March 28th  Meeting

7:00 PM
First Methodist Church Youth Center
217 W. 5th Street (behind the Church),
 Odessa, TX

PROGRAM:

My Experiences compiling:

"The Drifters"

by Tonya Holmes Shook

To tell you something about myself I must first say, I am rather a late bloomer when it comes to many things like writing but I have always had a creative mind touring constantly and researching for discovery. Duncan, Oklahoma, was the place of my birth, November 28, l935, in my parent’s home rather than in a hospital. New Mexico was my home from age nine to adulthood.

I have been told Mother taught me many words at a very early age by using a catalog to increase my sight knowledge and word association. Also, I do not remember when I ever had a beginning point for artistic expression, it has always been. I drew pictures before attending school. Color, design and construction of any object were first curiously inspected before the whole was appreciated for whatever it was. For instance when observing tree leaves I didn’t see a colony of green appendages but individual green, veined, leathery textured, objects that blew around when the wind moved them. Some leaves had little eggs laid on them and insect eaten holes. They turned hard and crunchy when the umbilical stem dried up causing them to drop to the ground. I never viewed leaves as being a part of a whole, but rather saw them as individual mavericks with lives of their own, much like me.

After decades of finding oils a means of artistic expression, mostly from my kitchen studio burdened with an artist easel and paints among pots and pans, I pursued painting pictures with words to express an accumulating knowledge concerning my lost heritage, perceived to be Indian. The results from my accumulation, notes jotted down in a little green-spiral notebook, had aged forty years before anything was ever formerly written. My husband, Clarence, assisted me in some serious research by chasing down people and getting oral history before elders passed. I read material associated with earlier times researching archives and after many rewrites the results finally evolved into a self-published book, Displaced Cherokee: Come Home, Come Home. Humphrey Printing Company in Wichita Falls, Texas, allowed me to direct everything in the compilation of this work including my illustrations by using photographic means of documentation for all original records. This effort was awarded First Place in the l986 Oklahoma State Fair in an Open Class Category. It was also endorsed by the Oklahoma Department of Libraries that same year. 

Our family story is such a unique story I was dreaming about writing a novel as soon as my documentary went to press. With very little formal education, the notion to write a novel proved to me it wasn’t a thing for the faint hearted. I am not a quitter. It has taken me years and years of revision, research, and at a latter time, encouragement from Dr. N. Brent Kennedy, author of ; The Melungeons, The Resurrection of a Proud People: An Untold Story of Ethnic Cleansing in America. Our lost family heritage was due partly to our connection to this culture. I do not claim to be a writer but more of a storyteller and for eighteen years I worked at this piece.

Thus, The Drifters: A Christian Historical Novel about the Melungeon Shanty Boat People, brought my obscure heritage to life, my picture painted with words. It is a Historical Fiction based on fact during eras of the Trail of Tears, Civil War and Texas cattle drives.

I have boldly written things, poetry included, because it never occurred to me I couldn’t. Some things just take a bit longer but eventually they get done if I don’t grow faint hearted. Eighteen years is a stretch between projects, however. I trust it will not be that long for the new novel in progress, God’s Breakfast Nook. 

Tonya Holmes Shook


Tonya Holmes Shook
Rt. 1 Box 69-K
Hastings, OK 73548

The Shook family were placing some of Tanya's books on display at the Youth Center
before the March Genealogy Meeting

Many members purchased the Drifters Book and received a signed copy by Tanya Holmes Shook.
Tanya's program was enjoyed by all and I am on chapter II learning about the Melungeons.
I'll get back to reading after I finish here.

Join us on our next meeting!

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updated: 03/29/05