A Wonderful Trip

A friend and I took a trip to Clintwood, VA. This is not an auspicious place, but a good one.  It is the county seat of Virginia's "baby" county, which means it was the last one to be created in the late 1800s by taking parts of two adjacent counties in Southwestern Virginia (Russell and Wise) on the Kentucky border. 

We took the trip because it is the setting of my latest novel and I wanted to visit it. The Director of Jonnie B. Deel Librarian, Kim Rose, probably wondered why this random woman from Georgia was calling her about having a book event in July, but she set up a wonderful time for us. I met the ladies who run the Dickenson County Historical Society and they gave us a tour of their archives, and it is a labor of love.  We also stopped at my grandmother's home place and the "Natural Tunnel State Park," and I got to see how much the little town I visited as a child in the 1960s has grown.  

The first photo below is from 1930 or earlier, and it was, I think, something that led the ladies to believe I really did have roots there (along with my mother's lovely high school diploma from one of the high schools in 1946). One of the women from the historical society said, "We have that picture but we don't know who it is." "That's my grandfather, James Otis Fraley, who died in 1930 in a train accident, leaving my grandmother with three small children. He worked for the lumber company."

My friend and travel companion Mary Sheetz is a skilled photographer and took these photos of me interacting with the visitors. It was a blessed time. Anyone who buys one of my books is gifting me with the compliment of trust. They do not have to buy one of them, and they are saying they trust me that the book is worth having and reading.

The ladies in the photo below are the librarians. Librarians rock!