In a letter from Albert to his mother in December 1910, he tells her he has met a Miss McCamy who was a teacher at Cookson Creek. The McCamy's were living in the old house at this time having moved from Young-Harris, Georgia at the end of 1909.

The farm was originally over 100 acres, with the northern border being Horns Creek road and the southern 30 acres or so sold to "Aunt Lou", Mary Louise Rymer Miles and her husband Ed Miles. Frances parents sold the farm to Frances's sister Lena and her husband, Bob Ervin. In 1933, Frances bought the house and 50 plus acres from the Ervins, the Ervins kept the northern part of the property.

THE HOUSE in the photo above (c.a. 1909) appears much as it did when built. The roof over the front porch was flat and had a railing which could be used as a deck, it was changed to the sloped roof it has today after Frances bought it in 1933. Entrance was made through the door looking like two long windows. Also the original roof was wooden shingles some of which were not replaced until the late 1930's. The floor plan was in the shape of a "T", two rooms, a hall and a stairway forming the front as shown here. The hallway ended at the entrance to the third room which completed the bottom of the "T". The room at the bottom of the "T" had a porch on each side conatining a cistern to catch the water off the roof. In the photo the south porch is visable. All downstairs rooms had fireplaces. Upstairs the layout was similiar with the exception being the outside walls were only one story high, this meant the upstairs rooms were much smaller and had sloping ceilings starting about 3 feet from the floor and only a few feet of flat space at the top. The two "front" rooms had about 30 inch paneling and all rooms were plaster over hand split wooden lathes. There was the front porch shown in the photo and a porch on the south side of the "back" room. Albert later added a room to the back of the "back" room for a kitchen. Harry and Kathy modified the "back" room to include much of the south porch. Probably in the 1920's a Delco plant was installed and an addition was made adding a bathroom to the north side of the "back" room.

THE BARN was 40 by 60 feet and 3 stories high. It was made of hand hewn logs, the largest 12 by 12 inches and up to 40 feet long. The main timbers were held together with large wooden pegs. The west end of the barn had I. S. Mc. and 1877 cut into the boards. This was the initials of the owner and stood for I. S. McCash and the year it was finished, 1877. Oral history was the house was built after the barn, so the house was probably finished in 1878 or 79.

The Old Barn in the background with two of the granddaughters washing and rinsing their hair by pumping water from the cistern on the north porch and pouring it over the others head. The peak of the roof of the old corn crib appears in the left portion of the photo.

The bottom story of the barn had a low ceiling and contained stables for animals. The middle floor contained stables for horses and a tack room on the west side. the center was open so a horse and wagon filled with hay could be pulled in for unloading, (the north side of the barn was naturally higher than the south). The east side of the second story was used for hay storage. There were openings in the floor where hay could be dropped directly into the stables below. The third story only covered the western half of the barn and was used as a hayloft to store hay.

When first built the hay had to be hand unloaded from a wagon then moved to the back or side of the loft. Before Albert and Frances moved to Georgia, Albert had added a kitchen to the "back" room and also added a wooden track to the top of the barn. This track had a four wheeled trolley which could be locked in the center of the barn. A long rope ran through the trolley to the west side of the barn through another pulley, down to almost the ground and then out to where horses could be hooked to it. The purpose was simple, a load of hay would be brought into the barn and a 30 inch of so tool was inserted and opened up like a harpoon. One end of the rope was attached to the trolley and through a pulley which dropped down and was attached to the harpoon. A signal was given and the horse(s) would start pulling the rope on the other end. Up would come the harpoon with as much as 300 - 400 pounds of hay. When the pulley attached to the harpoon hit the trolley it would unlock and everything would run out the track. The person in the barn would determine where he wanted to drop the hay and pull a rope attached to the harpoon which would drop the load of hay. He then would pull the empty trolley back and repeat the process if needed. This saved a lot of hard, hot, work in unloading hay .

THE PRE CIVIL WAR HOUSE: There was a house on the farm, (very close to where Danny Frazier lives now -2009), before the Civil War. You could see remains of the housesite in the 1940's and maybe today. The reason this is included is it has a story. Polk County did not have any Civil War battles. However, persons formed their little private armies, a fellow named Gatewood was one of them. Gatewood was a self appointed assassin of Union sympathizers; plundering, robbing and killing. He came through Polk County and the house in question looking for the man of the house, who had hidden in a box of cotton. The premises were searched but they did not find him and so he escaped. Others were not so lucky, "The Heritage of Polk County" lists several others who were killed by Gatewood and his men.

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