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Sunday, Sept. 1 will be the 70th Anniversary of the Pate Family Reunion, for the descendants of Rebecca Lee Pate and John Jordan Pate. The reunion has met each Sunday before Labor Day at the Pleasant Grove Primitive Baptist Church in the Paul community since 1955, with the exceptions of 2020 and 2021 due to the Covid virus. 

Rebecca Lee and John Jordan Pate were born in Muscogee County near Columbus, Georgia. The family spent several years in Pike County before moving to the Brooklyn-Paul area after the Civil War, about 1875. Rebecca and John are buried in the Pleasant Grove church cemetery with their nine children and their spouses. Their children were: John Calvin Pate (Mary Ellen Wilson), James Burel Pate (Senie Jane Wesley), Julie Minerva Pate (Joseph David McClain), Sarah Ann “Sallie” Pate (William Newton “Bee” Wade), Mary Jane Pate (John Daniel Hildreth), Thomas Wesley Pate (Callie Emma Godwin), Benjamin Franklin Pate (Annie Hildreth), Malisia Rebecca Pate (Robert Hildreth) and Viola Melvina Pate (William Allison “Alan” Godwin). 

Noted Pate genealogist, Joel M. Pate, from Tallahassee, Florida has done years of research and has documented the Pate family back to our nation’s beginnings in Jamestown, Virginia. 

All descendants of these families are invited to come and enjoy fellowship and food. The reunion begins with a meeting at 10:30 a.m. in the church, followed by a pot-luck lunch. Each family is asked to bring food to share for the meal. Attendants are also encouraged to bring family photos and mementos for “show and tell”.