When Heaven holds a foot race

Heather Ainsley ECB Publishing, Inc. Life for James Wiley Roe began much like any other boy. He was born on Aug. 21, 1921, in Jefferson County at the “Old Cobb Place,” a local saw-mill camp that was owned and operated by J.R. Hughes. When James was just 18 months old, however, he fell ill to a mysterious disease that affected his mobility severely, and the young boy suffered fever, fatigue, vomiting and stiffness in his neck and limbs. Local doctors were helpless to cure little James, an