After slavery they moved up to Altoona, with George's parents and
brought much in the way of customs to George.
Grandfather McCoy and also grandfather Pretty told of many experiences
that they went through during their enslavement. The Negro and white
over-seer was much in evidence down there and buying and selling of
children from their parents seemed to have left a sad memory with
George.
Isaac Pretty's family was large. He had seven girls and seven boys,
George being the eldest. George remembers how his heart would ache when
his grandfather told of the children who were torn from their mother's
skirts and sold, never to see their parents again. He went into deep
thought over how he would have hated to have been separated from his
mother and father to say nothing of leaving his brothers and sisters.
They were brought up to love each other and the thought of breaking the
family ties seemed to him very cruel.
When George was told that he was grown as formerly related, he saved his
money and when the great earth quake in Charleston occured he went down
there to see what it had done to the place. Before that time in 1882 he
remembered having seen the first block of ice. When he got there, the
Charleston people had been making ice for a few years.
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