Kisekwi-Waskwi “Blue Sky” Cornstalk - Adkins decendants of Cornstalk

How so, Larry? So far I can’t find any proof Bluesky existed!

I’m a volunteer curator on Geni, and you may not speak rudely on this site. When was this oral tradition first written down, do you know? Ronnie Adkins mentioned it briefly in his 1990 book and that’s the earliest mention I’m aware of. What can you direct us to?

What then is the likely dating of the information Ronnie Adkins received, from whom, and in what format? You mentioned he recently died. What happened to his work papers and correspondence? Perhaps you can gain access.

Also, it’s time to upload page 13 as a scan from his book instead of quoting it. A snippet is fine and does not violate copyright.

That’s fabulous, thank you.

Private and Dorene Private User In the past few days I've seen our curators being accused of being racists and now trolls -- we will not allow this any longer. Geni's Terms of Use specifically prohibit such abusive language. Stop it now or your accounts will be restricted or terminated.

Dorene I do appreciate your messages above, bringing the discussion back to the facts of the matter. It's our expectation that the information on Geni should reflect the best available information that conforms to the Genealogical Proof Standard. If such evidence doesn't exist, then putting unsourced or improperly sourced information on Geni is somewhere between conjecture and fantasy. Our curators are doing everyone a service by enforcing proper genealogical practices.

Per Hathi, Bluesky is mentioned on pages 12 (three times), 13 (five times), and 803 (one time). I am assuming p. 803 is either a citation or an index; if it's the former, that helps resolve a lot of this contentiousness. Even oral history has a citation format, so we'd know who he interviewed and when he got the info. So fingers crossed that that's what's on p. 803 when you're able to share, Dorene.

Hathi's copy was deaccessioned from UW-Madison. There are only five libraries in the world that still have copies of Adkins' book: NYPL, WVU, the Blue Ridge Regional Library in Virginia, Marshall University, and the Lawrence County Public Library in Kentucky.

Erica Howton, do you have an NYPL card to put in a reference request? If not, I can try calling in a favor.

The book was self-published, so we're likely talking about an extremely limited run, and certainly no digital copy. "Adkins, Land of York, Surrey County, England, to Beech Fork, Wayne County, West Virginia" is the alternate title; the OCLC cataloguing title is "The Adkins Family of Wayne County, West Virginia: Also Cabell, Lincoln, and Boone: A Genealogical History."

I don’t have NYPL anymore. but I’m pretty sure Tamás Flinn Caldwell-Gilbert does.
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I read recently (from Dorene?) that Clinton Mays Audalene’s brother, was a big contributor to Ronnie Adkins, and earned big thanks and citations. Perhaps he can be reached and help us date the “oral tradition” a bit better.

No, he’s gone. So maybe Audalene

Thanks for checking, Dorene! Does pp. 12-13 give details on the oral interviews he conducted, or say anything else about the sourcing for the Bluesky info? Any of that info would help here.

(By the way: Is "Blue Sky" or "Bluesky" the preference? We keep using both.)

Dorene Private User you appear to be one among a group of people who have come here to abuse our curators in the hopes of pushing a genealogical agenda that is not supported by the evidence (or at least, not by evidence that has been provided here, yet). You've started several discussions where other members of your group (Larry, Holly, Tammy, Tina) have repeatedly violated Geni's Terms of Use that prohibit abusive language towards other users. My warning goes to all of you, together and individually: abide by the terms or face administrative action.

Darn. That's unfortunate that he didn't footnote or in-line cite the portion that's so important for answering our question, and that he didn't give details on the Bibles.

We can eliminate Osborn; he doesn't address our question.

The Hiram Adkins letters have been digitized by UNC and are available in these four folders. Can we find Bluesky mentioned in any of them?

The Lambert papers finding aid doesn't specifically mention Cornstalk or Bluesky. It does say that Box 20, Notebook 10 contains information on "Shawnee Indians, etc." Information on the Adkins family in particular is in Box 11, Notebook 9; Box 13, Notebooks 10-11 and 17; and Box 19, Notebook 1. Marshall also notes that some of his items are actual interview transcripts...excellent! Hopefully that's true for the materials we're seeking.

So, if we're going to figure out where Ronnie Adkins got the oral history, we need to contact Marshall. And if we're going to find an extant written record from someone for whom Bluesky was in living memory, it'll be in the UNC digital folders I linked. Let's start there? Divide and conquer?

Oh, and lucky us! UNC saved us a ton of time by providing indices ([example here), so we can at least determine which records we don't need to check. A lot of these papers are things like newspaper advertisements, receipts, bills, tax records, etc. So we don't have to strain our eyes reading them. :)

I discounted the specific source from Osborn that you listed, because neither Bluesky nor Cornstalk is discussed in it. No one's discounting the family's existence -- we're discounting that particular source's utility in solving our problem.

If you read Osborn's "History of East Lynn Community," you'll see that there's no mention of the Adkins family history or of Cornstalk or Bluesky specifically. He does list some individual Adkins family members, starting with Harvey Adkins, an early merchant, and Chapman Adkins, the first postmaster. A Linza Adkins died in World War, a Hezekiah Adkins was a clerk of the county court, and a Chapman Adkins (perhaps the aforementioned?) was a lawyer. That's it for Adkins mentions. Nothing about the family history.

This is the extent of what he has to say about the "Indians":

Our progress in material things has been truly great. Our fine graded road, rail road, school building, bridges, and telephones have all come in the last few years. Our venerable neighbor and ex-Confederate soldier, J. W. Lloyd, to whom I am indebted for part of this history remembers when there was only one log cabin at this place. Just before that time this was a howling wilderness infested with the beasts of the forest, and Indians still lurked around seeking whom they might devour. ...
On the farm of Charles R. Morrison, on the head of Beech Fork is a small mound covered with stones. Mr. Morrison informs me that an excavation was once made in this and in it was found an Indian tomahawk and near the mound has been found at least a hundred arrows made of flint. This mound is in Mr. Morrison's apple orchard, that produced this year 1500 bushels of apples. In times past these apples have won prizes not only at our district and county fairs but also at the state fair.
A few rods up the hill from this mound is a spring the basin of which is cut in a solid rock and is about the shape and size of a small wash kettle and will hold several gallons of water. The basin is smooth and judging by the mound and arrows nearby, this place must have been the habitation of Indians at some period. Could the rocks and hills but speak no doubt they would tell some wonderful stories of the early settlers and the Indians in this section.
Daniel Boone, the noted hunter, Indian fighter and public servant, represented this section in the Virginia Assembly in 1791, this being a part of Kanawha County at that time. He resided near Point Pleasant for some years and it is likely that he did part of his hunting right here on Camp Creek and Beech Fork.
Lord Byron wrote of Daniel Boone: Of all men, saving Sylla, The General Boone, backwoodsman of Kentucky, was happiest among mortals anywhere, and that he enjoyed the lonely, vigorous, harmless days, of his old age in wilds of deepest maze.
The story of the captivity of Mrs. Jenny Wiley is connected with the history of this community from the fact that she has a number of relatives living in this section. Her maiden name was Sellards. Cornelius Sellards who died a few years since, within one and one half miles of East Lynn at the age of 95 was a nephew of Mrs. Wiley. Mrs. Wiley was also related to the Fry family. She was taken captive by the Indians in Tazewell County, Virginia, in 1790. Three of her children and one brother were slain at the time of her capture and later the Indians killed two more of her children by dashing their brains out against trees. The account in Hardesty's Encyclopedia, of this capture says that the Indians proceeded down the Tug and Big Sandy rivers to the Ohio with their captive. Whether they followed the rivers all the time I know not, but there is a legend that they came down Camp Creek and encamped one night at the natural bridge on the right fork of Camp.
The Indians proceeded with their captive to the wilds of Kentucky where she remained about eleven months and then resolved to make her escape. While the Indians were absent from camp she started on her perilous journey through the forest during a rain storm and at length came to Big Sandy river. She called to some men who were at work on the opposite side of the river and told them of her escape from the Indians. Having no boat these men rolled some logs into the river and tying them together with grapevines, pushed across the river and brought Mrs. Wiley back with them. As they were ascending the bank the old Indian chief appeared on the opposite bank. He recognized Mrs. Wiley and seeing that she had made good her escape disappeared in the forest. Mrs. Wiley rested here a few days and then returned home and rejoined her husband who had long supposed her dead.

Larry, I'm sorry that you've had a negative experience. There is information here on how to close your account if you feel that's the best decision for you.

I also want to stress again that oral history is a valid approach in genealogy. Where they can be tricky to use is when we don't know who provided an oral history and when, or when we have conflicting oral histories within different family lines (which is extremely common and understandable), or when an oral history is recorded too many generations removed from the events described to be reliable. (For example, there was an oral history
given by one of Tecumseh's collateral descendants in 1979 that Shawnee historians do not accept as authoritative because that's too far removed. That's common across all ethnic groups.)

Since I've been following these conversations, I've been reading a number of oral histories from Shawnee descendants. There are a lot of citable, convincing oral histories out there, even from the 1800s -- I just have yet to find one for this line. I'm confident that if we look under enough historical couch cushions, we can find the information we need, in a format that meets the Genealogical Proof Standard.

If other Shawnee lines have had their oral histories recorded so many times, and if Bluesky's descendants had enough writings to constitute archival collections at universities, then what we're seeking should be findable if we look hard enough. So let's keep looking.