Feed Sack Fabric

When grandma judged me responsible enough to get the fabric pattern she needed and strong enough to carry the sack, she began sending me to pick up chicken feed for her at the Browns' warehouse. She would show me the fabric pattern she needed to finish her currect project and tell me to be sure to a sack with that pattern. (The Browns' general store was very small, so big things, like watermelons and sack of feed, were kept across the road in the post office/warehouse.)

This first entry on feed sacks shows how much I don't remember.
~ I know it was chicken feed, but I don't know what size bag. It couldn't have been 50 lbs; Grandma would have never sent a girl for that.
~ What were the dimentions of the opened feed sack?
~I remember there was a fixed formula. It was something like
? two sacks made a skirt.
? one for a sleeveles blouse.
? another for short sleeves?
? one sack for a skirt-only apron
? two sacks for a bib apron.
? back of a quilt took how many sacks?
See also the Feb 16 entry about Quilts.

I hope a cousin who remembers will let me know so we can fill in the blanks.

Jackson Skinner, Wounded at New Market

Jackson McWhorter Skinner, with brothers, uncles and neighbors, fought with the Confederate Army. Jackson was a private in the 62nd Mounted Infantry, Company G. He entered the Army 16 May 1862 in Braxton County. A post-war source listed him as wounded in action 15 May 1864 at Battle of New Market. The wound he sustained at New Market never healed. His grandchildren remembered him as an invalid all his life.

New Market was a severe blow to the 62nd. Many men were killed, including local men, Privates Andrew Heater and Eli Sanders and Captain Conrad Currence.

Jackson McWhorter Skinner was born 1843, d. 1891. He lived up Clover Fork and he was a farmer. He had a fair complextion, light hair and gray eyes. He stood 5'7". Jackson was the husband of Patience Duvall and father of Gideon, George Delbert (Dick), Annie, Clara, Lola, Lloyd, Ed and Earl (Pappy). He was my grandmother's grandfather. He was the grandson of Alexander and Catherine (Scott) Skinner

For more on Patience and several of their children see the
Feb 15 '06 entry Dick Skinner's Restaurant.
May 28 '07 entry Dick Skinner Milks a Cow

Footnotes
1. The Battles and Campaigns of the 62nd Virginia Mounted Infantry, according to http://www.alleghenymountain.org/solmain.htm#62nd were
~ Imboden's Tucker County, WV, Expedition, November 8-14, 1862
~ Jones'-Imboden's West Virginia Raid of April 1863
~ Gettysburg, July 1-3, 1863
~ Greencastle, PA, July 5, 1863
~ Williamsport, MD, July 5, 1863
~ New Market, May 15, 1864
~ Cold Harbor, June 3, 1864
~ Lynchburg Campaign, June 1864
~ Monocacy, MD, July 9, 1864
~ Bunker Hill, September 5, 1864
~ Third Winchester, September 19, 1864
~ Fisher's Hill, September 22, 1864
~ Woodstock, September 23, 1864
~ Cedar Creek, October 19, 1864

The regiment's Organizational Assignments were:
1. March-July 1863: Northwestern Virginia Brigade, Department of Northern Virginia
2. July-Dec. 1863: Valley District, Department of Northern Virginia (Part of escort for ambulance wagon train during Lee's retreat from Gettysburg, and defended the wagons at the battle of Williamsport, MD, July 5, 1863.)
3. Dec. 1863-Jan. 1864: Imboden's Command, Valley District, Department of Northern Virginia
4. Feb.-June 1864: Northwestern Virginia Brigade, Department of Northern Virginia
5. Wilderness-Petersburg Campaign, May-June 1864: Wharton's Brigade, Breckinridge's Division, Third Corps (Lt. Gen. A.P. Hill), Army of Northern Virginia (The 62nd was detached from Imboden's Brigade and served with Breckinridge against Grant's offensive. The 62nd was returned to Gen. Imboden upon the latter's frequent requests.)
6. Battle of New Market, May 15, 1864: Second Brigade, Maj. Gen. John Breckinridge Commanding
7. June 1864-April 1865: Imboden's Brigade, Ransom's-Lomax's Cavalry Division, Valley District, Department of Northern Virginia.

Photo Essay from the 1930s

.These images are from a photo essay titled Walter Donaldson, Orlando, WV. Mr. Donelson was acclaimed as the One Millionth Pupil who was taught to read and write through WPA Educational classes during the Great Depression.

These photos from the New Deal Network website are an uncanny peek at life in the 1930s. There were Donelsons, or Donaldsons, in the Orlando area by 1860 but not in what we would today call Orlando. The program, the photos and Mr. Donaldson were in Sand Fork, or more precisely, Rocky Fork of Indian Fork of Sand Fork of the Little Kanawha River, in Gilmer County. In the 1950s I knew homes and landscapes exactly like the ones in these photos.

Check out the Donaldson Photo Essay. It would be great to hear whether others think the photographer captured the time and place and people.

Smallpox in Confluence

In From Blakes and Riffles Going Back To The Seventh Generation,
Click here to go to a collection of Orlando, WV histories. At the left
Lee W. Blake tells us the tale of two railroad workers, "Olvia Stuttler" and "James Skinner", who were caught up in a smallpox scare in 1898. At that time, Ovie Merlin (O.M.) Stutler, 24 years old, who would marry Ennie Riffle, came down with smallpox. Although James Skinner, the 22 years old son of Perry Scott and Emily Jane (Posey) Skinner, was with him and therefore quarentined with O.M. for most of the year, James never came down with smallpox.

To the right is Lee Blake with his wife Civilla. Belw left is O. M. Stutler a few years after he recovered from smallpox. See Lee's story in the March '07
entry Lee Blake – Orlando Lumberman & Genealogist

Here is how Orlando historian Lee Blake remembered the events.

The worst scare I rember was small pocks in 1898 Olvia Stuttler of shady brook, and James Skinner, both of Orlando, W.V.A. I think it was still called Confluence, at that time Stuttler and Skinner, was workin at Cowen or Camden on Gauley. Stuttler got the small pocks thay run off and got on train so they locked them in and run them to Flatwoods and left them locked up tell the sherif and members of board of helth could get there from Sutton. Stuttler had broken a window, was out when thay got there. All was afraid get close to them. These officers come armed with shot guns. Stuttler was very sick laying in the snow. He had to do what thay told him. When he under stand thay was trying to help them. Thay put in a old house above the Orlando cemetery and kept them about all winter. Skinner never taken the small pocks that was the reason thay were kept in so long. I knew two other famileys had small pocks no one died in this community. Clover Fork Creek is the line betwen Braxton and Lewis and thay had gards to keep you from one county to the other. It hard to get to the store or gristmill. The first few days was the worst.

Thay locked the mail train to the rail at Burnsville. Finly let it thrugh.

I have knowen of three cases of Polo one death this all happend in a radis twenty mile square a long the lin betwen braxton and lewis county not more then ten mile deap in Either County.


Notes:
1. Following are the other diseases Lee remembered.
Here are the disease i rember so well from 1890 to the present Typhord fever 22 cases 6 deths six cases of Diphtheria four death. Three famileys of twenty childern all had scarlet fever some was very bad one death in the twenty cases four famileys. Chicken pocks no deaths; wasent very bad. I remember two famileys seven children each. All had what they called the black french measles. This was bad no one died. There has bin menny cases of mumps no one died

2. James Skinner would marry Dora Parmer. Their children included, among others, Cecil who married Kate Riffle and Necie who married Ed McNemar.

The Indian Campsite

In the 1950s a cousin, Neil Beckner I believe, took me up past his Beckner grandparents' home and the United Brethren Church to see what he assured me was an old Indian campground. The spot was pretty isolated, back in the woods. I could kind of see where someone might think it looked like a campfire site, the way the stones were, but I couldn't see anything to convince me it had been inhabited. Neil couldn't provide any more verification than to tell me folks used to find arrowheads up there. Now, our mothers' cousins and young uncles were forever telling outrageous stories so that even though I could see my cousin believed what he was saying, I couldn't be sure someone wasn't having him on. Still, it was a lovely place, and when I turned my back to the campfire area I was treated to a breathtaking view. Oil Creek Road (and Oil Creek) were a steep drop below us so that the view east looked out over majestic rolling hills.

Decades later I visited Serpent Mound at Chillicothe, Ohio. When I finished the walk from the tail to the head of the undulating mound I looked up and saw what seemed to be the exact same, distinctive, view I’d had so long ago from the Indian Campground overlooking Orlando and Oil Creek.

I have no idea what the connection might be between the two sites. As I understand it, the Mound Builders who we believe built the earthworks lived centuries before the Native Americans who would have left arrowheads. Still, the similarity between the two sights was uncanny.

additional note, March 22, 2006:
In 1924 Roy Bird Cook wrote "John P. Duvall . . . secured 1400 acres more embracing the land between Roanoke and Arnold and a large part of Canoe Run. Duvall was a prominent man in frontier days and his "Indian House" was the site of an old Indian village, it seems. The writer has a collection of flint implements secured in this vicinity. John H. Conrad has a similar collection from the lower valley, and for years on the farm of the late George Cook could be discerned a small mound attributed to a race here before the Indians."
from West Virginia Archives & History at http://www.wvculture.org/history/agrext/roanoke.html


Here's an interesting webpage about Native Americans in the area.
http://www.artcom.com/Museums/nv/sz/45660.htm

Above Orlando I saw an arrangement of rocks in the woods that would have made a good campsite. At Chillicothe, OH I saw an earthwork serpent that, by the way, looked like the one to the right. Both sites overlook a similar landscape.

Orlando Businesses Over the Years

The following is an inventory of businesses that have served Orlando. The earliest was established around 1835 (John Riffle’s grist mill) and the last was the general store owned and operated into the 1970s by (my aunt) Juanita (Stutler) Burgett.
It would be great to get more information on Orlando Businesses.

~ John Riffle’s grist mill (built about 1835) 2.
~ Hickory Mill (opened in 1905 by Coal & Coke) 1.
~ Charles and Maggie (Cosner) Skinner's gristmill 2.
~ Wade Mick’s mill and feed store 2.
~ a restaurant owned by the Coal & Coke 1.
~ Dick Skinner’s Wagon Restaurant 1,4.
~ Lee Morrison’s restaurant 1.
~ Glen Skinner’s barber shop 4.
~ Dolan Hotel 1,2,4.
~ Rush Hotel 1.
~ Kelly Hotel 5.
~ general stores owned by
Pete Kennedy,
Rush,
Dolan,
Mike Moran,
Adblake’s,
Charles and Maggie (Cosner) Skinner,
Bill Foster then Bill Conrad, then Dexter & Lela Brown, then Juanita (Stutler) Burgett. 1,2,4.
~ Mike Moran’s mortuary 1,4.
~ Cecily Tulley Brice’s millinery shop 1.
~ C.Z. Ruth wholesale house 1.
~ Mike Moran’s skating rink (replaced the wholesale house) 1.
~ Hole in the Hill, a bootleg saloon 1.
~ Mike Moran’s feed store 1.
~ Bill Foster’s feed store 1.
~ Nathan Parmer, Blacksmith 1.
~ Jake Queen, Blacksmith 1.

David Parmer reports the following:
Orlando as reported in the Burnsville Kanawha Banner.
~ In August 1912, O. E. Hollister opened a five lane pin bowling alley.
~ On March 22, 1911 Dr. Stanton Trimble moved into the Sandy Tulley house.
~ In 1913 the Oldaker Mercantile Company was bought out by G. F. Bennett.
~ In 1914, W. B. Foster bought out Bennett.

Photos:
upper right The Wagon Restaurant
middle right Former Dolan Hotel in the 1970s. It had been a private residence for many years. The landscaping had changed, but there had been no external architectural changes.
lower left Mike Moran, mortician and entrepreneur

1. Orlando:Cinderella City... Weston Democrat Wed, Nov 2, 1977. Cited as sources History of West Virginia by J.M Callihan and Orlando residents Macel Parmer Bennett, Martin Sweeney and Edith Blake.
2. A Pictoral History of Old Lewis County: The Crossroads of Central West Virginia by Joy Gilchrist Stalnacker, published by Walsworth Publishing Company
3. Lewis County, West Virginia: Her People and Places by Joy Gilchrist Stalnacker, published by Walsworth Publishing Companyin 2000.
4. My own experience in Orlando in the 1950s through 1980s
5. Newspaper ad: see Nov 30, '06 entry Hotel Kelly

Orlando Quilts

Here are two of the quilts my grandmother Edith (Skinner) Stutler made for her grandchildren. On the right is a Grandma's Flower Garden. One the left is a Log Cabin. I cherish my grandmother's quilts. I trace the the way she joined one fabric tightly to the next, I delight in how the pattern dances across my bed. Even today I can feel against my skin the texture she made as she stiched the feed sack fabric, even as I struggle to remember the texture of her long, heavy, hair pinned up with large combs or how her hands looked as she stringed beans on the front porch.

Grandma used the same fabric and the same patterns as everyone else. I know her quilts have a lot in common with the quilts her sisters and sisters-in-law made and from the quilts of her friends at the Ladies’ Aid Society. But I suspect that Grandma’s quilts are also as different from anyone else's quilts as she was different from anyone else.

If you have a quilt made by an Orlando woman, would you please submit a photo and whatever information you may have about it and her? It would be nice to see different types of quilts from each woman.

Grandma's early quilts (before about 1955, I'd guess) were pieced either entirely from cotton chicken feed sacks (summer quilts) or worn-out woolen clothing, like men’s suits and women’s coats (winter quilts). Later, scraps from store-bought fabric began to appear in Grandma’s quilts. I believe the one pictured above is entirely feed sacks.

Grandma had a limited number of patterns she worked from, including, among others, Pinwheel, Wedding Ring and Log Cabin. She also did some crazy quilts. I remember all the crazy quilts being woolen winter quilts.

Although I have difficulty understanding her choices, Grandma took great care in chosing the colors and patterns she juxtaposed as she pieced the quilt tops, and also in chosing the fabric for the back of the quilt. She sewed the pieces together on a trundle Singer. That is, a pre-electic sewing machine that was powered by the operator’s feet, working a see-saw device. By hand Grandma quilted together the pieced top, filler and solid bottom.

Dick Skinner's Restaurant -A Family Affair

A couple times a week my father would ask Ma, "What kind of apple pie you got for desert?" I learned recently that Pop was remembering Uncle Dick's place in Orlando where apple pie was the only desert that was ever on the menu.

According to a 1977 newspaper article Uncle Dick was George Delbert Skinner (pictured at the left). That article and others mention a lunch wagon. My family only mentioned Uncle Dick's restaurant. Dick's mother Patience (Duvall) Skinner (pictured at the right; my grandmother's grandmother) worked behind the counter.1

The 1977 article says Uncle Dick's brother, Marcellus Earl, aka "Pappy," also worked there. Another source, Pappy's granddaughter Barbara Skinner Joseph, says Earl/Pappy went on to open his own establishment, Brunswick Pool Room, in Weston in 1921. Another or Patience's boys, Edmund (might she have meant Edwin Glen?), was with him for the first couple years. In the years that followed, Pappy's son Lawrence, and then Lawrence's son Larry, worked in the business. The poolroom was a fixture in Weston for 40 years. In 1961 father and son closed the poolroom and son, with Pappy's support, opened Skinner's Grill, which was still in operation in 1977, operated by Pappy's grandson Larry with the support of his dad Lawrence.2 I wonder if they are open today and I wonder if they serve apple pie.

Going back to Dick Skinner's in Orlando, I know the daughter of another brother, Gideon, also worked there, because that was my grandmother, Edith Skinner, who later married Oras Stutler. She worked at Uncle Dick's in the 19-teens. That's where she fell in love for the first time. When I was in my teens grandma told me how she had been head-over-heels crazy about a fellow, but Uncle Dick and some of the others broke them up by telling her something awful about her beau. Grandma never told me her suitor's name, or what her family had against him. But here's the romantic part: this mystery man came courting Grandma in March, 1968, one year to the day after Grandpa died. Grandma was 71 years old. Her old flame had a nice farm in PA by that time. He had never married and he had followed Grandma's life over the decades through a subscription to the Lewis County Democrat. He knew when all her kids were born and when they came to visit, knew when her oldest daughter, Virgina, had died and most every important event in Grandma's life. Grandma spurned his late courtship, but her then-teenage grandaughters could never understand why.

Back to Uncle Dick and the restaurant again. My sister, Jackie, tells me Uncle Dick's restaurant was located in the building with Mike Moran's general store, with an entrance on the side. I don't know the years of operation, but I'd guess it opened between 1912 and 1916. The Weston Democrat article says most everything in Orlando folded during the 1920s because of changes in the railroad lines but I suspect Uncle Dick's ran into the 1930s, because it was a small, family-run business with very little overhead, and because my father, who didn't get to WV until he'd met my mom, had either been to Uncle Dick's place, or it was at least still a vivid memory in the family when he got there. My sister remembers the decaying building in the 1940s. I don't remember it in the mid 1950s. Uncle Dick would have been 65 in 1934. I understand he lived up Three Lick until he died at the age of 92 in 1961.

1. Orlando:Cinderella City... . Weston Democrat Wed, Nov 2, 1977.
2. Lewis County West Virginia: Her People and Places ed. Joy Gilchrist-Stalnaker, Hacker's Creek Pioneer Descendants, page 181.

Orlando, West Virginia

Orlando, West Virginia is one of hundreds of "wide spots in the road" deep in the hills of the Mountain State. Orlando's story reflects over two hundred years of American history, from a unique and interesting perspective. What is more, this "wide spot in the road" is woven into the roots that feed and bind together the descendants of Oil Creek's settlers who are now spread across America.

You are invited. . . to share stories, facts, thoughts, documents and photos about Orlando, Oil Creek and Clover Fork, from yesterday and today. Please ask questions and question what you find here.

Together our memories, photos and facts may be a worthy reflection of the life and times of a place and a people. Orlando’s story will be revealed as more and more of us share our memories, materials and ideas, as more branches of our family tree are represented.