I'm from Where?

I used to say my family hails from Johnson County, Indiana. But after getting into genealogy 10 years ago, that question is a little harder to answer. The last 10 years in Indiana I've done research in Johnson, Brown, Hamilton, Jefferson, Bartholomew, Decatur, Jennings, Boone, Morgan, not to mention a few others I can't remember. My father's side is from all these areas in Indiana. On my mother's side we start with these counties in Kentucky: Clinton, Wayne, Pulaski, and Russell counties. Then there are the areas of Kentucky that my father's side goes back to in the very early pioneer days: Shelby, Floyd, Whitley, and Wayne counties. I sometimes wonder if my father's Lovealls knew my mother's Guffeys in Wayne county back in the 1820s. That would be amazing wouldn't it? That area's population was a lot smaller back then and maybe they would stop by the closest trading post or general store. You know how the old men do - sit around the woodstove and swap stories or share the goings-on in their part of the county. When I was growing up I would spend summers in Kentucky at my grandparents', the Conners. My pappy Conner would do just that. He would walk or ride the mule to Rosie Conner's store where there was a big woodstove sitting in the middle of the room with chairs all around it. I can imagine all the tall tales that went on there. I still have a photo of that store and the big woodstove somewhere,I must try to locate it. I'm sure that tradition hasn't changed in centuries at least in Kentucky, the meetings at the local gathering place. Even here in Brown County this tradition still goes on at our local country store. I've even sit in and listened to some of their stories. What fun! You can learn a lot.