The Chesser Island Homestead

My assignment for today was to be the docent at the Chesser Island Homestead.  This homestead was built in 1927 by Tom and Iva Chesser.  They were third generation ‘swampers’ farming in the Okefenokee. 

There is a whole lot of history here that would take pages to go into, so my suggestion is you just come to visit me here to hear the whole story.  I’ll give you a few interesting facts, but there is so much more.

Tom and Iva raised seven children in this house without any electricity.  They were basically subsistence farmers that raised their own food and hunted the land for deer, bear, alligators and otters.  They had chickens, pigs, and bee hives constructed from hollow cypress logs.  They raised sugar cane to make syrup and harvested sap from the pine trees to produce turpentine to sell for things like flour and cloth that they needed to buy.  I could go on and on…

My job is to sit on the porch in one of the two rockers, and wait for visitors.  I know it’s a tough assignment, but somebody has to do it.    I was there for about six hours today, and only had 16 visitors.  That left me with plenty of time to enjoy the peace and quiet and observe the little nature things going on.

Marching up the front steps’ railing was this formidable looking insect.  It was about two inches long.

I haven’t had time to investigate what it is, but I’m hoping my friend ‘Bugman’ Jack can figure it out for me.  That oblong area on its abdomen was just iridescent in the sun.

I also had plenty of time to enjoy this fence lizard that was skulking about the stairs.  I think this is a female, and I’ve seen her near the stairs each time I’ve been at the Homestead.

At the end of the afternoon, I sped back to the VC to use the phone to once again check with the hospital in Waycross about my doctor’s December surgery calendar.  I was not surprised to hear that a calendar has not yet been set up.    At least this time, they took my name, birthdate, phone number, surgery request, and promised to call me back as soon as a calendar is developed.  Yeah, right!  I have yet to receive a promised call.  I’ll give them two days, and then I’ll bug them again.  Uf-dah!

                                                                              THE END!!

Thanks for stopping by… talk to you later,  Judy