Growing Up In Williamsport, Ohio

​Our History in Williamsport
 
While I do not want to dwell on the history of Williamsport here, I do want to tell about our family’s history there. I don’t know why my parents moved from Stoutsville to Williamsport. In recent years, I have realized that many of the people who lived in Williamsport were of German descent. Many of my family’s ancestors came from Virginia then moved to Kentucky and up into Ohio. My recent DNA test indicates that we came from England, Ireland, Scotland, Germany and Scandinavia.
 
The mode of transportation for my grandparents was horses and trains. Then my parents lived through the transition from horses to automobiles. When my mother was young, she went to the Circleville Pumpkin Show with her Dad, Isaac Skaggs, in a horse drawn surrey with a fringe on top. My Dad’s father, Amos Francis, was a horse trader. They were a family that was always involved with horses. My Dad had a crooked little finger from hitting the rear end of a horse.
 
During that transition time, not everyone had a car so some of the necessities of life came to them. One of my first remembrances of living in the south end of town was the bread man. Every time he came, I would be waiting. He always gave me a big oatmeal cookie. We also had a milk man, an ice man and a dry cleaner. Unlike today, we didn’t have to pay them $5 to deliver.
 
My Dad’s employer, the Dunlap Company, paid their workers at Archie Rawlinson’s IGA Grocery Store. We bought things all week long and put it on the store’s tab. When my Dad picked up his check, he paid for the groceries. My mother often made a list of things she wanted and dropped it off. Archie or his workers would gather the groceries up in cardboard boxes and deliver them to the house at no charge. Life was good….at least for me.

©Marilyn Francis Ferguson 2019
Photography/graphics by Michele Ferguson Schuck