Tombstone Thursday

West Cemetery

Ovil, Christian County, Kentucky

Charles P. West

1828-1875

Four brothers are buried in this small cemetery: Charles, Francis, William and Henry Harrison West.  William Ellis West is my great, great grandfather.  These four were sons of Jesse West (1798-1843).  William's mother, Mary Bright Rogers, died shortly after his birth and Jesse married second to Martha Pruitt (Prewit) who is the mother to the other 3 brothers.  Henry Harrison West was the youngest born about 1842 and does not have a grave marker.  Of the 8 grave markers (there are 7-10 unmarked field stones) Charles Patterson West has the best preserved stone.  The largest marker is over 6 foot tall... Nancy the wife of C.P. West died in 1913 and appears to be the last buried here.  W.E. West (1822-1896) is at the front of the cemetery, while Francis M. West (1835-1898) is in the back row.

West Cemetery is on private property and is located in the woods that is reputed to be infested with rattlesnakes. Please get permission from the property owner, Richard Maywald, to visit the cemetery.  His son took us back to the cemetery.  This cemetery has not been visited by many since 1966 when it was copied and published in a cemetery inscription book for Christian County.

- Photo taken and submitted by Indiana Bones.

[Tombstone Thursday is dedicated in memory of

Donald G. West 1952-2000]

"Using Family Names For Computers!"

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The backyard Garage is finally torn down!

With all of the rain this year (plus not feeling well & a sundry of other excuses), it has taken me almost the whole year to finally tear it down. But, yesterday, a friend & his boys helped me. Busy from 6AM until the friend got here, I was tired, cold and really out of the mood to go through with it. But, with others to motivate me, we were done in about three hours. I still need to haul the debris to the dump, but the garage is down.

This is why I did not have time to post anything yesterday, nor for today. However, I was reading Facebook posts and one of my friends is Bill West (no known relation to me) who puts out a very nice genealogy related blog of his own... had an interesting topic about naming computers. Bill named his computers after TV show characters. One of the comments came from a Diane who said she named her computers for family members citing her two aunts. I got the idea that it would be cool to name my computers after my ancestors. So, I added the following comment to Bill's Facebook entry: "Diane, that is a neat idea... naming computers after family! Ignatius West was born in 1750 in Granville Co., NC and is the brother of my direct ancestor Thomas West, Jr. Thus, Iggy (my nickname for him) is an Uncle many "greats" back. So, I, hereby name my computer "Iggy"!"

We all have some cool names in our ancestry that are interesting, neat, special or highly unusual like my direct ancestor Littleberry Woodis. I could name a computer "Littleberry" or even "Woodis"! I could name one "Cincinnati" after my Great, Great Grandmother Cincinnati O. [Williams] West (I still do not know what the "O" stands for and it was used many times in records). My father, brother & nephew were all named "Gaither Glennis West" with either of the given names would make great names for a computer. Mom's name was Bernadine... not a bad computer name. Powerful names like James Tobias Long or Mary Bright Rogers. Another one John Barton Haynes. My favorite is Arthur Sylvester Mays husband of Susan Apalone Lewis. The name Ap(p)olone was used a lot in my Mattingly family.

We could name all sorts of items for our ancestors. Since we travel a lot to Ohio to see the grandkids in the Cincinnati area... I think I will name the car in honor of my GGGrandmother "Cincinnati!" My cell phone "Littleberry!" (Well, they have "Blackberry" phones, don't they?) Davy Crockett named his long rifle "Old Bess" - so, why not name important items we use? I wonder what is showing on "Tobias" today?

Oh, if I still had a garage, I could have named it "Woodis!"

- Written by JGWest