| Sources |
- [S104] Cocke County, Tennessee, and its People, Cocke County Heritage Book Committee, (Walsworth Publishing, 1992), 54, 108.
- [S24] The Newport Plain Talk, (http://www.newportplaintalk.com).
Sunset Gap, churches give home to cancer victim
Josh Dunn, at right, executive director of Sunset Gap Community Center, visits with Stephen Freeman. Freeman is taking care of his mother, Kay Freeman, who lived in this 40-year-old mobilehome at Grassy Fork and suffers from cancer. Sunset Gap selected the Freemans to receive a mission home because the existing home could not be repaired. They moved into their new home last week.
Author: David Popiel
July ended its hot streak only to be continued by August notorious for its ground-drying heat in our hometown, where citizens look to the sky for rain's relief.
During the past several weeks we've been stuck back in the World War II era and talking about how the youth then enjoyed exploring caves and wandering across the county. In many ways it was a better, safer time for young people but there was danger in the environment as we learned of the death of Billy Gregg, who fell into a vertical cave and died. I am going to wander away from that past and give you a break by telling you of recent visits I made with Sunset Gap folks to the mountains of Grassy Fork. You can expect that we will return for some last recollections of Gregg and the times. I've been able to talk to some of his only relatives, found a photo, and learned some important details of his life and time. I'm sure you will want to hear this.
Sometime in mid-July our circulation manager Pat Helms, who is a director at Sunset Gap, and keenly interested in our community, asked me to write about the summer camp projects. I did this last year and thought it a good idea to update you. In so doing, I discovered how one woman's life would be changed forever. It is a good gift to her despite a heroic battle with cancer. The call to the mountains gave me a chance to revisit places I've not driven in years, and see some new things and changes along the way. I noticed that Ed Black at Black's Market has a big project going on and it looks to me like he is building an outdoor vault. We'll find out more about this.
Thanks to Sunset Gap, visiting church members, and Gap executive Josh Dunn,
the Grassy Fork woman with terminal cancer can look forward to the comfort of a small new home, just a few hundred feet up hill from her current trailer. As part of its outreach to improve housing for Cocke County needy, Sunset Gap builds a "giveaway Mission home" each year. The recipient is usually a person or family with the worst housing among applicants.
This year Sunset Gap selected Kay Freeman, who lives off Spar Road at Green Corner in Grassy Fork. She has suffered with renal cell cancer since 2008 and is bedridden. She was weak in a recliner and using an intravenous mix when I walked into her home.
Sunset Gap Director Josh Dunn said she applied for the summer work camp for home repairs. Dozens of church members from several states spend hot summer weeks doing repairs and house building each year.
When Josh visited Kay Freeman and her son, Stephen, at their old mobilehome, it became clear the repairs would cost more than a new structure. She has been living in the home for about 40 years. Her husband had started building a home but he died several years ago. The unfinished home is further up the mountain, a haunting testament to the past. It would cost far too much to complete this house.
Stephen was living and working in Colorado when he got the sad news of his mother's cancer. He quit his job, packed his things and returned to be by her side to assist and care for her.
She is the daughter of the late Stewart and Bea (Cates) Freeman and lives on the family farm. Her brother Walt Freeman lives nearby.
Kay Freeman refers to the place where she lives as the "old Mac Brown place." It was in April 2008 that she received news from her doctor of her terminal cancer.
"If it wasn't for Josh and Sunset Gap and the church members, I don't know what we would have done. There's black mold and leaking roof," said Stephen.
Dunn said the 800-square-feet house was built in three weeks thanks to three churches, each doing a different phase of construction. Jamestown Presbyterian started the house; Hillsborough Presbyterian worked the second week; and Clearbranch United Methodist finished the mission house. Clear Branch members live in Trussville, Alabama and the other churches are in North Carolina. Each church also put up at least $5,000 for building materials.
Hillsborough Presbyterian Church members have been visiting Bogard's Sunset Gap for the past eight years during the summer work camps. They work under Director Dunn's oversight and hands-on leadership, using Lowe's building supplies.
During my second visit to the homesite on July 23, the heat was unbearable. I saw Jimmy Proffitt and his wife assisting the church group. They had already started moving Kay's furniture and she was planning take-up fulltime residence mid last week after the power was turned on. One of the Clearbranch women told me the trip from Alabama takes about five hours one way. The church has a mission emphasis and has been coming to Cocker County for 10 years every third week in July. She said only last year did they have a bad experience. One of the men fell off a roof and shattered his knee, but he was able to return this year to work on the Freeman home. Josh was overseeing finish work inside and out and said, "We tried to take care of her. I think she'll be happy." Accomodating features include wheelchair ramp, wide doors, bench in shower, carpeting, electric heat and air conditioning, nice shaded porch. Kay will get some comfort the remaining days of her life as she sits on the front porch with a view of Snowbird Mountain and her family farm in the mountains at Green Corner off Spar Road.
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