This is a story set in the North Carolina Mountains. It is about two families of Scotch-Irish and French decent. It centers on one 11 year old girl and her 6 year old sister and two boy cousins, one 13 years old and his 8 year old brother. The story begins in the year 1914. The author got many ideas for this book from an elderly lady (in her 90s) who was asked to take part in an oral history for her community by the Director of the Rural Life Museum which was part of university library. At that time the author of this book was a student at the university and she was studying to be a teacher as well as an art student. The sweet lady decided she wanted to write this story down into a book and she wanted to add illustrations, at least ten pictures. (We ended up with 40 illustrations). This is what brought these two together. While the lady was writing her book of community history, the university decided to ask the lady and the student (author) to do an Elderhostel Class for the university. The lady told the author (artist) many stories she did not put in her book, one of these stories became the "Fire" and another the "Grandfather". There really was a Frenchman who came to this community with his trained monkey that danced beside the organ grinder. And that little monkey is buried in the family cemetery. The author also included stories that her father told her such as the "Ghost". This story was of a haunting young woman who killed her husband in the early 1800s. She was hung for it in 1838 and this too is a true story from these mountains.