last night I laid in bed half the night thinking about what I have may have missed. I often think, it’s right in front of my face, but I just can’t see it. My mom used to say, “Hidden in plain sight!” Why can’t I find the missing pieces?

My 1 -2  & 3X Great-Grandmothers Teareasy, Jane and Margaret aka “Peggie” Montgomery”s are just those people, the ones that keep me up at night. I have been asked numerous times, why Peggie unassumingly kept her maiden name? I’ve never found where she ever married, but I did read once, that she claimed to have been married three times. Which could have been possible, I guess, but I can’t find a record of even one marriage.

Jane’s death certificate says that her father’s name was James Howard. I know… I know… the old joke… and have quoted it myself on more than one occasion, the one about, “If Grandpa had married Grandma, we’d all be Howard’s,” and it’s probably true, who knows. But anyway, Peggie always listed herself as a Montgomery. I have never found her death certificate, which is strange since she died while living at my uncle’s home. There should be some kind of a record somewhere, I would think, so I’ll keep looking.

The only Magoffin County Howard, I haven’t placed on the tree anywhere is the doctor James Howard born abt 1810 that traveled through Magoffin County, Kentucky and is listed one census. So I’ll keep plugging away.

I do have a picture of Jasper Newton Adkins my Papaw Kell’s dad and Teareasy Clarinda Montgomery aka Teresa his mother, but I still need to verify it’s them in the picture before I post it. Once it’s posted (I know your as anxious as I was to see it) it goes down as gospel. So as soon as it’s authenticated, you’ll see it. I have one of App’s & Delilah Adkins but the same thing there – got to get it repaired and then authenticated. Sorry peeps, but that’s the way it’s got to be.

Now my mysterious Grandma Jane Montgomery still puzzles me from many reasons, as I have said many times in the past and now just keep repeating it – so that something may click some where in my head; was born the illegitimate child of James Reuben Howard and Margaret B Montgomery aka “Peggie Montgomery”. Now, James and Peggie were never married. I’m also not clear if he was James Reuben or Reuben James Howard? The two had several children together, so I know they loved one another, very much.

So why can’t I find some kind of record of her birth? or life? other than census records? No one remembers anything about her. How could she just go completely untalked about?

Every old newspaper had, for the lack of a better term, a gossip column, disguised as current event or something. I get scrapbook pages emailed to me by a McGuire/Craft cousin from the 30’s and I’m so thankful to see them. My grandpa’s name is always spelled wrong, he hated that, but it’s cool to read it anyway, and I always forward them on to my uncle, I’m sure he enjoys reading about it as much as I.

But to be perfectly honest, I no longer trust the information I read in a newspaper, after reading a recent obit and not one life fact or one shred of personal information was correct. Not even his own father’s name. I just shook my head and the sad part of it was, the reporter never corrected it. So it will stand throughout history – WRONG!

But at the very least, it would at least be a place to start, so if you’re looking for a hobby, please stalk the Magoffin and Morgan counties Newspaper archives to see whatever rare jewel aka rubbish (gossip) they may have listed on them.

I can handle whatever it may turn up. It’s all history anyway. I just have to KNOW!

Thanks as always,
Sheila Jean Adkins Metcalf

PS: I’m tired and I’m writing this off the top of my head, so there may be a few mistakes here and there, feel free to point them out to me and I’ll correct them after my nap.

Motivation is a fire from within. If someone else tires to light that fire under you, chances are it will burn very briefly. ~ Stephen R Covey