The Douglass Family

I become convinced, the more I study Tennessee history, that there’s some underlying structure that I’m just not aware of, because I’m not from here and the names that mean something to me are the names that end up in history books. They are, however, not always the most important names to understanding the shape of history.

Take Colonel Edward Douglass, who died in Cage’s Bend, up near Gallatin, in 1795. He had a ton of children: John Douglass, William Douglass, Edward Douglass, Elmore Douglass, Elizabeth Douglass, Ezekiel Douglass, Sarah Douglass, James Douglass, and Reuben Douglass.

Edward’s son, Elmore, married Eliza Allen.

James’s daughter, Louisa, married George Allen, Eliza’s brother.

Reuben Douglass’s daughter, Evelina, was married to William Franklin, Isaac Franklin’s brother.

Reuben Douglass’s granddaughter, Henrietta Watkins (her mom was Sophia Douglass) married Albert Franklin, another brother of Isaac Franklin.

Eliza Allen and Adelicia Acklen would both have been down in that bend at the same time. They were married into intermarried families. How could they not have known each other?

 

 

 

Another Old Person Rant

My phone physically works. It’s not broken in the sense of broken in reality. The screen is fine. The body is fine. It is in one piece.

But 50% of the time, if not more, it won’t let me answer calls. It’s pretty regularly failing to connect with wi-fi.

It’s got some programming issue. My guess is that it’s too old to keep up with the newest iteration of the operating system.

And I find that really irritating. They lose interest in keeping my phone relevant and that makes it “broken” in a way that means I need a new phone.

It’s going to suck if cars get to this point–“oh, sorry, we just don’t fix cars that are five years old.”