The Christmas holidays have always been, for our family, the best time of the year. It is as much a reunion as it is a holiday. A reunion of sights, sounds, memories and great food. Great cooks abound in this family, and traditional cooking responsibilities are as follows: Granna, the matriarch, always does the cornbread dressing, although granddaughter Catie is in training for the future. It is too good for mere words. The turkeys, one baked and one fried, are my responsibility. I’m much too modest to brag, but OMG! I also handle the collard duty. My brother-in-law, Bobby, makes giblet gravy that should be patented. Daughter Kathy, my wife, makes great deviled eggs, along with help from Catie. Youngest daughter Ellen, Bobby’s wife, handles the potato salad, along with help from Kathy and Catie, and I have threatened to do away with her if she ever changes anything. Eldest daughter Patti makes wonderful sweet potato soufflé and crock pot mac and cheese. There are of course, assorted and sundry desserts. If that doesn’t get your mouth watering, you might need to check your pulse. We lost Mac, our patriarch, this past March. Our Christmas joy will be tempered somewhat due to his loss. However, he would want us to carry on all of our wonderful traditions just as though he was with us, and he will be, in spirit. Mac loved Christmas, the traditions, his family and the good food. He no doubt is peering down on us and enjoying from afar the clutter, congestion, banter, laughing, crying and everything else that emanates from a family gathering …… and we will be thinking of him every minute, along with the real reason for celebrating this very special season. Charlie Roquemore

The Christmas of 1943 I was a new bride, and was anxiously awaiting my husband's arrival from Army maneuvers taking place in Murfreesboro, TN. He was stationed at Camp Rucker, AL. What he did not know was he and the men were destined, at a later date, to participate in what would be called D Day. His officer announced a few weekend passes would be issued to the soldiers scoring highest on the rifle range, plus passing the drivers test in an 18-wheeler truck. The pass would be given the soldier with a new haircut, clean shave and clean Army uniform. A tall order for men living in tents near the snow covered mountains, depending on creek and rivers for most water. My husband was awarded the pass and thumbed a ride to Murfreesboro Bus Station only to be informed the roads were icy and his trip would be delayed. The first bus failed to negotiate the road. My husband persuaded a few men to help him push the second bus out and were finally on their way to Rome. I heard his steps on the porch at midnight and when he related what he went through to see me, I knew he loved me. It was not only the best Christmas ever, he was the best present I ever received. After the War we had many more enjoyable Christmases, but none to match the Christmas of 1943. Edythe Lee Scherer

My oldest daughter was very much pregnant with our first grandchild in 1985. She came over to visit one afternoon. She was sad and depressed. This was her first Christmas with her husband’s family. The couldn’t afford to buy presents for everyone. I told her she could. I pulled out the stuff to bake sugar cookies. We baked sugar cookies and decorated them. Since her feet started to swell, I mixed the cookies and cut them while she sat and decorated them. Then we put them on paper plates, wrapped them up and then put bows and name labels on them. By the time we finished, her spirits were up. I loved seeing her happy once again. My heart was full of joy. After all, Christmas is full of joy and giving. Since that Christmas, we have received homemade bread, apple butter, salsa and more. She’s a good cook. That Christmas Eve, we had a grandson. And a Merry Christmas for my daughter and me to remember. Merry Christmas! Joyce E. Clark

Growing up, I was the fourth of seven children. Christmas time was always special and while we didn’t have a lot of money, it didn’t seem to matter. One tradition was putting out the nativity scene that my mother had bought. Each year we carefully unwrapped each piece and you were considered the really lucky one if you unwrapped baby Jesus and got to place him between Mary and Joseph. That nativity scene was the one thing I was very verbal about wanting one day. It held so many memories and held such a special place in my heart. My mother died in 2005 in California. I had the nativity set packaged and shipped to ensure it would arrive in Georgia without breakage. It is still in the original box and I have put it out each year. Last year, my third year to set it out, I removed a piece of paper from the bottom of the box and under it I found an envelope with my name on it in my mother’s writing. Here is what she wrote: 2-8-96 These are my memories as I put away the nativity scene. Yes, I left it on the buffet until now (only this year). We bought it at P.B. Carrols Variety Store on Palos Verdes Blvd. (I am sure you remember us shopping there) I can’t read the sticker and the price but I am sure it was $5.98 or $6.98, hand painted and the year had to be in the late ‘60s. I am positive that (1)It was a big purchase and (2) that I hemmed and altered clothes to pay for it (a skirt was 50 cents). It was really a special deal to have the nativity set. I felt you children would appreciate it and learn from it. It represents and shows the humble birth of Christ. After all the people handling it, looking and rearranging it, it still has no chips that I can see. Just thought you would like to know these things. Love, Mom My mother wrote this note years before she died and left it in the box for me to find one day, finding this letter made for an adult memory that I will always cherish. Rebecca Eaker

Christmas 64 years ago. March 1943, I was inducted into the Army at Fort McPherson, Ga. After serving 28 months in the C.B.I. theater (China, Burma, India), I returned on a ship to New York and then on a train to Camp Gordon, Ga. I was discharged at Camp Gordon on Dec. 23, 1945. I left on a bus for Rome, my home. I arrived at the Rome bus station after midnight. Everything was closed. I started walking down Broad Street to my home in South Rome. The clock tower brought back memories of walking up to Boys High School. A grocery store in the Cotton Block where I delivered groceries still looked the same. As I approached the bridge a city bus pulled up beside me. The door opened and the driver said “get in here.” He repeated “get in here, you are not walking home!” I got in the bus and he said “where to?” I told him North Blanche Avenue in the Anchor Duck. When we got there he said “now get off and have a Merry Christmas!” Alvin E. Shepherd Sr.

The simplicity of Christmas was where the joy of Christmas use to be! It’s really sad that Christmas has become SO commercialized! It’s great to have the "super" stores — where you can find most anything your heart desires, but then again it’s sort of sad. In the 40s and 50s people didn’t rush around stressing themselves out like they do today. Rome was a great place to grow up — no "super" stores, but really nice stores downtown where you got personal service anytime you shopped for anything. People cared about your needs and just loved to help you with your purchases. There were so many nice places to go — several drug stores, department stores, five and dimes etc. — and always staffed with clerks to help you. There were several eateries downtown, all great places, like the Busy Bee, the Bumble Bee, the Partridge, The Dock, the Krystal (my favorite!), and even great food at the dime stores and drug stores, and even at the Greyhound bus station. Alcohol was only beer and those joints were off Broad, well, maybe at the Bumble Bee. What I’m saying is that things were slow-paced and there was no rushing about, there were no restaurants with mixed-drinks and entertainment, no brawling or gun-play on the streets. It was a good family setting and such a joy to be on the streets, especially at Christmas with all the bright lights and decorations. As a teenager, it was so much fun to "drag Broad" (slowly) and enjoy the season. Today it’s sad to be politically incorrect to say "Merry Christmas" but to that I say, "Bah Humbug!" If your faith is different than mine and you greet me other than Merry Christmas, then I will not be offended and will respond in a friendly manner. I will continue to say "Merry Christmas" and if that offends you, then so be it! It’s Christmas, the celebration of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and has been for over 2,000 years. So get used to it! It seems that in today’s world that the giving of presents goes way overboard. Presents are great, but the Gift that He gave is what the season is about! When I was a kid in the 40s, the only thing that I really wanted for Christmas was one thing, well, maybe two, and that was a set of Roy Rogers or Gene Autry guns and holsters, and that second thing would be a cowboy hat. My sister-in-law Olive taught me in Sunday School at Fellowship Baptist and she says that in Sunday School that the only thing that I ever wanted to talk about during class was Roy Rogers. But her teaching must have taken hold, as you can tell in my writing above. At Fellowship there would always be a Christmas tree and there was always someone to come in dressed as Santa and give out gifts to each boy and girl. What a treat! Another thing I always looked forward to was the big Christmas (not holiday) tree we always had in the hallway of our house at 507 W. 7th Street (now Turner McCall). The tree always had these beautiful blue lights that had liquid in them that bubbled (sure don’t find any of those around anymore!) and with gobs and gobs of icicles,- which I loved to help throw on the tree. My wife Lenora tells me that it’s wrong to "throw" them on the tree, that you "hang" them one by one — oh, well! How can one possibly think of Christmas without thinking of the delicious food, but mainly of the sharing of that day with family and friends. I wish we could get back to the simplicity of Christmas, back to what it’s really all about. I hope your Christmas is a really great one and that on this big important day that you’ll take time to remember that it is "Christmas and thank our God for coming to earth as a baby and giving us the hope that we all need in our lives. God Bless! Ron (Ronnie) Hall

I am writing on sharing the tradition and memory of my belated son, Brandon Lamar Stoner. (3-31-85 to 4-22-2006) Each year on Christmas I would always hang candy canes on the Christmas tree. Brandon and my other son, Aaron, looked forward to this, and as any kids would eat them up. I had to replace the candy canes each day as long as the tree was up. On Christmas 2005, Brandon’s last Christmas with me, he walked in the front door and his eyes gloomed when he saw candy canes on my tree, and said, “Mom, you know this is my favorite part of Christmas, you putting the candy canes on the tree." I cried and then he grabbed one off and then he went to take a bite and realized it was a fake candy cane. We both laughed and for the past three Christmas I put that fake candy cane on his grave and look up to him and tell him, “Here is your candy cane. Enjoy it, and one day I will be there to hand you a real one in person again someday.” This is my most memorable part of Christmas that Brandon loved — the candy cane. Beth Stoner

Some of my earliest Christmas memories began going to the Goodyear Center on the Saturday before Christmas to pick out a toy of my choice since my dad was a Goodyear employee. Next was memorizing lines for our church’s Christmas play every year. Working on simple costumes was also part of it. The Christmas play was always followed by each child receiving a bag of fruit, nuts and candy. About a month or so before Christmas, my little brother and I would eagerly await the mail delivery of the Sears and Penny’s Christmas catalogs. We would flip the pages so many times trying to decide what we wanted for Christmas all the while our parents reminding us that they had to pay for what we asked Santa for, therefore letting us know not to expect everything on our Christmas list. On Christmas Eve, our parents would drive us around looking at all the Christmas lights and decorations passing time and hoping we’d get sleepy before going home and putting us to bed to await the big morning! Christmas morning my toys would be on one side of the tree while my brother’s was on the other side. None of our toys were ever wrapped. I don’t think we ever got everything on our lists but thinking back, we were never disappointed. For just mill workers, our parents did a great job pleasing us. What is sad is I never remember my parents getting each other any gifts. It was always all about us. Janice O’Kelley Gable

I love to think back on the Christmas holidays when I was a little girl. My mother and daddy, Norris and Mable Cox, would get up early to be sure Santa had come and was ready for me and my brothers, David and Kenny Cox. My daddy called me Prissy, and would go to the front door and open it up and shout, "Prissy! Hurry! Santa Clause is here. Hurry! I would run into the living room in hopes of always catching Santa and Rudolph, but for some reason I would always miss them and they would always be gone. When loved ones are gone, these precious memories mean even more. Merry Christmas, everyone! May the Lord richly bless and prosper each of you! Marcia Cox Ely

Our favorite holiday memories include the time spent making Christmas pies with our children, Chip and Kelly, when they were pre-teens. For a few magical moments, they forgot they were "cool middle schoolers" and thoroughly enjoyed getting flour on everything from counters to noses! Gene and Lynn Shaw

One of my favorite Christmas Memories was when one of Santa's favorite elves came to my front door one Christmas Eve. I was still working on Broad Street at our family shoe store. One of my father's friends had just gotten out of the hospital and wanted to buy his wife a diamond necklace for Christmas. Daddy asked me to take him shopping. We went to Ford, Gittings & Kane where he purchased a BIG diamond necklace. I think it turned out to be in the neighborhood of $12,000 cash. You could have picked me up off the floor. I thought he wanted a single chain with a diamond. Instead, he bought a broad chain with 11 diamonds. After recovering, I went back to the store and told Daddy. It didn't surprise him that the man spent that kind of money. Later that evening my front doorbell rang. It was Joe Gittings with the most beautifully wrapped box I think I had ever seen. He brought me a strand of the most beautiful pearls I had ever seen. (They were the ones I had been drooling over for three years). He said, “Merry Christmas and thank you for making our Christmas.” Everyone knows what kind of man Joe is, well, he will always be my favorite Santa's elf! Julia Hilburn Dent

My favorite holiday memory is the year my cousin Bobbeth and I received our dolls. Our Uncle Tuck Mitchell and Aunt Dorothy gave us two beautiful dolls. We were so happy as we weren’t expecting much. Santa Clause really came to see us because of our Uncle and Aunt. Elaine Couch

I have a story concerning Christmas when I was 10 years old. I had two surgeries performed on me. This was in the month of December so every child was released to be home for Christmas. I was the only child that would not be released. All the nurses brought me a small Christmas tree all decorated. Then on Christmas Eve, they let me be with my entire family. This was such a surprise for me. Then my nurses arranged for Santa Clause to make a visit to me in the hospital. Also, some of my neighbors bought me a small gift. I also received a lot of books to read and coloring books for me to be entertained. My doctor was Dr. James Kelley and he gave me a visit the day before Christmas with a present in hand. I unwrapped it and it was a world globe. I was finally released and made a full recovery. Honey Unsworth Blaylock

My precious memories of Christmas, I will always remember. My mother and father were Ivallee Rampley Atkins and Lewis Atkins. They worked in the spinning room for Pepperell Manufacturing. We lived most of my younger days at the lower end of Park Street. On Christmas and at night, I ran out to see if I could see Santa Claus. I saw the beautiful star between the “smoke stacks.” Growing up in Lindale was the best a young person could have back then. We had the movies, swimming, tea room, band concerts, ball games and skating. Ralp and Blanches and The Knowles Drive IN best hamburgers and banana splits for 25 cents. We had about 12 girls including Lynn Knight — where you saw one you saw all. We had Montine “Smith” Culbertson Mother Mamie. She could make good fruitcakes. Now at the age of 78, God has blessed me with good health. I still can see the star hanging between the smoke stacks at the mill. I have a picture on my entertainment center. I hope all my many friends all over Floyd County have a Merry Christmas and the best New Year ever. Glenda Barnett

My most memorable Christmas was in 1945. World War II had ended in the Pacific and my husband had enough points to return home. He had been on Tinian Island in the Mariana Islands with B-29’s. After serving overseas for several Christmases he returned safely and saw his 7-month-old son for the first time. What a joyful Christmas that was! Anne Fletcher

When I was 16, I was in charge of the primary children's part in our small nondenominational church's Christmas program and I was a perfectionist. The children, dressed as angels, would carry real lighted candles in star-shaped holders and as they walked down the aisle, the golden light would spill into the dimly lit sanctuary.... As a special surprise we would have a real baby (borrowing the girl who would be Mary's 6-month-old baby brother). My smallest cherub was to be the angel who announced the great tiding to the shepherds. As we readied ourselves that night, a Wyoming winter storm was threatening … Everything was in place. Mary knelt and placed the sleeping 'baby Jesus' in the manger; Joseph stood protectively beside them. As the smallest angel stepped forward to make her announcement, ice-covered tree branches broke off, snapping power lines and plunging the church into almost complete darkness. There was a brief silence and above the roaring wind a little voice called out, “Help! This is no place for a baby. It is dark, cold and so scary!" With that, she crumpled into a pile of bent wings, lopsided halo and broken-hearted tears. Mary quickly grabbed her now wide-awake-whimpering baby brother, hurried to the side of the sobbing angel and gathered them both into her arms. The other children, their carefully rehearsed parts forgotten, rushed in to offer comfort and in the darkness a child began to sing "Silent Night." It was more perfect than I could have ever planned for! Diana Lynn Davis West

My grandparents and I play a game called Christmas Blessings. This is how it is played. We go driving around at night to look at the Christmas lights and the first person to see some lights has to say, “I have a Christmas Blessing” and then they say as many things as they can that they are thankful for before someone sees more Christmas lights and starts telling about their blessings. I say things like I have a blessing because of my warm home, my school, my pets, playing with friends, turning 7 in May, candy canes, presents, baby Jesus being born. And lots lots more. It helps to talk fast and yell loud. The person who finds the most lights and says the most blessings wins. It is lots of fun! Isabelle Julianna Perez

Santa Claus brought a Kodak camera to me in 1964. This was the first camera that my family owned. As I was slowly opening the yellow box, a piece of folded notebook paper fell to the floor. It began, "Dear Santa (Philip)". Since I was the "little corn - big ears" of the family, I read the letter skipping over the words that I did not know. It was about a half page — neatly printed words. "Philip" was my father. The contents of the letter seemed to convey how much the letter writer thought of my father. I understood that in some manner my Dad had helped his first cousin secure his family's Christmas. The letter was signed, "Love, Kennon." My Dad smiled and tucked it into his pocket. Philip and Kennon have both passed from this life. They shared a tall build, full head of hair, dry wit and easy sense of humor. They also shared a Christmas secret. The image of that notebook paper letter from so many years ago, came to mind recently. I wish that I had asked them what toy was hard to find in 1964 or what small miracle was needed to assure a child's happiness. Santa Claus had done his best. Susan Rogers

Hello, I want to tell about my family holiday traditions and memories. Well we have a lot of grandbabies and greatgrandbabies and four children. They all came to Thanksgiving dinner. We had turkey and chicken, dressing, devil eggs, ham, baked beans, green beans and all kinds of greens, cakes, pies — just about anything you would want. But most of all, I had my family to share all this with. We have about the same thing every year, always at my home. We all gather around and have prayer and then we all eat we have the best time talking, laughing, cutting up and thanking God for us getting to be here as a family one more time. That is what it is all about, having all the family together one more time. We never know when it will be the last one we’ll have together. It is good to keep family together year after year. That is what love is all about. Keep love in your family and it will keep you together. But the love that was felt here … it’s hard to tell just how great it was. We need to always keep peace in the family while we can. If that is not a good memory, I don’t know what is. It’s all about love — just four little words. Mary Ann House