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James
Robert Vinson was born in Macon County, North Carolina on December
17, 1912. Growing up, his family did not have electricity in their
home. They lived on the opposite side of the Little Tennessee
River and the power company would not cross the river. "We cooked
on a wood stove and most everybody had a fireplace." Water came
from a nearby spring and was carried to the house. Mr. Vinson
remembers that the women had it hard in the summertime. "They
didn't have any freezers. They had to can everything and it was
pretty hot canning... in the summertime." Later in his life his
family used "gravity water" to bring water to the house. In his
case, the water ran down the mountain through a channel under
the back porch. "You just had to step off the back porch and put
a bucket under that spout." By the time Mr. Vinson returned home
from World War II the REA had brought service across the river.
When asked about how he felt about electricity he said, "We need
it. It would be bad if we had to go back to those old kerosene
lamps. I would hate to do without it. If we didn't have electricity
we'd still be carrying water from the spring." |
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