Hop City House: First Book of Hop City Saga

by Pamela K. Kelley, Kris Jodon (Editor)

This is the story of a house. A very special house and the people who built, loved, labored, and laughed and cried and who are buried nearby. Our young family once lived on the forty-five acres of hilly land on Hop City Road in Upstate New York. The house was in need of major repairs and curious about the house's history and the Roman numerals my husband discovered carved in the attic beams, I sought out the previous owner, Harold Rue. I had just begun my local research when we were relocated to Texas. I tried to put Hop City behind me, but after reading "John Adams", I realized Abigail had lived in a saltbox, and I dug out my notes. What followed was almost a passionate adventure of discovery of the real people who settled on our land and built our house. I was able to trace the Rue family back to their European roots and the perilous voyage to America. Volumes of data found in historic books and diaries posted on the internet gave me enough information to explain the settlement of Balls Town. I loved talking about my discoveries with a friend who had a Hessian soldier in her family tree. Kris read my drafts, told me my book "is gripping with history". Friends are priceless! I hope it is filled with emotion and the love of family, land and country. I wove family antidotes of our Hop City house so our daughters would not forget sledding down the back hill, 4-H meetings in our kitchen baking pies, hauling firewood from the barn for our Franklin stove, and waking up to a Nor'easter that would become "snow days" and no school. Daughter Molly just laughed when she read my first draft saying, "Mom, how could I forget our house?". The role the Balls Town militia played in the American Revolution was the beginning of a larger story and two more books were to follow. Enjoy, laugh and cry (according to my brother). This is my first book. Cheers for historical novels, they are history books you can remember. Pam

294 pages, Kindle Edition

First published May 25, 2013