Chapter 1 (200 kb, PDF)

In newly-formed Clay County, Alabama, William Lafayette Black ("Fayette") marries his brother's sweetheart, Martha Ardellah Toland ("Della"), after his death the Civil War. The W.L. Black family struggles in meager circumstances until Fayette uses the money and influence of Della's Uncle Merit Street to gain local political clout after Reconstruction. As a conservative, Fayette was the political enemy of the local, poor farmers and their party, the Populists. Four years after the birth of their last son, Hugo, the Blacks moves to the County seat, Ashland, and W.L. Black set up a merchant's business.

This passage covers the Black family's move to Ashland and how the Black family settles there.