Goodall Family Mystery Has Been Solved

For several years, many of us have wondered what ever happened to Thomas Tuggle Goodall, the twin brother of Papa's father. We knew he married a lady from Knoxville and had two children. From Knoxville, they moved to Galveston, Texas. The last written confirmation we had about Thomas Tuggle Goodall was his attendance at his father's, Harrison Aiken Goodall, funeral in 1900. The last words were that he was headed back to his family in Galveston.

Uncle Walter thought it was strange that no one ever talked about Uncle Tom. He came to the conclusion that he perished in the huge hurricane that took the lives of thousands in 1900. Two summers ago, a cemetery had to be moved near Mt. Juliet. One of the graves found there was T.T. Goodall, July 16, 1929. This brought on the talk of who T.T. Goodall was.

Several of George Van Buren Goodall family lived in Mt. Juliet. George V was also Papa's father's brother. Aunt Martha (Mattie) the daughter of Granville Goodall (Papa's first cousin) remembered at the age of five Uncle Tom coming home to see his brother (George) one last time. She told the story to some of her family members and it was passed along, but not to any of the Goodall's in TXR. There was still no proof that the grave was T.T. Goodall.

Dottie Gibson (my 5th cousin once removed), the head of the Gaggle of Goodalls, lives in California. I asked her for any information that she might have. She sent me what she had. Thomas Tuggle Goodall lived in a boarding house in Galveston, TX, as a 62 year old widower in the 1920 census. There was no record of him in the 1930 census anywhere in the USA, so these dates point to the grave being Uncle Tom's. She suggested I contact Karen Waugh, a distance cousin in Florida. I did.

She filled in all the blanks. She told me that George Van Buren Goodall and his wife Nannie Bridgewater took Uncle Tom to their log cabin home on Highway 70 to care for him. He had come home to die of TB. He stayed in the hallway of the house until his death July 1929. The death date is perfect.

Now, the story takes a really interesting turn. A husband and wife Cooper (?) purchased the old Goodall log house and had it moved to a beautiful setting further out in the country. They remodeled the entire house and added a modern kitchen. The year after they completed the remodel, the wife who was a nurse, tested positive for TB. The hospital where she worked did a big investigation as to where she contacted the bacteria. Finally, it was decided that she had contacted the bacteria from the original wallpaper and newspaper which covered the logs. She had stripped the walls herself. Isn't it amazing that over seventy years later the bacteria was still powerful enough to affect a person?

After I gave my report to cousins in Mt. Juliet, I found out the George Van Buren Goodall and his son, Granville, also died of TB.

Cousin Ann Goodall Shelton is going to meet me soon and take me to the cemetery to make a picture of T.T. Goodall's gravestone.

I would like to thank Dottie Gibson, Ann Shelton and Karen Waugh for all their help in solving a family mystery for the TXR side of the family.