Friday 19 February 2010

Thursday 18th February 2010 - Another Town, Another Courthouse

          The morning newspaper startles me into wakefulness headlining an incredible statistic:"8 out of 10 Americans released from Haitian Jail".  Now I know the 8 out of 10 cat-owners prefer, what is it, kit-kat chocolate bars, but if the Haitians have been jailing hundreds of millions of Americans, no wonder there was an earthquake. 
 
          Today is courthouse day.  Dulcie, who seems to know a limitless number of things I'm not interested in, professes not to know where it is, but she can't look out for spires like I can.  It is a lovely sunny, springlike day.  I wonder if shirtsleeves will be OK.  A lady passes me in the parking lot:"bit nippy", she says by way of greeting.  I'm struck dumb (well, no, I'm making that up, but she obviously operates on a different scale to me).
          There is no plat map of Glasgow, which is no surprise, so after a bit of toing-and-froing between Tax and Probate, I have to settle down into trekking through deed books and all that terrible writing.
          Butler County had its courthouse fire in 1853, so that's when records start.  The place names book I found in the library tells me I want to start about 1866, so that's OK.  Roughly speaking, the story I pick up is that Captain John Glasgow, a planter in 1860, has married, had a son, and died by 1870.  His brother William has signed over all the property to him, and married.  John's widow then goes on a buying spree (that's a bit of an exaggeration), buying anything which joins with what she's got.  She gets mixed up with the Searcys, who are next door, sometimes buying jointly.  She is not listed (these indices are all transcriptions) as being in Butler County in 1870, but William and family is.  She dies in 1884, but John H Glasgow, who I presume is the son, is still dealing with the Searcys, and by 1890, in at least one deed, Searcy is described as being "of Glasgow, Butler County, Alabama".
         My new regime requires a break for fluid in the middle of the day.  I step across to the cafe.  I'm in a part of the world where if you look towards a crosswalk, every vehicle stops 10 yards short of it.  In the cafe I ask for tea and get a brown translucent plastic beaker full of iced liquid, which I assume is the mandatory water.  The shock of the first mouthful tells me it is sweet, mental analysis tells me it's cold tea.  So this is what people drink around here!  I point out, pathetically, that I'm a Brit, and expected it hot, without sugar.  They rummage about and find a teabag, and the coffee machine provides hot water.  It, kind-of, does.
         When I get back to the courthouse, a young man is talking to one of the clerks.  Every sentence, however short, ends with "Ma'am".  I've noticed when young people here talk to me, it's the same, with "Sir".  I guess they still do manners here.
 
          There is an interesting side issue here.  There are a number of black (the records all say "coloured") Glasgows around.  The only one I found still here is black.  He lives on what used to be the "Searcy" Road, and is now the Davenport Road.  He told me his daddy (or Grandaddy) was called Davenport.  One of the black Glasgows, Irvine, in 1888, married Leona Davenport.  I guess all that's connected.
 
          Later that night, no longer being reliant on Silver's discrete coughing, I drive downtown (a couple of miles) to visit the single bar in town.  It is almost empty, but the barmaid, probably because I asked for a soda, insists on 'carding' me.  I retaliate by showing her a European driver's licence.  My victory is short-lived: she can't find my date-of-birth, but neither can I.
          Back at my local, the joint was finally jumping, with a group of good ole boys getting seriously tanked-up, and a lady whose husband was on night shift.  She told me a lot about the Hyundai plant, where he works, and which employs about 3000 people directly, and Kia, just across the state line in Georgia, and Mercedes, up at Birmingham.  She was cooking nicely, but, unfortunately, when I carded her, she came up seriously short in the 'grown-up' department.
 

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