My name is Jon Gwinn, son of Leonard Cyrus Gwinn (1900-1950) and Minnie Ray Gwinn (1902 - 1982) of Beckley, West Virginia. I have only recently (at age 84 in the year 2026) become interested in my family's ancestry. My 1st cousin Nelson Gwinn was our unofficial genealogy researcher. He gathered a substantial volume of information, only some of which I have at hand. My sister Leona was also interested in our ancestry and wrote a book titled "The Gwinns of Roundbottom" (ISBN 9798988801719) published by her son Tom in September 2023. Her book is available at Amazon. Also, I've accumulated letters, photographs, magazines, newspaper columns, maps, deeds, and more, all of which are scattered around my office serving no purpose.
Nelson was quite talented musically, and he enjoyed learning to play a variety of instruments including guitar, piano, sousaphone, organ, fiddle, mandolin, and banjo. His favorite instrument was the guitar, and he was very proud of the 1933 Gibson that his dad bought for him when he was 13 years old, and which he continued to play for the rest of his life. Old time country and bluegrass music were his favorites and he attended many jam sessions. He was featured on radio stations several times. Nelson, Ethel and family lived in Huntington, WV as I was growing up. We visited them on numerous occasions and I came to know Nelson's son David who was a bit older. David and his father were into amateur (aka Ham) radio and they built all their own equipment. I remember David bending sheet metal for chassis and drilling holes for tube sockets. Nelson continued to operate his radio station after the family moved to Grand Rapids, Michigan. David went on to graduate from MIT and enjoy great success.
I've long wanted to organize this material and put it where it is accessible by my progeny and members of the wider Gwinn family, and where it may enjoy better odds of being preserved rather than lost forever. I am not experienced at genealogy research and I make no claim for the accuracy of the contents here. Some of this information came from discussions with ChatGPT AI which can be mistaken. With that said, I hope visitors will find this information to be interesting and perhaps useful.