Keeping Grandma Alive...and all the others, too (including yourself)
Several weeks ago Favorite Photo was a prompt for 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks. Here’s one of my favorite photos. I’m actually showing two photos, and you’ll see why below. A little background Theodosia Marie “Dosia” THOMAS MARTIN (1893-1954) was my first cousin, twice removed. Her father, James Renatus “Renn” THOMAS (1865-1949) was the only brother of my great-grandfather, Jeremiah…
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Kids can be mean. When I was in elementary school, every St. Patrick’s Day meant a day of being pinched if you weren’t wearing green. I wasn’t Irish (or Catholic), so I didn’t pay much attention to St. Patrick’s Day. But I lived in a neighborhood with many Irish and/or Catholic families, and those kids did pay attention. If I…
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A few weeks ago, I read something written by A. B. Simpson (1843-1919) that made me think about my farming ancestors and the Bright Shiny Objects in their lives. A Bright Shiny Object (aka BSO), for those unfamiliar with the term, is anything that distracts a person from the task at hand for more than just a short time. Simpson,…
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2020 was a trying year, to put it mildly. Everyone’s life was, and still is, disrupted. Some more than others. I already worked from home, and I don’t have kids in school, so much of my day-to-day routine wasn’t turned upside down. Of course I was affected by the shortages of paper goods, hand sanitizer, disinfecting wipes, meat for a…
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A few weeks ago, I read The Beantown Girls by Jane Healey. The story follows the World War II adventures of three twenty-something women from Boston. This trio of best friends volunteer to be Red Cross Clubmobile girls overseas. One the women, Fiona, hopes to get to the European continent and somehow find out the fate of her missing-in-action fiancé. …
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When I notice an early death in family history records, I’m always saddened. But I’m always curious, too. When I saw that my first cousin, thrice-removed, James C. “Jim” GRIFFIN (1895-1922) died from a boiler explosion I looked for a newspaper article, and I found one. I found something unexpected, too. Jim’s Early Life Jim. GRIFFIN was the son of…
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