From left, the author's grandsons, Michael and Mark Priest, with their Pappy, James Cherry Sr., coming back from fishing. (Photo courtesy of DEB PRIEST)

When I was growing up in Granville, we often went to the river to swim and/or cool down. One man would take his soap along and “take a bath.”

Things changed, of course, as people started renting spots at the river. So my dad rented a spot for quite a few years in the 80s and 90s. So I remember a lot more years spending time at the river. My three brothers and I spent time at the river with our kids.

Dad had a camper set up there and there was a fire ring set up and we would often cook hotdogs and marshmallows with sticks over the fire. Some of us would fish there. Dad had a flat bottom boat that was used for fishing. We had inner tubes and would either just float. Sometimes we would float down the river for a ways.