Person:James Miller (133)

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Miller
- in Meade
- in Hardin
- in Brandenburg

James Riley Miller

b.30 Jan 1893 Big Spring, Meade County, Kentucky

d.12 Oct 1958 Hardin County, Kentucky

Family tree▼

Parents and Siblings

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F. Thomas Foster Miller1864 - 1928
M. Celia Nancy Lamb1865 - 1940

Lillian May MillerAbt 1883 -
Eunice Miller1889 - 1890
Dona Belle Miller1891 - 1975
James Riley Miller1893 - 1958
Shelley Dewey Miller1898 - 1977
Laurin Nelson Miller1902 - 1950

Spouse and Children

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H. James Riley Miller1893 - 1958
W. Nora Pearl Dowell1896 - 1980

James Lamar Miller1914 - 1962
Ruby Miller1916 - 2003
Bernard Casper Miller1919 - 2005
Vernon Miller1919 - 1919
Dortha Pearl Miller1924 - 2008

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Facts and Events

Name^[3]	James Riley Miller
Gender	Male
Birth^[2]^[3]	30 Jan 1893	Big Spring, Meade County, Kentucky
Marriage		(5 children) to Nora Pearl Dowell
Death^[3]^[1]	12 Oct 1958	Hardin County, Kentucky(or Breckinridge County?)
Burial^[3]		Cap Anderson Cemetery, Brandenburg, Meade County, Kentucky

When James Francis Miller was born, James Riley claimed he was too young to be a grandfather. He insisted, instead, on the name 'Daddy Jim'

Go remembered when she and Daddy Jim were married, they were civalried. The community folks came and stood outside the house singing and making lots of noise. They were "tick-tacked". This is when you would put a string on the side of the house and rub rosin on it. It would squeal and make a big racket.

One chivalrie the whole county will remember is the Ritchie Chivalrie. Will Knight's daughter married a Corbett. Chivilries were looked on with disfavor in that neighborhood. They'd already gone out of style. (early 1900's). Old Mr. Knight, father of the bride, got mad when the civalrie'ers came and he shot and killed Chess Ritchie. This was before honeymoons and the couple was living at the bride's family home.

Daddy Jim would tell the tale of when Frank Bradley died. I (Ruby Miller) was just a little girl at the time. Some of his friends were there when they laid him out. One little boy asked the others if they'd told the bees yet. So one of them left. The others thought they'd go and see what they'd do. So they went slipping around in the dark. The man went to the hives (kept by Frank Bradley) and said, "He's gone, he's gone, he's gone". He did that to every hive. The dead man's brother or Uncle or some other relative did this. The little boys just overheard and slipped around to see what happened.

Told by RML: "Daddy Jim would also tell of when he was a little boy and someone would die. The whole neighborhood would go and sit up until the person was buried. Sometimes the people would divide up and take turns but sometimes one person would stay two or three nights. Anyway, one time some people were sitting up with a man's body when the casket started groaning and grunting. The nails scrunched and everybody got scared. Someone sent off to Guston for the undertaker. nobody knows what happened or why. this was in the days before embalming so the body was probably swelling but nobody ever knew . . ."

When Daddy Jim was sixteen years old, he had typhoid fever and everybody thought he was going to die. He was unconscious for a long time. When he came to, all the neighbors were there. That's how he knew how bad off he was. He was so sick that they sent to Louisville for a trained nurse. When he was convalescing, the nurse suggested fresh oranges to give him an appetite. You couldn't get fresh fruits in the country then so one of the neighbors got on his horse and went to Ekron to stop the passenger train and get some oranges from the butch (the man who went up and down the aisle and sold oranges and cigars and refreshments to the passengers on the train).

James Riley and Pearl Miller had four children. The oldest three, Codge, Tade and Poot, (Lamar, Ruby and Bill) came two years apart, followed by Dortha Pearl (Suze or Pig) six years later. The older three referred to themselves as "us kids and Pig". The family moved to a farm outside of Brandenburg, KY on the old Highway 60 towards Hardinsburg in 1927. Ruby described the farm in 1977:

When we first moved to the farm in 1927, sassafras bushes had grown up in a corner of a field around a natural basin that held water. The bushes were young and us kids loved to play back there, building forts and riding the saplings which was real fun. The cattle and sheep liked the dense shade that was near the pond. The ground was smooth and dusty and the paths led through the small trees to the pond's edge. Being a favorite spot, it became a landmark on the farm. Later the pond was stocked with bass and it was a good fishing place. The bushes have become trees and it is still a spot of beauty and the subsequent owners of the farm refer to this place as the "Sassafras Patch".

The corner field behind the woods was known as Walnut Basin to the family. The field was a gently sloping basin on which several large walnut trees stood. Soon after buying the farm in 1927, Daddy sold the walnut trees to a timberman and realized a profitable sum of money. Today this Walnut Basin is still in the family with a pretty home overlooking the basin. James Francis Miller, son of James Lamar Miller, built a house there for his family.

The Alfalfa Patch was a flat of about 10 acres seeded to alfalfa near the house. A locust thicket near the road occupied a low corner of the field. The field also contained the "sink hole" that met lots of needs for a farm homestead. During the haying season, this 'patch' kept the family busy. My brothers and I, all below the age of 14, fell heir to many of the chores of getting the alfalfa into the large hip-roofed barn. Raking the hay was a fun chore. Loading the hay on wagons pulled by the family mules, Tobe and Rhoady, was harder. My job in helping get the hay in the loft, by way of a hay fork, was driving Tobe and Rhoady, after being unhitched from the wagon, to pull the hay, by the fork run by system of ropes and pulley, up into the loft. One brother would man the fork on the wagon and another would place the hay by tripping the fork after it was pulled into the loft. The bad time was when I'd get so interested in driving the mules, "geeing and hawing" that I'd forget to say "whoa" at the right time and would pull the hay fork "off the track". My older brother would then have to climb to the top of the barn next to the galvanized tin red-hat roof and get the fork back on the track.

The family farm of over 200 acres had three plots of woodland: the Big Woods, Little Woods and Chappell Woods. The Big Woods got its name by being about 20 acres in size. The Little Woods lay in a low place just west of the home, a place of natural beauty, with a large pond reflecting the trees and jumping with large goldfish. This was another favorite place for the kids, a place to fish, swing on grapevines, secure the Christmas tree and gather persimmons. The Chappell Woods lay on the tract that Daddy bought from the neighboring farm. This woods lot afforded good blackberry picking around the edge of the woods in late afternoon shade.

Front of JRM business card http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=836f7570-756a-4b3e-9f55-6f9f89e51420&tid=7870267&pid=-1024171491

Funny http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=14496a88-b3a2-4437-a614-7375afd91c0f&tid=7870267&pid=-1024171491

JRM business card back http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=b414b4a3-5e2b-497e-a200-7c821bb99ff6&tid=7870267&pid=-1024171491

JRM political ticket http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=3dae57f4-1843-466f-ac96-4b3199031074&tid=7870267&pid=-1024171491

JRM political ticket http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=dd11a25b-147e-41d8-98c3-b3549215e269&tid=7870267&pid=-1024171491

JRM political ticket http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=a90e5ec2-bb03-4987-b922-2282ceed25e5&tid=7870267&pid=-1024171491

James R Miller http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=369a596f-bbe3-4cae-9709-6f8323625ae0&tid=7870267&pid=-1024171491

JR Miller Family http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=c7e2bb6a-1ca9-4cf0-8835-2e965933d0a8&tid=7870267&pid=-1024171491

Brandenburg town hill http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=4d8fd0db-fca1-4af4-98e2-537ce0fb16a5&tid=7870267&pid=-1024171491

Blackjack school names http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=96ab1aa9-7338-4c45-89bf-3f9a295fb384&tid=7870267&pid=-1024171491

Blackjack School (2) http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=5305ed29-a30a-48e4-8cd4-9a43b1dc88c2&tid=7870267&pid=-1024171491

BJ School http://trees.ancestry.com/rd?f=image&guid=340cc957-cdb4-404b-b59d-5839a1f95ce3&tid=7870267&pid=-1024171491