I'm her grandson. Grandmother was quite a lady. She was very talented in quilting. She was also really good at southern country cooking. She gardened until she was up into her 80's. She'd grow vegetables and she had many nut and fruit trees on her property beside the graveyard across from Dysartsville Baptists Church. She made jellies and jams and all kinds of things like that as a hobby. She was quite an industrious woman.

The house she and my grandfather, (Papa) bought was well over 100 years old at her death. The home was old when they bought it.

My grandmother used to work at the elementary school in Dysartsville back when Dysartsville had one. The building later became some kind of youth correction facility and was a senior home at the time of her death. She had also worked somewhere ironing shirts.

Her husband, Eliga Blankenship, had worked as a merchant marine before his death. He passed away some time around 1987 or 1988, I believe. His name was pronounced like Elijah, and he was sometimes called /layj/ as a nickname. On the ship, he was nicknamed Blackie because he had a dark skin tone. He was either a half or a quarter Cherokee from his mother's side, I heard.

My grandmother liked to tell stories about her past, the family heritage and various things. One story she told was about an ancestor, she said on the Price side of her family, who was 'Black Dutch.' From reading online, I gather that this was either a person of Spanish or Portuguese descent who lived in Holland. He was a nobleman, and he got into a dispute with the king over the amount of taxes he owed on some type of bird, I think it was guinea hens. In his anger, he threw the king of the Netherlands into the fireplace. Then, he fled and hid in a barrel on a boat and came to America. That was supposed to be one of her ancestors according to the family legend that had been passed down to her. There was some kind of little copper pot or pitcher that the youngest child in the family inherited that had some kind of connection with the story, though it may have been acquired by an ancestor further down the family tree.

It was a priviledge to have Belle Blankenship as my grandmother. (Actually her name was Zula Belle-- not sure of the spelling, and not sure if Zula and Belle were two words or not. She didn't care for Zula and so went by Belle.) She will be missed and remembered.