The Stained-Glass Windows of Elizabeth Lee

                       Elizabeth Lee Memorial Methodist Church, Chickamauga, Georgia.

Louise was choir director two different times at the Elizabeth Lee church -- 2003-2004, and then again from 2013 to 2016. We enjoyed attending the church, and still have many friends there -- including a number, I'm happy to say, who read this blog.

The church's two stained-glass windows, now more than a hundred years old, do not actually stand side by side as you see them above -- they are positioned on each side of the pulpit area at the front of the church. I put them together in Photoshop as an illustration for a commemorative booklet and audio-visual presentation which I created for the church to celebrate the renovation of the windows.                                                                   Cleaning the glass.

The windows were removed, taken to the Llorens Leaded Art Glass Company of Winder, Georgia, and completely disassembled. Every piece of glass was cleaned, new pieces cut to fit as needed and then the windows were reassembled and reinstalled in the church.

                                          Reassembling the windows with new lead.

I made two or three trips to Winder to photograph the process. It was fascinating to watch.

 Putting the finished panels together.

Reinstalling the windows in the church.

Just remembering an interesting project on this last evening of 2023. The photographs were made with Olympus OM-D E-M5 cameras.

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $3.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail me a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

Check out the pictures at my online gallery: https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  Looking is free, and you might find something you like.

Photography and text copyright 2024 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography  stained-glass windows     Olympus OM-D E-M5 camera     Elizabeth Lee UMC

The William Daniell House, 1790

                                 The William Daniell House, Watkinsville, Georgia

After the death of his first wife, with whom he had eleven children, Revolutionary War veteran William Daniell married 17-year-old Polly Melton, and in 1790, built a new, Plantation Plain-style house for her. Fortunately, he built large, because the couple had thirteen more children together. Daniell lived to be 97, and the home he built for Polly is now thought to be the oldest house in Oconee County. In fact, it may well be the oldest house in North Georgia, although that depends upon where one draws the line between North and Central Georgia.

If you consider the line of demarcation to be Interstate 20, than the Daniell House's only rival north of the interstate is the 1793 Fort Hollingsworth-White House between Homer and Cornelia.

Just slightly south of I-20 is the Thomas Ansley Rock House near Thompson, built in 1785. The Jacob Burkhalter house in Warrenton is even older, dating from around 1778. 

On the National Register of Historic Places, the Daniell House is now owned by Oconee County and is used for weddings, receptions, family reunions, and other meetings and events.

Adapted from my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia.

(Photo: Canon EOS 6D camera, Canon EF 24-85mm f3.5-4.5 lens.)

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $3.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail me a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

Check out the pictures at my online gallery: https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  Looking is free, and you might find something you like.

Photography and text copyright 2023 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography  travel     Georgia     Oconee County     Watkinsville     historic houses     Canon 6D camera     Canon EF 24-85mm lens

Winter on the Farm

 Winter at Deer Run Farm: Chickamauga Creek and Pigeon Mountain.

This photograph was made a few days after the great blizzard of March, 1993 covered the land with snow from north Florida to the North Pole. A 36x24-inch canvas print of this scene now hangs above our fireplace.

We had about a foot of snow in most places on our farm, with drifts much deeper in some places. I bottomed out my four-wheel-drive Chevy Blazer in our yard and had to pull it out with the tractor.

During all of this, one of our young heifers, who had been bred prematurely by our neighbors enormous Brahma bull, went into labor with a calf that was far to large for her to deliver. She was suffering greatly. Our veterinarian was able to come in his four-wheel-drive truck and give her an injection the slowed the labor contractions. We and our neighbors Ken and Sara sat up with her most of the night in near-zero weather, sheltered by a ring of large hay bales in our barn. The veterinarian was able to come back the next day with his assistant and do an impromptu C-Section. The heifer survived, but unfortunately, the calf died just before delivery.

But that was life on the farm. A lot of good memories that far outweigh the bad.

Signed copies of my book Backroads and Byways of Georgia are available. The price is $22.95 plus $3.95 shipping. My PayPal address is djphoto@vol.com (which is also my email). Or you can mail me a check to 8943 Wesley Place, Knoxville, TN 37922. Include your address and tell me how you would like your book inscribed.

Check out the pictures at my online gallery: https://davejenkins.pixels.com/  Looking is free, and you might find something you like.

Photography and text copyright 2023 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   photography   farm life     cattle

 

Was This Always the Goal?

The empty tomb. Jerusalem, Israel 

Who shows a picture of a tomb at Christmas? Well, I do, because in the deepest sense that's what Christmas is about. But most people prefer to think about the baby in a manger. Seems cozy and comforting, doesn't it?

Unless you grew up poor on a farm, you probably have no idea what a cold and incredibly filthy place that stable was, and how unsuitable as a birthing place for anyone, let alone a king. 

But his birth, necessary and important as it was, was not the goal.

His life, which he lived perfectly and without sin, was not the goal, although that goal was ever before him.

His death, cruel and unjust, was a necessary step. For on that horrible cross he bore in his own body every sin you and I have ever committed or ever will commit. But even the cross was not the goal.

The tomb itself, where his body laid for three days, was not the goal. 

The goal, from all eternity, was the empty tomb. God raised Jesus from the dead. This was the ultimate proof that Christ's sacrifice had been accepted by the Father and our debt was paid in full. This is the gospel, as expressed clearly in I Corinthians 15, verses 1-5: "That Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures, and that he was buried, and and that he rose again the third day according to the scriptures."

When Jesus went to that cross, he carried with him in his own body your sins and mine. He paid in full the debt of our sin and now offers you and me eternal life as a free gift.

What does he ask of us? He asks only that you and I accept the fact that we are sinners in need of a savior, and that we receive Jesus by faith as the savior we need.

My prayer is that if you have never received Jesus as your savior, you will do so on this Christmas Day.

Photography and text copyright 2023 David B.Jenkins.

I post Monday, Wednesday, and Friday unless life gets in the way.

Soli Gloria Deo -- For the glory of God alone.

Tags:   Christmas    Jesus Christ     Israel     Jerusalem     the garden tomb