Man 1: Since I was probably in the first grade, my first-grade teacher, she asked me, uh, what did I want to be when I grow up and I said that I want to be an undertaker, you know.

I tried working at other jobs, but I, I really wanted to go to mortuary school, and I don't think I was wrong.

I think I’m pretty good at what I do.

♪♪ Being a mortician is not something that around the dinner table that you're gonna talk about.

[laughs] So, so you don't use the word mortician, you say I’m a funeral director.

It don't sound so bad, you know, like okay.

People like that.

But if you say that I’m a undertaker, I'm a mortician, erghh.

[laughs] My own family, my ancestors and things, I don't know a lot about them because a lot of them died so young, and, and of course I’ve always wondered what happened.

Maybe it's just meant for my family just to pass away at a young age, you know, so I was-- I wouldn't talk about my age.

For years I wouldn't even tell anyone how old I was.

I just-- when people'd say how old are you I just wouldn't even talk about it.

I said it's not important because I really thought that I was gonna die at a young age, and I, and I got to the point to say, Okay I’m gonna have to break this cycle.

I’m not gonna die, I’m not sick, I’m not my father, I’m not his, his father.

You know, I’m me, I’m different.

And I think that maybe my ancestors would want us to know, Well, this is what we died of, this is what took us out.

This is how you honor our memory just by learning from our death.

♪♪ - Hello, I’m Lise Simms, and each week on our show we bring you the story of someone who, for one reason or another, wants to connect with an ancestor, or an entire generation of their family tree and we help them do just that.

We're an ongoing project dedicated to connecting families across generations, and today that person is Sam Reed.

Hi Sam.

- Hello.

- [laughs] You knew you were born to be a funeral director, you said, by the first grade.

Sam: Yes.

- How do you know what a funer-- funeral director is?

- It was just a special calling that I had, uh, in the first grade.

It's just like when, um, uh, someone's been called into the ministry, uh, to do the will of God, to work for God, I mean, and being called into this line of work, uh, it was the same way, you know.

- But how did you know a funeral director even existed?

I didn't know anything about that world when I was in first grade.

Sam: Well I guess just being brought up in a small town, you know, a lot of people are dying and everything and having funerals at the local church.

Um, I wanted to attend each service.

Lise: And you did, I understand.

- And I did.

Lise: Whether they were family or not.

- Whether they was family or not I would go and I would attend the service and someone within the family said, Well who's going to, uh, Mother Smith's funeral and they said the Buzzard, that's what they called me 'cause I attend everybody's service.

[laughs] Lise: What did it give you to attend those services as a young person?

- It just made me understand, uh, maybe how the undertaker really made the body up, fixed them up for that last celebration that they were going to, you know, and, and I just began to really feel like that was my calling, that that was my passion in life.

I didn't want to be a fireman, I didn't want to be a police officer, schoolteacher.

I wanted to be an undertaker.

And, uh, even the teacher in the first grade, she, she asked me what did I want to be when I grow up and I said I wanted to be an undertaker, and I just knew at that time that's what I was destined to be.

Lise: When you were fairly young you lost several family members.

Sam: Correct.

- Can you tell me who they were to you and how old you were when they passed away?

Sam: Uh, my father died in '72.

I think I was in the 10th grade.

Lise: Mm.

- Uh, then my uncle who actually raised me, uh, he died in '74.

And my, uh, grandmother died in '74, '75.

Uh, her sister died maybe a year before then.

Then my, uh, I had a brother die who was my, uh, uncle's son, you know, so there were a lot of people that l-- you know, left me at a early age.

And they was fairly young.

Lise: I would think so.

That must have been fairly traumatic.

You were, you were young.

Sam: It was, and, um, and I just became more and more knowledgeable about funeral service just by helping other members of the family make arrangements.

I just felt like that, that was my place to, to do that, you know.

Lise: That's beautiful, and that's when, is that when the feeling of, I don't want to talk about my age because I could die young started?

Sam: W-- uh, exactly.

After, uh, my father died, you know, that's when that really began to set in that maybe I might die young, you know.

Lise: Well, speaking of young deaths, your grandfather, Sam, died at the age of 26 and that is the death you start your research with.

You meet up with your sisters to kinda compare family accounts of that death-- Sam: Right.

- --and I’d like to watch that with you now.

Sam: Okay.

[birds chirping] I’m going to my sister's house to have a conversation with my two sisters about my grandfather and about his death and the cause of death, uh, what we think it may have happened.

And we have never really talked about it, so I don't know what they're thinking, you know.

How are you?

- Good, how you doing?

- Good.

Woman 1: Good.

Sam: Ah.

So, what do you think about our grandfather dying so young?

I mean, have you heard any stories about, you know, maybe how he may have passed away?

Woman 1: Well, the census just said he was stabbed but-- Sam: Mm-hm.

- --it didn't say-- well I found out later, years later as a matter of fact-- Woman 2: Mm-hm.

- --that it was our great aunt, our grandmother's sister, that supposedly, you know, stabbed him for, uh... hitting our grandmother-- - Oh.

- --but that's the story I heard.

Woman 2: Who, Red?

Woman 1: Mm-hm.

Sam: And what, you just heard this in people talking.

Woman 1: Yes, in people talking.

It wasn't a-- it wasn't a fact, but like I said, when I did pull up that census it actually said he was stabbed.

Sam: Right.

- I wish I could... - But it didn't say who stabbed him?

- Hm-mm, it didn't say who he-- who stabbed him.

I know it happened in... Crozier?

That's where they was livin'.

So that's, that's one of the reasons that, uh, since we got into this a few months ago, I said, Well, there's only one way to find out, so I decided I would request something just to check it out for ourself.

- And what you got?

Woman 1: Well, we'll wait and see.

I’ll go get it.

- Well, go get it.

Lise: Lenora has a copy of Grandfather Sam's death certificate from West Virginia’s Division of Culture and History.

Lenora: And...

So we gon-- we gonna find out together what happened to Papa.

[laughs] Woman 2: Okay.

Okay, McDowell County, Elkhorn, full name, Samuel Reed.

Okay, male... - Oh shoot.

- What is that?

- Snap.

- What?

What is that?

- Does that say gunshot wound?

Woman 2: Oh yeah.

Lenora: Oh wow.

Woman 2: What did I say?

Get outta here.

- Look at that.

Woman 2: Home.

Lenora: He was shot at home.

Woman 2: Wounded in the leg.

Lenora: That won't kill you.

- Well, yeah, if you hit the main artery, it does.

- Wow.

- Wow.

Woman 2: He was a what?

Sam: Trade profession.

Lenora: Tipple man.

He worked at the tipple in the coal mine.

Woman 2: Okay.

Okay, his father's name was Henry Reed.

Sam: Now that you see that it was a gunshot wound instead of a stab wound, I mean, so what is your theory now?

Lenora: Could've been a-- ruled an accident.

It didn't say murder.

It just said gunshot wound to the leg.

Woman 2: Okay this is-- okay, it say homicide.

Sam: Okay, that's what I was looking for.

Woman 2: This is a homicide.

Sam: Okay, that's what I was-- Woman 2: May the 11th.

He got shot May the 11th.

Wow.

Lenora: What does it say up there?

Who done it.

Sam: Yeah.

Lenora: Do it matter?

Sam: It does matter to me, I mean, I'm-- Lenora: I still think Red-red probably did it.

Sam: Mm-hm, because someone had told you that.

Woman 2: Mm-hm.

Lenora: Why would they say that?

Woman 2: Why was it hidden?

Who does she take the f-- who does she take the blame for?

Sam: So maybe... - Somebody just shot him.

- You know, well, maybe other people that, that was raised in the house with them, they may know more now.

They-- you know, we may be able to talk to our cousins.

So, um, I’m wondering what really went on, you know.

- Will we ever find out?

[tense music] ♪♪ - Who knows, I mean I’m not even sure.

They said my great aunt was the person that did it, but maybe my grandmother may have did it and my, my great aunt took the, the blame, you know, 'cause she was so young.

I don't know.

What I would like to do now if I had the opportunity is to do some more research.

Then I’m really wondering, you know, who actually shot my grandfather if someone was actually charged with his death since the death certificate said homicide, you would think that a person would be charged.

We would have to go McDowell County to find out, uh, probably more information 'cause this is where it took place.

♪♪ Lise: For the first time in years Sam returns to his boyhood home of McDowell County, West Virginia.

♪♪ - Now we're entering the town where, where I lived, where I grew up here in Powhatan.

This is still the area here.

Now, this is the high school that I graduated from.

Northfork High School.

This here, yeah.

I think that used to be, it maybe used to be the funeral home.

I was baptized in this church, Mercy Seat Baptist Church.

All of my uncles and things worked in the coalmines here at Keystone.

And my, my father worked on the railroad.

I’m not sure what was worse, workin' in the mines or workin' on the railroad.

It might be a good idea to stop up in Crozier Bottom where my cousin lived because my cousin, her father was his brother, so I’m pretty sure she may know some information that, that I don't know.

Hey, Shirley.

Do you know who I am?

You don't?

Look at me.

What--who do I sound like?

Shirley: [indistinct] Sam: No.

Sam Reed.

- [laughs] - I went to school with your daughters.

- What you doing here?

Sam: How you doin'?

Shirley: What you doing here?

- We're working on a special project.

Shirley: Yeah?

- Yeah.

Trying to find out some information about my family.

So the reason that I came here trying to find some information about my family and I thought, I said, well, Shirley Mae would know something about my grandfather and it’s good to see you, [indistinct].

It's been a long time.

- [indistinct] [laughing] - Yeah, I went to school [indistinct].

Sam: Yeah, thank you.

[laughs] Now, you remember my grandfather was your father's brother, right?

Now what was your father's name?

- Alex.

- Right, and so your father and my grandfather, Sam, that was married to Addie... - Was cousins.

- Was cousin-- w--they were cousins, okay.

So he was killed up here in Crozier Bottom.

Do you remember that?

When he was killed back in-- this was I guess, uh, 1936-- Shirley: Mm.

- --and I guess you was a little girl.

- I was born in 1937.

- You was born in '37 so you were still young, so do you remember any stories or anything about maybe how he died, that he was shot, uh, killed, or something?

Do you remember anything about that?

- No.

See 'cause I was born in '37.

Sam: Right.

Well I didn't get a lot of information from my cousin, Shirley.

It would be good if someone could remember in this area 'cause this is the area where my grandfather actually was killed, and-- but it has changed.

A lot of people have died off.

Some people have moved in, a lot of people are young, some people are born, and lot of these people I don't even know now, but it may be somebody here that I don't know that, uh, I may run into that may know something.

I have no idea.

Let's knock on the doors and see if anyone has any information that may be helpful to me.

[knocking] - They have dogs.

Now you know I gotta hold this door.

Hey, how you doin'?

- Hi.

- Hi, I’m Sam Reed and I’m researching my family's history, and I just want to know if you remember any Sam Reeds, any Reed families.

- Uh, we haven't lived here long enough.

- You haven't?

- We don't really know many around here.

- Okay, all right, thank you.

♪♪ [knocking] ♪♪ Well, they said the third time is the charm.

♪♪ [splash] Okay.

♪♪ [dog barks] 20 years ago, I probably could've tell you everybody's name that lived up into this-- in this community here.

I knew everyone but since I moved away, I don't know.

[knocking] [rattling] - Hey.

Woman 3: Sam, how do you do?

Haven't seen you in a while.

Come on in.

Sam: Fine, do I know you?

Woman 3: Yes, you do.

Sam: Wow, okay.

- It's been awhile-- Sam: It's been awhile?

- Since the Florida wedding.

- Barby and Augustine’s wedding.

Sam: Yeah, I remember that.

- Yeah, I made the dresses.

Sam: Yeah, but I can't-- give me your name.

- Claudette!

- Okay, yeah.

How're you?

Claudette: I’m blessed.

Sam: I knew the face, but I could-- I couldn't have called a name.

Claudette: Oh, it's good to see you.

Come on in.

Sam: Good to see you.

Thank you.

Tell me about my grandfather's information that you may know about him.

I've done some knockin' on doors and you're the first person that answered, you know, so I’ve heard stories about how my grandfather died but I’m not sure.

Hopefully I, I thought maybe you might know some information.

Claudette: Well, this is an account that my mother had told me, and it was about maybe tragic things had happened here in the community and she told me about a lady named Miss Sarah Hamlit that apparently shot a Reed man and that she shot him 'cause he was very abusive.

He was a very mean man.

And apparently after a argument, I’m not sure exactly who he was arguing with, her or somebody else in the family but she shot him and mom told me she shot him in places she knew that he possibly die from and she stood over him with that gun and wouldn't allow anybody to come near him until she sure, till she was pretty sure that he had died.

And that's the account that Mama had told me and uh, this is what I get out of it that they were being protective, Sam: Right.

- you know, because apparently this man was very, very mean.

You know he might have been like a Jekyll and Hyde.

You know, he might have been a different person sober than he was when he was drinking.

Sam: Right.

- And, and, and maybe he got more abusive when he was drinking or maybe he was abusive all the time.

He was a mean man and that's why she shot him.

Lise: Claudette, whose mother is something of a town archivist, has an old article on Grandfather Sam's murder.

Claudette: And I found something.

You're welcome to have it.

- This is about my grandfather?

Claudette: Yeah.

- Wow, okay.

The article's saying that, uh, my Aunt Sarah, we called her Red-Red, was charged with the killing of my grandfather, Sam Reed, a colored man of Crozier, and she told the officer that at the hearing that she had shot him, but she didn't mean to do it.

Was shot in the leg with a 12-gauge shotgun and he bled to death before they could reach the hospital.

And it says that the investigation officers said "that the woman told them that Reed had been 'fussing' with her sister."

When the officers went to Crozier to Sarah Hamlit’s home, "the woman didn't seem to be talking "about the affair very seriously and laughed several times."

An investigation was going to continue on May the 14th.

May the 14th on Thursday.

It said that, uh, he was buried at Crozier cemetery but I was thinking it was in Norwood but there's a cemetery up here?

- There is a cemetery here.

It's across the highway up there somewhere here between here and Ennis.

[train chugging] [horn blows] Sam: I may just take a trip up to that cemetery just to see if there are any headstones and that may tell a lot more history about the family.

Sometimes headstones give more information.

Even if he was the way that, uh, has been described to me, that he was a mean man, that he was abusive, it does not mean that he wasn't given a decent burial.

I hope there's no snakes up there.

Not sure if the landscape has changed over the years, but I can't tell that this was a cemetery, and I, I, I don't know.

Let's see.

Maybe we'll find somethin'.

I thought I see something that looks like a headstone even though it's made out of wood, but a long time ago they used wood headstones in the Black community.

So, I mean, but it may be just a tree but just kinda like odd-shaped.

That up there.

No, that might be just a tree.

I don't know.

I don't see anything here that look like it may have been a cemetery here.

The trees are full-blown, weeds everywhere, and it was gonna really be hard to find, you know, because some of the weeds are taller than we are.

♪♪ This is really gettin' in the mountain.

Let's hope we see a gate somewhere.

[chuckles] ♪♪ Any luck?

Right now, we're not comin' up on anything.

♪♪ I don't think that we're gonna find anything.

♪♪ Actually, I’m almost a little bit disappointed because I really thought that maybe we would run into somethin'.

I-I can only imagine that, uh, people, people came out to the funeral because everybody in the community knew him, they knew the Reed family, and they knew he died of a tragic death, and people usually follow tragedy, you know, just to see who showed up or whatever, you know.

So I’m pretty sure that, you know, he had a, a great celebration because that's what we tend to do in the, in the African American community.

Regardless of how someone in your family dies, uh, you still give them a celebration of life.

[birds chirping] Lise: Next Sam heads for the McDowell County archives to look for any paper trail of his Grandfather Sam's murder.

He especially looks for any mention of Sarah Hamlit, Sam's great-aunt who was supposed to have killed Grandpa Sam with a shotgun in 1936.

♪♪ ♪♪ Sam learns that the courthouse archives are vast and hard to navigate.

Files yellowed with age and covered in a thick layer of coal dust could be anything from court records to police records to other mundane county affairs.

[thunk] Defeated by the difficulties of the archive, he asked courthouse clerk, Francine Spencer, to help him search.

- Okay, Sarah Hamlit.

There's a case.

Page 467.

You want to turn to 467?

Lise: Sam has found a reference to his great-aunt, Sarah Hamlit, in a legal record of his grandfather's case.

Francine: This is telling you that she uh... Sam: She actually goes to court for a trial.

Francine: And it's saying after the jury heard all the evidence that was introduced in this trial, they were sent into the room to deliberate and after a while they came back and returned a not guilty verdict.

It doesn't specifically say why the jury didn't find her guilty and you know sometimes in a lot of cases sometimes it will tell you that and sometimes it won't.

It just depends on the circumstances.

♪♪ Sam: You know, I was a little surprised, you know, at the story that how abusive and mean my grandfather was.

I mean, he may have been very mean and abusive, I don't know, but, uh, this led to his demise.

And I’m sure they were drinking because my family has a history of drinking alcohol and everything, uh, and abusing alcohol in my family, so maybe he had came from a family of abuse and alcohol and he started drinkin' early.

I’m not sure what type of environment that he grew up in 'cause he was young, he was 26, you know, still a young man, and I just know that my grandfather worked in the coal mine.

[metal squealing] [train chugging] Lise: Coal was the United States’ foremost source of fuel until as late as the 1950s.

As the 19th century progressed, coal became more and more valuable a commodity as coal-burning locomotives expanded the United States into the size that it is today.

Mining coal was a high national priority.

The discovery and exploitation of the massive Southwest Virginia coal field began in the mid-18th century.

The coal field, roughly 1,520 square miles, required a steady stream of laborers from all over the United States including many African Americans from the South.

♪♪ The high demand for coal created fast-paced, grueling, and dangerous working conditions.

19th century mine walls could fail and collapse.

Vehicles could collide, and miners could be suffocated, poisoned by gas, or burned by gas explosions.

Mining towns reported high rates of diabetes, hypertension, kidney disease, lung disease, and tuberculosis.

Sam's ancestors lived and worked in the Virginia coal field and died of those very kinds of mining-related ailments.

One died at the age of 70 while still working in the mines, but many died before the age of 50.

The Pocahontas Exhibition Mine in Pocahontas, West Virginia allows visitors to experience that dim light and those cold, damp conditions that Sam's ancestors experienced.

- Sylvester Myers.

- Okay, Sam Reed.

Sylvester: How are you doing, Sam?

Sam: Fine, how are you?

Sylvester: Good.

Sam: Okay.

Sylvester: Got some good clean [indistinct]... Lise: Sylvester Myers, a tour guide and himself the child of West Virginia miners, opens their conversation by explaining how mine foremen dealt with a slain miner's body.

Sylvester: This is a place right here where if they had a person that was killed in a mine or injured, they put him in that basket Sam: Okay.

Sylvester: and that person did not go outside.

If he was killed until they changed shifts.

The miners couldn't take him out.

Someone would have to come in.

They'd have to do it on a lunch period.

Lise: In horrifying contrast with the loving attention Sam pays to his clients, miners who died on the job were treated merely as a financial liability.

Left in the mineshaft until the end of the workday their bodies were finally removed in a coal basket.

Sam: So uh, so why couldn't they take them outside, I mean when they got killed?

Sylvester: Inside a mine was their livelihood and if they took time out to move a body they couldn't earn any money.

It was a tough life.

It was real cruel.

Sam: My grandfather and my father, they all kinda like, drank a lot, you know, I’m trying to see if thi-- if this played a big role into the alcohol debt.

Sylvester: It, it played a big role in all the, not all the families but that was common.

- So the miners, so they would drink a lot?

- They would drink a lot.

Take all the bad feelings that you've found when you came into a place like this.

This is not a beautiful place to make a living.

To work in a coal mine was difficult.

It was not healthy.

It was a tough life and it's not the best way to live a long time.

[water dripping] ♪♪ Lise: Next, Sam visits the Emma Yates Memorial Library to extend his Reed family genealogy.

Now that he understands his Grandfather Sam's death, he specifically looks for information on Henry Reed, Grandfather Sam's father.

[keys clacking] [printer whirring] - I found some documents.

I didn't find anything about my great-grandfather, but I did find something on my great-great-grandfather and I just had enough time to print the documents and the first one is a pension.

It's, it's, it's a pension I guess, uh.

Wow, I wasn't expecting to find this.

And his name was Henry Clay Reed.

My great-great-grandfather, "Who was your..." so he was a slave.

Wow.

[chuckles] That's when I saw "Who was your master at the time of entering upon duties?"

So this must have been some type of, uh, veteran's pension that my-- he was in the army or something.

I’m trying to read on down through here to see.

It says, "Application of person "who served the Confederate States in the war between the States."

It's in--it's interesting that I have someone in my family that actually served in the Confederate army, you know, which is blowing my mind [laughing] right now.

Wow.

He, he died in the county of Tazewell in the town of Pocahontas.

He died here in Pocahontas.

This is-- wow.

Okay.

His date of death was May the 28th, 1930.

So, I’m trying to see how old he was when he died.

♪♪ 114?

Oh my-- [laughs] 114 years old.

Wow.

Man.

This, this is, this is an eye-opener.

Wow.

I did not expect to find anything.

I'm, I'm... 'Cause I was thinking that all of my family members were-- was dying off early, but here someone lived to be 114 which is wild, you know, so, uh, maybe I’ll live to be that long, that old, I’m not sure but there is hope now, you know.

Lise: In 1815, Sam's great-great-grandfather, Henry Clay Reed, was born into slavery in New London, Virginia.

From 1861 to 1865 he was a servant in the Confederate army under the auspices of his master, Nathan Reed.

After that there is little public record of him until 1924 when he applied for Civil War veteran's pension at the age of 108 in the town of Pocahontas.

He appears to have lived there until he died in 1930 at the age of 114.

Now that Sam knows Henry Clay died in Pocahontas, he visits the Butt and Company undertaker shop with guides Amy Flick and Thomas Butt.

Thomas's ancestor, William Butt, prepared Henry Clay for burial in 1930.

Sam: What type of coffin would my great-great- grandfather would have had when the time in 1930?

- That wood coffin right there would be most of everything he made would be out of wood.

Sam: Okay.

I’m wondering if he did any of, any of the embalming or anything during that time.

Amy: Right.

And you'll see over in the corner he saved.

Sam: I mean, I’ve seen this in books from years ago, uh, what they used.

Wow.

Thomas: It looks like they injected that into the veins, Sam: Right, mm-hm.

- and it was kind of like a... Sam: And I’m not sure what this was for but... Thomas: Some kind of pump.

- Some type of pump and of course these are the bottles that the fluid actually came in.

And of course I was calling these caskets but these are really coffins.

That's what they were using then.

They were coffins and caskets came along, uh, much later on and of course these are much smaller than the caskets are now.

♪♪ That's, that's an old age, you know, to live to be 114.

Uh, maybe it was in the water, uh, but I would like to know did many people live to be that old or was just one or two but whether it was in his diet, whether was in the type of work that he did.

what was it that caused him to live to be 114 years of age?

[knocking] Lise: To answer that question Sam has arranged to meet with Jesse Spencer, a distant cousin.

Jesse: Come in.

My mother was a Reed.

Sam: Okay.

- All the way back, same line as you.

- Okay.

- My father's grandmother was a Reed, so my, my mother's great-great-great-grandfather and my father's great-great-great-grandmother were brothers and sisters.

- Okay.

- It was far enough back that it didn't cause any serious problems.

- Right, okay, wow.

Jesse: So, what have you been doing as far as the history goes?

Sam: This here is a death certificate as well as a pension, so this was really interesting and, uh, to, to find out and, and to realize that, uh, to know that he was 114 years old when he died.

- Well, that's common in our family.

The Reeds.

- Well, maybe on-- - The Reeds.

- --my grandmother's side, but on my father's side seemed like everybody was dying off very, very young-- - No, no.

- --because my father died when he was 40 - Well-- - and his two sisters died in their 20s.

- Well there's, there's, there's two, two groups of Reeds.

- Okay.

- There's the Reeds who live a long time and there's the Reeds that don't.

But the ones who don't, it generally has to do with other circumstances.

- Right.

Jesse: I mean, I’m not saying that all the Reeds were gonna live to be 114 like him-- - Right.

- --but we have a long history of Reeds living that long-- - Okay.

Jesse: --like Henry Clay Reed was 114, his father, Dave Callaway, was 92-- - Okay.

- --okay, and there was a woman living on the same census records with them and I think she was Dave’s mother, she was 110 - Okay, wow.

- So, like my, my cousin, Aunt Annie May, she was 96-- - Okay.

- --and that's a Reed and, uh, Minnie whose mother was a Reed, she's living now.

She's 93.

That's very common on the Reed side of the family.

- Okay.

- But my father, my grandfather died at 47 'cause he ate some contaminated food-- - Okay.

- --so lifestyle had a lot to do with it.

- Right.

Jesse: When Clay died, he had all of his teeth in his mouth at 114.

You know that's what they say he died from?

Infirmities of old age.

I mean he just died, he just burnt out.

And he had a solution for that and Uncle Dave passed that on down to me and today I want to show you, show you what he did to preserve the calcium in his body.

- Okay.

[laughs] Jesse: What Henry Clay had picked up from his grandfather-- Sam: Okay.

Jesse: --was a remedy to preserve the bones in the body.

That's why when he was 114 he still had all of his teeth when he died.

We boil the eggs and then once we boil the eggs we crack the shells, dry them open, and then I turn them into a powder and I’ll show you how I do that.

And he also used it for stomachaches.

When he walked through those mountains, he always had a little bag, a little knapsack and he had all types of herbs and spices in those bags.

Henry Clay Reed who passed it on to Uncle Dave who passed it on to me and I’m sharing it with you.

How's it coming?

- It's turning into powder.

Jesse: Okay, now I can't sit here and tell you that he lived to 114 simply because of that but we know that calcium in bones are very important and the fact that he had all of his teeth was pretty instrumental in that so you can drink that if you want.

Sam: Oh really?

Okay.

[laughs] Wow.

But I want to live long, and I want to keep my teeth and I love milk so this shouldn't be a problem.

♪♪ Lise: Next, Jesse tells Sam something unusual about his Reed ancestry.

- Now did you know, uh, about the Japanese?

So what happens is Henry Clay Reed, your great-great- great-grandfather, his father was Dave Callaway.

Dave Callaway’s father was Fuga, that was the Japanese guy and he must have come over here somewhere in the late 1700s because Henry Clay was born 1815, Dave Callaway would have been born about 1780-90 so this Japanese guy had to been 1750-60 somewhere around there.

Sam: Okay.

If I go back in my mind and look at different members of my family, they do look like Japanese.

I’m, I'm not 100% sure, but, uh, we may be.

I think we have to do some more research to find that out.

Lise: Sam decides to take a DNA test to verify whether he has Japanese ancestry.

Sam: I guess we will see when this comes back.

Lise: With his possible Japanese ancestry in mind, Sam decides to visit a Japanese Buddhist temple in Fairfax, Virginia.

Sam: The copilot, um, I think he got sick.

Someone said there's a doctor on the plane and someone said there's a nurse on the plane I said there's a mortician on the plane... just in case they, they couldn't help him, they knew I was here to assist.

[chuckles] I can go, uh, a long time working, walking, whatever I’m doing without getting tired, you know.

Uh, my body don't really get tired easily, you know, and I’ve been that way all my life, you know, so.

If Fuga, you know, has-- may have something to do with that.

Lise: At the Ekoji Buddhist Temple, Sam meets Reverend Kaz Nakata, Sam's professional counterpart in Japanese funerary culture.

Sam: Do you all have an organization or a group of people that go to the funeral home and dress the body?

Do you let the undertaker do that?

Reverend Nakata: Yeah, here in... Lise: In contrast with the Western funerary tradition of a mortician preparing the deceased in isolation, Japanese Buddhist tradition asks for the family to be present at each step of the body's preparation.

The first stage of the burial rite is a wake.

In the presence of the family the body is first washed, and the orifices are stuffed with cotton or gauze.

A priest like Reverend Nakata chants a sutra and gives them a new name so that their earthly name won't accidentally summon their spirit when used by surviving family members.

Next the casket holding the deceased is closed and transported to a crematorium where the family watches the person be placed in a cremation chamber.

Once the body is fully cremated the family will use special chopsticks to remove bones that survive the cremation chamber's heat and place them in a ceremonial urn.

The urn can be placed in a graveyard, kept at home, or scattered somewhere meaningful for the deceased.

The Ekoji temple even has a special chamber of niches for the urns of area devotees.

Reverend Nakata: Here we have incense, good piece incense Sam: Mm-hmm.

- that you can see and that you can smell, right?

Sam: Mm-hmm.

Reverend Nakata: but once you sprinkle on the chop it start burn.

Sam: Right, uh-huh.

Reverend Nakata: Then you see good piece incense turn into the smoke and ash.

Sam: Right.

Reverend Nakata: That means in Buddhism we say even something has a physically we can touch and feel and smell but someday we have to go back to ash and smoke.

♪♪ [beating drums] - [indistinct] Sam: I mean, it may seem crazy, you know, to the audience, but to myself and all the family members, I mean, there are many, many people in my family that look like they are Japanese.

They have the eyes, they have the cheekbones, the skin, the hair, so no, it's not crazy.

We may not be.

I've found a lot of answers to questions that I had, uh, like I said about my grandfather and how he died and a lot of answers to questions about members of my family dying so young, and I had this fear for many, many years that I would die young because other members of my family died young but now that I found out there are members of my family that lived a long time, especially my great-great-great-grandfather who lived to be 114 years old, you know, of age, and, uh, and that was great, so I feel that there is history in my family that, uh, we live a long time also, so I’m okay with that now.

I’m okay talking about my age and understanding that it, it wasn't natural.

It was something personal that they did that caused their death at an early age.

Woman 4: So how old are you?

- [laughs] I’m 52.

[laughs] I wasn't ready for that one.

[laughing] Okay, I’m 52, yeah, and I’m looking forward to another 30, 40, 50 years if possible.

Yeah.

♪♪ [chuckles] - In your hands right now, you have the results of the DNA test that you took-- Sam: Right.

- --and we asked if you would wait and read them here with us.

So you don't know what's in that envelope.

Sam: No.

Lise: So, um, if you're willing, you wanna take a peek?

- Yes.

- Okay, let's do it.

- All right.

[crinkling] - Do you have a preference one way or the other?

- No.

- That's good.

- No.

[rustling] [silence] "Based on the results of the Y-chromosome test "there is an extremely low statistical probability "that anyone in your direct paternal ancestry "is of Japanese or Asian origin.

"It is probable that your direct paternal line is of West African origin."

Okay.

- Your cousin, Jesse, who, who introduced you to this idea, although you knew some family members looked as if they might have Japanese heritage, will he be disappointed by these findings?

- I don't-- I'm not sure.

I’m not sure.

He may or may not I’m not sure.

[laughs] Lise: And how do you explain the, uh, looks now?

[laughs] - I guess it's just a look.

Lise: Yeah.

- It may be just a look, the way, uh, we're designed, the way we're made up.

Yeah.

Lise: You're okay with it?

- I’m okay with it.

Lise: Well, that's good.

- Yeah.

Lise: Now I know you have some theories about Sarah Hamlit, your grandmother, who shot your grandfather, correct?

Sam: Uh, Sarah, my aunt.

- Your aunt, that's correct who shot-- who went to court for it and they came back with a not guilty verdict.

- Right.

- You have some theories about that.

- Well, I mean, I’m o-- I'm okay with the verdict that came back, uh, because when I came to the knowledge to know, uh, anything, uh, you know, I had learned to love my Aunt Sarah, my grandmother, so I didn't know anything about that.

I just knew her as Red-Red, and, uh-- Lise: Right.

- she kind of like raised everyone that was in the household-- Lise: Right.

Sam: uh, probably my grandmother she raised because my grandma was much younger than her.

You know, so if this happened sometimes I feel like she felt responsibility because she took away a husband, a father, you know, so she felt responsibility to look after them-- Lise: Mm.

- so, 'cause no one ever remarried.

Lise: Oh, interesting.

Sam: And, and the family all stayed together in the house.

Lise: I wanna briefly mention that your great-great- grandfather, Henry Clay, was a Confederate soldier, and you said that was profoundly surprising.

Sam: Right.

- Have you thought about that further?

Sam: Uh, I thought about it and I’m still trying to, you know, digest that.

You know?

'Cause I was ready for going far enough back that my ancestors was probably slaves, but I never thought in a million years that anyone in my family would have been connected to the Confederate army, you know, so that blew-- that really blew my mind-- Lise: Of course.

Sam: and I’m still thinking about, I'm, I'm like, wow, you know?

Lise: Well, you need to do homework and more research on that-- Sam: Yeah.

Lise: because we want to follow up with you and hear what you discover as you dig further into that line-- Sam: Right.

- if you would let us know we'd love to.

Sam: Okay.

- Now Sam, if you had to take your whole experience and say in one word what this meant to you, what would that word be?

- One word?

Um...

It's just, just experience.

I mean, just, it's just been a good experience to, to take this journey and to learn about my family's history because everything that I learned on this journey I did not know.

Lise: So that word you'd use would be experience.

Sam: Right.

- Well that surprises me because there was a word you used often with us on the road and we have a little gift for you now, take a look at this.

- I was like wow, you know, wow.

Wow.

Wow.

Wow.

Wow.

Okay, wow.

Wow.

Wow.

Wow.

Whoa.

Wow.

Wow.

Wow.

Wow.

Wow, you know.

Wow.

Wow.

Wow.

[laughs] I didn't realize [laughing] I used it that many times.

Lise: Sam, I think you said it best and that was a beautiful journey that you had.

Thank you for sharing it with us, Sam Reed.

Sam: Thank you.

- Thank you for joining us.

If you want to become a part of our Generations community, please visit us at byutv.org.

I’m Lise Simms, and I’ll see you on the next Generations Project.

♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪ ♪♪