Goodner Family Bible

I'm just posting these here to get them out on the internet. I'll also post them on Ancestory.com. They are pages from a Goodner Family Bible.  The book itself was in terrible shape and, after many unsuccessful attempts to find a home for it, I finally disposed of it - but kept these four pages.  I got the book from dad (James Ray Willis) and am not even sure which Goodner it belonged to.  The first page lists the marriage of Edward Blooming Goodner and Effie Elizabeth Vail and it probably belonged to them. This is not in our own direct line.  Edward was the son of Blooming Cruse Goodener and we are descended from him through his daughter Adeline (Addie).   

Remember that it only takes a senate vote to approve a treaty!

The recent blog posts seem to be updates on the Winnsboro Art Walks so I guess I'll keep it going.  This month the theme was Mardi Gras.  We weren't going to participate this time but several of the regulars were going to be out of town so we decided to help fill the void and Glynda started sewing and we did some cheap shopping o the internet.  My crown costs $3.50 and Glynda's shoes were $6.99 - always of course plus shipping - but even that wasn't too bad.  As I explained on the FB post about this pic, it was done with a green background and a green screen program. The computer does a "find and replace" and in this case it's a "find green and replace it with red" so where you see the reddish tones in the costumes you need to use your minds eye to replace that with a bright, shiny green. Fun evening!!

Here's the 4 minute video - starting the the Art Center reception.

January Steampunk Art Walk video

Here we are dressing up for fun again.  There were a lot of folks on this one including several out-of-towners and the fourteen minute video attached shows you all about it. 

Lois Jeanette Wiffin

I have no idea who this is - but the picture was among the many in Aunt Maudes' photo albums that fit that category.  This one, like many, had the name on the back and it's evidently from 1933.  Every now and then I pull out one of these out and see if I can find a descendent.  I was successful on this one.  I sent a digital copy to a grandson after making the contact and the family was very happy.  They had not seen the picture before.  Yesterday the original went in the mail to them in Lincoln, Nebraska.   

Victorian Christmas Art Walk

Every third Friday Winnsboro has what's know as the "Art Walk".  It's a promotional weekend event for the merchants but on the Friday evening a themed walk takes place.  It starts at the Keyring Art Gallery and then the participating folks stroll down the streets and visit the downtown shops and restaurants.  Last month it was Renaissance and the month before was Steampunk!  There's also western and Thirty's, and Fifty's, etc. This month it was Victorian Christmas and carolers came along too.  Some stops are just a visit to the merchant and a customer or two, some are a bit bigger as we parade through a restaurant full of folks having dinner.  It's a lot of fun!  Then we gather at A&E for refreshments afterwards.  Michael Alford took the picture above just before we left the gallery last evening..  

Winnsboro in Texas Highways, January 2013 Edition

 And here we are in it!  Glynda and me on the left, then Marilyn and Jim from Art & Espresso, then Doc and Denise from Silhouettes Custom Apparel!  A little tea dueling at A&E - the official sport of Steampunking.  This duel was officially sanctioned by the American Tea Dueling Association!  Both splotched so there was no winner.

Pictures and article are by Randy Mallory

 There was an eight page write-up on Winnsboro and four of the eight are shown above.  This is great publicity for our little town.  There have been several write-ups recently in Sulphur Springs (Liefies Le Vin restaurant) and in Tyler (Silhouettes) and in Piney Woods Live magazine (Silhouettes).  Denise and Doc at Silhouettes make custom apparel and many of their customers are looking for period correct clothing - some of it seen in our picture (but G also did some of it).  The dress-up events take place on Third Friday Art Walks which begin at Key Ring Gallery and participants then walk from business to business sharing the nonsense.  But next Friday it will be Victorian attire and Christmas carolers - should be a lot of fun.  Then treats at A&E.  (Doc and I will get to slightly modify our Steampunk clothing and then will fit right in.)  BUT - next year I'm going to get a real top hat - the one I'm wearing in the pic is just a cheapy costume.

Fall color

Took a short walk around the property a couple days ago and took these pics of some of the last remaining fall color.  I've been reading a new (to me) photography site and in these I tried a couple of the suggestions I found there. I've gotten lazy and don't often use settings other than auto so I shot all of these on aperture priority and that makes a big difference!  They also had some suggestions on capturing fall color and back lighting was one of them and a couple of these have both ideas incorporated in them.  Another suggestions was shooting flowers from below the blossom and that shot, using all three suggestions, is my favorite of the session!

 Originally published in 1916.  Now, almost 100 years later, it's still true but is still not understood, or cared about, by the people that need to the  most!  
  

• You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
• You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
• You cannot help little men by tearing down big men.
• You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.
• You cannot help the poor by destroying the rich.
• You cannot establish sound security on borrowed money.
• You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
• You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than you earn.
• You cannot build character and courage by destroying men's initiative and independence.
• And you cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they can and should do for themselves.

 William John Henry Boetcker (1873–1962)

This post will slowly go away so I've added it to the part of the blog that doesn't change unless I change it!

RIP Twink!  We will all miss you and we'll always remember the good times!

So I think I'm going to start blogging again.  I just have to be sure to never use the words that refer to the musical event we have here so Google doesn't send all of these people here looking for information.  The event was really cold this time and, considering that, we had a decent turnout.  This one was more like the other musical event that takes place near Austin and is named after the nearby town that starts with a "K".  Meaning that it didn't have bands like we had at the last one - single, duos, and trios - plus a closing jam.

Part of the featured trio but the still camera was basically put away by then so this is all

.

In spite of the weather it was a very good time - several folks from Thermalloy were there and even Suzie and Marilyn drove in.  Just too much happened to say anymore about it here.  Our video person had to bail at the last minute and I made a trip to Walmart, bought me a video camera, did a decent job, and have spent much of the last  few days putting together a video (27 minutes) which also turned out well.  If you happen by the house you can feel pretty sure that I'll offer to play it for you.

I'll mention too my hiking stick and cane "business".  A store in town sells them and has over the last year sold three or four.  But he's now started wheeling the display out onto the sidewalk every day and, in October, he sold five of them.  That's kinda cool - helps offset the loss I took on the music thing.

The FALL-2012 concert is coming together quickly!

This one will be a more modest affair.  The Spring concert will be the bigger one And it's looking like this might be the direction we will go.  One evening, 5 or 6 acts in the Spring, individuals or smaller groups. In May we had about 40 musicians here.  This time it will be less than 10.  But the quality won't be any less! We're really happy that Lynn & Lindy will be here this time. They were on the road when we had the previous events so we tried to schedule around them this time.  They'll be off on an east coast tour right afterwards.  Vanessa Peters appearance here is one of those small world things.  She's the stepdaughter of a guy I worked with for many, many years and she's here as a result of a call made by another friend that we also worked with for many, many years who's been keeping up with the MusicFest.  Vanessa has been in Europe for much of the last 10 years or so and has toured there. Now she's back home in Texas and is going to play at Wildernest.  Randy Brown and Shannon Monk are also local.  They are both folks that we wanted to have at one of the earlier concerts but the scheduling just didn't work.  Kurt Bittner will be playing guitar with Shannon.  He's a cum laude graduate of Berklee school of music in Boston and has toured internationally.  Gus is the MusicFest Producer and is also a performer and owner and operator of Crossroads Music Company and Listening Room in Winnsboro.  He's listed as "Gus and Friends" and the friends will include Alex and Amy and maybe a few others.  You'll hear them at the Jacob Hayes Memorial.

So - some great musicians and a night of music at the Wildernest Stage.  We'll be keeping the website updated - www.wildernestmusicfest.com

Woodyfest

We just stumbled on the fact that there is such a thing less than two weeks ago but, on seeing some names in the lineup, we booked our Best Western room and made our plans.  We were hooked by a few names from the 60's and 70's as well as some of the older Kerrville performers.


First a few basics.  It's free! It's a five day event that takes place in three venues.  The opening show is on Wednesday and it's a ticketed event.  On Thursday afternoon there is music at the Brick Street Stage.  On Friday and Saturday afternoon there's music at the Brick Street Stage and in The Crystal Theater - concurrent shows - take your pick.  All three nights have performances at the Pastures of Plenty outdoor stage.  There is $15 parking for this.   Afternoon shows run from 11:00 AM to 6:00 PM and then there's an hour and a half to have dinner and get to the outdoor stage.  The closing event starts at noon on Sunday in the old Crystal Theater.  They call it a hootenanny!  There is no schedule.  Any performer can show up and do one song.  That show was worth the trip and we almost skipped it to start the trip back home.  All-in-all - the whole thing was very well organized!  During the evening performance there was a 30 minute or so stage changeover but that was the only bad mark on it. (There are many other events throughout the town during the week.)


We saw and heard lots of performers, some we knew nothing about, and we really enjoyed them all.  Not enough room to talk about all of them.  I'll just do it in pics. (I'm beginning to master stage photography with my new lens but the Crystal was really challenging with hot spots and colored lights.  The mike for the soloists was in the white spotlight but only one of them used it. Twenty minutes early got us aisle seats on the second row on the right side of the right aisle - was able to take most of these shots without moving. )

At  the Crystal Theater

Ellis Paul on the "Pastures of Plenty" stage

Glynda at the Woody Guthrie homesite.  They are going to rebuild the house

Me at the Woody Guthrie mural.  I wore a "Wildernest Musicfest" t-shirt both days!

Joel Rafael

Butch Hancock

Susan Herndon

Barry Ollman

David Amram. Incredible 80+ man.  Know him from Kerrville He's also a classical composer and conductor.  The backup musicians on stage were in awe twice.  Once when this guy sat at the keyboard and sang a song as he was composing it.  You knew that was true because it was referencing happenings at the Woodyfest as well as the musicians onstage at the time.

Audrey Auld

Bob Livingston.  In Texas music forever!

Burns Sisters (I think)

Andrew Hardin

Radoslav Lorkovic - this was the other time the musicians didn't know what to do.  He was singing a Serbian folksong.

Dan Duggin.  Had to do a lot of Googlin' to find this guys name.  He was a stage musician but this is my favorite of the almost 300 pictures I took!

Butch Morgan

'Nuff said here!

An incredibly sad loss!

Kent Gooding died on July 4th - in his 33nd year!  A wonderful person and incredible musician.  We had just really become friends in the last year as we enjoyed his music at several of the Winnsboro venues and at our JamFest in October and again at the MusicFest in May.  It was an honor to have him here.  We will miss him greatly!  He leaves behind a wife and daughter that would appreciate your prayers.


Here's a video of one of the songs he sang here in October. Kent at the JamFest