The land of the High Rock farm where Granny and Granddaddy Cole lived and farmed borders on the Yadkin River in Davidson County.
The view must have been lovely from there in the days when Grandsir Tom [Thomas] Cole and his wife, Mary [Nooe], could look out over the Yadkin flowing unhindered along its southward journey. The Yadkin runs its headwaters near Blowing Rock until it is joined by the Uhwarrie and the Rocky to eventually form the Pee Dee, which makes its way to the Atlantic Ocean near Georgetown, S.C.
The land along the river on the farm was verdant and beautiful. There was a jungle-like trail along the riverbank, and rocks in the river to be explored when the river was low. Granddaddy trapped fish in one of the tributaries, and Granny fried them to perfection. It was a fairyland that changed in the early 1960's.
In Granny Cole's papers, there is one that states, in her own hand, the change.
In the early 1960's, the Tuckertown Dam was built, and the backwater covered or damaged 20 acres of the farm.
Her paper went on to say, "The Winston-Salem Railroad crosses the farm between the residence [current] and the Yadkin River. The H.P.T.& D. [Highpoint, Thomasville & Denton] Railroad crosses the north corner of the farm."
In the old days, an afternoon safari walk down through the pastures to the railroad, even as far as the trestle bridge over Lick Creek below the farm, was a special outing.
Today, the farm still borders the Yadkin, which is now tamed on the north above the farm by the High Rock Dam
There is still beauty, but not what it once was.
There is a river whose streams make glad the city of God,
the holy habitation of the Most High.
