Smith County Historian Morris Burton told me to visit the old J.A. Blow Farm. I found granddaughter Helen Blow Nance and her husband Cecil chatting in the driveway. Not far away stood the original homestead and the two historic barns built around 1898. At 71, Helen still regrets being born ten years after the famous James Anson Blow died in 1914.

James bought 311 acres just south of Teaselville in 1886 (near old Nebo). In the process of raising nine kids with Mittie Martha he became known nation-wide as a premier corn, pig and chicken breeder. He also invented a spaying needle for pigs.

Second only to his corn, the "J.A. Blow Dove Pea" was also a huge hit. Mr. Blow wrote on a flyer, "In the Spring of 1890 I killed a dove and it had 82 peas in its crop, 5 of this kind I now call the 'J.A. Blow Dove Pea.' I planted these five peas in my garden and they all came up nicely, but a cut-worm cut two of them down and from the three vines left I gathered something over one quart of shelled peas..."

While checking on his corn one day in 1914 he was soaked in a spring shower. Pneumonia set in and James died two days later at age 54. With tear-filled eyes Helen said, "He was such a hard worker; it breaks my heart to think he never knew his grandchildren." His wife Mittie died in 1949 at the age of 83. "She never looked at another man." She was too busy being hospitable and running the farm. But then again, she never met a stranger; if they weren't eating her fine meals, they were borrowing the phone.

One of their sons, James Jr. "Uncle Bud," when he wasn't fighting in both World Wars, lived out his life on the farm with his older sister Maud. James was married at age 40 for two years. But his wife grew weary of the farm life and left him in 1940.

Beautiful Maud loved to teach so much she never married. (Female teachers weren't supposed to marry back then--a remnant rule from puritanical early America.) She taught about forty years, living with her bachelor brother Uncle Bud. (Had I known her, I would of proposed in 1970 when she was 82. But I was only seven and struggling with my grammar lessons.)

Uncle Bud and his sister Maud lived in the old homestead together almost their entire lives. Bud was an expert at farming watermelons, cantaloupes, purple hull peas and raising bees. He also loved to fish in the Neches River and hunt for gold treasure.

The Old Spanish Trail runs through the Blow Farm near a spring. Hundreds of arrowheads have been found there while more than a few prospectors have pawed the ground looking for $8,000 worth of gold coins.

Legend has it a wealthy family was attacked by renegade Indians on the Old Spanish Trail while en route to San Antonio. They reportedly buried their gold near the spring before several of them were killed, including the burying one. Uncle Bud was known to search and dig for the gold by moonlight. He took a lot of kidding but loved looking and didn't care.

Cecil showed me the ancient trail and spring. I could almost hear the Indians' arrows slicing the air as the gold clinked into the dirt. And I could see old Uncle Bud inching along proudly with his new metal detector.

I walked through the 100 year old house with Helen, listening to her vivid recollections. Much of the original furniture remained. If only the wood-burning stoves, antique beds and dressers could tell their tale. They always said, "There was a whole lot of living done in that house." Ivory keys on the family piano long for the touch of four sisters. The piano teacher from Bullard is gone; everyone is gone. A huge dining room table is waiting patiently to host another 30,000 meals.

Maud loved to read and follow the news. A bad fall and broken hip sent her to a nursing home and grave in 1975. Nothing could have prepared 77 year old Bud for his sister's death after so many years of love and respect for each other in the same old house. Word of Maud's death sent Uncle Bud running to the two old barns, weeping. Two years later he was buried next to Maud. I know they're in a much better place, but it's nice to see they are forever neighbors and friends.