The picture above is of a well which is at least 70 years old and the story is of a man who lived near and drew his family's water from this well from 1939 thru 1942.  Everyone called him "Friday " because he came to work at Stoneville Furniture Factory on a Friday.  He made 14.50 a week which was probably minimum wage during the end of the depression.  Most  men were glad to have any sort of a job at the time.

They also called him "the bee man".  He was raised in the Blue Ridge mountains and grew up taking care of bees.  He always  had five or six hives of bees in  the back yard.   He knew how to start new hives,; what to do if the bees decided to swarm.  Many of the men in town came to get him if their bees swarmed or for him to tell them what to do when the new bees settled in a tree.  He'd put on a beekeeper's hat and get the smoker and off he'd go to help.

Having been raised in the mountains, he hunted and was a crack shot.  I've seen him shoot a fifty cents piece from between a man's thumb and forefinger several yards away.  This could  only be a mountain man's past time.   He had many favorite trite sayings  such as if one got in a tight situation , he'd say "you're up a creek without a pedal".   If one wanted something which he  couldn't have, he'd say " people in Hades wanting water," or that you didn't have a " snowball chance in Hades  of getting it."   He'd  tell of his uncles in the mountains making moonshine during prohibition.  One uncle was the sheriff and the others made moonshine. He'd drink moonshine on occasion and he smoked one cigerette after another.

He was a generous man , willing to share what little he had with others.  He also was a very hard worker.  He died in his early sixties but is not forgotten.  He was remembered as "Friday", " the bee man" and by me as my daddy.