Richard’s Book

By Reno Bailey

It is titled The Story of My Reminiscences. I had never heard of it or its author until I talked with Bob Humphries, of Gaffney, S.C., a Jolly descendent. As I recall, he said he had a “little book,” written by one of his ancestors, that I might be interested in. He mailed me a copy, and to my great surprise it was a treasure of information, well written and a delight to read.

There are essays on his wives, parents, grandparents, siblings, in-laws, neighbors and acquaintances. In many he tells something of the individual’s character; who married whom; when they died; names of children and grandchildren; where they lived and were schooled. It’s an amazing collection—indeed a tangle—of names, hundeds of them. Richard was a contemporary and friend of the legendary Amos Owens. In fact, his daughter Mary married Amos’ son James.

We republish his book because his stories describe a way of life in an era we know little about, and it connects many of us to our ancestors, or to those of people we know.

In whatever form the book was originally published and distributed back in the 1920s, eventually a hardback version was created and put into area libraries. In 1974, someone retyped it for distribution to a newer generation of readers. It was retyped again in 1987, then again in 2009. This last time by another Jolly descendant, Joe Stockton, of Ellenboro, and a member of our society. We’ve used his version, and offer our thanks to both Bob and Joe.

It must have been quite a feat to retype the 50 letter-size pages (on an “old fashioned” typewiter). We scanned those pages, creating Word documents of every story or essay, then exported them to the PDF files you will be reading. You can download each story, or simply print it without downloading.

The articles are not in book order but are rearranged for easier access. If you wish to see the names of people included in this document, use the Index page.