> Keokuk County has a new coordinator, Craig Fenton. Please WELCOME him > in his new capacity. Craig comes to us with much enthusiasm and roots in > Keokuk > County. Welcome Craig! I have many warm and happy childhood memories of Keokuk County. (1937 - 1942) My family (SURBER) has roots going back to the 1850's in Keokuk Co. (mostly around Hedrick) We lived on the "old Utterback place" down the dirt road about 4 miles from Hedrick. It was owned then by Adne UTTERBACK. We were just barely inside the Hedrick Consolidated school district (I rode in a rickety school bus driven by, as I recall, "Mr. Vischer ... Fisher?") That dirt (clay) road was rough on the school bus. It occasionally got stuck in the sticky, red mud, even sliding into the ditch, and my dad would pull them out with a team (sometimes two teams) of horses. That was always very exciting. When we lived there, the old rock house was still standing at the top of the hill overlooking our small house near the road. I've learned that there is a quarry there now, and the old house is gone, which makes me sad. My dad & his family had lived in that house for a time about 1910. Gone, too, would be the glorious bank of bluebells that my grandmother, Finetti SMITH SURBER had planted behind the house. Jeanne Surber surberj@earthlink.net