About Me

So you obviously want to know something about me or you wouldn’t be here reading this right now. So, where do I begin?

Married with a step-daughter and son. The busy life of the church and web development. Hobbies include music (who doesn’t like music), percussion or better known as drums, health, and why I started this site, genealogy.

Education

I went to college straight out of high school and attended ITT Tech for CAD aka, Computer-Aided Drafting. I received an associate’s degree in Applied Science & Math. I could have gone on to receive my bachelor’s degree but that would have required me to move to California. Since then I have done zero work with my degree. The main reason, ITT is not known for CAD, only electronics. So when I applied for those particular jobs they just looked at me and thought I was nuts. Since then, ITT has gone belly up.

Employment

My first job was with a homeless shelter ministry. I was a cook for about 20+ men, janitor, and at times a counselor to some of the men I would meet. This job was a blessing in disguise as I was learning things about people that I never thought I would. Many of the men and women I met had chosen to be homeless. Some were highly educated men that simply chose a lifestyle of tenting under bridges and having nothing to their name. 

My next job was my longest employment. I’ve always had an itch for web design. I began working on sites back before programs were developed to speed the process up. I wrote the simple sites from the backend using coding. This also led me to design programs using Microsoft Access to speed up the repetitive jobs that I currently held in a warehouse. Since I created a program that made things easier, they quickly caught on that they no longer needed me as a program was able to do it. So, they let me go after almost 15 years of service.

Health had never been a concern for me. I didn’t always have a healthy life growing up. Sick while I was young was a common thing for me. After I got into about the 5 grade I began to be alright as far as the illness was concerned. Around 2011 I was introduced to a product that I swore was another quack job. I was told a story about a lady I had known all my life that was bedridden due to chronic pain. She began simply drinking 8oz of this stuff and within a month she was up walking her neighborhood with no issues at all. At first, I couldn’t believe it but thought I’d give it a shot, I mean, what could it hurt? Thus began the journey with Zija. At the time I could not sleep, my mind would simply run non-stop during the night. It was not unusual for me to lay awake for 4 hours until my body would simply give out. I began drinking Zija and within a week, YES a week, I was sleeping as I had never slept before. When I went to bed, I went to sleep. Not only that but I also had hip and wrist issues due to marching band and caring around a 50-pound drum. Those aches and pains also went away within the month. Plus, this little drink also put my sinus issues away. Since I live in the good ole state of Tennessee, we are known for the allergy capital of the world I believe. I could tell you when a storm was brewing a week in advance just by a headache. A month after Zija and no more headaches, no more sinus issues either. All the while taking Zija I began to want to take care of myself and watch a little more of what I consume. I quickly found out that not everything found in a grocery aisle is made to be consumed. I also found out that this little thing called “health care” is not about caring at all, it’s about money and the making of more or it. Several years later and Zija was sold right out from under everyone’s feet, forcing employees and people like me to look elsewhere. So, Pyur Life it is! They offer the original “Zija” mix that isn’t chocked full of sugar.

Hobby

Around the 1995 timeframe, a dear friend of mine came to me and asked me to attend a concert with him at his church at the time. I didn’t want to go but I thought what else am I doing. This concert was held by a group of guys that later both my friend and I would be “roading” for. Little would I know that the leader of that group was related to me through several family members. Kevin Young and the founding members of Disciple became great friends of mine a kept me out of trouble during a rebellious time in my life. Once they were signed by Warner Brothers they no longer needed two roadies and that’s when I went out and started a group of my own, Root. I played drums but we never really made it as large as Disciple. We were even featured on a compilation album with two songs, Lay Me Down & Candyland. After Root disbanded I was asked to play for another local group, Azariah. They were a different genre altogether but still playing nonetheless. I was never recorded for an album while with them and once I got married I left the band to be with my family. One member in this band is also in my tree and is linked to a great workmate from my last job. Those were great times!

Webmastering is something I’ve always enjoyed and honestly, I don’t know where it came from. I started playing around with creating websites back in 1998. I was living in my grandfather’s home after he had passed away. I was coding the HTML and creating small sites than before the internet had taken off. Give a few years and I began using Microsoft FrontPage. I created a couple of sites but my main one was our church’s. I doubled as the “sound guy” at our church and also the webmaster for their site. That’s when my ministry began for web design. Back while with Disciple I created shirts. They were nothing special but I would stencil partial lyrics out onto t-shirts. I made a name for myself, Xtreme EyeWitness. Since then I’ve stuck with that name and it’s what I call my hobby-ministry of web design. It’s my passion to help other churches for the main purpose of sharing Jesus Christ with the world.

Genealogy

Family and genealogy have also been very interesting to me. Most of my family doesn’t get into it as much as I do. What I find interesting is the “Six degrees of separation” theory. You may have never heard of this but it is the idea that all people on average are six, or fewer, social connections away from each other. As a result, a chain of “friend of a friend” statements can be made to connect any two people in a maximum of six steps. It is also known as the six handshakes rule. As you’ve read above several friends have turned out to be related in some way. I have found this over and over throughout my investigations. We are all related in some form or fashion simply due to Noah and his family. One might say Adam and Eve but remember, God hit the reset button with Noah and flooded the world killing everyone but Noah’s family that was safe on the Ark.

I love putting faces to a name and finding out the reason my nose is so big or that my family were called giants. It’s very interesting and has always intrigued me. Thus, the reason for creating this site. Paper/tin pictures only last a small time before quickly vanishing away forever. We must preserve these the best we can. I’ve grabbed all that I could and have labeled those that I could remember. With the help of some family members, we’ve labeled some of the others. While looking through the photos I have on my site you see without names or have questions, please contact me. 

I try to keep our church cemetery updated with new burials on Find A Grave. I also volunteer to take photos of headstones missing from Find A Grave. As you can already imagine, this is an ongoing contribution.

The family tree I have on my site is one that I manage and it is not linked to any other ancestry site. I will usually use many different sites I have found that this is the easiest way for me to keep all records in one location. I also used to house my tree on another site to which I no longer have public due to people stealing the photographs and then claiming they were theirs. I have recently begun cleaning photos and sharpening faces to come in clearer.

Well, that’s it about me. I hope it enlightened your day. 🙂
-David