Newspaper article on Thurman & Julia Dudgeon from Orrick Newspaper.

The quaint little city of Orrick, Missouri has many places and people of interest to Ray Countians. If you were to travel west of the little town for four miles you would find one place of great interest. There a west road loses itself behind a screen of Maple trees, a variety of flowers, pawpaw bushes, honeysuckles and sumac.

There a wife, modest and unassuming, and farmer with his hospitality dwell. Thurman and Julias' home was known as "the Riverside Home." Were you to ask "Who dwells there?" the answer would be: "THE WATERMELON KING OF MISSOURI." The title has been rightfully bestowed, for Thurman Dudgeon's melons are known far behind the borders of his own county. During the watermelon season their house is a meeting place for people who have come from far and near not only to purchase the most delicious melons ever grown, but to enjoy the great hospitality of this grand couple.

Upon approaching the home one is attracted by the inscription on the cement walk: "If you can't smile don't come in." As one enters the house, a motto upon the wall bears these words: "I'm satisfied, My little home is poor and plain, No tapestries are there--No marble statues grace it and no clock is on the stair. But I've a little plot of ground, we labor in each day. So thankful for the growth and yield, we often stop to pray. A tree nearby gives gracious shade and God is there to guide; My little home is plain and poor, But we are satisfied."

Mr. and Mrs. Dudgeon have builded a cottage carressed by the gentle shade of great trees, where permanence and strength are reflected. A home where the voices of two little girls have babbled in the ecstasy of babyhood and have grown to the full blush of youth and in the fullness of time come to maturity.

All who enter this home, know the glory that love is, the joy that happiness is, the peace that contentment is. The home is valued not by the dollars it cost or the richness of materials of furnishings going in to it, so much as by the happiness it has created. Ahome which has grown dear and near, because of the stress and storm it has weathered, the tears it has dried, the smiles it has caused. A home where patience and effort and denial have brought their pleasure of happiness and contentment and peace. A place where love comes like the fluttering dove and perches and dwells, unwilling to search elsewhere.

Thurman Emerson b. January-1-1865 in Taylor County Kentucky. His parents were George Washington Dudgeon and Martha Elza Phillips. Thurman died November 22,1950 in Orrick, Missouri. He married Julia Pigg on February 22,1892 in Orrick Missouri. Julia Pigg, b. December 11, 1872 in Orrick, Missouri, was the daughter of John Madison Pigg and Millie Tucker of Orrick, Missouri. Thurman and Julia Dudgeon were the parents of Fleda Francis Dudgeon-married Tillman Hicks, and Laura Bell Dudgeon-married Cecil Mcmullin.