Return to Tennessee and Discoveries



The Bryn Bed & Breakfast is now
a private home. It stands on the
land where Will Gum once
had his store.
(Courtesy Michelle Russell)



      In 2003, I returned to Tennessee. By now I had been convinced to write a book on Judy Garland’s family. This time I flew to Nashville, rented a car, and drove down to Murfreesboro. My plan would stay in a hotel for a few days, and then close out my visit in a bed and breakfast on the corner of Maney Avenue and East Main, only doors from the home where Frank Gumm was born. In this way, I would have some time to absorb the atmosphere.

It was wonderful to be back in Tennessee. As I wrote in the preface of From Tennessee to Oz Part 1, my first stop was the Rutherford County Courthouse in the town square of Murfreesboro. I COULD NOT WAIT to see those papers which Gerald Clarke mentioned in the opening of his book, Get Happy. What surprises lay in store for me.





Inside the Rutherford County Courthouse, now used for county
meetings. It had recently been renovated here, with the
intent of restoring it to its 1895 appearance.
(courtesy) Michelle Russell

Walking to the third floor of the old courthouse, and peering into the empty courtroom below on my way up, my heart was pounding. Seated at a table in the tiny room just below the cupola, I filled out the paperwork for the file and waited patiently for its arrival. I had no idea what to expect, but when I opened the folder I was surprised to see that the court records were hand-written. This handwriting, some in pencil and some in pen, was written by people who had been in the presence of Judy Garland’s grandparents, great aunts and uncles. The past was getting closer.

I began to read the court testimony. The case was about Mary Ann Marable Baugh’s will. She was the mother of Clemmie Gumm, Judy Garland’s great grandmother and Curry’s great, great grandmother. Having spoken to Curry about her many times, Mary Ann was indeed very real to me. She now became even more real.

The “voices” of the people Curry had spoken to me about were in these pages. I was “hearing” their words and voices for the first time--Bettie Baugh White, John Mason Marable Baugh and others. These people spoke with southern accents, some quite country. They said things like “I reckon” and called their mother “mammie.” About the cause of her mother’s death, Bettie Baugh said, “I can’t rightly say it. I left my teeth at home and thems a heap o’ cares.”

It was funny and real. Then, I read something that hit me like a bolt of lightening. Clemmie’s nephew quoted his grandmother as saying, “I’d as soon see the Devil come through that door as see Will Gum.” Will was Frank Gumm’s father. What was going on here?

I had been taking notes, but suddenly I realized I was not going to be able to take enough notes on what was contained in these files. I would come back the next day, but I was going to need a copy of this case to take home and study. It was a treasure trove. It took me a year to type out these handwritten pages and make sense of them. There were over 100 pages and some were very difficult to decipher.



Oaklands during a Civil War
period reinactment.
(courtesy Michelle Russell)



My next important visit was to the historic house museum, Oaklands. Although Oaklands was begun around 1812, my main interest in the home was for the years 1880 thru 1910. The reason was that George Darrow, the man who sent Frank Gumm to Sewanee, the man whose letter appears in Young Judy, lived in that home with his wife, Tempe Swope, during that time. In fact, he wrote the letter arranging for young Frank’s entrance to Sewanee in that house. I don’t know if Frank ever visited it, but it was experience to visit. For anyone visiting Murfreesboro, I highly recommend that you visit Oaklands, which is directly down East Main Street, turn left on Maney Avenue and you will find yourself at its entrance.

I believe I may have visited Oaklands twice during that week. On my last visit, I was taken through the house by a student, who kindly took a photo of me on the front steps. Before I left, I asked him about Jefferson.

During my week in Murfreesboro, I had come to realize that the Gum family did not originally live in Murfreesboro. They lived in some place called Jefferson. I decided that I must go there and see what I could find, so I asked him, “Where is Jefferson?”

“Do you mean Old Jefferson?” he asked me. I explained it to him and he replied,

“Old Jefferson no longer exists. It’s under water?”

 “What?” I said shocked.

He then explained to me that this town, which had been the first town in Rutherford County, the county seat in 1805, had slowly gone down to a few people and when the Tennessee Valley Authority decided to create Percy Priest Lake in hopes of stopping some of the flooding of the Stones River, they had decided to sacrifice Jefferson, since it sat between the East and West Branches of the Stones River. The River, by the way, was not named because it has stones, but because it was first discovered by Joshua Stone in 1700.

The student brought out an old scrapbook to show some news articles about Jefferson. They had few photos and no mention of Gums, but  I was already hooked. It was almost as if I had learned of a town where King Arthur once lived. Jefferson was now a legend and I had to find out more about it. Perhaps the mystery of the early Gums existed in this history.

While in Tennessee this trip I went to visit another historic home – The Sam Davis Home. Sam Davis is a Tennessee here, a young man who died rather than betray his fellow Confederate. He was nineteen at the time.

Sam has a connection to Judy Garland’s family. He was born in the home that Mary Ann Marable Baugh’s great grandfather, the Rev. Henry Hartwell Marable built when he first came to Rutherford County. As a result of Sam’s birth in that home, some thirty years after Rev. Marable passed away, the home was moved and preserved on the Sam Davis property in Smyrna, which is a town which also resides in Rutherford County, somewhat north of Murfreesboro.



Rev. Henry Hartwell Marable's log cabin (circa 1812-
1830) The home has since been restored and can
be viewed on the property of the Sam Davis Home
in Smyrna, TN (courtesy Michelle Russell)



On my first visit to this historic and very fascinating home, the house was still sitting on  pilings on a back lot, not far from some cotton fields. Meanwhile, while I was at the Sam Davis Home, I was able to buy some recordings of traditional Tennessee music. They would help me when writing.

While I was in Murfreesboro this trip, I met for lunch with a lady who was a distant cousin of Judy Garland. She had been born a Gumm. Alberta Gumm Wilson and she was just about the age Judy would have been.

It was so interesting to meet Alberta with her southern accent. Many aspects of Alberta were not like Judy, but others were. She had the long legs and shorter trunk and some aspects of her face were clearly like Judy’s. I could imagine what Judy would have been like had her family never left Tennessee! Alberta also told me that her daughter some real similarities to Liza as well.

My last adventure was to try to find the family graves over at Evergreen Cemetery, which was not far from where I was staying and near Oaklands. Alberta gave me some great pointers for finding the graves as one day I had wandered for over an hour and was ready to give up.

To stand before the graves of the people I had read so much about was something. There were Frank’s parents, Will and Clemmie Gumm, and there was Mary Ann Marable Baugh, John Baugh and many of their children. Standing there, I pondered the mysteries of these people I had been reading about in the court trial. What secrets had they taken with them to their graves?

When I left Murfreesboro at the end of this trip, I realized that instead of closing my research on this remarkable family, I was only beginning. On long the journey ahead was I had no idea.