Sixth Generation

1299. Samuel Franklin HERMAN²⁰³⁵ was born on 13 December 1892 in North Carolina.^34,1027 He was born on Robinson Rd. and in 1900 his family moved into the town of Hickory. Back in those early days that was considered a very big move.
Samuel attended school in a three room school house that sat on the piece of ground that is today the same spot that the Oakwood Elementary School is located. His first teacher was Mable Little. After his first year there they decided to build a new school. So while the new school was being built he attended the Claremont College, which we know today as the Old Hickory High School Building. When he was fourteen he quit school and went to work for The Express Co. in Hickory, working for them for two years. At the age of seventeen, he went to Jacksonville, Florida to work for the Seaboard Railroad Co. in the wheel and rod shop and also in the lumber port where they made flat cars. Sam said he also got a lot of experience in loading and unloading trains. At the age of nineteen, he left Florida and came back to Hickory and started his own business of painting buggies and also worked in a shop where they made horse collars.

They moved around a lot the first few years of their marriage until they bought the old Barger House in 1926. They lived in this house and started their family until 1940, when the house caught fire and they lost everything except the clothes they had on their backs. At this time two of his sons were in the Armed Forces. Ed was in the Marines and Howard was in the Army. The rest of the family got busy and worked together and rebuilt the home, but not in the same spot. It was placed on the hill above where the old house had burned. The old house being a log house that was 170 Years old at the time it burned. The new home was completed in 1941 and the family started a new beginning. In 1972 Interstate 40 came along and took this house, so Samuel and Myrtle had to relocate once again. Myrtle became very ill in April of 1974 and on July 26, 1974 she died. She is really missed by all her family. Samuel spent his later years as a painter. He went from painting buggies to painting houses; this he did until he retired.

Samuel Franklin HERMAN and Myrtle Estelle LAFONE were married on 30 April 1916 in Hildebran, Burke County, North Carolina. When Myrtle was only thirteen she met Samuel and their courtship started. Myrtle's parents thought she was too young to think about boys but Myrtle disagreed and their relationship continued. When Samuel was twenty three and Myrtle was fifteen they went to her parents home one day and asked to borrow the horse and buggy. Her father went and hitched up the horse and buggy for them. As they started to drive away, Myrtle's father called out to them and asked, Where are you going? to get married, at which Samuel replied YES. Her father just laughed," but when the couple returned that day, they were married. They had gone to a magistrate's home at Hildebran, N.C. and on this day the 30 April, 1916 they were married. Myrtle Estelle LAFONE, daughter of Wilburn L. LAFONE and Dora Genevia WILKIE, was born on 5 September 1899 in North Carolina.¹⁰³⁵ She died on 26 July 1974 at the age of 74 in Catawba County, North Carolina.¹⁰³⁵ She was buried in Oakwood Cemetery, Hickory, Catawba County, North Carolina.

Samuel Franklin HERMAN and Myrtle Estelle LAFONE had the following children: