Cabarrus County, NC - Sarah Ann Cox Ritchie

Sarah Ann Cox Ritchie Memories 
 
Note From Sharon:  Here is a 1946 newspaper article that was in my 
grandmother's scrapbook (Mittie Hahn Ritchie), about her mother-in-law 
Sarah Ann Cox Ritchie. The ancestral home she visited is in Stanly 
County.  

Mrs Ritchie Visits Ancestral Home Again After 76 Years – Mt Pleasant 
Woman Looks Upon Home Of Her Grandparents By Major Roy Webster

Mrs Luther Ritchie of Mt Pleasant, last Easter Sunday afternoon once 
again visited the home of her grandparents after a lapse of 76 years. 
When she was a little girl of five years of age, she went to see her 
grandmother in company with her mother and now she has gone back to the 
old home after the passage of more than three quarters of a century.
This is one of the most unusual happenings this reporter has ever had 
the pleasure of reporting, and it is doubtful whether a similar case of 
this nature has ever occurred in this part of the country. Mrs Ritchie, 
the wife of the late Luther Ritchie, Easter Sunday visited her son, 
Hugh Ritchie in Albemarle, and in company with her son went to the home 
of her grandparents some distance from Albemarle.

"I well remember seventy-six years ago," said Mrs Ritchie "when I went 
with my mother to visit my grandmother, Mrs Levi Shankle, down in 
Stanly county. My grandfather, Rev. Levi Shankle was born in Germany 
July 22, 1788 and while a young man came with two of his brothers to 
the United States. One of the brothers settled in Virginia, another in 
Chrleston SC, while my grandfather came to North Carolina and settled 
in what is now Stanly county. 
 
He died February 9, 1864, right in the midst of the War Between the 
States and he is buried in the old family cemetery nearby the old home. 
His tombstone and that of my grandmother are still in a good state of 
preservation, as I found out Easter Sunday afternoon when I visited the 
old homeplace. My grandmother was Sarah Ivey Shankle, and she was a 
sister of the grandfather of J.B. Ivey in Charlotte.

"Things have changed a great deal around the old homplace," said Mrs 
Ritchie, "after all of this time has gone by. The home itself was 
destroyed by fire many years ago, and other changes have taken place, 
but the old spring out of which I drank as a girl of five is still 
there, and from it still flows that ice-cold water which I remember so 
well from the days of long ago. In those days every family had a spring 
house and a milk box through which the spring water flowed and kept the 
milk cold. Part of the rock milk box are still there just as they were 
years ago. The hill at the foot of which rests the spring is just about 
the same as it was when I visited it those many years ago. My memory is 
clear about that visit, although I had never been there again until 
last Easter Sunday."

Mrs Ritchie is busily engaged every day in her work, and she has that 
cheerful, happy outlook which has always been characteristic of her. At 
the age of eighty-one she is still active every day, and she is 
especially interested in flowers and shrubs in her front yard which she 
cares for and attends. Mrs Ritchie is unusually well preserved, and her 
mind is keen and active, especially concerning things of long ago.

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This file was contributed for use in the USGenWeb Archives by
Sharon Perdue - spperdue@comcast.net
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