Greenbrier independent. [volume] (Lewisburg, Va. [W. Va.]) 1859-1980, 1916-07-21
PoCAHONTAs THEN AND NOW.
An Interesting Contribution. Recall
ing Scenes and Incidents of
BoyhOOd Days.

am pleased to comply with your
request to write some recollections
of Pocahontas. my native county. for
publication in the anniversary num-
Der of The Independent, though am
not pleased with the implication that
am old enough to indulge in inter-
esting Renaissance.
The Independent and / were
born not far apaJt in either time or
place. Our youthful days were passed
in the eventfu1 period of reconstruc-
ton following the dread strife born
of human frality and fraught with
human sacrifice, known as the Civil
War. was not old enough to realize
at the tine what It all meant; nor
fully to appreciate the privations our
people were called upon to endure.
AS far back as can remember
with any dfstinctness The Independ-
ent was weekly visitor at our home.
And a welcome visitor II was, fol in
that day newspapers were not circu-
sseted in Pocahoptas county as COM
monty as they are now. The house
hold that was supplied with The
Greenbrier Independent, the New
York Weekly Tribune. current issue
of the Hagerstown Almanac and the
family Bible was then in very gen.
e1ous state of literary preparedness.
We read them in the order named |;
sc21e getting rs far as the Bible, 9TH
ers indeed barely through The In
dcpcndnt.
l had better chance as a boy to
become familiar with current publ
cations than most boys of my, own
neighborhood, for my good mother
was the Postmistress at Dunmore for
many years, and it was my custom to
steal into the little room. which ther
represented the Federal building by
day and sleeping quarters by night,
and look over her shoulder while
she sat on a green split-tottom chair
distributing the mail. There was no
rural free delivery then. Sometimes
the papers addressed to oIr neigh
bors would remain in that little bed
chamber for ten days or two weeks
before they were called for; mean
while made their acquaintance.
Dunmore was at that time about
ffty-five miles from the nearest rail-
road station; that being Millboro,
Virginia; though our mail came prin-
cipalIy from Ronceverte, via. Lewis
burg. Academy and Huntersville.
And it came to us but once week.
Still there was compensation in that,
for when it came so infrequently and
so slowly we got less bad news than
we get now, nor did we get it as soon.
Every Monday, when the creeks were
not past fording, the United States
government, represented by Billy
McCarty and an old mule. threw a
muddy mail pouch inside the door;
then the family and some of the
neighbors waited anxiously to learn
what news it contained. Unless there
happened to be letter with black
border, we first tore open the hurdle
containing The Independent and
greedfly deyoured its contents.
Strange to say. in the innocence of
tie simple life of that time, we be-
l;eved all we read in the papers. Ev-
erybody knows better now.
All my early political controversies
were settled by an appeal to the edi-
torial columns of The Independent,
the sage utterances of which no man
dared question. 1t was due to its
teachings more perhaps than to any
other influence, that in my boyhood
days had the deep conviction that
corn cribs should be pad-locked in