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I also, grew up in Paintsville and I can remember that
wonderful bakery, you
could smell the aroma walking down the street. I also
remember going before
school to Tigers and buying wax lips, finger nails, and sour
straws.
I remember the flood of 1957, I was about 8 years old. I
remember my uncle,
Lowell Garfield Stambaugh rowing a boat from his house on Maple
Street to
our house on Turkey Nob Hill. His sandals were so wet that
my mom (Cora Lee
Blair Cantrell) put them on the open oven door of our gas stove
to dry,
forgetting about them, she later found them burnt to a crisp.
I remember the tragedy of the school bus that plugged into the
Big Sandy
River in Floyd County and killing I believe 15 children. I
remember sitting
with my granny (Mary Lou Jackson Blair Castle) and listening to
the radio
(WSIP) covering the story. They told how the river was
being drug looking
for the bodies and how people from all over the county brought
food for the
families and the rescuers that converged on the river bank.
I remember
being so sad and also afraid. A song was written and sung
by Ralph Stanley
about the bus wreck called, "No School Bus In Heaven".
I remember the day JFK was assassinated, everyone I knew was so
sad. We
stayed glued to the television for days it seemed.
I remember going to see President Lyndon B. Johnson and Lady Bird
Johnson in
Paintsville after JFK was assassinated. I wanted to see the
President so
bad and my mother would not allow me to go to Paintsville to see
him. But
after my mother had gone to work I went into town anyway, boy did
I get into
trouble when my Mother got home and found out that I had
disobeyed her.
I grew up in a town where children called adults Mr. and Mrs.,
where
children had respect for others, where people always said, "good
morning",
"good day", where neighbor helped neighbor, where you
could sleep with your
doors open in the summer and not be afraid, where families got
together for
Sunday dinner and all was well. I miss that town and those
people and all
the fun times I had growing up there.
I left Paintsville,
Kentucky in 1967
when I was 17 years old, I am now 51 years old
and I still call
Paintsville
home. I live in a suburb of Columbus, Ohio (Gahanna, Ohio)
and my friends
tease me when I tell them I am going down home to see my parents
(Levi
Cantrell and Cora Lee Blair Cantrell) by saying, Rose is going to
the Holy
Land.
Yes, to me Paintsville, Kentucky is my Holy Land.
I could go on and on, I think I could write a book.
Rose Mary Cantrell Bellar Chase
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