Kelly Coleman is a GPC student.

My grandfather, Garfield, loved to tell stories. One of his favorite stories to tell was about the great walk and the unexpected event that took place. He claimed that his father, my great grandfather, Porter, had walked all the way from Mississippi to Missouri in search of his family, but instead he ended up marrying his cousin. This is my favorite story because it seemed so unreal.

In the early nineteen-hundreds, my great grandfather, Porter, worked on a farm in Mississippi for a white man named Nelson. Nelson was an old unkempt man with long gray hair. Working for Mr. Nelson was not bad, but my great grandfather wanted to live with the rest of his family in Missouri. Great grandfather Porter did not really know his family nor did he know where to locate them, but he was willing to take a chance. On one hot summer night, he got out of bed and walked right off the plantation. When I asked my grandfather why great grandfather just did not have someone send for him he stated that money was not plentiful and he only knew of one cousin named Spanky. Since slavery was abolished, he was not worried about being hunted and captured. He started his journey with no food or water and the old shoes he had on were worn to the soles. But nothing was going to stop him from reaching Missouri.

As he began his journey, he came across a lot of different people. Some of the people were willing to help him with his journey and others were only interested in seeing him die. During his journey, some people were nice enough to let him stay in their barns so that he could rest, while at other times he just took it upon himself and boldly trespassed on to some people’s property. Because he was good with his hands and in the fields, he would sometimes fix things around some people’s homes or work in white people’s fields for a day to receive food and clean water.

As he continued his journey, the old shoes he wore had become so mangled to the point that he could no longer continue wearing them. Because he really did not have enough money to purchase shoes, he would sometimes stop in town markets and purchase cloth. He would use the cloth to wrap his feet. He continued doing this until he was able to work and make enough money to purchase a pair of good walking shoes.

As the days turned into weeks, great grandfather began to get sick. He caught numerous colds due to the rain and lack of dry clothing. He would sometimes sit in the woods during hot days and hang his clothes to dry. At times, he would use the water in the rivers to cleanse himself, but if he were caught by a group of white passers, they would sometimes run him off by shooting at and attempting to beat him.

Once he made his way to Missouri he had just one problem. He did not know where to find his relatives, but he knew that cousin Spanky worked at a train station. He found out where all the train stops were in Missouri and began to make his way from station to station looking for a cousin he knew as Spanky. It took him almost two weeks before he found the station which Spanky worked.

When great grandfather approached Spanky and identified himself as his cousin Porter from Mississippi, Spanky looked him up and down and stated: "I don’t have any family from Mississippi". Great grandfather gave all the memories and descriptions that he could, but Spanky could not recall ever knowing a cousin by the name of Porter. After great grandfather discovered that he could not convince Spanky that he was indeed his cousin, he decided to take residence in Missouri. He eventually married a black and Cherokee woman named Annie Mae. As they began to have a family and get to know each other’s families, they discovered that they were cousins! It turned out that Annie Mae was one of the relatives that he came to Missouri in search of. Once they found out, Grandpa Garfield says that they never spoke of it again. They just continued to raise their children and live their lives as they had done before they had come across the information. It was not revealed to the family until my great grandfather was on his deathbed. Then, and only then did his nine children know that their father and mother were cousins before they were husband and wife. Believe it or not!