MAN! Today has been the perfect Sunday so far! Hunter and I visited Grace Chapel for the first time in a long time. It was the most beautiful worship service I've been to in a while. I've never heard a congregation sing so loud and at the top of their lungs- so genuinely. I could hear hundreds and hundreds of hearts who have such a passionate love for the Lord. I felt so blessed. Then we ate an awesome lunch at Calypso Cafe and tried to decide what to do with the rest of our afternoon. Bummed that movie times weren't working out for us, we headed back home. I remembered the amazing little adventure I went on earlier in August (when I went to watch the sunrise and stumbled upon an amazing old shed and cemetery) and told Hunter how much I'd like for him to see it! So we changed into old jeans and tennis shoes and headed that way.
First, I took him to the shed. We explored as far as what felt safe. There was barbed wire and rusty nails everywhere. We kept seeing these tin signs that said "Our Own HARDWARE." I would have loved to take one, but they were buried too deep in the ground :(
Here are some more pics of the shed. You can see that it was built out of tree branches instead of nicely-cut 2x4's. That indicated to me that it's pretty old!
These really cool horse shoes were hanging all along the top, as well as other metal objects that looked like they belonged to different kinds of machinery. Between the tin signs, horse shoes, old refrigerator, axels and dolly's, we decided the shed had something to do with a hardware store.
Then we walked down to the cemetery. There was a memorial that was dedicated in 2002, but when we took a closer look at the older grave stones, not one of them dated after 1900!!! I was so excited. The stones bared the family name "Blair." I concluded that the surrounding land belonged to the family in the 1800's and they all died off, which is why the land had not been kept up.
But my most pressing question I kept asking was "But where's their house????"
No really, Hunter got tired of me asking that and finally said "There's no way that an abandoned house built in the 1800's survived that long! It probably got blown away."
Not good enough for me!
"But then how did the sheds survive and not the house? Their house is around here somewhere."
There are big piles of trees everwhere. It kinda made me sad, realizing that these trees are over 100 years old. I really hope this land is preserved.
This is another shed about 20 feet from the cemetery. Hunter and I tried to get to it, but the weeds were too thick. It looks like a horse shed. Again, I wondered "Ok, hardware shed. Cemetery. Horse shed. Where's the house???"
I thought it was really cool that the old telephone poles are still standing. They look like they were made from trees stripped of their branches. So! Here's the telephone pole that wired to the house, which is.... where?
These are the goodies I've collected from the shed so far (yes, I plan to go back!!)
So after our exploration, I went home and researched the family name on the internet for over an hour. AND THIS IS WHAT I FOUND:
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~maury/cemetery/BlairCem/BlairCemList.htm
Copy and paste the link. Read it and click on the tabs! It's very interesting! I was so excited to finally find a history! BUT I discovered what happened to the house. The land was owned by George D. Blair who was a prosperous farmer and an early settler to Spring Hill (at the time called Brittain, TN). Blair was very active in his community and church and extremely giving. He donated land and a church- which we found is STILL standing somewhere on Jim Warren road (can't wait for that adventure!!!). SO HIS HOUSE used to be seen from Port Royal road BUT.... was bulldozed in 2008. They say all that's left standing is an old millstone and I think I know the exact location- it's not far from our neighborhood. But I cannot believe the city of Spring Hill just bulldozed an incredible piece of history. No wonder why there is an old barn and a HUGE corn field across from our neighborhood! After researching, I realized how important George D. Blair was to Spring Hill. Not only did his flourishing farm help boost the town's economy, but it sounds like he was such a generous man who raised a stable family and gave without hesitation to his community.
All that to say, I know I'm a nerd, but I thought it was all so cool. When the weather cools down and the tall grass falls over and the bugs die off, I want to bring my friends and family to what's left of the Blair family's land.
I still can't believe they just bulldozed their house down...........
