Ken Roper
June 6, 2019
I thought I’d tell you a thing or two about my childhood.
This was way before I started to school and we had just moved from Tucker Branch to Trim Cove. It was in the summertime and I was playing outside in the yard and heard Mama Praying to the Lord for Him to let her live till her youngest son reached an age when it wouldn’t hurt him so much.
In ’86 when she went on to be with the Lord, I was in my 30s and I made her a promise that I’d quit smoking. I ain’t touched one since.
One time I remember me and Harold going down to my grandparents (on Daddy’s side). With Daddy at Grandma Ola’s house and around the table it looked like a bunch of peeled onions, except Daddy. All Daddy’s brothers were there and he was the only grown-up that had any hair.
At Daddy’s funeral I noticed his hair was still black as the Ace of Spades. Matter of fact both Mama and Daddy had a full head of hair. I recon that’s where I get from.
Ola Roper wasn’t big as a thought, but she could really cook. Thee was her husband (Theadore Roper) and he was over 6′ tall. That’s where Daddy learned how to build houses and he could fix anything, no matter what it was.
Bud and Joel was the first two (my oldest brothers), and at a homecoming at Hewitt’s Baptist Church backed each other out in throwing their new shoes into the Green Hole. They watched them go down the Nantahala River until they were out of sight, headed for Fontana. Daddy just threw up his hands when he found out, because they got them at Belk’s in Bryson City. Money was hard to come by at the time.
Another time we were there and they had some turkeys. Well, me and Harold was good at sailing rocks, so I hauled off and hit a male turkey right in the Wing. That sucker turned and ran me down and I got the beating of my life. Harold was nowhere to be found. He had run around the house and got some rocks and come back. He shewed the turkey off, I got up, and we both went to the house.
—Ken Roper
Last night’s video: Cooking Supper in a Hurry.
Tipper
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Oh how we miss Mister Ken. Praying for all the Acorn families in the path of Fern. We are -14 this morning in Northern Michigan and a beautiful sunrise is showing. So thankful as it has been cold, cloudy and snow for days. Tipper, we hold you, Granny and all your family before our Lord. May His Peace surround each one of you as you walk this difficult path.
Dear Tipper,
Ken’s running beans looked so nice. They are so good but a real job to put all those
strings up for them to run. Just think green beans cooked with fat back, mashed potatoes,
cornbread with onion and butter with a big glass of milk. Makes me hungry just to think of it.
We are set here in the Blue Ridge for any weather that breaks loose. The local convenience store
had run out of lead free high test for home generators with cars still lined up. They had plenty of leaded
gas. We learned when we were in Alaska several years ago that one can use leaded gas in the generator but when it started missing just change out the carburator (SP). Not that hard but another thing to do.
Walmart had run out of propane cylinders and received another shipment today. They are limiting purchases of 2 cylinders so everyone will have a taste of propane. We are fine. We don’t have the wood stove up but we have a propane heater and gas lights in the library and our camping gear stored ready to go in case the power goes out. For us it gets to be exciting and something we plan for all year. I think most people that live around here are the same way. It happens almost every year and it makes all of us the old ways and how people use to live. My folks were the same way. They had a wood stove, kerosene
lamps and gravity water. The only thing we don’t have is a spring house to keep the food cool so we just don’t open the refrigerator or put things in the propane refrigerator we use for camping.
I have empathy for the folks that have to get out and work in the cold, snow, and ice. Especially folks farm animals and wild animals. All of them around here have a special place or barn to go to for shelter.
Our dogs have their dog houses and the building with heat in it. I even got concerned that it wasn’t warm enough and got each dog (3) heated dog beds. We are laughing that if the power goes out we can just go sleep with the dogs. Have a safe snowy storm. Kathy Patterson
I remember getting a pair of shoes at Belks in Bryson City. They had an X-Ray machine that I stood on and could see the bones in my feet. Remember those? Ken was only a couple of years older than me. I bet he would have remembered his feet bones too.
I got a few pairs of shoes from Belks in Honea Path, SC when I was a young kid. This would have been in the 60’s. I don’t remember them having an X-ray machine, but remember Jack, one of the employees (maybe a manager) in the shoe department. I think everyone liked Jack.
Enjoyed this very much.
As always praying for Granny.
praying ya all will be safe and warm through this storm. over used my left arm so this morning I cant”t use it to type or I would have told a story about my daddy taking our two little boys to the creek that had a little island in the middle and our youngest only being about 3 threw his grandad”s shoes in the creek. I always enjoyed reading Ken”s stories.
Dee, I hope it’s better soon!
I’m late today, been distracted. I have to smile about something here today. Both yesterday and today I noticed commenters not in the South use “y’all”. I love it. Maybe both Southernisms and Appalachianisms are catching. (But do they use ” all y’all.) As to boys using shoes as boats …. I can see them thinking of it easily enough, but I never could have. My Dad said he only got one pair of shoes/year and was told they had to last. He wouldn’t say if they were too small and hurt him so he reshaped his young bones and squished his toes into overlapping. It’s a wonder they took him in the Marines.
I catch myself saying sountern words and I’ve always lived in Michigan. But I do watch ALOT if southerners Youtube channels and I’m sure that’s where I am picking it up from.
Hi Ron, I’m guessing your comment was partly about my comments. 🙂 You’re right, I’m not from the wonderful South, but I do have a sister-in-law from North Carolina, a sister who has lived over 20 years in the South (NC) and a dear friend who is from Texas, so the use of y’all is quite common in my small world. 🙂 As you said, I would have to agree that the term is “catching.”
I have never encountered Ken’s phrase, “backed each other out.” I like it. It’s more picturesque than “dared each other,” but chunking new shoes into the river, dare or no dare, is a puzzlement even if money hadn’t been tight.
A pleasure to read the story & comments as always ! Love & God’s Gracious Blessings to you all !
As you say, children do foolish things because they don’t know any better. I once found a bunch of small bottles of what I thought was water under our house. I took a sip from one and it was terrible, so I dumped all the bottles of bad water into the creek. Come to find out it was my dad’s whiskey; he was mad but my mother had no sympathy for him. I didn’t get a whipping, but got what for about messing with other people’s property.
I bought my wife a nice pair of diamond earing studs. To keep them together, she left them wrapped in the tissue paper in her jewelry box. When our daughter was about 3, she ‘explored’ her mother’s jewelry box (unaccompanied) and, finding the tissue paper in it, pulled the paper out and threw it away. Mom didn’t discover they were missing until long afer the trash had been emptied.
To her credit, darling daughter owned up to the deed never knowing that she had thrown out a few hundred dollars worth of jewelry.
Robert, my comment has a better ending. My grandson got hold of his mother’s rings and dropped them into a crevice there in the house. Days later, my son found them, only because it was the last place left to look.
I think I could have listened to Ken all day. Wonderful stories! I think every mama has prayed that same prayer.
Randy, When I talked about my son working shifts, my husband worked 24 out of 47 years on shifts. I remember well him putting blocks in the back of his pickup, praying to the Lord he would make to it to work and back home safe. He’d try to call me on break to let me know he made it there. No cell phones back in those days. Then when he got off shift, I was praying and pacing until he made it back home and you didn’t have a choice, you had to report to work. I know you wife felt that same uneasiness too. I pray for anyone having to get out in this storm. Please stay warm and safe.
I read a post from June 17, 2023 titled Ken and Family. Tipper mentioned a comment I had made in an earlier post. In this post Tipper wrote “Ken was all about family.” In that respect Ken and me would have been as much alike as two peas in a pod. Nothing I ever do or have in my lifetime on earth outside of my salvation is more important to me than time spent with my family. Today, this afternoon, I intend to make a round trip of 70 miles to get my grandson in order for him to spend the night and tomorrow morning with me before taking him back tomorrow afternoon before this icy weather comes in- another 70 miles for a total of 140 miles just to spend a few hours with him. For me this is worth every penny it will cost to do this.
It was a very short night for me. This danged ol’ cold is kicking my butt and temperatures here in west central IL are absolutely ridiculous. Stay warm and safe ya’all and I’m keeping everyone in the path of this horrible winter storm in my thoughts♡ Ken sounds like “quite the character” as my grandpa used to say.
I cannot imagine those boys throwing their new shoes in the river. Don’t believe I’d have told that. As Grandpa Smith would have said, “Well, maybe they were afflicted.”
Y’all be safe in the pending winter storm. From all reports, this one is serious business. God bless.
Kenneth Monroe “Ken” Roper was as fine an example of Appalachian upbringing as I know. I never got to meet him personally but we talked for many hours on the phone. You know me, if I like someone, I’ll find how we are related. Ken was the first cousin of my third cousin’s wife. That’s family in my book!
I enjoyed reading Ken’s memories! It’s interesting how relatable life is, even from generation to generation. For instance, I am a 40 year old mother with small children and I often pray to the Lord that nothing would happen to me until they are grown. I thought it was interesting that Ken heard his mother praying the same thing many years ago. I’m sure this is a common prayer and sentiment amongst mothers for ages, but I was moved reading that. I also thought it was interesting that his daddy had a full head of black hair at his funeral! I started greying a lot this year and have been taking a tablespoon of molasses on my coffee in case it’s due to mineral deficiency (namely, copper). I’m hoping it will help slow it down. I do think people are greying earlier now due to the modern American diet though I try to eat well and from the land the way God intended us to. I am praying for all of you this weekend, many of you by name as I have gotten to “know” you through your wonderful comments over the last couple years. Please stay very safe. I am praying for God’s protection and that you wouldn’t lose power. We are at -23 this morning in Western WI with a windchill of -43. I will take these extreme temps over ice and I feel very sorry for those in the paths of the ice storm. I am praying for y’all! As always, praying for Granny and all of you as you tenderly care for her in these days while she draws closer to eternity.
I have already commented about liking Ken’s stories and comments. I have been awake since a few minutes before 4 o’clock and just laying in bed on this rainy morning being “energy efficient “- other folks would call it lazy. I have been looking back and reading other post about Ken, I think Tipper said in one she had found 150 pages of stories about Ken. I think it is a shame these pages are not put into a cheap book form, something as simple as a spiral book. I would buy it quick, fast and in a hurry, in other words as quick as a chicken jumping on a June bug. I never met Ken and know nothing about him except for what I have read, but he seems like my kind of person. I would have dearly loved spending time with him. I think I read that he didn’t have a lot of school education, I think he was highly education with good common horse sense, sometimes I think that is a better education.
Oh, what fun stories to read. I could sit & listen to Ken on a soft couch all day long. I’m “just plain foolish” when it comes to listening to old stories from the past.
Morning prayers are lifted up for Granny & the entire family.
Enjoyed the stories.
As youngsters we tend to come up with ridiculous ideas of things to do. If someone dares us (or double dares) we did it. I’m amazed that I’ve lived as long as I have with all the foolish things I did as a kid, not to mention some of the stuff I still do as an adult. If my wife is watching I’m not allowed above the second step of a ladder. If she’s not looking I’ll climb to the top of the house.
God bless each and everyone, love care and protection from the storm approaching, in Jesus name I’m praying, that it will pass, at least the electricity will stay on, Lord keep each and every one safe and well in Jesus name, God bless you friends have a great day, God bless granny and the Wilson and Pressley families,
Good morning Tipper, Matt and Acorns. It is 24F this morning but promises to get up to 40F. We have been downgraded to 2″ of snow from the original 9″. The challenge will come from the week long temps at below 10 degrees. I’m hoping that this cold will kill off some of the mosquitoes and ticks that make so many folks sick in the summer months, Our FATHER looking out for us, PRAISE HIM. Praise GOD again …. great news from Ed’s PCP visit yesterday. He is getting Ed an appointment at Vanderbilt Hospital in Nashville. He has one other patient that attends the same clinic at Vanderbilt. I loved the video last night and I felt like I was there having gravy and taters with y’all. It is so heartwarming to see how much y’all love one another. I’m looking forward to some Potato Cakes today. This post had me remembering so many good things from my own childhood. TY for that Tipper. I keep all of the folks here and up Wilson Hollow in my prayers. I love y’all.
Barbara good news about Ed! I will keep praying they can help him.
What did he mean by saying his older brothers “backed each other out” when they threw their shoes in the river?
Ron, he meant they dared each other or egged each other on until they finally just threw them in 🙂
Thanks for explaining this.
I love to read other’s stories. I reckon every momma worth her salt has prayed that same prayer.
Our daughter has two big ol turkeys. She said they’re always eyeballing you like they might do something. I’ll have to tell her about Ken’s mishap. Thank you for sharing
The real cold has moved in and the snow begins tomorrow. Y’all take care and be safe! God bless
I always liked Ken’s comments and stories, I miss him. I have also prayed and asked God to let me live long enough to see my children and then my grandchildren get grown. He has allowed me to do that. Everyone of them have become fine, hardworking, salt of the earth young adults. My daughter was too, before she was killed in an ATV accident. They took after their mother and grandmother! My turkey story would be mother selling the few turkeys she once had and me throwing rocks at the man that bought them. I must have been about 4 years old at that time. They said I was telling the man he was not taking Mama’s turkeys.