This article, written by Todd Preston, President of the Magoffin County Historical Society, was taken from the July 31, 2008 issue of THE SALYERSVILLE INDEPENDENT newspaper.

            I finally made it to the Pricey Rocks!  Hubert Blanton and I have been planning a trip there all summer.  Elder John Blanton of Salyersville and Elder C. J. Murray of Lexington visited Friday and took a tour of the Pioneer Village.  John, a Magoffin County Muzzleloader, helped construct the Pioneer Village a few years ago.  He now is with the Kentucky State Police.

            We helped Mr. Murray with his genealogy and it turns out he is related to most folks in the Rockhouse area, especially the McGuire clan.

            Mr. Murray has recently inherited land in the head of Pricey and I was invited to go with them the next day when they expected David Tackett and Gary Ward to join them with four-wheelers.  Of course, I was eager to go.

            I went to Trace to see if Hubert wanted to go but couldn’t find him at home so I went on to John’s.  They were getting ready and soon the Tackett’s came so we went to the mouth of Pricey and unloaded the four-wheelers.  I hopped on behind John and we went to Rock Lick and down to the Seymour Howard home.  I had explored the area the last time I was there. At that time tobacco was growing all around it, now the Kudzu vines have it obscured.

            Soon the rest of the group came and they had picked up a couple more ATV’s and a dirt bike.  We traveled as far as we could up the hollow called “Stonecoal”.  They got out maps showing the homes of yesteryear and came to the conclusion that the thing to do was head for the Pricey Rocks so away we went in that direction.  Now, if my hair hadn’t already been gray, that trip would have done it instantly!

            One of the strange aspects in approaching the rocks is that the land is not very rough and rocky then all of a sudden, one comes up on a seventy-five foot high rock blocking the trail!  You can climb up the rock in places by pulling up on bushes. When you get to the top you see where it appears an earthquake or some such happening has split large sections off the main boulder and there are fifty or more feet between the chasms.  Now, I want to make a return trip when the leaves have fallen.  John Blanton has offered to take me any time and also go to visit the Cisco Cemetery soon!

            Magoffin County has several sites such as this that could be tourist attractions if they were more accessible and if there was a pick-up load of cans picked up off the land. 

            I’ve been told the barely accessible four-wheeler trails were automobile accessible a few years ago.

            I’ve just completed reading the book “Salt and Pepper Memories” by Puncheon Creek’s “first lady” Patty Auxier.  I didn’t read all the recipes but the folklore and genealogy as well as the stories of growing up in yesteryear gave my old television a much needed rest.  Patty has done an excellent job!

            This put me to thinking…why hasn’t Belsey Connelley, M. F. Rice, Charles Rowe, Jimmie Allen and this list could go on and on, might could even include Ol’ Todd, done the same?

            For instance, a couple was in our facility yesterday searching the John Hale-Margaret Trusty family.  I soon found they had lived in the College Heights area so I took Mr. Reeder, husband of Angeline Hale, to that area where he ended up seeking info from Belsey Connelley.  Belsey not only showed him where the John Hale land was but also told who owned it before John Hale and the several owners to the present day.  Of course, we also got an overview of everyone living in Salyersville in that time period and the best part is now Mr. Reeder’s name, address, age, telephone number, etc. is set down in Belsey’s mind and in his daily diary!

            We don’t claim bragging rights and even though we don’t exactly keep a diary like Belsey, we have captured and put into print a “big bunch” or shall we say “gobs” of information down through the years.

            You may wonder what “big bunch” and “gobs” means.  Well, it means “pert nigh” and that means “pretty near”.  Pretty near means simply “nearly all”.  Who will volunteer to translate all the old “sayings” into modern English?  It’s a good thing that teachers Nina Kelley Brown Flint or Maxine Carpenter Arnett didn’t catch one using this  type of English or they would quickly have received an “F”. (Smile)

            Joking aside, it was a part of yesteryear’s way of speech and our forefathers were not all Irish but from about every country on the globe, so this mixture became what was to be called the mountain way of speech. 

            Duane Mathias (dcmathias @windstream.net) wrote that he is interested in finding more info on the Praters and Dixons.  First, we want to tell him to contact Val McKenzie who is an expert genealogist on the Dixon family, the first family to build a home in Paintsville, Johnson Co. KY.  Their burial site is now known as the “Old Town Cemetery”.

            Henry Dixon b. ca. 1774 in NC married Joyce -?- b. 1774 VA and they were the parents of Henry Dixon b. 1822.  Henry married Jane Stafford b. 1832 and they were the parents of Benjamin F. Dixon b. 1855 and Nancy E. Prater b. 1856. Nancy was a dau of John Prater b. 1814 and a gr/dau of Archibald Prater and Sarah Fugate.

            Benjamin F. Dixon and Nancy were the parents of Tobe Dixon b. 1888 who married Una Nell May. Una Nell was born ca. 1894, the dau of Harmon May and Nancy Jane Adams.  Tobe and Una were the parents of Dallas Denver Dixon b. 1918. Dallas m. 1^st to Wilma Workman b. 1924.   

            Ernie Nichols (mountianman95 @yahoo.com) wrote to ask if we had any info on Dock Spradlin or his son Marvin Spradlin or siblings.

            Dock Spradlin at age 40 married Frankie Gibson age 16. Dock was the son of Mart Spradlin and Tilda Jackson. Frankie was the dau of Green Gipson and Martha Hale. Funeral home records show that Marvin Spradlin was born 10 Jul 1921 and died 30 Aug 1978 and is buried in the Taylor Gipson Cemetery.  I did not see a marker for Marvin when I copied the cemetery a couple of years ago.

            Marvin Spradlin was the son of Dock Spradlin and Frankie Gipson.  He married in Aug 1941 to Versie Cole.

            The 1930 Magoffin census lists Dock Spradlin, age 51, married 15 years to Frankie Gipson.  Their children were Marvin age 9, Orvil age 7, Ollie J. age 5 and Rollie age 3.  The 1920 Magoffin census lists Green Gipson age 40, wife Martha (Hale) age 37 with children Mary, Taylor, Kinley, Frankie age 15, Lucy, Jeff, Duby.  Dock Spradlin is listed in this household as a servant and saw mill laborer.

            We got a good rain Tuesday which was much needed by farmers and gardeners but it came with extreme winds so I’ve had to spend the last couple of hours cleaning up the maple tree limbs that were blown out of our old trees in the back yard and along the river bank.

My daughter Jessica and I have taken time to give a good cleaning to the Pioneer Village log homes in preparation for the 30^th annual Founder’s Days the last week of August.  Ye’ all come!

            Col. Morris O. Fletcher, 7065 Meisner Road, China, MI  48054 continues to work toward securing a marker for “Old” George Fletcher, the progenitor of the vast majority of eastern Kentucky Fletchers.  Let’s pitch in and help him with this project, you may write to him or come in to our library and leave a donation. It will be properly recorded and used to pay on the George Fletcher monument.