acres) to his sister Essie and her husband Howard Crouch, who had been living in Roanoke with their son Kenneth, but they returned to the farm, farmed the land, and cared for Lucy for about the last 20 years of her life (they were living there by 1940 according to the Census that year). Delbert and Alice lived in Lynchburg a few years but then purchased an adjoining farm down the road, on the opposite side of the farm from that which adjoined the farm of Zone and Lucy's eldest child Herbert and his wife Bessie.

In her old age, before there were trees blocking the view as there are now, and before telephones were installed in that area on party lines, Essie and Delbert devised a system of communication. Essie agreed to hang up a flag or other item if something was wrong with Lucy as a signal to Delbert or someone in his family that they needed to come over. Sometimes when she was overwhelmed taking care of her mother, Essie hung up the signal.

Lucy was one of the first in the vicinity to own a television set, perhaps at the influence of her grandson Kenneth, though probably not until she was in her early 90s since the 1950s were when average Americans were purchasing televisions for the first time. Her legendary naivete about such "newfangled technology" shows how people can easily misunderstand something new. It has been reported by some descendants that she kept a towel on top of the TV and would lower it over the front when she wanted to ensure no one could see her--she was convinced that if she could see characters on TV, they could see her. In other words, she may have thought a TV was like the webcams of today, and her fears would be legitimate ones now. My question is--why didn't she just turn the TV off when she did not want to be seen?! In an analogous situation to the computer technology of today, because I have a horror of a computer virus or hacker compromising a webcam on a computer or cell phone, there is something to be said for putting a piece of tape over the camera to ensure no one could see you if it were to come on and record.

Although Lucy was at times bedridden and somewhat of a burden to daughter Essie and family in her later years, her mind remained alert until the end, and it seemed like a good situation after the Great Depression and World War II were over. Although she outlived two of her nine children, and she and Zone were estranged from their son Leffie at the time of Zone's death in 1934 because Leff borrowed money from them and failed to repay them, then died of pneumonia at age 45 the year after his father, Lucy was fortunate that all of her grandchildren in World War II survived it, but her sister Annie lost a son. Lucy had a daughter (Essie), son-in-law, and grandson living with her, two sons (Herbert and Delbert) living almost in sight of her house, her other daughter (Ollie) living on the opposite side of Difficult Creek almost in sight of Herbert, and sons Howard and Otey living within five miles. Most of her siblings and her son Jim lived in the Roanoke area. Also living close to her, on Headen's Bridge Road, less than a mile away, was her oldest grandson Cecil, Herbert's oldest son, who continued the family tradition of farming. Furthermore, Quaker Baptist Church was in clear view of some parts of her property, though located on the opposite side of Difficult Creek and on a different road that intersected with her road at Chestnut Fork a mile away. One could walk through the woods and across the creek to the church, a much shorter route than going by road if you had to walk.

A reunion of Lucy's descendants was held at the home in 1951, probably in honor of her ninetieth birthday, and pictures were taken. Her grandson Kenneth Crouch had already begun researching her and Zone's genealogy and prepared a six-page handout for the event. Twenty-two years later, he would prepare a larger booklet covering both sides of his family entitled "Saints and Black Sheep," which he gave to family. Although done with a manual typewriter and with many errors or omissions, rather crude by the standards of most of us experienced genealogists, it formed the basis for my subsequent research and was the first written genealogy to which I had been exposed, when I was nine years old in 1982. It inspired me to go in more depth on this and other sides of my family. Kenneth did this without the advantages of computer, Internet, DNA, and other technology at our disposal today.

For those who have seen her grandson Kenneth's booklet "Saints and Black Sheep," I should warn you that there are four families shown as ancestors of Lucy's maternal grandmother, Nancy Lewis Mayhew, that are not: the John and Warner Lewises of Gloucester County, Virginia, the family of Indian Princess Pocahontas and her English husband John Rolfe (including the Flemings of Goochland County, Virginia), and the Augustine Warner and Nicholas Martiau-George Reade families of Yoktown, Virginia and Gloucester. Also, the Reade line is shown back to royalty and farther back, legendarily, to Biblical figures, and a connection is shown to George Washington and Queen Elizabeth II of England via the Martiau-Reade lineage and to General Robert E. Lee via the Warner lineage. I am unsure how he came up with that ancestry, for there are ample records showing Lucy's Lewises were instead Quakers from Chester County, Pennsylvania. However, her immigrant ancestor Ralph Lewis of Wales and Pennsylvania has been traced back to nobility and royalty, and because the names Jordan and Fleming have been used several times in the Creasy family, it is probable, and there are some DNA results that back it up, that the mother of Thomas and John Creasey who came from Fluvanna County, Virginia to Bedford was a daughter of Samuel Jordan and Elizabeth Fleming of Goochland County, Virginia. Lucy may have told Kenneth she had heard there were Flemings back in her ancestry, which could have caused him to mistakenly assume it was through her maternal grandmother's Lewis side rather than her paternal grandmother's Creasey side. I had to give up some very prominent or famous ancestors and cousins when I determined in my adolescence that Kenneth had the wrong Lewis lineage in his booklet, but I have made up for it by finding other interesting ancestors and cousins, and maybe Lucy can indeed claim the prominent lineage of Charles and Susanna Tarleton Fleming after all (though not the branch descended from Pocahontas that Kenneth claimed), which would make her and her descendants cousins of First Lady Dolly Payne Todd Madison and Supreme Court Chief Justice John Marshall.

In spite of being frequently bedridden in her later years, Lucy was able to attend and be photographed with her eldest son Herbert and his wife Bessie when they celebrated their fiftieth wedding anniversary at their home in April, 1957, about ten months before her death. Either that year or the year before, she was also sitting in her chair when she was pictured in a six-generation photograph with her father's portrait that included her great-great-grandson Roger Lee Ransom (1956-1989).

My mother remembers going with her parents (her father Ray being a son of Herbert) to visit her Great-Grandmother Lucy the weekend before she died, when she was on her death-bed. She died at age 96 on that Sunday evening, February 2, 1958, and my mother, her parents, and brother did not come back to Bedford for her funeral.

After Lucy's death, Essie, Howard, and son Kenneth lived almost the remainder of their lives in her home (in Essie's case, until she had to go into the Bedford County Memorial Hospital Convalescent Center twenty months before her death in 1986 after a stroke). The house never had plumbing or bathrooms until it was sold out of the family following Kenneth Crouch's death in 1995, when the new owners restored it and added a bathroom along with many other modern features.

Below is her obituary from the "Bedford Bulletin-Democrat":

Mrs. B.Z. Overstreet, 96, Dies Feb. 2 at Home

Mrs. Lucy Henry Cheek Overstreet, 96, one of Bedford County's oldest residents, died Sunday night, Feb. 2, at her home in Chestnut Fork after several years of declining health.
Born in Bedford County, she was a daughter of Henry Byrd and Amarilla Jane Mayhew Cheek. At the time of her birth her father was serving with the Confederate States Army in the War Between the States.
She was an active member of Quaker Baptist Church near Chestnut Fork until her health declined. She was married in 1884 to Berry Zone Overstreet, who died in 1934.
She is survived by 100 descendants [incorrect--98], as follows, two daughters, Mrs. Howard E. [Essie] Crouch and Mrs. M.P. [Ollie] Ayers of Bedford County; five sons, Herbert C. Overstreet, W. Howard Overstreet, Otey S. Overstreet and Delbert R. Overstreet of Bedford County and James M. Overstreet of Roanoke; 32 grandchildren, 56 great-grandchildren and five [incorrect--three] great-great-grandchildren.
Funeral services were conducted Tuesday afternoon, Feb. 4, by the Rev. John F. Layton, Jr. of Bedford, assisted by the Rev. Charlie M. Shelton of Nathalie, the Rev. L.C. Coffman of Daleville and the Rev. Fred Harcum of Lebanon, from Quaker Baptist Church near Chestnut Fork.
Musical selections were rendered by the church choir with Mrs. Nelson C. [Vivian] Ferrell organist.
Burial was in the Overstreet family cemetery near Chestnut Fork. Active pallbearers were her grandchildren, Kyle Ayers, Alonza P. Ayers, G. Winston Overstreet, Melvin H. Overstreet, Cecil C. Overstreet and Berry H. Overstreet.
Flower bearers were her grandchildren and great-grandchildren.

Comment by Bryan Godfrey: It appears a mistake was made in that she had only three rather than five great-great-grandchildren at her death, making the total number of living descendants at that time 98 instead of 100. However, it appears her granddaughter Gladys' two adopted children were not counted, and if they are counted, then that makes 58 rather than 56 great-grandchildren, and 100 the total number of living descendants. She adopted her children around the time of her grandmother's death, but perhaps soon afterward. Furthermore, had Lucy not outlived her sons Luther and Leffie, that would have added up to 100 biological descendants at her death. She had three more grandchildren who died in infancy.

Below is a newspaper article written after her home was sold out of the family and restored, from "The Bedford Bulletin," 15 December 1999:

Couple restores county homeplace of noted historian
Kenneth Crouch lived most of his life in Body Camp cabin
By Glenn Ayers

When Ginger Bell accompanied her husband, Frank, to Bedford County in 1989, it made 32 times Ginger had moved in her life. Yet, this was the first time it had been her choice. She made a good one. Not only for the Bells, but for all those who love local Bedford history.

Part of the wisdom of her choice was the property she came to; the rest was what she and Frank chose to do with it.

A native of Charleston, SC, Ginger met and married Frank in Florida, following his retirement from Adams Construction in Virginia. Matter of fact, it was his familiarity with rural Bedford County that affected their choice. He had assisted W.B. Adams in the establishment of Spring Lake Farms.

The spot they chose was the remaining 12 acres of what had been a 560-acre tract in 1770. It lies on the Difficult Creek Road between Body Camp and Headens Bridge. Originally owned by one James Gilliam Sr., it passed to his son, James. Jr., who with his wife, Nancy, built the home that went through years, heirs and descendants but still stood.

A number of friends advised the Bells to bulldoze the old dwelling and put in a double-wide. But Ginger noticed that beneath the crumbling weather boarding was an original log structure.

Then the clincher. Inscribed on a stone of the inner foundation were the words: "January 3, 1800." So much for the 'dozer.

Now began Ginger Bell's inspiration--and Frank Bell's labor. "I had the dream," she says, "he did the work." Almost literally. Though some of the plumbing and wiring were sub-contracted, Frank, Ginger, and a son-in-law did most of the rest.

At first, the Bells meant to restore it for a guest house, since they own another farm in the vicinity of the Moneta Road/ Route 24 intersection. As the work progressed, however, they abandoned the extra quarters ideas. "I fell in love with the place," says Ginger.

There may be a reason for this beyond mere venerable structure. A genealogy of the building, prepared by James R. "Bob" Tinsley, traces its ownership from the original Gilliam to its last occupant--Kenneth Crouch.

Crouch, Bedford's most noted historian, lived there all but the last two years of his life, when illness compelled him to stay with relatives in sight of where he had lived from 1924 to 1993.

The house was acquired by Berry Zone Overstreet in 1902. Overstreet and his wife, Lucy, were Crouch's grandparents. Though the house came to his parents--Howard and Essie Overstret Crouch--his family still refers to it as "Grandma's house."

Grandma's house was originally a log cabin with an over and under room. It became a log house when an identical cabin was built flush against it, each portion having the same twisting siaircase to its respective upper room. Later a kitchen was added to the connecting breezeway.

The remains of a slave quarters were nearby. The house was served by a hand-dug well at the front and surrounded by maples and oaks that have stood at least a century.

After his father's death in 1977, Crouch continued to live and care for his mother until her death in 1986. From then till he left seven years later, he occupied one downstairs room, using the other, plus a room upstairs to house his books, papers, and autograph collection. The proceeds from the sale of this famous cache went to the Bedford Museum and Quaker Baptist Church. "It took me two years to sort (the items) out," says Wilma Noell, Crouch's cousin and executor.

The simplicity of Crouch's living arrangements show him true to the history he collected, the culture he sought to preserve. The only modern amenities he added to his "country living" were a cold water spigot piped from the old well and an electric hot plate to heat water. He cooked on a wood stove.

Often he ate at the house he made home in his last two years. Another cousin, Isabelle Overstreet, recalls him often dropping by. She would say, "Get a plate, Kenneth, we haven't much, but you're welcome to what we have. He'd say, "It doesn't take much for me, Izzie."

In the remodeling, every effort was made to maintain the charm of the building's rural antiquity. After all, as Tinsley pointed out in his study, it's "One of the oldest standing homes in Bedford County and has been occupied for over 195 years. It should be on the register of historic homes, since very few of the rural homes are left."

In other words, it's mostly the mansions that have survived, but the Bells have rescued Americana. Plus, they have saved the home of Kenneth Crouch.

Of course, it has been modernized. Still, its basic American Gothic has not been altered. Windows have been replaced, but the floors still slant. The linoleums have been removed to reveal the original plank flooring and the stone fireplaces have had years of soot removed. The ceilings and doorways are still low and a six footter has to duck when going room to room. Two modern bathrooms have been added (one in the old breezeway), but at the top of the twisting stairway that remains, is a bedroom with rustic chamber pot.

There are many changes. A new well supplies the house and hot water now reaches an updated kitchen. The Bells added a comfortable bedroom, that brings sunlight through a stained glass window. A resident of the Elks National Home created it for Ginger when she worked there.

How do Crouch's relatives view the restoration? "I'm glad they did it," says Isabelle Overstreet. Then she wistfully demurs, "But I miss it--I miss Kenneth." Wilma Noell echoes part of this. "It's beautiful--but--it's not Grandma's house anymore."

Ginger Bell understands the feeling. It's included in the name of her inspiration--"Contentment."

"People say to me, for what you spent, you could have built a beautiful home. I tell them, I have a beautiful home."

Ginger and Frank Bell will host an Open House at "Contentment," January 2, 2000, from 2 till 4 p.m. It will mark the 200th anniversary of the house's construction. All members of families who have lived there, historians and interested public are invited to attend. The address is 1249 Difficult Creek Road, Bedford, VA. Phone: 297-7243.

Comment by Bryan Godfrey: The article is erroneous in saying Kenneth lived with family members his last two years because of failing health. Although he often stayed during heavy winter snows with my Great-Aunts Gladys and Isy who were his closest neighbors, he lived at his home until the last month of his life, and died only a couple of months after being diagnosed with liver cancer. Indeed, I can vouch that I showed up at his house in July, 1995, three months before his death, before he even knew he had cancer, and he had to run out a bunch of cats.