By Alexander Nunn Opelika Newspaper
September 12, 1976
For today I'd like to tell a bit about the migration from Chambers, Clay, Tallapoosa and Randolph counties in Alabama into the area around Tifton, Ga. It was in the early days of tobacco expansion in South Georgia. Walker Pearson seems to have been the first East Alabama settler to move there. He was responsible for the large family group that migrated southward in 1921. Walter Hand married Ovader Pitts and they had children all born in Alabama: Jeff, Bennie Walker, Charles, Worth, Barron, Herbert, and Jim and daughters, Ora, Bessie and Elizabeth.
The Hand men and boys traveled by wagon train from Chambers County in 1921, making the trip in six days and driving part of one night to complete it. The women and children traveled by train to Tifton.
On the wagon train with the Hands were families of Willie Radford Hood, Dewey Jordan, Will Allen, Sam Watson and Frozen Robinson.
The Walter Hand family settled on the farm of Walter Pearson and stayed there for a year, then moved to the E. P. Bowen farm and stayed there many years. Later, they bought farms of their own. At one time the Hands were all Congregational Christians.
Walt Hand was the father of Ben Walker Hand, also buried in this cemetery.
By Alexander Nunn Opelika Newspaper
September 12, 1976
For today I'd like to tell a bit about the migration from Chambers, Clay, Tallapoosa and Randolph counties in Alabama into the area around Tifton, Ga. It was in the early days of tobacco expansion in South Georgia. Walker Pearson seems to have been the first East Alabama settler to move there. He was responsible for the large family group that migrated southward in 1921. Walter Hand married Ovader Pitts and they had children all born in Alabama: Jeff, Bennie Walker, Charles, Worth, Barron, Herbert, and Jim and daughters, Ora, Bessie and Elizabeth.
The Hand men and boys traveled by wagon train from Chambers County in 1921, making the trip in six days and driving part of one night to complete it. The women and children traveled by train to Tifton.
On the wagon train with the Hands were families of Willie Radford Hood, Dewey Jordan, Will Allen, Sam Watson and Frozen Robinson.
The Walter Hand family settled on the farm of Walter Pearson and stayed there for a year, then moved to the E. P. Bowen farm and stayed there many years. Later, they bought farms of their own. At one time the Hands were all Congregational Christians.
Walt Hand was the father of Ben Walker Hand, also buried in this cemetery.
Family Members
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Thomas Jefferson Hand Sr
1902–1996
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Arthur Jimerson Hand
1903–1927
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Bessie Jewell Hand Cook
1905–1987
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Ora Lessie Hand Hightower
1907–1985
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Charles Barrett Hand
1910–1969
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Benjamin Walker "Ben" Hand
1913–1986
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Dora Elizabeth Hand Leverett
1915–2008
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James Herbert Hand Sr
1917–1998
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Walter Hand Jr
unknown–1919
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