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Another person who was a big part of the hotel was Aunt Ida Grigsby. She was the widow of John Grigsby and an aunt by marriage of Minnie Grigsby Gilley. She was of Pennsylvania-Dutch descent and a wonderful cook. Incidentally, her husband was a traveling salesman, selling wrought iron ranges. The family never knew where they met or married.
After he died she went to Canada and thought she would live with one of her sons and his family. It just didn't work out and she wrote and asked my Daddy if she could come back to Bulls Gap and live and work at the hotel. By this time he and my mother were divorced and it worked out very well. She lived there the remainder of her life. She planned and helped with the meals and just generally made herself useful. Everyone "loved" Aunt Ida. The railroad men loved to tease her, but usually she could give as good as she got! She was a large lady, but always very neat. Thinking back over this, I wonder where she could find clothes to fit? She had lots of troubles and physical problems. We could certainly take a lesson from her because she never complained!
There were apartments as well as rooms in the hotel. Some of the names who come to mind who rented there are the Burkheimers, the Heddens, W.M. "Cotton" and Barsha Ward, Connie and Nettie Richardson Ward, a school teacher. This couple had a double wedding around 1929 with my Daddy and Bonnie C. Parks of Pilot Knob, who worked at Worth's Drug Store. The wedding took place at the Worth Quillen residence. Others were Clifford and Maude Moore, the R. E. Grubbs, Charlie Moores, and at a much later date, Rev. and Mrs. McGregor, a retired Baptist minister, Mrs.Georia Talley, to name only a few who come to mind.
Some of those who boarded of the railroad men I can remember were "Bert" Lord, an Englishman. He came to the United States, worked a couple of years in New York, sent for his lady friend who was in England, a nurse. She came over and they were married in New York at the Little Church Around the Corner. They had one son Billy and they spent a lot of time at the hotel. They lived in Knoxville on Linden Ave. and had a sign on their door which read " The House of Lords". Arthur Wilson, an engineer, who was severely burned in a train wreck on the Leadville cutoff. He didn't make it. Jimmy Johnson, a conductor, who was called "crapear" because a piece of one ear was missing. Curtis Grant, known as "Governor", an engineer and his family. Sherwood Johnston, an engineer who was forever playing tricks on people. Everyone gathered around for the fun! I remember him coming in from a run carrying his suitcase and asking for Flo Hinshaw, who was the dining room girl, as he brought her something. She came in and with much reluctance opened the suitcase. There it was - a huge sulled-up possum! There was also Frank Hall, a conductor...he loved to go fishing with Daddy. Jimmie Johnson who was the manager of the Sands Store, which was the railroad commissary, and on and on.
Through the years there were many changes taking place in Bulls Gap and the area. This made a difference in Daddy's business.
The first I can think of was the building of the Leadville Cut-off from Bulls gap to Leadville, which shortened the trip to Asheville, N.C. by by-passing Morristown. I don't know how long this construction lasted, but they were good years for Daddy and his business.