Hello! This is my first blog, and I'm a bit nervous at this. I figure, who the heck is interested in my life anyway? But, if nothing else, maybe this will be good therapy. I realize that this would be an exercise in futility if it were not an honest an open enterprise...But not too open, I have to save some things for my priest.My name is Kenneth, and I guess I should start off with some history here. My plan was to relate stories about my life and the influences of my family upon me, good and bad. I live in north Texas, and I am married and am the father of one son. The above pics are my dad at about 19 when he was in the Navy in the 50's. The next one is me and my son Kenneth Santiago. My family history as I know it, goes back to England in the 1790's. So it would begin with my Gr. Gr. Gr. Gr. Grandfather, Jesse Holder. Old Jesse was a Methodist minister and a silversmith. He married a woman with the maiden name of Garrison and emigrated the America sometime in the late 1790's I figure. The family story is that he took a ship to Greenland then passed through Canada and into Massechutses. From there to Virginia. From Virginia to Warren County Kentucky about 1800. He was a circuit preacher on what was called the alligators circuit. This would have put him traveling horseback from Kentucky, all the way to Texas! It was called the alligators circuit from the many alligators that roamed the area. Methodist preachers killed alligators to supplement their income. They ate the meat, skinned the gators, left them with parishioners to dry, picked them up on the return trip, and sold them at trading posts. Sounds like quite the life eh? Jesse had six children, and I am descended from the youngest child, Jesse Pryor Holder. Jesse was born in Bienville Parish, Louisiana in 1829, just as the Federal Government was opening up the Louisiana territory for settlement, and the land was cheap, if not free for those who would homestead it. I have visited this area quite a few times, and it is truly gorgeous land. There are not any more Holders there any more, but at one time, we were a whole community there. I was delighted to find places like "Holder Mountain", and "Holder Road" that rings the mountain, and the "Holder Cemetery" where a few known Holder graves are still visible. Now the area is ringed with natural gas wells, it figures, my dirt poor relatives move away, and then the area is found to be rich with petroleum deposits! He, he...Hence forth, the "Holder Luck". Anyways, Jesse grew up in this area and was a farmer until the outbreak of the War of Northern aggression (that's the civil war for the northern brethren). The Holder's were not slave holders, and did not enlist in the Confederacy until 1862. Some of Jesse's brothers and sisters moved to Shelby County, Texas (Centerville)I do not know if this was due to the mandatory conscription order that was issued by the Confederacy in those days (because it was widely ignored and unenforceable) or if it was because the Federals had taken New Orleans and were moving North towards Jesse's home. The latter would make more sense, because it seems Jesse enlisted with his neighbors and kinfolk at about the same time into the same units. The description of the Confederate Army Surgeon, was that he was a man of about 5'6, dark skin, dark hair, and gray eyes. He would have been an older soldier, at about 33 years old. I have been able to gather up many documents supporting this from the Federal and State archives. It never fails to fascinate me when I look upon his signature on his enlistment papers, signing for his bounty of $50.00. Not much of an enlistment bonus these days, but I imagine it was quite a bit of cash for him. There's a story that is told by historian Shelby Foote about a Confederate soldier who was surrounded on all sides by Federals. The Federals asked him what he was fighting for, and why he would not surrender. They asked him, "Are you fighting to keep your slaves?" The confederate answered, "No". "Well, are you fighting for Robert E. Lee? Again he answered, "No". "Well, then why are you fighting Johnny Reb?" The Confederate answered, "Why because you're down here!". I figure this was as good and as honest an answer that was ever given by the poor white farmers of North Western Louisiana, and I can see in my minds eye, my Gr. Gr. Gr. Grandfather giving that same answer. He was fighting for to protect his home. He was fighting to keep his little farm from being burned, to keep his wife from being violated by the often unruly Federal troops, fighting for his own honor and to keep what he saw as a foreign invader from his soil. As we look back now, we modern Southerners see the grievous error in the culture of the old south, such as ungodly slavery and the utter control of the planter society over all, even the poor whites such as Jesse. But when I look back and think about things, and think about what I might have done in his shoes, from his perspective, I probably would have done the same thing. There wasn't much time to think about the great philosophical issues of the day, when there is an army marching for your destruction....no matter what you believe. So from this perspective, I can respect and honor Jesse for his commitment to his country and his home, and his willingness to lay his life down for his brothers. Jesse fought up and down the State of Louisiana with the 20th Louisiana Volunteer Infantry, Company C. Down around Irish Bend he was shot in the chest and badly wounded. In those days, the average caliber bullet was 50 cal., so you can understand why most wounds required amputation. Jesse was carried to Vermillion Bayou where he was captured by the Federals and taken to a hospital in new Orleans. Due to his injuries, the Federals did not ship him North to a prisoner of war camp...That probably would have been a death sentence. Somehow, he recovered and was paroled back to his until where he fought out the rest of the war. He was in Natchitoches, La. At the close of the war. Jesse went on to have 12 children. He returned to farming until his old age, and war wounds made it impossible for him to continue on. My Grandfather, George Holder said that he remembers him visiting Gloster, La., as an old, old man who was really crippled up. Jesse lived to be 91 years old and was living on a Confederate Pension in his old age, of which I also have the paperwork. He died in Pleasant Hill, La., near the site of the Pleasant Hill Civil War battlefield site, which was preserved in his lifetime. He was buried at Wallace Cemetery nearby. I believe that his grave was marked with a wooden marker, because he was dirt poor at the time of his death. Here recently, I sent off to the V.A. for a Granite Confederate gravestone to properly mark his grave. It is said one can judge a society by the manner in which it honors it's dead, my brother Darl and I tried to do that by placing this marker for Jesse a few weeks ago.Jesse had a son named James Monroe Holder. Gr. Grampa James grew up and worked all of his life in the Kingston, Desoto Parish area of Northwest La. He was a road engineer, and worked nearly his entire life improving the road system there. Often this involvement use of prisoners and chain gangs to do the back-breaking work of carving out roadways through this wild and undeveloped area. My grandfather always remembered how his father gave him a new pocket watch upon his completion of High School. I have that watch to this day. In 1928, he died suddenly of Appendicitis at 50 years of age, and this really rocked my grandfather's world. He so loved his father, and had had plans to go to college to study engineering, but had to leave that dream behind to support his family.My Grandfather, George Holder, went on to do just about every kind of work under the sun to make it through the depression. His main talents seem to reside in Carpentry, and he shared this trait with several of his brothers. He became a Master Carpenter, but also dabbled in small engine repair and water well pumps with occasional work in the oilfields of the area. Some of my earliest memories of my grandfather were us sitting around on his property in Frierson, Desoto Parish, La. Working on small engines. Here was an old school man of the South, but not the stereotype that many think of. Although raised in an era of segregation and Jim Crow, I don't ever remember the "N" work passing over his lips. It was always either Negro, or colored folks. He was always respectful to everyone, and was charitable to all. I remember once how he would take me and ride out to these old shacks, and brother I mean SHACKS, deep in the countryside, to where these elderly black folk lived. He had heard that their water well was busted and that they had no way to get water, and it was the hot of the Louisiana summer! We went out and spent all day placing a new submersible pump in the well and didn't stop working until their water was flowing again. I remember the old man that lived there, he was a really old guy, and I being 6 or so, thought he was the blackest man I had ever seen. I was too young to realize that I was staring at the son of a slave who had share-cropped all of his life...Just like my people had done two generations before. He came out and brought us something to eat, and water to drink from a bucket that he had inside the shack. The food was nothing more than hot water cornbread fried in an old iron skillet. It was horrible and the water was pretty nasty..But my grandfather pulled me aside and said, "Jimmy (he always confused me with my dad, so I got used to being called Jimmy) you eat what these folks give you, and you be real obliged about it, it's all they have". So, I ate it.....And was real appreciative. When the work was all done, the old man looked very embarrassed, because he knew he couldn't pay my grandfather for the work that he had done. My grandfather's price was for the old guy to "help". That meant to stand there and hand tools to Grampa. It also meant that whoever "helped" had to listen to my Grampa, ever so gently share the story of the gospel, and his personal witness of Christ in his life. Grampa was very subtle about it, and would weave the story of God's grace through the day as we sweated in the hot Louisiana sun, dirty, greasy, and very tired, we ended the day over the running water in the old man's house. It was then that I noticed his wife was incapacitated in the bedroom. She was crying and thanking my grandfather for fixing the water, and was embarrassed that she could stand up to properly thank him, it broke my heart. Grampa told them not to thank him too much because he was going to charge them for the work. He explained to the old man that he was in desperate need of some lawn furniture, and he had noticed that the old man had some rusting steel lawn furniture on the corner of his property. I started to tell Grampa that that stuff was rusted through and wasn't worth hauling off, but he shushed me right up. I just didn't get it, but Grampa was teaching me something. The old man's should straightened up when he heard this, and I can understand now that what I saw was dignity creeping back up into the old man's heart, knowing that he had the ability to trade something for the work...And not just be in debt to another white man. That old man smiled and said, "Deal!", and shook my Granddad’s hand, and then shook mine. I remembered how his hand felt like sandpaper. The calluses were so hard, and his hands were cracked and covered with lines that many years of doubtless suffering had left behind. As we drove away, my grandfather explained to me a lesson that his father had taught him, that you never do your charity in such a way as to compromise another man's dignity. That old man was probably the poorest man I had ever seen...but he was a man, and he was God's child, and Grampa said that God loves those kind of children the most, and that to pass them by without helping where you could, was to store up wrath for yourself on the day of judgment. You see, my Grampa wasn't one that just preached his religion to me, he lived it. He walked as he talked, and he talked softly and worked hard. He looked just like his brothers, who looked very much like their father, and their grandfather Jesse. He was about 5'8, with olive skin, brown eyes, and black hair. He was an imposing figure...And if you didn't know him as I did, he would strike you as a scary looking guy. He was incredibly strong. He could drive a nail straight through a board with one tap, effortlessly, up into his 80's. There were people who had told me that my Grandfather had been a pretty stern man in his younger days, who took no crap, and would not tolerate much from a stranger. I can see how that might be true, but my view of my grandfather had always been of a simple, fair, and godly man. He was simple though, he could not fathom going to a restaurant fro dinner. He had cows and pigs and chickens, and he grew his own vegetables....So why pay someone else to feed you? Why go to a movie, why waste money on these frivolous things when you could be saving your money. Why not go ride a horse instead or do something more constructive with your time. My dad says he can never remember going out to dinner or any kind of recreation except church and family picnics. Grampa was all about family. Of all his brothers, he was the sober peacekeeper. One of this brothers was a local Sheriff who had a reputation for drinking and shooting a few people here and now...not counting his pretty rough treatment of the local Negroes....Not exactly an enlightened character. Sometimes the brothers were so rowdy and out of control, Grampa had to round them all up and straighten them out...Even they didn't want their brother George to get cross with them, cause someone usually would get smacked around pretty good. Grampa didn't drink, and wouldn't have alcohol in his home. My Grandmother, Marjorie Cato Holder couldn't tolerate a drunk. Her maiden name was Cato, but her mother Ida's maiden name was Flores....It took me years to figure out that was an Hispanic name...They always pronounced it with a long e, so it wasn't until many years later that I finally figured it out. My Grandmother's father had been a bad drunk and she said that she would only marry a man who did not drink, and that's exactly what she got. She had really traumatic memories of the drunkenness that she had suffered under, and she could hardly talk about it. I'll never forget her aversion to drunken behavior...And years later I would come to really understand it clearly for myself.Little stories like the one above about my Grandfather are not one time deals, these kinds of things happened all the time, it was his way of life. I can't remember a time when he wasn't teaching me something, whether he was conscious of it or not. I don't mean to say he was perfect, I am savvy enough to know that no one is perfect, and I am sure he had plenty of faults of his own that I didn't know about. What I can say, is that whatever those faults might have been, his example to me was always one of goodness and wisdom.My Grandmother, Marjorie Cato was another one of those influences on me that I could never calculate in goodness. To me, she was the perfect southern woman. I realize I risk being called a male chauvinist by saying that...but I guess that may be true, perhaps my domestic world view is a century or so off. My grandmother was an intelligent woman, but at the same time, the kind of grandmother that was always cooking something. If you came into her house, you were gonna eat! She was a godly woman, a Sunday school teacher, and a very loving woman. She was always there to meet my grandfather with a meal when he came in, or a cold glass of sun tea on a hot day. Her world was the household, and she was adept at taking care of her domain. I never really remember ever seeing her argue or fight with my grandfather. I once asked her if she had ever fought with my grandfather. She told me, "Fight, noooo, I would never raise my voice to your grandfather". I believed her too. She had a profound respect for my grandfather, and I think that was the key to their marriage..the respect that she always had for him. I knew that they sniped at each other as they got older, but it was never more than that. My Grandmother recently told me about how happy she had been with my grandfather. She told me that she never once had to worry about the things that so many other women had to worry about, like their husbands running around on them, or being violent and all. She was always gentle and kind with me and always spent that extra time with me and let me know how she was interested in my little world. Whether it was giving me an extra jump in Chinese Checkers, or listening to me chatter on about some stupid thing at my elementary school.
