Pumpkin Cheesecake with Gingersnap Crust

This recipe is adapted from one I found at Allrecipes.com.  Did you know that the old fashioned way to cook a pumpkin is to put it in the oven?  Just rinse it, and put it in the oven, about 350 for an hour or so.  This is also a good way to cook squash.  No fussing over cutting... and this method gives no worries about some of the pumpkin being too done while other parts remain uncooked.  In about an hour, go back and turn it off.  Leave it there.  Let it cool for an hour or half a day.

You can make your own pumpkin puree, and it will taste fresher and more pumpkin-y than canned pumpkin (although the latter is really convenient and less messy).   I use a TV tray for cleaning pumpkin, because it might be too messy for a regular cutting board.  Just slice it into fourths, and use a spoon to scoop away the seeds and strings.  Then pare the skin off easily with a knife.  Cut into chunks.  If you have a food processor, you can whiz it, but don't add liquid.  Another way to puree the pulp is in a mixer for a long time. 

Gingersnap Crust:
Crush and whiz (in a food processor or blender) 1/2 cups of gingersnaps and 1 cup of graham crackers.  You want a fine mix, and I sift mine thru a sifter, because the gingersnaps sometimes don't chop up.  Add 2-3 tablespoons of sugar, and 1/2 to 3/4 of a stick of butter.  I like to put my butter in the microwave for 15 seconds because I rarely have it at room temp when I begin.  This, you press into the bottom of a springform pan.  I don't have a springform pan, so I use a square 9x9 pyrex glass baking dish, a round custard dish or a 9x14 glass pan.  Just put it back in the fridge till you add the filling, and it can be hardening.

Mix 16 oz of cream cheese till creamy, and add 1/3 cup of brown sugar.  Here's where my recipe is a jazzed-up version of the online classic:  While my cream cheese is getting fluffy, I use authentic whole spices that I grind, crush or grate, myself.  I just put those on top of  the pumpkin puree that I will be adding.

I use about a teaspoon of cloves, taking just the buttons off of the top.  (Toss the 'forks' into your simmering potpourri, as they are tough.)  I crush them on an old Cherokee grinding rock using a round Cherokee stone that I found in the woods.  You could use a bowl and pestle. 

I use about a tablespoon of cinnamon that I got when travelling in the Carribean.  If you go South, don't miss a chance to visit a grocery store or town marketplace somewhere like Montego Bay.  You can get amazing fresh spices, whole, and they'll keep for a year or more if you don't refigerate them and leave them whole till ready for use. 

I crushed a fourth of a nutmeg.  That would be about 1/2 teaspoon.

I used fresh ginger root, grating it on a grater... about a tablespoon and that is a lot.

Add a cup of pumpkin puree and these spices, scraping down your bowl edges to incorporate all the cream cheese.

Add 1 teaspoon of vanilla.  Or, you could also use a spoon of Frangelico at this step instead.

You'll get a creamy mix, richer than pumplin pie mix.  Gently pour it into the crust, and pop that into the oven.  Turn the oven to 350.  Add a big pot of water to the bottom to keep your cheesecake moist and avoid cracking.  Cook for 30 minutes or until the edges are puffy and the middle still jiggles.

There's a trick here:  You want to keep your oven steamy, so don't be opening and closing the door a lot.  Treat it like a souffle.

After 30 minutes, turn the heat down to 325, and set the timer for 15 minutes.  Make this topping:

1 cup sour cream
1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon Frangelico

You can use Vanilla if you don't happen to have Frangelico.  (Frangelico comes from the liquor store and some people use it as a coffee flavoring.  It is rather expensive, and has a flavor of hazelnut and berries.)

When your topping is made, gently take the cheesecake out of the oven and pour this evenly over the top.  Avoid moving it around with a spoon if you can, so it won't break into the cake which is still cooking.  Then put it back in the oven, turn off the oven at the end of the timer above, and just leave it there for an hour, in the oven, still cooking but at an ever-lower temp.  After an hour you can take it out, insert a knife around the edges so it will shrink without splitting, and put it back into the cooling oven until both oven and cake are at room temp.

Now, for the hard part.  Cover it with foil and stick it in the oven to chill and set up overnight.  Next day, Eat It.

This is a great upscale recipe for holiday visits, but the cream cheese makes it dangerously rich and fattening.    Once in a while, it won't hurt ya.  Enjoy!  And do post any variations that you try.

Greenway of the Cherokee Ozarks

September 29th marks the date that stakeholders will meet together and talk about forming a Greenway of the Cherokee Ozarks.  To date, regional meetings have been conducted in Vian, Marble City, Tahlequah, Salina and Colcord to explore interest in the Greenway concept, and we've had a good cross-section of local folks from end to end, interested in the project and who think it is a good idea.

Blue Sky Water Society is the local host for this event, Steve Woodall Consulting is our facilitator, and the National Park Service's Joy Lujan is our community development technical assistance team mate.  I'm helping with a few things-- reservations, some invitations, the Blue Sky Water tees, totes and water bottles art.

If you would be interested in collaborating on the Greenway, we'd love to invite you here and now to be a part of this worthwhile project. 

You can join greenwayofthecherokeeozarks@yahoogroups.com or email me for a direct addition to that list. 

You are also invited to subscribe to the Greenway blog:

  http://greenwayofthecherokeeozarks.blogspot.com/ 

Check out this article in the Current:

http://www.currentland.com/ViewArticle/272/Default.aspx

Follow on Twitter:

http://www.twitter.com/CherokeeOzarks

The Art of Cherokee Living

The Art of Cherokee Living

I didn't ask his name.  As we played a gig on the Cherokee Courthouse Square last Saturday, this Stickball Stick maker unloaded his table and set up to demonstrate the art of taking a wooden branch and turning it into stickball sticks.  You can see from his powerful forearms that making sticks is not something one can do without physical conditioning.  It must also take learning, and listening to the wood-- the nature of the grain and its features.  As we sat and listened to Barbara McAllister and to the Cherokee Childrens' Choir, we watched him work.  With his bare hands, he bent and shaped the wooden frame to curve.  He used his thumbs and the strength of his fingers to teach the wood to fold over all the way against itself.  He used a baseball bat to formulate a uniform shape on the racket.  And that is why all stick ball sticks are about the size of a bat on the racket. 

Cherokee Syllabary Cherry Silk Scarf

Here's an interesting new design.  I made this silk scarf using syllables from the Cherokee language.  I won a benefit auction for a used working Nacho Cheese heater, and converted it to a soy wax heater.  I keep the was there all of the time, and when I am planning to do soy wax resist batiking, I flip the switch.  Like a double-boiler the water heats the wax to a low melt, and I don't have to fiddle with the dangerous microwave in my utility room-slash-art studio.  I rarely work in reds, but was making a peppermint swirl tiedye tee for a custom order and had prepared the soy wax resist lettering in advance.  This is made using analine dyes of 3 blended shades of red, so it has shading and is not just a solid vat red.

Most of the clothes in stores is made from cloth which was vat-dyed.   The cloth goes thru a batch of dye and is highly agitated (although not mad ) in order to achieve a consistent monotone of color.  If you've a friend who tells the same joke over and over, you can appreciate how I feel about solid monotone colors.  It is just boring.  It is done because vat dyeing looks better when fabric is dyed before the clothing is constructed.  Or, only after clothing is constructed does nonvat dyeing "look right."  Basically, its easy, quick and cheap to vat dye... if you're doing millions of, ie, yards.

Much more time-consuming and thus expensive is anything ombred (ohm-burred) where the colors shift like watercolor, or tied and dyed as in tiedye and mudme.  This scarf was time-consuming because of making each syllable and its pronunciation.  (Not all Cherokee Syllables are there.  My chart shows 13 rows of 6 columns and some columns have 2 syllables as in Ga Ka and Dla Tla.).  The dyeing itself was rather simple compared to some dyes I use which are prepared with exotic stuff like inner bark, heartwood, fungus, bugs and the like.

This sweet cherry scarf is being listed at Island Retreat on etsy.  You will find a link on the right, perhaps to this very scarf if it is listed.

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Invitation to Nature

It is the twelfth hour before this event, but it is the first chance I've had to invite folks.  Tomorrow from about 10 to about 2 at Looney Preserve, you are invited to join some of who are getting together to think about some things about nature.  We are tossing out ideas about what would be included if there were in the  Greenway of the Cherokee Ozarks, stretching from I-40 to 412 and surrounds.

Looney Preserve is between Colcord and Jay on SH10, I think.  Well, you'll see some balloons or streamers and maybe a sign referring to The Nature Conservancy.  It cuts back hard to the South, so look carefully if you are coming from the South.  Go down that road and you will find it.

Here is a story about how I found it the first time.  I was coming home from a Court appearance in Jay.  Storm clouds blew up and it began a torrential rain, as I was driving SH10 going South back toward Tahlequah that morning.  Beside the road was a haggard-looking man with a big burlap bag.  I thought he must have been picking up cans.  The weather was severe, and I gave him a ride.  I told him I'd take him home, and he directed me to the Looney's house.  He said he'd been a journalist or publisher and for some reason I think it must have been of a local paper.  He was about my age... or within ten years either way.  It wasn't that far, but by the time we arrived there, the rain had subsided and it was humid and sunny-- one of those sudden Spring freshets that pass thru.  He invited me in to meet his parents.  I was fascinated with the beauty of their modest place, with bird feeders hanging from the trees and went in.  His mother and father were there-- quite old and it seems spry, in a light-filled sunny room, reading or piddling around.

They were the Looneys.  I later learned that they were reputed conservationists, but it was obvious by the way they took care of the birds.  This fellow told his parents that he was out picking mushrooms and had gotten caught in the thunderstorm and I'd brought him home.  He told me about a cool cave there, and asked if I'd care to see it.  That day, the rain had made a place impassable and I was in courtroom attire:  a suit and leather shoes but didn't mind getting my feet wet although we couldn't go in.  On the ground he picked up an arrowhead and gave it to.  He said he had knapped it and had left it there on the trail for finding.  I thought that was kinda cool.

Before long, I had to get back on my way home.  Maybe I spent an hour there altogether.  When I got back to my office, I joked that I had been waylaid by mushrooms which kidnapped me and took me thru a time warp.  But my law partner, Mary Barksdale, and our secretary/paralegal was accustomed to me ambling off the career path on some unplanned adventure such as this from time to time.  I had only wet shoes to corraborate my adventure.  I always had happy thoughts about that special natural place where like-minded people lived, that I had met in an unlikely way.

Here is a note about Mr. Looney's passing  from 2005:

Murray L. Looney

July 20, 1914 - May 29, 2005

Murray L. Looney was born July 20, 1914 and Died May 29, 2005.  That just states 'when' he lived, not how he lived. Murray was a gentle man. He is one of the founding members of the Central Oklahoma Grotto and was an excellent caver. He was the equipment manager for the group and would rework a carbide lamp for you if you managed to mangle yours into inoperability -- with a smile and an eye twinkle.


Not that he couldn't get a bit irritated at times of supreme human dumbness, but then who wouldn't? Murray was husband to Mary Looney, who preceded him in death in 1989, and stepfather to Nick -- also gone now (1999) -- and Joe. I've asked Joe to write up a piece for the newsletter, so I'll not step on personal toes and wait for his erudite words.


Personally, Mary and Murray greeted John and me with open arms in 1973. We were relative neophytes to caving and absolute greenies to Oklahoma caving. Our interest matched their passion and we stuck with the COG family quite happily. Murray managed all the grotto equipment, while Mary managed the people and FOOD! It was Oklahoma Caving at its best.


Always thin, Murray would be one who could slither through the cracks and is, I believe, only one of two people ever to have made it out the Texas Entrance of Nescatunga Cave. This is something no one wishes to do. There is nothing nice about that passage --  it just had to be mapped and Murray was half of the two-person mapping team. And, just so you know, Mary was NOT the other half!


The graveside funeral service was held at Row Cemetery, just north of Colcord in Delaware County, Oklahoma. Joe Looney spoke of Murray's life and accomplishments and the group then regrouped at the Farm for reminiscences and repast. The Farm is the retirement property (paraphrased) that was Mary and Murray's dream retirement home which they shared together for 10 retirement years before Mary's death. The cave resurgence is in the front 'yard' and the water from the cave flows all year round providing  a blissful murmur. The two-bedroom home is well maintained ...and will become a nature cabin for conservation groups, available by reservation -- soon. Submitted by Sue Bozeman

So on Saturday May 22nd come if you can, and perhaps it will also prove to be a magical experience as it was for me in 1985 or 1986.

Cherokee Star Pieced Quilt

Cherokee Star Pieced Quilt

A favorite in my collection of quilts by other women, is this Cherokee Star Pieced Quilt.  I think I bought it at a garage sale and the sellers didn't know who made it.  Most seven-point star quilts are actually appliqued, but this one is the only authentic fully-pieced 7-point star quilt that I have seen in person, except in recent years at the Cherokee National Holiday Quilt Show.  This one is pieced in sometimes-now-ragged prints that appear to be from the 1950s, on a plain white background and it has a white back also.  It is stained in places, faded in other spots, and threadbare too.

The batting is thin white all cotton batt, and the back was pure white cotton fabric.  It is fully hand-quilted and has a petite half-inch folded-over binding.

Moon Cherokee Star Quilt

Moon Cherokee Star Quilt

I am fascinated by seven-point stars, because they're very difficult to execute.  So when I ran across this wonderful kitschy Cherokee Star quilt for sale, I wanted to get it.  It was made by Bob Moon's mother-- I don't know her first name.  I acquired it in the 1990s.  It is made in typical 1970's polyester of seafoam green and coral.  (The photo flash sort of washed out the colors.)  The central 8-point star is a classic common pattern.  But it is studded with these nice pieced  Cherokee stars which have been appliqued onto the surface of the quilt.  It is quilted on a commercial long-arm machine.  Here the quilt is modelled by Gracie Piddlewhiskers, who thinks it is her role to get on every quilt for the picture.

Chenille Snake Doctor Quilt

Chenille Snake Doctor Quilt

Here's a wonderful old favorite quilt I made, a long time ago in about 2002.  It is called "Snake Doctor Quilt."  When I was little we had a local name for dragonflies--- Snake Doctor.  I thought Snake Doctors were magic, and that they would land on things (snakes, plants, etc.) and heal them.

I'd made some quilts for my children and grandchildren to each have a quilt expressing his or her personality, and had a few colorful scraps left over.  I'd just become acquainted with Seminole Patchwork, having bought a seminole patchwork skirt at Cherokee Holiday.  I was wanting to learn the Seminole way of strip piecing on the bias, so I practiced with just whatever scraps I had left over.  When this one was finished being quilted, it made me so happy to see that the black formed a matrix background and the colors seemed to jump forward.

Another fun thing about this quilt is that the Snake Doctor is made of primitive hand-made chenille.  I sewed down several layers of inch-wide strips and cut open any folds into the snake doctor pattern.  Actually, it sort of accidentally ended up being a snake doctor and at first I was just playing with the idea of sewing down chenille that I made myself.

Over the years I lost my good seam ripper used for ripping chenille.  But recently I did get a new one and look forward to using this technique some more.   I can't remember where, but I did show this quilt one time, because I remember that Debbie Duvall liked it.  Maybe it was at the Cherokee Heritage Center.

I made this quilt for utility before I started selling quilts, and it is one that has lasted 8 years or so, and is washed frequently.  It gets hard wear.  Because it has great body and is thin yet flat, I speculate that I used an all-cotton batt in black, or a wool batting.  It was mchine freehand quilted by Wavalene Winkler at Living Designs, and she used a dense thumbprint stipple which is very nice. 

Civil War Replica Quilt

Civil War Replica

Here is a fun quilt that I'm making possibly for inclusion at a Cherokee Nation facility.  Legislation passed into the Cherokee Nation Code states that when buildings are constructed, a percentage of the budget is for Cherokee art. 

I'm a Cherokee history buff.  This quilt is interesting because I've utilized replica fabrics which existed during the Civil War era.  See how the colors of red are turkey red?  See how there are two shades of blue... conrflower blue and indigo?  See how the green is more of a bronze color?  Greens back then were made in a two-stage process where indigo was overdyed with something producing a yellow.  Greens were transient colors, and if you ever look inside the seam of an old quilt, you can see what the original color more closely resembled.

The cream "blank" squares are natural unbleached muslin, but I then overdyed them with a camel color to sadden the fabric and give an aged appearance.  A quilt from the 1860s, now 150 years old, would not remain this bright.  Beth Herrington has a quilt from this time period, which was once featured in a Thompson House quilt show about 15 years ago.  It was a quilt that a soldier had carried with him in the war.

This one consists of four four-patches grouped together.  And while I have never seen a 16-patch, it is typical because it is geometric, pieced, contains squares of about four inches.  The sewing machine was invented or sold about 1824 or so--- it is a contemporary of photography and the industrial revolution in England.  But very few homes had treadle machines and almost all sewing was by hand.  This one was machine pieced (and when quilted, it will be machine quilted).  Unlike quilts from the 1860s, this one is retrospective.  The squares contain images (such as quilt block patterns) from the Civil War era, and also facts and information about the Cherokee condition in the Civil War.  Most of the facts were gleaned from Emmet Starr's History of the Cherokee Indians.  You would find the last names of some of the soldiers who fought together; some names of battles in Cherokee Nation, Indian Territory; information about impacts of the war; and some quotations; treaties; casualty summaries, and the like.

When I made this quilt before I added the war data, it seemed too new to be authentic and didn't tell much of a story except via colors.  Now with the fact squares, it 'speaks' about its historical context.  I'll be posting more Cherokee art quilts of this nature in the future from time to time.

I am seeking a Cherokee hand-quilter who would like to collaborate on this project, but my time frame is short.  If you would be interested in hand-quilting it (or know of someone who does that), then I would be delighted to hear from you.

Is Barack Obama Cherokee

I'm researching Cherokee quilts, 1780-1830.  In doing so, I ran across an article asking whether Barack Obama is Cherokee.  It seems there is a story in his family that he has some Cherokee ancestry.  So, I followed the link (above, if you click the title to today's blog) and found some likely surnames to research.

Payne is one surname, and I remembered the famous Andy Payne, who ran the Bunion Derby across America.  There's a documentary film about Andy Payne with historical footage.

I was most intrigued by Sarah Bunch, who shows up at age 77 in the 1870 Newton County AR census, and who claimed to be from Virginia.  Her age would tend to make her a Cherokee Old Settler from the period 1812-1817 in the original Old Settler domain stretching from Batesville to basically the AR River at Fort Smith (ish).  But I see a householder in the census who might be a son (if he was born when she was in her 30s) born in TN about 1830.  I suppose it is possible that she came West after 1830 (perhaps on the removal) and settled with relatives who were thereafter deceased by 1870, in the former Cherokee domain.  By 1830 most Cherokees had moved on to Indian Territory, or become assimilated into Arkansas which was I think by then a state.  Some Cherokees remained in AR and gave up their Cherokee affiliation by attrition and assimilation, in order to keep their land in Arkansas.  An earlier AR census shows that Sarah was probably married to Nathaniel Bunch.  In 1850 this family shows up with many more householders.  A characteristic Cherokee name is Larkin, and that is a name of one son in 1850 living with the family.

Creekmore is a prevalent Indian name, but I think they are Creeks or Chickasaws and this line of his family lived in the Chickasaw Nation at, if I recall, Ada..  Christopher Reeve, Mariel Hemmingway, and Lyndon Baines Johnson are among some of his far-remote relatives, albeit not necessarily Cherokees.

Merely clues for further speculation and research.  As for Justin Timberlake... read the enclosure link.

Announcing: 7-Point Cherokee Star Quilt Kit

Finally!  After years of wishing, some clever quilter has designed a seven-point Cherokee Star quilt.
Get it fully finished, $1,130 or in a kit for the star part only, $35.

Cherokee Quilt Concept- In my DNA

I just finished these wonderful marbled Cherokee Syllabary strips.  Each strip is 45 inches long.  Starting with a plain white cotton, I use soy wax batik to creat a resis, and then practice my Cherokee syllables along with the pronunciation.  Long ago, young girls would learn to embroider by creating an alphabet sampler in satin stitch or cross-stitch.  I've employed the same learning tool to help my ability to read the Cherokee language.

At present, this is not yet a quilt top.  I was just so excited about the pop-art effect that I had to share it.  The calico between hand-dyed strips gives a 3-D depth effect.  This one will be a corker to sew, if those starry little dots don't hold still! 

This top will be $100 as a top only, in the bed size of your choice.  Or it will be $450 fully finished with custom machine quilting, several options for loft and batting content, a choice of stiff like those nice quilts our grandmothers had which lay beautifully or puffy like a comforter, and any cotton backing that you fancy.  This quilt would make a wonderful "Going Away To College" quilt for some special Cherokee student who needs the hug of home while out there in the big old world.  So if you have a May graduation gift to choose, contact me at ktibbits@lrec.org for details.  Yes, you can make payments. 

Steampunk Fiddle

 

Here's a steampunk fiddle I created into a collage.  It started out as a fiddle that had been last mended by Sam Mouse (how Cherokee is that surname?)   in 1982, but which would not hold tuning.  It had been just hanging on Friedrick's wall five years ago when I moved here.  People would take it down and try to play it.  The sprockets are sort of a nonverbal sign saying, "Um, I don't think this fiddle is a serious musical instrument any longer." 

Anyway, it is featured among the 1,000 in an art book about 1,000 ways to recycle.  Some day I will post a a link and review of that book.  It is chock full of great art.

Nancy Newton Carter

Here's a wonderful old picture of my great-grandmother, Nancy Newton Carter.  Her husband, Enoch Carter is in the background.

She was born, if I recall, at Rabbit Trap in Adair County.  A lot of her ancestors are buried at Hope Cemetery North of Westville.

She lived her adult life in Carter community.  In the 1950s when Lake Tenkiller was built, part of that land was changed by the lake.  Today it is called Carter's Landing.  There was, long ago, a Carter Schoolhouse.  There was a post office at Carter community, named after the postmaster Bud Chronister.  The mail came to Chronister, Oklahoma and some of the old birth certificates of babies such as my father show the birthplace as Chronister, Oklahoma.

I published a family history of the Carter women's side of the family in 1995.  Today it is out of print, but I plan to publish it for sale online soon.  Leave a comment with your email address if you wish to be notified about how to purchase this book. 

It contains a story passed down in our family from the Civil War about Nancy's mother, Laura Newton when she was a teen.  She lived back East in the Cherokee homeland of Tennessee.  Raiders came to the home.  They took anything and everything, at gunpoint.  She pleaded with them to let her keep her wedding dress, and they left without taking it.  Another time, she went down the road to a neighbor's homestead to borrow a cup of sugar or flour.  But as she was walking along, she saw a man or men hanged from a tree in their yard.  War must have a terrible toll on the psyches of the people who live thru them.  Laura Newton, all of her life, recounted vivid and chilling stories of these events and she never got over it.

Dance Skirts

Cherokee women look for a couple of things when they make a skirt to wear to traditional dances.  For one thing, a skirt should have the ruffle beginning at the knee.  That's so you have room to move around and you're not constrained by the size of the skirt.  The main part of the skirt should be loose enough to sit in comfortably, with an elastic waist for bending, twisting and moving-- snug enough to hold up the dress and loose enough to breath and stretch in.  The ruffle can be short or long.  If it is short, it is more likely to get caught on your legs if they have something on them.    A deep or long ruffle gives a better fit.  In choosing the best skirt length, I tend to prefer a skirt that hits at about mid-calf.  Shorter skirts are found among Mvskoke and Natchez dancers, and longer skirts are more characteristically Cherokee or Loyal Band Shawnee.   Shorter skirts are better for carrying the sounds of shells and cans.  Longer skirts look better and are warmer.  The dust ruffle can be sewn-in, or it can be sewn on top.  Dust ruffle gathers can be regular or 'chunky' and irregular.

I sometimes make skirts for dancers and guests.  I like to keep a couple of  extra skirts on hand, to give to friends who come to dances.  I just enjoy making them.  Sometimes, a bolt of fabric just "jumps out at me" and I think, "That would make a pretty skirt."

One skirt in this picture is black, grey, blue and white with circles and hearts that make lines.  In first grade, my grandmother made me a dress from some of  the same fabric that her grandmother had.  And this reminded me of that old black, gray and white machine-printed bolt cloth.  Its 28 inches long.  The waist fits 28" to 38".  It is modest and rather short.

The second skirt is dusty rose with dime-sized roses, a maroon border and flounce dust ruffle.   It is about 29 to 30 inches in finished length.  It can be almost any waist size from womens' Medium to Plus, because the elastic will be added when it is gifted or sold.

I have been asked to make skirts like these for Cherokee tribal citizens, and usually charge $50.  If you find them for sale in retail establishments, they will be more like $75 due to retail markup.  There is a certain time of year when all women get a new skirt... either by gift, purchase or making a new one.

Ross & Kin, a Ross Genealogy Reprint by Vera Dean-Ross and Kathy Tibbits

Ross & Kin 

Ross & Kin is a compiled genealogy of the descendants of John Wesley Ross, who shows up in the Ozark Mountains having been born perhaps in the 1820s.  There are mysteries about where he was born, and there are stories about his possible origin.  Even today in Newton and Pope County Arkansas, many of the families are descended from this original settler family.   Granville James (Jim) Ross published this book in about 1982 and it is out of print.  Over the years his wife Vera Dean-Ross kept margin notes in her copy, which refine and enlighten the original... sometimes adding a new generation of information or correcting things or adding clues.  Recently, Kathy Tibbits sponsored the edition's reprint.  It is essentially a photocopy of the original with Vera's margin notes, albeit sometimes faint since these were in pencil.  Now today, it is an essential tool for the next generation of Ross Family genealogists because of Jim & Vera's meticulous work.  Some day it may be revised to add the generations which have been born since about 1980, more photos and the fascinating history of the Old Settler Cherokee ancestors as they came west by wagon to settle there, as well as missionaries to the Cherokees who intermarried.    $28.87  plus shipping, available only at Lulu.com.  

After costs are recovered, half of profits go to a scholarship fund for Ross heirs.  

Surnames:  (among others) Ross, Standridge, Blevins, Meek, Meeks, Martin, Phillips, Goates, Hull, Carter, Jones, and hundreds more.

Geography:  Carroll County, Missouri Territory; Treat; Jasper; Newton County; Pope County; Dover; Russelville; Clarksville; Arkansas Territory; State of Arkansas; Green County Missouri;  Clay County Missouri; Dardanelle; Summers; Box Oklahoma; Vian Oklahoma;  California, and many more places.

Avatar, The Movie

Saturday, Friedrick and I had a fun date to Fayetteville, where we saw Avatar in 3-D and ate at Fayetteville's most acclaimed Asian restaraunt, Taste of Thai.

Mike Pinkerton, Stilwell Pharmacist, and I were in first grade together, in the classroom of Mrs. Duvall and intern Delores Sumner at Cheorkee Elementary in Tahlequah.  He owns Stilwell Pharmacy now.  He couldn't put into words why I should see Avatar, only, "YOU JUST GOTTA."  I had been pushing that movie to the back of my list for a couple of reasons.  It is cold winter, and thus the convenient movies are the ones on Pay Per View.  Pay Per View costs less, too.  That was a fact not lost on me as a woman newly out of work.  Never before have I been a housewife or full-time artist.  I've always had a demanding, more-than-40 *real* job outside the home mostly.  Besides, I couldn't get over the fact this movie was an animation.  I'm a computer geek from back in the days when a Radio Shack TRS-80 had 16k of ram and you programmed all morning to finally play pong on a black and white TV.  And Friedrick is a gamer, so I'm weary of animation because it seems too clunky almost always.

All I can say is "WOW!"  The animators in this movie have done a credible job of creating a seamless fantasy world of beauty with lots of causation and insight about nature.  There's a long history of movies themed around travelling in and out of different realities.  Avatar does something different though.  Everything happens in just one world.  So, as in Wizards and Lord of the Rings, the action takes place with animated characters and model real warriors in one spot.  One of my fave movies from the 1990s was Ferngully, and Avatar has some commonalities with that simple, sweet storied film.

 There's another timely theme:  Wes Studi plays the (animated) Na-vi Chief.  It sort of delighted me to hear some Cherokee words in the movie.  I think they were describing the stream of exterminators coming for them as "Uktena."  That is a Cherokee cultural concept--- a simple way to talk about it would be a huge giant snake.  A cool thing about Cherokee is that there is a lot of attitude or worldview in each speaker's conversation.  To call it an Ukten when a stream of troops is marching in to kill you, is to bridge a huge culture gap in the thinking of people.  

(Here's an aside:  Cherokees, like a lot of indigeous peoples who survive at least somewhat intact (albeit, assimilated to survive) have groupthink.  Its a way of looking out for each other and valuing the good of the whole group.  Cherokees aren't too tuned-in to being the Chiefs of various things.  Cherokees are mostly about getting stuff done together.  THAT'S all I'll say about that.)

Anyway, this movie does a breathtaking job of lining up indigenous people against global capitalism-- a faceless ideological opposite which is an enemy too nebulous to take-on except vicariously thru its shock-troops.  Is it fantasy?  I'm sad to report no.  This conflict is playing out in Brasil and Venezuela, where forest tribes are facing venture capital projects about drilling for fossil fuels or clearing rain forest to plant plantations.  It isn't even a new story.  Indigenous people have been giving way to evolving social darwinism since hegemony began.

More about that, some time.  See this movie, Avatar.  See it because it is fanciful.  See it because it will make your heart ache with unkept promises.  See it to remember what heroes are like.