Family genealogy is something that recently became an interest for me. I knew very about our family roots and when I made a visit to our local genealogy society to research my Grandmother Ballard's family, Maybelle Thompson Ballard, the volunteers working were able to help me find information and steer me into other avenues of research. My findings are included in this book as are the genealogy of my wife, the Maybins. It would be a monumental task to include a complete genealogical overview in a book of this nature so I have only limited my findings to those of my immediate family. I also have included a public domain article pertaining to my ancestor Alson Gordon and his Civil War experience which was written by another individual and credit for this article is duly noted. As a writer of short stories pertaining to my own life experiences I am including some of my writings.