Dusty Old Papers

After two weeks of travel, I am back and realize I’ve left the readers of this blog waiting…. So onward along the road of this journey!



Iris - Tennessee State Flower



In the months following my return from the second trip to Murfreesboro, I spent a lot of time typing out court testimony. Curry and I also spent a lot of time talking about it. It was good to have someone with whom I could discuss the intense things I was reading in the testimony. It was almost unbelievable information. Curry was the only person who really would understand what I was going through as I transcribed it. Not only had she done years of research, but Mary Ann Marable Baugh was her great, great grandmother; Mary Ann’s blood runs in her veins, so I felt she might have some insite into Mary Ann’s way of thinking.

One thing we both knew, Baugh family members, and their descendants could be very stubborn in their ideas. I had seen this, as had Curry. Mary Ann Baugh was an opinionated woman, a social woman. She was generous, compassionate, but also worried a great deal about money and didn’t like people telling her what she should do.

Of course, the questions about Mary Ann Baugh all led to Will Gum, Frank Gumm’s father and Judy Garland’s grandfather. Will, a young man with little money of his own had married into a fairly wealthy family. As a result, he’d been given his own store in the heart of Murfreesboro and, for a while, lived a fairly good life. So what went wrong? Why did Frank Gum(m) grow up poor as Gerald Clarke wrote in his book on the life of Judy Garland, “Get Happy.”

Transcribing the court testimony one sentence at a time, sometimes struggling over words that were not written clearly, I learned that some Baugh family members felt  Will’s ill luck was not just back luck; it was his own fault. They said Will was traveling to bad areas, drinking and gambling. As a result, he’d gotten into trouble – A LOT OF TROUBLE!  He needed money and had THREATED Mary Ann for it. In the present time, the money Mary Ann Baugh lent him would add up to tens of THOUSANDS of dollars. Within a few years, she was running out of money.

Some descriptions of Will and Clemmie bordered on elder abuse. It was shocking and frightening, but I tried to temper my opinion. In terms of court record, it was all hearsay. But I was hooked to the story. I had to get to the bottom on it.

Then, there were the fires….Fires started easily in those days, but Will Gum had a lot of fires in his life. Why? Did he set them? Did they happen because he was drunk?

One day, while in Murfreesboro, I’d gone over the fire department and asked them what they thought about so many fires appearing in one person’s life. I’m not sure how I qualified it but I’ll never forget how one fireman turning to me and said, “Just where is this Willie Gum?” They were ready to get him and I had to explain he was long gone.

That summer, while attending The Judy Garland Festival, something else happened. I met a girl who told me she was in contact with one Jimmie Gumm’s granddaughters-- Stephanie, Judaline’s youngest daughter. Stephanie was looking for information on her family history. That summer, Stephanie and I began speaking on the phone. We had a great time talking and she explained some things about the family hierarchy to me. In time, Stephanie introduced me to her father as well.

As my book continued to develop, there were many unanswered questions. I had a story no one had ever told, perhaps because no one even knew about it, but I knew there was a lot more to it.

In the next few months, I came into some money and realizing this would probably be the only time in my life I was free to pursue something like this, I made the decision to escapte my new home in the mountains during the winter, when it was going to be very cold,  and go to live in Murfreesboro, where I could seek out the truth. Curry would be visiting Murfreesboro the end of September, and we would be able to do some research together.

So, in late September of 2004, I packed my car, almost to the ceiling, and with my cats, Sabrina, Theo and Pennsy in their cages, set off for Murfreesboro and one the greatest adventures of my life!

Theo and Pennsy made themselves at home
wherever we were. Sabrina was with us too.

Next: A Short Explanation - Understanding the Gum(m) Family