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I wanted to say a few words about my late husband, Vance Ramsey, who was born in Shawnee, Oklahoma, and died July, 2007 in Ohio. Vance delivered papers and had other jobs as a boy, went into the U. S. Marines after graduating from Shawnee High School and played football and baseball. He served three years during the Korean War, was on the USS Quincy (the ship that took President Roosevelt and Sir Winston Churchilll to Yalta at the close of WWII), manning a 14 inch gun. Vance earned a Sharpshooter medal, and traveled around the world several times, visiting Edinburgh, Scotland, London, Naples, Rome, Haiti, Panama, Hong Kong, Yokusha, Japan and many other places. He was also a Military Policeman and did some boxing. Upon graduation, Vance used the G.I. Bill money to enroll in engineering studies at Oklahoma State University at Stillwater, Oklahoma, and cooked in a boarding house to make extra money. He transferred first to Oklahoma City University, then to the University of Oklahoma where he received his degrees and majored in medieval studies. His doctoral dissertation is entitled Tradition and Chaucer's Unfaithful Woman. He was chosen to teach at the University of Texas, Austin, and then at Ohio University, Athens, Ohio, and taught Roots of the English Language, Beowulf, Chaucer, Shakespeare, etc., and directed graduate students in getting higher degrees. He served eight years on the University Research Committee, which determined how grant money was to be awarded to teachers in all fields. Upon taking early retirement, Vance plunged into a study of the Civil War, reading hundreds of books. He had been fascinated by the fact that his great-grandfather, Harrison Ramsey born near Cookeville, Tennessee, about 1841, had served in the Civil War. Vance's Dad, also Harrison (son of Wade Hampton Ramsey and wife Ada Alice View/Vieux) knew "old" Harrison and visited him at Upton, Hardin Co. Kentucky (became Uptonsville or Uptonville). We learned that Harrison Ramsey served in the 25th Tennessee Regiment, along with his kin named Ramsey and Choate, and that he had signed up at Sparta, White Co., Tennessee (Cookeville was nearby). Vance visited the Shiloh Battlefield twice doing research, and wrote a novel about his great grandfather and some imaginary exploits. Vance loved to read all of his life, studied several languages, wrote The Manly-Rickert Text of the Canterbury Tales, 700 pages as I recall. He had a wonderful wit and sense of humor. Charts of his Ramsey ancestry and material about my gathering of information about James Randolph Ramsey and his wife, Elizabeth Choate, of Seven Knobs, Burning Branch of 1820 onward, Jackson, Overton, White counties, TN, has been charted (with sources) and made available online in several places and includes hundreds of Ramseys. It took me about 15 years to trace the pioneering Ramsey men of Pawnee, Pawnee Co., Oklahoma Territory circa 1890 (all shown on censuses as born TN) back to Cookeville, and the result was that Vance and one of our sons visited Cookeville and amazingly stopped at the home of Opal who turned out to be a 3rd or 4th cousin who knew so much about these Ramseys, and introduced Vance to others who were also interested in these Ramseys, and their kin who have Choate ties, Hensley ties, etc. Thanks to Genforum for making space possible for me to write in memory of my dearly missed husband.
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