Grandma Mixson, Me, David, Dad in North Carolina

In July we went on vacation in our new station wagon to what we started calling "our cabin" in North Carolina. This time Grandma Mixson came with us and the Yawns - Betty, Billy, Janice, Karen and Timmy.  One day we all went to Cherokee and took a picnic lunch.  We walked up and down the main street looking into all the shops, one with a big carved bear on one side of the entrance and a life size Indian on the other.  Not to be outdone, another shop had a real live Indian Chief in full headdress.  In one shop a big bowie knife caught my eye, five inch blade, leather hilt, belt mount case, I wanted it.  I had brought several dollars with me that I had saved from my hard earned allowance, and I had enough to buy the knife.  Knowing better than asking Mom for permission, I asked Dad and he said, “You’ll be real careful with it wont you?”  I said yes and he said I could buy the knife.  I had the knife for many years afterwards although I was disappointed when I could not take it on Boy Scout camping trips because they didn’t allow fixed blade knifes or knifes with blades longer than 2 ½ inches. 

Mom and Beth by river David and Timmy fell in.

After seeing all the shops and buying my knife we all went to a picnic area with tables by the river.  We got the coolers out of the trunks of our cars, spread out a tablecloth over the table and had lunch consisting of sandwiches, chips and cokes in bottles.  David and Timmy finished lunch quickly and went off to explore the river and manage to fall in getting all wet but fortunately not getting swept downstream for the river had a pretty good current.  When the returned to the picnic table they got a scolding from Mom and Betty particularly since Mom had told them not to play in the river.  Not having planed on getting wet, we had no extra dry clothes or even a towel with us, so David and Timmy had to be wet for the over an hour drive back to the cabin. 

One day we went to Tweetsie Railroad which is much like Ghost Town that we went to the previous year, the big difference was the Railroad which you traveled in a broad circle around the town while it was attacked by Indians, robbers and saved by the Calvary.  As we walked down the main street we came upon commotion and there stood Dennis the Menace (Jay North) from the TV show.  I was surprised that he was taller than he looked on TV.  Brenda, David and I ran over to him to see if we could get his autograph but were not able to. Mom got a good photo with Dennis in the same stripped shirt he always wore on the TV show and then me on the left, Brenda’s face over Dennis’ shoulder, David to the right behind Dennis, Dad holding Beth in the background.  It was the highlight of our vacation.

Updated: 08-07-2022

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