Vernon and Velma

Vernon Ephraim Rosamond, firstborn son of Ed and Dullie Woodard Rosamond, born at Moore, Arkansas in 1919 on the old Gregory Place, now lives "out on the mountain" on the newly paved Old Highway 123 (the Judy road) with Velma, his bride of over 60 years. Now in the year two thousand...Vernon is our senior Woodard cousin still living on top of the mountain we all call home. We treasure the wealth of memories he shares with all of us.

When they built Highway 123, Vernon says he was around nine years old and his parents lived at the Mt. Judea tower site...this new road came in about one fourth mile from there. The Old road is still there, going down to Sam's Throne. In recent years, when he served as an Ecotour guide for people to Sam's Throne, Vernon and Jack Seaman walked seven miles, parking their truck at Hwy 123. He says people drive around in four wheelers and travel all over the mountains, rock climbing the tall bluffs. You can walk to one quarter mile to the top of the bluff, but it is steep and rugged ground.

He tells of the time when State 123 Highway was being built by Barnett Cheatham way back in 1845, then called the Old Cheatham Trail, traveling along an Indian trail to around Sam's Throne and down the mountain to Big Creek where it followed the creek. On top of the mountain, the road passes by the Woodard Pond and winds its way on over to join Highway Seven at Lurton.

This first wagon road had the trees removed and the biggest rocks, so a team and wagon with iron wheels could get over it. In the twenties with the Model T's around, it was graveled by the State Highway department. Vernon remembers the 1925 road camp down in the woods below the old Rosamond place. They got water for the camp and to build the road from Grandpa Woodard's pond. Our Uncle George Daniel worked on this road. People came from Bass and Cave Creek to work, Shaddock was boss of this job.

Early, Vernon worked in the timber with the Forest Service, leaving Arkansas to work and retire from Douglas Aircraft in Tulsa. Returning to enjoy the mountain and to again work with the Forest Service in recent years, he has served as a guide for the EcoTours Program...with Nature Walks to Pedestal Rocks, Sam's Throne and other great places. He knows many stories of early days of Newton County...from his own experience.

When he was two years old, they moved to Schuler Point. (the old log house and well were still there in 1994). The Forest Service has now planted pine trees on it. In February 1928 they moved to Ft. Douglas Ranger Station where his dad worked for the forest service.

Ed and Dullie later moved back to Tarlton and lived in the old log Isaac Freeman home there on Highway 123 next to the Tarlton Cemetery while their new home was being built. Vernon attended Tarlton School in 1924 and 1925, later going to school at Lurton and to Deer.(In this same old abandoned log house, Iva and Errol Haynes had their firstborn child in a February snowstorm of 1928...Her name is Colleen.)

After our annual Woodard Reunion, in June of the year 2000, a young cousin Kevin Daniel from Little Rock, Arkansas brought his bride up to have Preacher Vernon marry them out on top of a bluff down the mountain from his rock home. They walked out to the top of the bluff overlooking Big Creek Valley and said their wedding vows under a beautiful sky...with only Vernon and Velma and a video person to witness this...

When I heard of this wedding, it reminded me of the day Vernon Rosamond and Velma Awbrey married on September 17, 1935. All our family walked over the road to attended the wedding which took place near the same location as this one...but in the back yard of the 'Old Awbrey Log Home' on the road to Mt. Judea, near the 'look off' for Sams Throne.

At the time, aunts, uncles and cousins gathered on Grandma Woodard's porch for the two mile walk over to the Awbrey Place where the wedding was to take place in their back yard. Vernon's sister Wynonia and I were little seven year old girl cousins, giggling and making jokes as we walked down the dusty road with the entourage of family, on our way to the wedding.

Since hardly anyone in our family had a car, we walked most every place. Joining us for the walk to the wedding was Brother Dan Hefley and his wife Ollie and some of their daughters. Preacher Dan was to marry them in the yard behind the old log home on the Awbrey Place...

In our party was Grandma Martha Ketcherside Woodard, Vernon's parents, my mother Iva Haynes and Vernon's sisters Edna and Floye, and about twenty other Aunts and Cousins set out to walk together the two miles down old Highway 123 to the afternoon wedding there on the Awbrey Place.

I think my Uncle George and Aunt Nellie Daniel probably drove their old Model A over there and carried Grandpa Woodard and the oldest and maybe, the babies of the family usually got to ride with him. Uncle George Daniel was the original Mr. Fix it. He could take a wheelbar and put a motor on it and make a car out of it. Sometimes it was hard to tell what it had been in its first life. But, they drove on over to the wedding.

One reason I remember the walk so well was that Grandma Woodard and Aunt Dullie (Vernon's mother) sniffled and cried all the way. Grandma, wiping her eyes on her apron and blowing her nose on the ground...(This fascinated me that a lot of people could do this, now I realize it was probably as sanitary as the handkerchiefs we put in our pocket). When I asked Mother why Grandma was crying and she said, "Oh, she just always does that at weddings." We ran playing in the ditches as we went along...running ahead of the others down the dusty road.

As we walked in sight of the Awbrey log house, a lot of people were gathering..talking and visiting...and when Brother Dan and Aunt Ollie Hefley came there to perform the ceremony in the back yard of the log house, chairs were set up for grownups underneath the trees. Tables for food set up farther out in the edge of the orchard with dishes and baskets waiting for the wedding meal. We children all sat on the ground in front of our parents, waiting for the wedding to begin.

As they came out the back door of the house, the bride was beautiful and the groom was beaming. Vernon and Velma were the oldest children of the Rosamonds and the Awbreys and everyone was there to celebrate. They stood facing us as we watched. Brother Dan Hefley read from his Bible and prayed over them...and us. This was the first wedding I ever saw and it made an impression on my spirit and I am sure, of others there. I never forgot that.

After the wedding, the young couple moved into a family cabin beside the Woodard Pond, across the road from Grandma Woodard's house. My Grandma would sit and churn so she could watch out the window and tell us about Vernon kissing Velma over the front gate every morning as he went off with his dinner bucket to work in the woods. She said he would start off and then go back and "Buss her again, just a-bussin her...I'd thank he was gone and he'd go back and do hit again." This also made an impression on me.

As the forties and the war came along, the Rosamond family and Vernon's family moved to Oklahoma where Vernon worked in an aircraft factory until retirement. With retirement, Vernon and Velma have moved back to the mountain, built a wonderful rock home...there on the very same spot where they married and the old log house stood. They have a large family, many grandchildren and a loving family of friends and neighbors.

By now, most of the old folks have gone on and we are the old folks they used to talk about, with family stories and memories. Patriarch of our family, Vernon is the preacher, farmer, maker of split oak baskets. His greatest love is his Lord and his Velma. Most all our family have moved away from the mountain and it is such a comfort to have them still there... When we come home to the mountain, they welcome us for a visit or a family reunion. So we can go home again...

AND HAVE OUR FAMILY WEDDINGS!!

Thank You Colleen Haynes Rongey for sharing the above...