Small Town - Big Hearts

I was afraid we were going to have to high tail it out of Quanah before we did what we came here to do because of a lack of rooms... As it turned out, we got to stay...
I got up early, put on my best overall jumper and went bear footed out too the lobby to speak with the manager.... a good'ol boy who moved here to take care of his mother when she became ill and now that she has passed is counting the days until he leaves next month... anyway... I talked to him about vacancy percentages and overbooking percentages.... he gave me a sly smile as the chew washed across his teeth and said "well, I think I might be able to find something for you" . And he did! So today we headed out to the cemetary looking for my moms grandmother.... I was surprised at how large the cemetary was for the size of this town... I believe there are more people in the cemetary than in town. Oh and t here was a huge grave side funeral going on... must have what was left of town! LOL...








Once at the cemetary we discovered the person who kept the plat map and all the records was in town at City Hall... So we headed back to town. I had to chuckle when we pulled up. It would seem city hall is now housed in the old John Deer / farm supply building. We easliy found the person we needed to speak to and she was more than happy to help. She looked up the information, copied a plat map for us and marked it on the map. So we headed back to the cemetary... Sure enough therre she was Josie E. Kidd, burried in the Leonard family plot. Josie's daughter Viola had married in to the Leonard family and Josie was burried right next to Viola and had a beautiful headstone


While tooling around t he cemetary I also took these shots among others:





Once we leave the cemetary, my mom decides she wants to drive around town to see if she can find any familiar sites. My mom hasn't been here for 66 years... so I'll let you guess how many familiar sites she found! But we did meet this adorable couple



Pat has lived here all her life... and they knew some of my mom's kin.

we also went to the courthouse to see if we could find an exact date of death formy mom's grandmother since the headstone only has the year on it. I spoke to the sweetest gal named Tina in the county recorders office. She wasn't able to find any information on Josie, but did fins marriage information for one of my moms Uncles and told be if she still had the original certificate she would give it to me. She went in the back and came out with three bundles of yellowed certificates, unfortunately none for JL and Ruby Kidd... how cool was that of her to look and offer!



This has got to be the friendliest place that I have ever visited. Every single person we see makes some acknowledgement to us, whether it be a wave from across the street or a smile and a hello in passing. And the folks that we have had the pleasure to chat with have been more than helpful, often going far and above what was asked in an attempt to help us. This town is small and getting smaller everyday... but the people have the biggest hearts.

Here are a few more shots from today:



















We did tons more today, but I think I've talked your ear off enough for today... Off to Seagoville, just outside of dallas in the Morning to visit my moms sister... until then ... peace out!