Roots and Branches- Oct-Nov 2001 Newsletter

Included on the attendance list along with their relationship to the family were:

For those of you interested in further family reunions, please read the following and write to me with your suggestions and comments!

Several of you have suggested that we have a more organized reunion with an "agenda" and I even spoke to some of you at the reunion about suggestions. Upon returning home last evening, I began looking into different ideas for our coming reunions, but would like to check with all of you before implementing any.

First, I think we have all agreed that Camp Wesley Pines in Copiah Co is a wonderful place for our future reunions, and that the date will remain as the last Saturday in the month of October. Votes were made to move it back one week, but upon finding that time slot already taken, we voted to stay with the 4th weekend.

If our reunions are to be successful in the future, we will need to have more than one person in charge, this year, the burden was left to Luther, who did not get to visit enough, instead he was busy registering and preparing for our good times, for which I will be forever grateful. He was a wonderful host, as well as Ted, the director of Camp Wesley Pines, and the accommodations and food were very well prepared for us, and enjoyed by all who attended.

A few of us are consistent at the reunions, we will be the ones that will need to be in charge, but we will need to share the responsibilities so that the burden will not fall on a single person. This way, we can all have time to enjoy our family.

Reading through several online guides this morning, I have come up with many good ideas that I would like to share with you and to get your opinions, on why or why these might not work for our group. Our group changes from year to year, but hopefully, with a bit more organization, we will get a larger, and more consistent group of family to attend. Of course, I do realize that there will be years that some cannot attend because unforeseen circumstances.

Some suggestions made by family members at this years reunions included having a genealogy class for those interested, and electing a committee or person to be sure that flowers are placed on our descendants graves that do not have local family living in the area. While I like the idea of a genealogy class, I personally do not think enough of our attendees are interested in learning genealogy, but are instead there for the fellowship. The idea of putting flowers on our descendants graves is a great one, though we have descendants spread all over Copiah and Simpson Counties, and it would be a task of monumental proportion and expense, ... not too mention some of the grave sites, such as George Washington Barlow & Norval Barlow are not easily accessed. If I am wrong about this, please let me know!!!

What would you all like to see us do in our reunions? I would love to hear from all of you about what you would like to do. Should we play games, these can be some wonderful icebreakers and will insure that we meet everyone at the reunion.

1. Give each person an index card with another reunion guests name on it (preferably someone they don't know all too well), and a pen or pencil. Now, everyone mingles with everyone else (except the person whose name is on the card) and find out everything you can about the person on your card"! Find embarrassing stories or facts about the people – it’s so much more fun that way. Afterwards, get back together and have everyone stand up and introduce the person on their card and the things they found out about them.

2. Sit in a circle. Pass around a bag of M&M’s (for more fun, buy several bags and dump them all in a huge bowl). Tell everyone to take as many as they want, but not to eat them yet. Every group has the people who reach in with both hands and scoop half the bowl – don’t worry; they’ll get theirs in the end. Once everyone has their M&M’s and is ask ing when they can eat them, inform the group that for every M&M they took they have to tell someone about themselves. "Argh! 100 M&M’s!? Um, one, my name is Chuck. Two... I am tall. Three, I…play the clarinet." Fifteen minutes later… "Ninety-nine, I have a brother. One hundred…uh…uh…my brother’s name is Matt! Done"!

3. How'd you get your name? What better way to introduce yourself than to share your name? Have each person stand up and tell what they know about the reason they have their name. It can be your first, middle, or nickname, or if you happen to know where your last name comes from that always works too.

4. Show and tell. Many of us have items handed down through our families that we are proud of, and it would be fun to share these items with other family members and perhaps brag about our descendant to all. I know for instance that Lora Beth has a pocket watch from our great grandfather Andrew Jackson Barlow, and a dress worn by Elizabeth Till Burkett Barlow, and if I am not mistaken, I think I heard one descendant brag of owning a gun that was used by his descendant during the Civil War.

5. The Reunion Trivia game involves everyone from six years old to eighty years young.   New questions are written
for each reunion because they should teach and entertain.    This is a great game, because it gives people a lot of inter- esting things to talk about after the game is over. Twenty-five to thirty questions are just about right. Start with serious questions meant to inform.   How many living generations are there in our family?   Who is the eldest living family member? Ask the person to stand, be recognized, given flowers and accolades. Who is the youngest member present?
Ask the parents to show off the child. Which couple has been married longest? Shortest?   Again, ask them to stand and be recognized. How many sets of twins were born in the family? Then, more on to lighter, less serious questions. What was a grandmother's middle name? How many children did the family founders have? Name them. Introduce anything about your family you think is unique, such as: What was Uncle Jim's job in the Army? Answer: Uncle Jim was a bugler in the Cavalry. Family trivia games give people lots of interesting things to talk about throughout the reunion.   Include some silly questions, too. What is Uncle Bubba's real name? What relationship was Aunt Kirsten to us and how?   Many times we call someone aunt/uncle/cousin when they're not really relatives. Younger members don't know why. What were Uncle Ed's two cats' names?   And, finally, the bragging questions. The purpose of these is to recognize people who are doing something special or outstanding. Emphasize what's extraordinary and worth recognition.   Who's attending college this year? Each college student should stand, tell the name of the college and their major.   Who bought a house since our last reunion? Who had a baby this year? Once you start thinking questions come easily and are limited only by your imagination. You don't have ask all of them at once. Remember your objectives are to entertain, educate, recall and get everyone involved.   Keep comments and speeches to a minimum.    Never ask a question for which you have no answer. A slight dose of foolishness is fun, but don't get too silly. People will lose interest. Be creative. Avoid negatives, such as: How many husbands did Aunt Trudy have? Or why did Uncle Lee go to jail on Christmas Eve?

6. All of the adults bring a baby picture of yourself, we will post them on a board and have a "guess who" contest.

7. How bout' a game of horseshoes between the different branches of the families? Any takers?

We had a very generous offering this year for covering expenses, ie...postage, and Luther's deposit on the campground.
After those items were paid, we had $148.00 left over. So now I have new suggestions for what to do with that money, and would like to hear from you with your suggestions also:

My favorite idea is to have a memorial plaque with brass name plates of our loved ones lost the year prior to the
reunion, too be added to each year. The plaque will be displayed each year at our reunion.

I have always liked the idea of having t-shirts made up for our reunion. I would suggest beginning with perhaps a yellow t-shirt depicting the cover of Lora Beth's "Barlow Kinfolk" book as the logo on and with the year of the reunion. For following years, we could have a contest and have you submit your ideas, ie.. with your old family photographs, or your own original artwork, to be voted on at the time of the reunion. Of course, someone has to fund these items before the idea can be implemented, and I for one do not have excess cash lying around...as I am sure is the case with many of you. Of course, the t-shirts will be sold at the reunion, hopefully at a cost that is reasonable for everyone to afford one, and possibly with a very small profit to be added to the following years t-shirt fund. If anyone of you have experience in making these tshirts with logo's, (I know that iron on logos can be made on the computer) but only after several trial and errors, which in itself can be expensive)... please let me know if you might be interested in this "job". Of course, then we run into the problem of how many, and what sizes to have available so as not to have left-overs or not have enough, and I would like to hear your suggestions for solving those problems also.

Idea's for funding these types of items, other than asking for offerings that I have come up with would be that perhaps we could have our many talented family members to donate one or more of their crafts to be either raffled or auctioned off. I know we have a couple of wonderful artists in the family, and perhaps someone makes quilts, or crochets doilies and or afghans, etc. I think we can all come up with some item to donate for these causes.

As many of you know, the Old Pleasant Valley Cemetery, aka Millsaps Cemetery, was a project of ours this past year, an effort was set forth to clean it up and to have it declared an historical cemetery, which was done. However, the ceme-
tery has since began to grow back up. Charlotte Barlow Farthing who was instrumental in having the work done, tells me the County of Copiah cannot fund the upkeep of the cemetery, but that they would allow the county prisoners to do the work, if we supply their lunch. Charlotte took care of that the first go round, at a cost of about $75.00. It would be a good idea to have appropriated from our reunion fund, about $150-200 a year so that the job might be done at least twice a year, unless we have a local volunteer (s) who might like to undertake that task. If you wonder why our group might be interested in this undertaking, take a look at the list of persons known to be buried in that cemetery. Our fundraisers might use other means of obtaining moneys for this project also, I can provide several addresses of people who have family buried in that cemetery that might be willing to contribute.

Now, back to the beginning, should you all decide that these are ideas you like, I for one do not want to be the only person organizing these things. Thus, we should vote for committees to handle the various types of events ...ie...

Together these will be the committee, and will work together to plan reunions for the upcoming reunions, and will need to work closely together. I suggest since we are all long distances from each other, that the persons elected have an e-mail account for ease in communication with one another. Each "job" may be carried on by one person, or more as needed.

Finances: We will need someone who is good with numbers and honest to take care of the money that is raised and carried over from year to year. Person's asking for money for reunion use will need to communicate with the committee the reason for the need, and they will decide if that reason is a good one before the money can be appropriated, and then only if funds are available. This person will need to keep a record and receipts of all moneys used, as well as to whom the money was paid out and for what use.

Communications:
Is responsible for managing the address list and mailing all the various invitations and follow-up reminders.

Fundraising:
The fundraising subcommittee is in charge of planning and carrying out the varying fundraising activities for the reunion. These can include auctions, raffles, cakewalks, or other more bizarre ideas you could come up with. They are also in charge of obtaining any items needed for any of the fundraising activities, or for contacting family members if items liked baked goods or homemade crafts are needed. They will work very closely with the financial committee.

Family History:
The family history committee is responsible for collecting family memorabilia for display at the reunion. They can create a large wall chart with family members’ names to hang on the wall for guests to see how they are related to each other changes , and being sure that all changes and updates are made prior to the next reunion. If any research side trips are planned (cemetery tours), it is this committee which takes care of the details. I suggest Lora Beth and Carol Hilton for this job :) Should the Memorial Plaque suggested above be implemented, these persons would be in charge of updating the plaque from year to year, and to be sure it is displayed.

Photography:
I always intend to take pictures at the reunions, but often get sidetracked and don't get very many. The ones I do take, when I get home, I cannot remember the names that go with the faces in a lot of cases. To solve this, we can elect one person that is good with a camera to be sure everyone is photographed and labeled. We can use money from our funds to buy the film, and for the development, with a set to be downloaded on the Mississippi Kinfolk site for all to view and copy, and for those of you not having a computer, a copy of the photographs could be made available at a cost to cover the expense, and perhaps a dollar for his time.

Accommodations: This is Luther and Ted at Camp Wesley Pines!

Welcoming:
The welcoming committee is responsible for welcoming the guests to the reunion. This person will be responsible for making the name tags available. I suggest that these can be made up ahead of time using the list of persons who have rsvp'ed as will be necessary for accommodations and meals. An idea I like is to color code the name tags by family branches, ie .. Thomas Norvel Hilton line, George Washington Barlow line, Bryant Barlow line...etc... If you are double related, we will do half and half colors :) If more than double related, you'll get a rainbow :)

Children's activities -- "Continuation" is the essence of all families -- that's the reason they exist. For the most part, older people are the most enthusiastic about family reunions and are the ones doing the planning. But it's obvious
to everyone that the kids are the continuation of the family, and are the ones who will be planning the reunion in 40 years. So the older people really want the kids to have a good time. And, of course, every kid always wants to have a good time, too. Remember: for a kid, it's not a reunion -- it's a party. So take some extra effort and show the kids a good time. Older teens are often good at organizing the younger children. Any volunteers for this one?

Setup and Cleanup:
This will be someone who checks all the rooms and the areas of use to be sure nothing is left behind, and that we leave the place as well or better than we found it, this is not a large task at Camp Wesley Pines, as we are not doing the cooking or cleaning up of the kitchen.

I will be happy to fill 3 or 4 of the positions if you choose. Please send your recommendations for each committee to me and I will try to get a plan going. For the folks who attended this years reunion, and for whom I do not have e-mail addresses, I will use money from the existing fund to mail a copy of this newsletter to them so that they might have a say, and I will include the Carpenter's and Ivey's.

Person's who would like to volunteer for a specific committee, please let me know. At next years reunion, we will have an official vote to elect the committee's for the following year. I myself would
like to recommend John Barlow, < jandcbarlow@webtv.net> of Clinton Mississippi to be our finance committee if he will accept that responsibility.

Door prizes: Elizabeth Jordan made up a basket of condiments necessary for Cajun cooking, she is from Louisiana ...
This would be a great idea for each family to purchase or make a gift to bring and give as door prizes. The committee along with your suggestions will decide how the door prizes will be given.

The family reunion is a perfect place to bring, display and solve the mystery of materials, papers and photos you can't identify. Everyone has pictures — usually from bygone era — of unknown origin, occasions, times and place and even, more importantly, of unknown persons.

Ask members to bring mystery photos. Indicate who brought each photo, then ask everyone to look at them and see if they can identify the people in the pictures. This is an opportunity for some of your older members to shine because they know the people and places, occasions and reasons for the pictures.

If you have artifacts that you can't identify, bring them along too; include tools, implements, toys, crafts.

What do you think of creating a family directory, with names, addresses, birthdays, and maybe even pictures.

Using the register, I am updating my mailing list with changes that need to be made. If you know of others that might be interested, please send their e-mail addresses if one is available, or their mailing address when an e-mail is not avail- able.