No Idle Promise

Around 1944, my grandfather, R.C. Vaughan, moved his family just a very few miles to be an independent poultry farmer. My daddy was about five. As more and more farmers became chicken growers, my grandfather saw big business getting involved. So, he began shifting into the hatchery business. Then, he slowly abandoned chicken farming altogether to raise hogs. It was no small hog operation. On about 40 acres, he had more than 600 head. With my grandmother, Kathryn, as his partner, my daddy working alongside them, and hiring several others, the hog farm expanded to include Vaughan Sausage Company, which produced pork products (including my Granny's sausage), and distributed those products to stores within about a 20-mile radius of the farm. At its full operation, the farm milled its own feed, raised the hogs, moved the hogs to slaughter, and then moved the pork products under the Vaughan Sausage Company label.

It was into this environment that I was born in 1959. My middle brother, Tim, was born in 1961. My youngest brother, Russ, was born in 1964.

In August 1973, our family - me, my daddy, my mama, and my two brothers - moved from the farm. It was a necessary move. But, my daddy was leaving behind the only home he had ever really known there on Brookwood Road. My brothers and I were certainly leaving the only home we had ever known. While we were excited about the new-ness of the move, there was a sadness, too. I promised my daddy, on the day of the move, that I would one day write the stories of my childhood - of our family life - along Brookwood Road.

That promise wasn't an idle one. Even at 14, I was already a writer. For a few years I had been writing short stories, and reading them to my grade school classes. Sometimes I was even asked to read them over the school intercom. I wrote a book in the fifth grade, hand-written on notebook paper and bound together with staples. Believe it or not, I still have some of those hand-written stories. In addition to the stories, I had also written some feature stories for the weekly newspaper serving our community.

So, in 1973, at 14, when I promised my daddy that I would one day write this book, well, it was not the idle promise of a teenage boy. He knew I could write. And, he responded to my promise by saying, "I think that would be great."

For the past 40 years, the memory of that promise has been ahead of me, but just out of reach. And, now, it's written. My daddy died in 2014 about three months before it was published. But, he knew I had writing it, was able to contribute to it, and was able to hear me read some of the chapters. If and as you read it, you won't be reading just any old book. You will be reading one of the most intimately personal projects of my life.

Brookwood Road: Memories Of A Home is available in hardback, paperback and Kindle versions. Ordering information and appropriate online links are available at www.brookwoodroad.com.