Blount and Beyond Online Magazine - Magazine - Page 11
Memories of Rowena Tallent Foster
1929 - 1998
Part 1
MEMORIES OF ROWENA TALLENT FOSTER
In the heart of the Great Smoky Mountains is a place so quiet and peaceful you can sit for hours reflecting in the
grandeur and glory of the majestic land. The ground is covered with lush green carpets of moss in the spring,
and in the fall with crisp, crunchy leaves of brilliant golds, reds and yellows. Lacy ferns nod their heads beside
babbling brooks that go ambling past tall spruce trees and stately populars. The stillness is broken only by the
singing of birds, giving praise to the Creator. This land is a safe haven for deer, rabbits, squirrels and other
larger and smaller of God9s creatures.
This place wasn9t always quiet and still. Once upon a time the sounds of saws and axes rang out over the hills.
Men talking, children laughing, and mothers singing as they went about their work. There was a time when
people lived there. They worked, loved, played, built homes and raised families. They grew old and died there.
My roots go deep in this mountain land. My Great Grandfather John N. Walker married Margaret Jane King,
and raised 13 children. My Grandfather, John H. Walker married Mary Ann Trotter and they had 11 children.
My mother, Lucy Ellen, was one of the middle ones.
My father was James Melvin