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Farming For A Better Future, page 388
(Above) Dave and Rhoda Barley on the 1930 Census in Pond Beat (National Archives and Records Administration via Ancestry.com)
Dr. Victoria Joiner had conducted extensive research on her family while simultaneously completing a doctorate in education. Dr. Joiner is also connected to Pond Beat in two ways. She is the great-greatgranddaughter of William and Louisa Timmons; her great-grandfather was John Joiner, William and Louisa's son. John married Emma Jacobs (1871-1941) in 1891. Together they had eight children, one of which was Elijah Joiner (1913-1990), Dr. Joiner's grandfather. The other connection to Pond Beat comes though Dr. Joiner's grandmother and Elijah's wife, Geneva Barley Joiner (1913-2003). Geneva's parents, David Dixon Barley (1875-1937) and Rhoda Lee Abernathy Barley (1882-1964), were well-known around Pond Beat.
David Barley passed away before his family had to move away from Pond Beat in 1941. They owned over 350 acres of land in the community before 1941. His widow, Rhoda, was given $65 per acre for the land and moved the family to a farm on Stringfield Road. The farm Rhoda purchased was 200 acres and had an orchard. Dr. Joiner recalls hearing about peaches. With the profits from the orchard, they bought land off Pulaski Pike, including an antebellum house, where the Barley children and some cousins lived in what Dr. Joiner refers to as like a Barley Family compound. Unfortunately, eminent domain meant the family was
displaced once again. This time, the family spread out in all different places.
Thomas Lyle is the great-great-grandson of William and Louisa Timmons. His great-grandmother was Kate Timmons Joiner Lacy, who married Wyatt Lacy (1867-1951) and five children. Their daughter, Amanda E. Lacy (1897-1987), married James P. Burns. Amanda and James were Thomas Lyle's grandparents. Mr. Lyle also has other connections to the Lacy family. His grandfather, James Pensacola Lacy, was a son of Theophilus Lacy, one of the three brothers from Virginia who settled in south Madison and north Morgan County around what became Lacey's Spring.
Thomas Lyle's great-grandparents, Wyatt and Kate, bought a house on Sivley Road after moving from the arsenal land. The house was located off Governor's Drive behind a furniture store named Brad's. They had to move once again in 1965, this time to a house on Farris Drive, where Thomas Lyle lives today.
Hostess for the group interview conducted by New South, Ms. Deborah Horton Jordan is the great-great-granddaughter of William and Louisa Timmons. She worked as the chairperson for the reunion and offered her home in Harvest for the picnic and interviews. In a truncated version of the family tree, William and Louisa's daughter, Mary Timmons Joiner,
married Emanuel Wilburn (1871-1955), a farming landowner in south Madison. Mary and Emanuel had four children: LeRoy, Mildred, Willie, and Ms. Jordan's grandmother, Celeste. Celeste was born in 1897 in Pond Beat and married James Horton, the son of Everett Horton, Sr., a prominent landowning farmer in the Pond Bea/Mullins Flat area. By 1930, Celeste was a widow, and she and her son, James Bruce Horton, lived on Triana Pike. James B. Horton was Ms. Jordan's father.
James B. Horton and his wife, Callie Sue, were Ms. Deborah Horton Jordan's parents. They found their way to Harvest by following a cousin, Aaron Burns. Burns was a cousin by marriage and a close family friend. It appears that he moved to Harvest before the area in south Madison was purchased for the arsenal. He owned about 80 acres that he rented out to others to farm. After moving from Pond Beat, Celeste bought a house off Pulaski Pike. When the family was made to move again in the 1960s, they moved the house to Harvest. James had grown up in the house and couldn't stand to leave it behind. He hired a company -Kennedy Moving Company, likely - to bring the house in two parts to its new location. James, a plasterer by profession, refinished the house himself. Land records show that in 1968, James Horton purchased about 30 acres from Burns and moved the family to Harvest. Now, Deborah and her sisters live in the three houses on the Horton Family compound. The land records of Madison County give an illustrative history of landownership in the 20th century. - (4916)