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Community News

Potts Camp News
Dale Hollingsworth

Eugene, former pastor of Temperance Hill, and Peggy Blankenship, celebrate 50th anniversary

Lynn Goolsby and his mother, Joyce Clayton, drove to Milan, Tenn., on Saturday, Aug. 7, to attend the 50th wedding anniversary of Bro. Eugene and Peggy Blankenship. He was a former pastor of Temperance Hill Baptist Church for seven years, where they are members.

Happy days are here again at Potts Camp School, across the road from my home, and Mary Reid School.

We are proud of our wonderful teachers and schools.

We send our deepest love and sympathy to the family of Curtis Gurley of Byhalia in his death. He was born in Potts Camp. We remember his parents, Wilburn Gurley and Dorothy Shaw Gurley, our friends who lived here.

Reid’s Gift MB Church and Mary Reid School were named for my great- aunt, Mary Potts Reid. She gave the land for the right-of-way, so the Frisco Railroad would come this way, and named the depot Potts Camp, in memory of her dad, Col. E.F. Potts (first settler). She also gave land for Potts Camp Cemetery and for churches and schools for both races.

Thoughts

I. Thank you God for saving my soul. Thank you, God, for making me whole. Thank you, God, for giving to me thou great salvation, so full and free.

II. O give us homes built firmly on the Savior, where Christ is counsel, head and guide. Where every child is taught His love and favor and gives his heart to Christ, the crucified.

III. Oh, God of love, you are so great; we are so small. Ask me not my race or creed. Just take me in my hour of need and let me know you love me, too, and that I am a part of you.

IV. And some day, may man realize that all the earth, the seas, the skies and the earth, belong to God, who made us all, the rich, the poor, the great, the small, and in God’s Holy sight, no man is yellow, black or white.

Thoughts

One of God’s special blessings is the sound of music! Who can sing or listen to a spiritual hymn and not feel the presence of God, or who can listen to a patriotic song and not feel the love of our country?

I learned the power of music as a child, sitting around the fireplace listening to my dad play his French harp (by ear). We had an old Victrola in the hall with many favorite records we played over and over. When my dad went to St. Louis to the railroad hospital every year, he always brought back one of Jimmy Rodgers’ famous records. We played “All Around the Water Tank” so much, I felt like I was there beside him “just waiting for a train.”

Happy birthday to Mary Jarrett on Aug. 22; to Elinor Edwards on Aug. 25. Happy birthday to Don Randolph on Aug. 26; to Hanna Goolsby on Aug. 27; to Betty Fincher and Tom Dickey on Aug. 30. Happy birthday to Nancy G. Green on Aug. 27; to Jennifer Rowland on Aug. 28 and Zac Wilson on Aug. 29.

Prayer List

Pray for those who have lost loved ones. Pray for Gussie Davis of Hickory Flat, who has returned home from the hospital but is seriously ill.

Henry Tutor was my neighbor and friend for many years. He is now in Ripley Nursing Home.

Charles Henderson, also a special friend for years, is ill.

Others who need prayers – Connie Work, Betty Fincher, Mary Jarrett, Pauline Huchens, Diane Clayton and G.R. and Ruby Thompson.

Memories and History
A True Story

Several years ago, we had a terrible ice storm. Trees had fallen near my home and others, and broken the light wires. One morning our pastor, Rev. Ray Daniel, drove up in his pick-up and got out his power saw. People saw the pastor working, so they came to help. Soon, I had my lights back on. He wouldn’t take any money. He took the wood to people who burned wood.

That summer, we had a revival at our church. The evangelist was at Flick’s Place when 32 United Methodist women were brought there after their bus had broken down. They were from Alabama. The evangelist called Rev. Daniel and he made several trips in the church van to take them to our Potts Camp United Methodist Church, where it was cool. They were from an Alabama United Methodist Church. They stayed there all day.

Bro. Daniel helped them, spoke to them and let them play the organ and sing. They almost had a revival.

About 6 p.m., a Greyhound Bus arrived from Birmingham, Ala., to pick them up. We were having a revival in our church that week, and people were arriving for supper.

One of the Alabama women wrote to the Mississippi Methodist Advocate, “I just wanted the Bishop to know that in Potts Camp, Miss., there is a man of God who found strangers on the road. He took them in and cared for them, then sent them on their way with the sure knowledge that through God’s grace all’s right with the world. He showed his love for God and for people.”

We will never forget Rev. Ray Daniel and the Potts Camp United Methodist Church.

Did you know?
Richard Simmons

Preparing for a miracle

Everyone was exited about seeing the cannon arrive at Framingham. At the American Headquarters in Cambridge the coming and going was enough to support that something was in the offing. This alone was enough to cause a great deal of activity within the ranks. General Washington and his troops had waited for a conflict with the enemy. Would there be an all out assault on Boston, or would they begin the erection of works on the heights of Dorchester, or both?

On January 27, the bitter cold continued, with the thermometer dropping to 4 degrees, then to 1 degree the next day. Even at this temperature the ice was too thin for an ice bridge to carry an army. General Washington and some officers, including Henry Knox, went to examine the approach to Dorchester. They dismounted their horses and were proceeding on foot when two mounted British officers came at them at full gallop. They ran and scampered for their lives and successfully escaped being exposed. Later a British raiding party crossed the ice to Dorchester and burned several farm houses.

Washington convened his council of war seeking an agreement to attack. The council marked the fourth time Washington had called for an attack on Boston. Once again they said no. Another plan was devised to lure the British out to attack the colonials. Washington was disappointed. They then set to preparing to take post on Dorchester. Decision made, there was no holding back.

The plan was to occupy the Heights on a single night, before the British knew what was happening, just like Bunker Hill. The plan included the hauling of the guns from Fort Ticonderoga into place. The problem was the hills were 112 feet in elevation. The ground was frozen and would be impenetrable. Digging ditches and throwing up the breastworks would be almost impossible, at least in one night and without noise.

The solution was a highly sophisticated scheme. They would fabricate the fortifications elsewhere out of sight, then with massed manpower and oxen, haul, along with heavy cannon, to the Heights of Dorchester, where all would have to be in place and ready for action before daylight. A farmer named Rufus Putman had read of such a plan and took the idea to his superior, Colonel Richard Gridley, and to Henry Knox. The three went to see Washington and in no time hundreds of men were at work building chandeliers, great timber frames that could be filled with “screwed hay” and brushwood called fascines. Washington also wanted barrels filled with earth set in rows in front of the parapets, to add to the appearance of strength. The barrels could also be rolled down the hills on the advancing enemy.

To divert the enemy and drown out the noise of the work parties, Washington planned to precede the operation with night barrages of artillery fire from Roxbury, Cobble Hill, and Lechmere Point where a number of guns from Ticonderoga had been emplaced. Critical and dangerous to the operation was the crossing of the low-lying causeway of the Dorchester peninsula, which stood in plain view of the British lines at the Boston Neck, less than a mile away. Next week, the move on Dorchester Heights gets underway, win or lose.

Did You Know On

Aug. 18, 1872 – Aaron Montgomery Ward issued the first mail-order catalog. It was a single sheet price list.

Aug. 19, 1812 – During the War of 1812, the USS Constitution defeated the British frigate Guerriere some 600 miles east of Nova Scotia.

Aug. 20, 1971 – Texas Instruments introduced the first electronic pocket calculator.

Aug. 21, 1888 – William Burroughs of St. Louis patented the first successful adding machine in the United States.

Aug. 22, 1906 – The Victor Talking Machine Co. of Camden, New Jersey, produced the first Victrola.

Aug. 23, 1775 – King George III proclaimed the colonies to be in a state of rebellion.

Aug. 24, 1814 – British troops invaded Washington, D.C., setting fire to the U.S. Capitol and the White House.

This Week’s Quiz

Where is the largest shopping mall in the United States?

After reaching the town of Westfield what change did Henry Knox make to speed up the pace?

Who was the first Japanese-American to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives?

Who was the first president to hold a live, televised press conference?

Who was the first president to have a White House telephone?

Answers to Last Week’s Quiz

The original Purple Heart Medal was called the Badge of Military Merit.

Three ships were involved in Columbus’s voyage to the Indies. They were the Nina, Pinta and the Santa Maria.

There are 12 rivers that exceed 1,000 miles in length in the United States.

Ben Franklin, John Adams and Thomas Jefferson recommended the words E Pluribus Unum to Congress as part of the design for the U.S. Seal.

Bill Clinton signed legislation ending lifetime welfare benefits.

Ref: 1776 by David McCullough, American Patriot Almanac by William Bennett, The Real George Washington by Perry Allison Skousen.

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