All My Ancestors

Despite the difficulty of choosing just one photograph for the 4th edition of Smile for the Camera, I decided to choose this one of my grandfather, on the left,  and his as yet unidentified compadre.

What in the world were these guys doing? I was very surprised when my dad’s cousin gave me this picture of her “Uncle Thad.” I’d never seen anything remotely like it in all the family pics I’d perused.   I love the seam down the front of his left leg–looks like it was sewn with twine.  This makes me know for sure he wasn’t married at this time because my grandmother would have mended this cut? tear? rip? so that it would have been invisible. They married in December 1913 in Lubbock, Texas.

My grandad was a character, I think.  When I knew him in the 1950s and 1960s, he smoked unfiltered Old Gold cigarettes, drank black coffee, and walked across two rooms to kick the television if it wasn’t getting good reception.   And liked it just a little too much if my brothers and I, or even my parents and I, got into any sort of disagreement. 

I think part of the attraction of this photo for me is that this is a part of my granddad’s life I never knew about, but he looks like such a guy–posing with is cane knife (I think) with a rip in his overalls.  As I’ve blogged about previously, there are formal studio photos of all of his siblings, but not of him.  Clowning around with a knife was evidently what it took to get him into the studio.

This is a photo of my great aunt and uncle, Inez Osborne and Noah Parker.  Noah died in 1946, before I was born, so I didn’t know him.  I always heard he was a big man and this picture certainly proves that.  Aunt Inez was probably only about 4′10″–they must have been quite a pair.

Aunt Inez lived to be over 100, dying in 1978.  This picture must have been taken around the time of their marriage in October 1913, in Lubbock, Texas, though I have no way of verifying that.  In 1916, they had a son named Raphael Winfield Osborne.  Raphael must have been named for Inez’ brother Raphael who had died as a 2 year old, in 1877, the same year Aunt Inez was born.  The older Raphael is referenced in their father’ Charles’ letter in an earlier post.  The Winfield is for Inez’ father’s middle name–he was Charles Winfield Osborne, author of the letter mentioned.  The Raphael named for his uncle also died young, in 1927 at age 11.

Part of the reason I blog is to write up what I know about my family.  Until I started working on this installment, I don’t think I ever realized that Aunt Inez was 35 before she married.  Interesting.  So now I go to investigate the rest of her siblings, and I find her next younger sister, Becky, married late as well–age 42.  Inez and Becky’s older sister never married.  The youngest sister married at age 23.  Most of the brothers married in their 30s–I knew the men in this family usually married “late.”  On the other hand, this may have been typical of the time.  Interesting to consider.

Noah and Inez’s daughter Mary is the person who helped me the most with this family’s research.  Mary grew up in Pampa, Gray County, Texas, where her grandparents, my great grandparents Charles and Gertrude, moved sometime between 1913 and 1920.  My dad, who was Mary’s cousin, grew up in Perryton, Ochiltree County, Texas, about 65 miles north of Pampa.  I’m still working on why my branch of the family didn’t seem to have much to do with the part of the family that was in Pampa–at least not in my lifetime.  It may be that everyone was just so busy making a living and rearing their families, there wasn’t time to socialize.   But I think there might be something more than that.  At any rate, I appreciate Mary’s giving me some pictures, some stories and some insight into the family.  I miss having Mary to ask.

Mary, her husband Ben, Noah, Inez, Raphael, Charles and Gertrude are all buried in Fairview Cemetery in Pampa.

I’m writing this as a response to Bill West’s invitation to a Geneablogger’s Picnic.  Bill blogs at West in New England. 

He provided these questions as starters:

• *What food does your family serve at picnics?
• *Are there traditional foods or family recipes?
• *Is there one particular relative’s specialty you wish you could taste again or one perfect picnic day you wish you could go back and relive?

At the risk of being as welcome as a herd of ants at the picnic, I have to say there really weren’t any picnics in my family. 

I passed up writing on Miriam’s AnceStories2 prompt about summer because I didn’t want to be too negative.  Summer is my least favorite season because I don’t like being hot.  As my brother says, “We come from a family that doesn’t like to sweat.” 

I think the root of this “problem” derives from the part of the country we’re from and the fact that our livelihood came from working outdoors.  It is just too hot in the Texas panhandle to enjoy a meal out of doors.  Most years, it gets hot in April and stays hot through October.  Here’s picture I have of some of my family making the attempt–doesn’t it look like fun? 

NOT.

The woman in the white dress on the right is my grandmother Rachel Cooper Osborne.  I believe the man just behind her whose face is hidden may be my grandfather–I’m basing my guess on the way he’s wearing his hat.  It looks familiar.  The women are her sisters-in-law–married to my granddad’s brothers, some of whom are in the background nearer the cars. 

I just don’t think this looks like a good time.  I don’t know the circumstances of this gathering–my guess is that it’s near Pampa since that’s where these couples lived at this time in their marriages.  It looks like they’re maybe getting ready to roast some marshmallows–can’t believe this crew would roast weiners.  I don’t know, but you can see how the surroundings just aren’t conducive to picnicking.

My dad wasn’t really a grouch, and he didn’t insist on many things, but he was adamant about not eating out of doors.  His view was that he worked outside all day and when he came home for a meal, he did not want to go back outside.  And don’t get me started on what he thought about picnic fare such as wieners or bologna.  He was a farmer to the core–he didn’t mind being outside dawn to dusk to do that work, but he certainly didn’t want to have a meal out of doors.  And his view of meat definitely didn’t include anything other than the standard cuts of beef he’d learned from his stock-raising relatives and his own experience.  We always had beef in the freezer and that’s what we ate.  (Those were the days before we were aware of the health and social consequences of raising and eating so much beef.)  My mom, with her German roots, occasionally sneaked some bologna into the house but trust me, it never appeared on my dad’s plate.

So my theory is that this is an important piece of info to record about my family.  I think we didn’t picnic because we didn’t live in a part of the country where picnicking was a part of the culture–the outdoors were part of our work life but not a big part of our recreational life. 

We had long hot summers–the closest to a picnic we had was when my mom and I would take dinner to the field during wheat harvest.  That was usually early June and it was often 100 degrees–we had the hot meal we’d spent the morning cooking loaded into the trunk of the car, we parked into the wind so the car wouldn’t overheat, and the men came in on their combines and trucks and used the shade the vehicles cast to eat.  (My mom had on gloves and wore long sleeves because she was so fair-skinned.)  My Uncle Pete always requested my mom’s smothered steak and there was always a lot of iced tea.  We served it unsweetened though nearly everyone put in varyig degrees of sugar.  There was always dessert–usually a cake or a cobbler.  It was too hot for ice cream–it wouldn’t have lasted a minute under those circumstances.  The men were grateful for the break and the meal and they put their dirty dishes back into the trunk and we were off, back to the house to clean up.  No paper plates or plastic utensils for us.  :-)  And, in response to Bill’s prompts, I’d only like to repeat this experience if I could be with my family for the event. 

In South Dakota, my grandmother usually fixed lunch at home for Granddad to come in for–which he didn’t need much of because Gran had fixed eggs, fried potatoes and pork chops for breakfast.  His fields were closer to the house than my dad’s were back in Texas.  The one thing I remember, too, about my South Dakota grandmother is that she had sewed some layers of fabric around some quart jars that she used for a “thermos” when she took tea or water out to Granddad in the field.  I don’t remember any of us ever having any official ice chests or picnic baskets. 

It really was a different world. 

Here’s my response to Miriam’s AnceStories2 prompt for this session, “The Doctor”  

*Who was your doctor or health practitioner when you were growing up?

When I was a child, my doctor was “Dr. Roy.” At that time, there were only 2 doctors in town, I think.  Dr. Kengle had his own hospital and had delivered me, but I found in the county history that he started practicing in 1929, so I think he was probably retired shortly after my birth.  I rdo emember being in that hospital as a child–one of my aunt’s worked there.  I don’t remember why I was there, I don’t think it was for an appointment.  But I remember that it was built more like house.  It had wooden floors.  The building was later the local USDA office–pretty appropriate for the small rural town I grew up in.

Dr. Roy’s hospital was on Main Street and was a 3-story building.  I can still smell what it was like.  One of my brothers now has an office in the basement of that building–a few weeks ago we went up to the first floor.  It really still looked the same–the pharmacy, the waiting room, the two halls that the receptionist sat in front of.  It was all office space now but I could still see the hospital there.  We rode up to the first floor on the elevator–probably the first one I’d ever seen as a child.  I remember going to visit my dad in that hospital–he’d had to have an appendectomy.  Hospital rules prevented me from visiting him, but for some reason, they brought him down on the elevator and I got to see him.  He was in a hospital bed and I don’t remember getting to be very close, but somehow just getting to see him and have him speak to me made me feel better.  It was amazing being in that space again–somewhere in the late 1960s the county built a new hospital on the outskirts of town–probably about the time Dr. Roy retired.

So with that move to a new hospital, we could no longer tell by driving down Main Street whether someone was having a baby.  On the top floor on the north end of the building was the labor and delivery room, according to my mom, who ought to have known.  If the lights were on, we knew there would soon be another citizen of our area.  It was one of those rituals we always went through when we drove down Main Street.

*How often did you go to the doctor? Every year for a check-up, or just when you were ill?

I remember going only when I was sick, which wasn’t very often, and when I had to get vaccinations for school.

*Did you have a lot of illnesses as a child? Or were you fairly healthy?

I must have been fairly healthy.  The only childhood illness I can remember having is the mumps in the second grade–I still have the “get well” cards my class made, drawn on that thick now-crumbling paper we used for art in our classrooms in those days.  Earlier, I know I also had the chickenpox and have the scars to prove it, but I don’t remember having them.  The family story is that I got them from my brother who’d been hospitalized with the croup–he came home with chickenpox.

*Did you have any injuries (broken bones) or surgeries? Have you ever had to be hospitalized?

Not as a child, and it’s a miracle, really.  My brother built tree houses and I would help him and then sort of take them over for my own purposes–usually reading.  And we would walk the top of the corrall fence, which was essentially a 2″ x 4″ several feet in the air.  Grandad’s barn was always fun, too–despite dire warnings, we climbed to the top of the hay bales stacked to the top of the barn.  And if he was in the field for the day, we ventured onto the roof of the barn.  I only had brothers and there were only boys in my neighborhood so playing rough was part of my growing up.  My brothers ended up with stitches but I managed to escape with neither stitches nor broken bones.

*What specialists did you have to see?

I never saw a specialist of any type and I don’t remember anyone else having to see one.  Except maybe my cousins might have seen one because they had to wear special shoes.  I’m not sure that as a child I was aware of specialists.

*Did you have to see an optometrist and/or wear glasses?

We always had health screenings at school.  I remember the year I couldn’t read the eye chart–I was in the fifth grade.  So off to Dr. Nowlin’s.  His son was in my class and the last time I checked, he was the town optometrist, following in his father’s footsteps.  My first glasses were pink cat frames.  So cool.

*Was going to the doctor a pleasant or unpleasant experience? Share both your most unpleasant and your favorite medical memories.

I was always scared when I had to go to the doctor.  Probably because it wasn’t any sort of regular event.  My most unpleasant childhood medical memory is getting my diphtheria vaccination.  Those were the years when they stuck your arm repeatedly and then an awful scab almost the size of a dime appeared.  I still remember thinking the nurse wasn’t ever going to stop sticking me and I find myself checking the upper arms of people about my age for a similar scar.

I don’t remember any particularly pleasant experiences, except I do have this vivid image of sitting in the waiting room at Dr. Roy’s hospital, reading magazines.  I think the floor was those green tiles of linoleum and the chairs were red vinyl–it was the 1950s after all.  In my mind, I think I remember reading an article about Twiggy, but she was hot in 1966 and that was kind of late for me to have been at that hospital.  I don’t know–I just remember there were always lots of interesting reads in the waiting room.  We always had the newspaper at home and we went to the library, but there weren’t the glossy magazines that were in the waiting room.  It was a peek into a world I didn’t have much access to.

*As an adult, how do your current medical experiences compare with those of your childhood?

Probably the biggest difference is that I try to do “preventative maintenance” with fairly regular visits to the doctor.  I’ve had surgeries, including knee replacements and a couple of C-sections, with two healthy sons to show for it.  I use health insurance which is not something my parents dealt with until I insisted.

*Do you still see the same doctor?

Dr. Roy is long deceased and I am long gone from my home town.  About 8 years ago, my physician of 30 years retired–much to my distress.  :-)  He certainly deserved some time with his family without the stress of his practice, but I felt pretty abandoned.  I shopped around until I found a good replacement–I was careful to look for one younger than me (easier and easier to do these days) so I don’t have to go through the retirement trauma again.  

*What kinds of health problems are prevalent in your family? Are there any genetic diseases of which your relatives should be made aware? How have you attempted to avoid these risks or diseases?

The two diseases I know of that may be genetic are arthritis and heart disease.  I was diagnosed with osteoarthritis at a fairly young age (35) when I weighed what I should.  I had to have my first knee replacement 20 years later–again, a bit young for such an intervention.  My weight is more than it should be, but I also know that my dad and many of his cousins had knee and/or hip replacements.  Both of their grandmothers were in wheel chairs because of arthritis.  When I first visited him for my knees, the osteopath asked me if there was some sort of cartilege disease in my family–there very well could be but as far as I know, it has never been diagnosed.

My paternal grandmother’s family has strokes and my paternal grandfather’s family has heart disease.  That said, my grandmother lived to be 83 (she did have a stroke a few years before her death) and my grandfather lived to be 93.  And my grandfather smoked unfiltered Old Gold cigarettes until his late 80s. 

And then there’s my mother who had breast cancer despite there being none in the family.  Her mother lived to be 92!

So I eat healthy and attempt to be active.  I’m not as active as I should be but I’m doing better since my knees no longer hurt.  My weight is more than it should be, but my “numbers” are good–no high blood pressure and decent cholesterol.  I cannot discount fate’s role in my health.

*Are there any doctors, surgeons, specialists, nurses or other health practitioners in your family, or in your ancestry?

I have a sister-in-law and a niece who are nurses–they do not currently practice, but it’s nice to have them available as “resources.”

My fourth great-grandfather was evidently a country doctor.  William Greene Ball was born about 1808 in New York City, trained for his medical career in Clark County, Indiana, and practiced for many years in Warren County, Iowa until his death in 1881.  He’s referred to in the family as “Dr. Ball.”  :-)  I have a couple of his “recipes” for various ailments.

*Are there any stories about certain medical problems or injuries, or about interactions with medical practitioners that have been handed down through the generations?

My dad was always proud to have had Dr. Denton Cooley (whom his staff called “LJ” for “Little Jesus”) do a valve replacement on his heart.  My mother’s family didn’t have much use for “doctoring.”  My grandad on that side had a pacemaker implanted and never went back to the doctor–until about 25 years later when the battery was apparently run down.  And the other family story is of “Ol Doc Smith” who came to the family home in Beaver County, Oklahoma, in the early 1930s when my great-grandmother drank carbolic acid.  He left a signed death certificate there because he didn’t think she’d live until morning but left instructions to try feeding her raw eggs to cause her to throw up the acid.  She lived through that episode but was untimately successful in taking her life.  I don’t know where Doc Smith was based, but I do know my grandparents lived several miles out in the middle of nowhere, so he must have truly been a country doctor who made house calls on those dusty roads.

Thank you again to Miriam Midkiff for her prompt down another memory lane.

I’m late this week doing Miriam’s “assignment.” I think I spent too much time worrying about the prompt from last week–about diversity. From reading her blog, it looks like I wasn’t the only one who wasn’t particularly comfortable writing about my family’s views on social diversity and civil rights. It’s not a pretty picture and I like to think I’ve moved past those opinions.

So I am writing about games because we played lots of them.

*Did you have a regular game night or family night?

No. Our family of 5 didn’t play games all that much, but when we got together with other family members, we always played cards (with grandparents) or dominoes or Monopoly (with cousins).

*What games (board, card, dice, or acting out) did your family enjoy? Was there a favorite you played time after time?

I wish I had a dime for every game of Pitch, Gin, and Spades I’ve played. We had such fun–my husband had never played cards and when he got acquainted with my grandparents, he learned to play. My grandmother thought he was unnaturally lucky and would throw salt at him or back around his chair to make him think she could break his luck. The rest of us were usually collapsed on the table with laughter and my husband was just amazed that my grandmother could be that crazy.

We also played Yahtzee a lot, Aggravation (marbles), Sorry, and also dominoes. I remember learning to play Clue and playing it obsessively one South Dakota summer with my friend Lois. We’ve also played our share of Trivial Pursuit. This past Thanksgiving, we played a game called Apples to Apples which was great fun–I gave it to a couple of people for Christmas.

*Did your family have a family or game room? What was it like? What kind of game equipment did it have (foosball, pool table, etc.)?

No game room. We just set up the card tables in the living room or den–my brother has made an Aggravation board, and he’s also made this cool 8 sided, felt covered topper for a card table for cards or dominoes.

*Do you have any funny stories or a particular memory (good or bad) that stands out of game-playing time?

See the story about my grandmother and my husband above.

*Were there any games you disliked? Why?

To this day, I don’t like to play Monopoly because of bad memories. The great aunt and uncle we lived near by had one daughter and 8 grandkids. Those grandkids knew how to rumble, and when they came to visit, I inevitably got roped into playing Monopoly with the boys (there were only 2 girls in the bunch) and my brothers. I was sure they were cheating–which, translated, probably meant I was losing. Later, my husband and sons played Monopoly–I wouldn’t play–and the same level of emotion often “erupted” from that game. So I avoid it. Let’s face it–I work for non-profits.

*Were there any games that were not allowed to be played? Why?

The only thing I can remember is that my grandmother went through phases of thinking it wasn’t “ok” to play cards. It sort of depended on what preacher she’d heard recently. As she got older, and also as we begged her, she would play with gusto.

My husband had never played cards nor had he played any game with dice. He said his mother would make a spinner for any game that required the throw of dice to move ahead. He soon mastered both cards and dice. Don’t tell his mom.

*Did your parents have a regular night when they would play games or cards with friends or extended family?

No, though I do have a very early memory of going to some people’s house who were high-school friends of my parents. They played cards, but I only remember that happening once.

*Did you ever have game nights with groups, clubs, or neighbors on a regular basis?

No.

*Was game playing associated with certain annual events, like holidays, birthdays, or vacation times?

Our game playing tends to be centered around the holidays when we were all together. The past few years, it is Thanksgiving.

*What kinds of snacks and beverages were enjoyed during game playing?

The times we played with grandparents, we often had popcorn. (See my story about popping corn with my grandfather and friend here.) My granddad was also particularly fond of ice cream, to “cool your belly.” My sisters-in-law usually have some yummy snacks–almonds, M&Ms, and those butter-soaked crackers with chocolate chips melted on top and sprinkled with nuts.

*Were there prizes awarded to game winners or even to losers? What kinds? Did everyone chip in towards purchasing the prizes?

No prizes. Just bragging rights.

*Did your family or you ever do jigsaw puzzles? What’s the largest–in terms of number of puzzle pieces–jigsaw puzzle you’ve completed?

We don’t do this so much any more but we used to. I remember having one one year that was too big to fit on the card-table. One of the doctor’s office I go to often has a jig-saw puzzle out on a table–I often find myself working on it and thinking about the times we used to do them as a family.

*What did you do with completed puzzles? Did you display them or simply put them away?

They went back in the box and probably then to the thrift shop.

*What about puzzles such as crosswords, cryptograms, or others found in puzzle books? Are you a Sudoku fiend?

My mom and I used to race to see who could get to the crossword puzzle in the newspaper first. And it was a standing joke in our family that Dad knew the most esoteric things. When I asked my own husband some question about a long-ago political party, and he knew the answer was “Locofoco,” I knew the torch had been passed.

One of my brothers likes crosswords and the other likes cryptograms. One of my sons does Sudoku–I’ve avoided them as I’m afraid of getting another obsession.

*Did you ever go to an arcade and play pinball machines or other arcade-style games? Or did you ever shoot pool?

There were pinball machines at the bowling alley in the little town where I grew up, and the bowling alley was one of the approved places to go. I liked playing pinball. I don’t remember playing pool until I went to college, and then it was at the home of the dean of the fairly conservative college I attended. fun!

*Do you remember seeing your first video game, either in an arcade or on a television (Pong, Atari or early Nintendo games)?

I remember playing Pong on an early Apple personal computer. We had one in the department where I taught–it was out for anyone to play so we could “get over” any anxiety we had about computers. What a good idea.

*What kinds of video games did you like to play, if any? Do you play any now (gaming station or handheld)?

I quit playing video games a long time ago–I used to play Mario Brothers–on my computer. Those games have long out-stripped my abilities. This past Christmas holiday, I was laying in bed, listening to my now adult sons out in the living room playing Wii–they were having a good time and I was having a good time listening to them.

*What was your first computer game? Do you ever play computer games now, either on your computer or online?

I think my first computer game was probably Pong. I do occasionally play Bejeweled, Text-Twist, Freecell, Solitaire, and Zuma–mostly games my son installed on my computer and got me hooked on. I don’t play online. Too chicken.

*What about the present? Does your family or do you personally play games or do puzzles? Do you participate in game nights with others, such as poker or Bunco?

We tend to play games only at holidays when we’re all together. My oldest son and I occasionally do crosswords–

*Here are some other game ideas to write about: lawn games (horseshoes, croquet, badminton); kid games (marbles, jacks); betting, casino games, and bingo; party games (pinata, pin the tail on the donkey), etc.

I loved playing jacks as a kid. I can still smell the heat coming off the building and sidewalk where we sat in second grade playing game after game of jacks at recess. I was pretty good–I think I had fairly good hand-eye coordination. I can remember playing horseshoes occasionally in South Dakota–I could never get the hang of it. I did master shuffleboard–the best minister at our little church when I was a teen put a shuffleboard game and a ping-pong table in the church basement. I wonder how I kept from letting loose with the swear words then?

*What do you know about your parents’, grandparents’, or perhaps even great-grandparents’ game playing? Do you remember them saying anything about games they played when they were young?

My maternal grandparents played cards. And they also talked about playing baseball and basketball at their country school. My grandmother was supposedly pretty good–or maybe it was just my granddad’s romantic memories. He always talked about how good she was. Somehow I don’t think my paternal grandparents would have played games–but I just don’t know.

*Do you have any photos of either your present or your childhood families playing games? What about ancestral photos?

I have lots of pics of us playing cards and various other games. Here’s one from last Thanksgiving–Aggravation on the homemade board. Sadly, no ancestral photos.

In keeping with my plan to respond to other bloggers’ challenges or questions, here’s my response to Miriam Midkiff’s prompts over at AnceStories2. The theme is winter.

* What has been your attitude toward winter? Is it “the weather outside is frightful” or “let it snow, let it snow, let it snow”?

Comparatively, I like winter more than summer because I don’t like to be hot. I don’t dread it and I’m not particularly afraid to drive in wintry weather. Maybe that comes from having grown up in the Texas panhandle where winters could be fierce but not all that long–and there were chores to be done no matter the weather so staying in the house all the time was not an option. (Not that I had to do the chores, but Dad was out there come rain or shine or snow.)

*What are or were your favorite outdoor winter activities? Some ideas to jog your memory include sledding, skiing, skating, snowshoeing, snowball fights, or making snowmen. Where did you go to do these activities? Did you ever have an accident participating in any of the more active sports?

Of course we had to make a snowman when we were kids if we got enough snow to do so. I also remember my brothers and the neighborhood boys making snow forts–we even had them on the playground at school for a few days one winter. We could hardly wait to get out there, install ourselves in our respective forts and let the snowballs fly.

I have never skiied–not too many opportunities in the panhandle, though some of the area families used to travel to Red River or Taos to ski. My winter sports were mainly done in South Dakota at my grandparents’ place. We ice skated on the companion pond to the where we swam in the summer–I loved ice skating even if my ankles weren’t really cooperative. And we nearly always went sledding or tobaggonning. Somewhere in the family archives are some wonderful home movies of us all out on the hills taken about 1953. My dad, who would have been a very young 24 or so, was attempting to go down the hill on a grain scoop. He had the handle out front using is as a steering mechanism. Needless to say, there were lots of accidents on the slopes that day, but it looks like we were having a lot of fun.

*What are or were your favorite indoor winter activities? Did you play board games or cards, listen to the radio or watch TV, do puzzles or needlework, read books and magazines, or write letters, journals, or stories?

I’ve always read, no matter the weather. We didn’t have tv when I was growing up–not that it wasn’t available, but my mother thought it was “not a good influence.” I’m pretty sure it would have been no worse that the attitudes and words that were produced when my brothers and I played a game of Monopoly. But even today, when we get together at Thanksgiving or Christmas, there are card games and/or dominoes going on, and usually a really big jig-saw puzzle set up on a table over to the side.

*What do you remember about winter clothing in your childhood? Do you have any stories to tell about long johns, snow suits or snow pants, a favorite or unfavorite pair of boots? Did you wear a pair of mittens with a string connecting them around your neck?

The main thing this part of the prompt makes me remember is Bill Cosby’s routine on “Idiot Mittens.” I suppose you have to be of a certain age to remember that and smile.

*Did anyone ever make you hats, scarves, mittens or sweaters to wear? Were they knitted or crocheted?

No one in my family knitted or crocheted. I do remember getting this “wonderful” mohair sweater for Christmas about 1967–we’re all standing out in the South Dakota winter sun and snow having our picture made. Everyone’s all bundled up except me–I’m proudly displaying my gold fuzzy sweater and brown stirrup pants. Those were the days!

*What were your favorite winter foods or drinks? Some ideas include soups, stews, casseroles, hot chocolate, tea, or hot buttered rum.

I don’t remember winter food being much different than the rest of the year. After they retired from spending winters in South Dakota and would be at my aunt and uncle’s, my grandmother would make stew that was delicious. The last bite was always a kicker because she inevitably sneaked in a little cayenne pepper, which settled to the bottom. And Grandad would do his popcorn thing, so I guess those are my main memories of winter food.

*How about the cold? Did you ever get frostbite? Did you ever take a dare and stick your tongue on something metal? Was your bedroom cold at night in the winter? How did you stay warm at night…with an electric blanket, a bedwarming pan, or hot potatoes at the foot of your bed under the covers?

I don’t think I ever officially got frostbite, but I think I came close. The year I was in the 6th grade we lived in South Dakota and my brothers and I went to what was essentially a 2 room schoolhouse. Recess was great fun–there was a huge hill by the school and in the spring and fall we often went down that hill inside a tractor tire. In the winter, we used sleds or tobaggons or what were called “flying saucers.”

My bedroom that year was freezing. We lived in apartment above my grandmother’s store and post office. The only heat source was the furnace in the store downstairs. My mother lived in terror of our being in a fire, and, looking back on it, I can understand with that fear. All the bedrooms were in a row on one side of the apartment–I think it might have formerly been a hotel. My room was on the end that had an outside wall. I think I had an electric blanket but I don’t remember for sure. I just remember that I could usually see my breath in that room.

And the real “inconvenience” was that the toilet was downstairs and outside. This was 1963–not really the dark ages, but it certainly was different than what I was used to, having come from the oh, so civilized, Texas panhandle.

The only thing I can remember sticking my tongue on is the orange juice can. In those days, we bought condensed juice in a small frozen can, added 3 cans of water and stirred briskly. But what was there about sticking one’s tongue on that can? It’s almost a rite of passage for people from that era, and I have to admit I did it more than once. So much for “live and learn.”

*What big storms or hard winters do you have memories or stories of?

About 1956 there was a huge blizzard in the panhandle. We have a picture of our little house with a snowdrift up to the eaves.

My most recent memory of a bad storm is the ice storm we’ve just experienced here in Oklahoma City. Our power was out 6 days. Our fine mayor wants to bring an NBA team to the City–I’m wondering how interested they are going to be in coming to a place that has trouble keeping their power on?

*If you live(d) in areas that get little to no snow during the winter, what are or were your winters like? Windy and rainy? Warm or hot? Did you wish for snow, or were you glad you didn’t get any? If it did occasionally snow, did the bad weather shut down your community? Do you remember the first time you saw snow? What did you think of it?

I’ve always lived in a place that gets snow, at least occasionally. Of course, there’s always the hope that the snow will shut down work or school. That happens more here in Oklahoma–I don’t ever remember school being called in South Dakota. I am actually one of those people who can honestly say she walked to school in -20 weather. Granddad would sometimes take Grannie on the tractor to open the store–the mail must go through, y’know. She had to be there, just in case. Plus I think they kind of liked the challenge of it all–Granddad had some sort of heater on his pickup and that was the first vehicle I remember seeing plugged in at the utility pole. They certainly didn’t have a garage, so between the plugged in pickup and the tractor, they could usually get where they needed to go. They lived on gravel roads that Mr. Stuart, the county road caretaker, kept graded with the road-grader he kept at his home.

*Do you remember stories from your parents, grandparents, or other family members or old timers of big storms or hard winters of the past?

I just remember my mom talking about their first winter in South Dakota. Granddad had moved up there thinking he wanted to ranch. My dad and he had spent the summer and fall doing the back-breaking work of putting up fence and then the winter came. Feeding and watering the livestock in those conditions was a bit more than Granddad bargained for, I think. By the time I was a teenager, he was leasing out his pasture land and farming some land he rented from an absentee landlord. There were a couple of horses in the barn that had to be tended to, but that was far easier than having to tend livestock in the pasture.

*Do you have any photos of your ancestors outdoors in the winter, or of their homes or automobiles covered with snow? What about photos of ancestral horses and sleighs?

I talked a little bit about some of the photos earlier. Grannie would send us pictures of the snow in her letters from South Dakota–she was the family photographer. She was the one who shot the movies referenced above. No pictures of ancestral horses and sleighs, though there must have been some of those–I wonder if that’s how the part of the family who lived in Russia in the 1860s-70s got around.

I think there’s something to be said for living in a place that has seasons–sometimes in this part of the country it seems like there are only two–summer and winter, but the change of seasons creates a nice rhythm for life. And I can always use the cold as an excuse to not go out–sort of like I use the heat in the summer time.

Here’s a good example of answering one question but getting at least two more. When was this photo taken and who is the subject?

Due to my recent posting about John Wright Osborne, I’ve made another family connection. I’ve very glad as one of my goals is to find descendants for each of the generation that has 10 Osborne sons–the sons of Jonathan Osborne and Martha Roland. I believe that at least one of them had no descendants–Archibald Magruder Osborne died before he was married and I assume he had no children. I’m not sure about the oldest son, named Christopher for his paternal grandfather. I’m certain I’ve found descendants from 3 of the 9 who are known to have had children, so I have plenty more work to do.

This photo came from a descendant of John Wright Osborne’s father, Thomas. I believe I’ve mentioned that he married twice–his first wife, Mary Jane Wright, was John Wright’s mother. His second wife, Eveline Matlock, bore 9 more children for a grand total of 13. Thomas was just younger than my own ggreat-grandfather, John Osborne, and was his business partner in some land deals in west Tennessee, though Thomas lived in the eastern part of the state.

Thomas’ descendant wants this to be a picture of Eveline. The subject’s clothing, hairstyle, and jewelry are the main clues from the photo itself. There is no photographer’s stamp or mark on it–nothing is on the reverse. The original is small, about 2.5″ x 4″. The cardboard backing is not thick but it is rigid.

Eveline was born in 1824, so even if this photo was made in the early days of photography in the 1860s, that would make Eveline in her mid to late 30s. I’ll admit that I have a hard time estimating today’s ages, much less those of folks a century or two old, but I don’t think this person looks 35 or so. I have some books on reserve at the library to see what I can find about the jewelry and the dress style. Her hair looks like its in a snood, but my research on snoods indicates they’ve been used since the middle ages, so that doesn’t help narrow the date. From the little research that I have done, the fact that there are no props in the picture and that it’s a bust shot rather than a full-length shot, and that it’s a small photo, make me think this photo is earlier rather than later.

But what do you think about a date? I’d be happy to hear from anyone with a tidbit of info about photography history, and I’ll be happy to be contradicted–not a common event, trust me.

Here’s another cropped version of the photo–maybe it helps

Is there a hint of a high waist line at the bottom of this image?

We’d love to know what you think.

After I wrote about cousin John Wright earlier in the week, I decided to look again at his family.

Finding his Civil War questionnaire was accomplished early in my genealogical endeavors. In going back through his file, for example, I found that he’d been in Camp Douglas, the prisoner of war camp for Confederates. I knew I had other family members who died there but I’d forgotten that John W. had been there.

After the death of his mother, his father Thomas remarried, to Eveline Matlock, and had several more children. The first child of that second marriage was Louisa M. Osborne, with the M. probably standing for Matlock. Louisa married a physician, Dr. S. T. Blair. I believe her sister married Dr. S.T.’s brother, but there were lots of Blairs in that area, so maybe a cousin.

On a lark, I entered the good doctor’s name into Google and found one of those fabulous Goodspeed write-ups for him. (I actually think I was looking for information about the college John Wright refers to–Ewing and Jeff, which turns out to be a Cumberland Presbyterian college with the official title of Ewing and Jefferson College.) To my surprise, he’d moved to Missouri. I always say I’m one of the few people I know who doesn’t have family in Missouri or Kentucky. That just changed.

So I started looking for records on this family in Missouri, and, again, surprise, surprise, I found that at least one of Samuel and Louisa’s sons and grandsons distinguished themselves by being the Supreme Court Justice, and in the case of the grandson, serving as first the lieutenant governor and then the governor of the state. The father served in the state legislature as well.

Part of what allowed me to get to this information was accessing Missouri’s online death certificates–I found one for both Dr. Samuel and wife Louisa. Each was signed by James T. Blair, I believe one by the father and one by the son. That lead me to searching for more information via the census records and newspapers.

I was sorry to read about the untimely death of James, Jr. and his wife Emilie. What a freak accident. So I get to add these to my other (2) relatives listed as “famous“at the Political Graveyard site. Now, of course, since that site notes that his burial site is unknown, one of the things I have to know is where James, Sr. is buried.

There’s a 1930 census entry for a James T. Blair, b. about 1868 in Tennessee that matches the James Sr. who was in Missouri, but is this the same man? He’s managing a hotel in Palo Pinto County, Texas. (I don’t know if he knows it or not, but he has other relatives in the area at that time.) Maybe it is him–who knows? Maybe he needed something completely different to do. Maybe he went to Mineral Wells for the “waters.” Places of birth and dates match, but more work will need to be done.

At any rate, this was an interesting find. I look forward to more like this–after you’ve done genealogy for so long, these sorts of finds are few and far between. I like it!

John and I are first cousins, 3 times removed. His father Thomas (1810-1871) and my great-great grandfather John (1808-1865) were brothers. They were two of the ten (!) sons of Jonathan and Martha Roland Osborne of Mecklenburg and Haywood Counties, North Carolina.

I first found John years ago when I was searching through the Tennessee Civil War Vet’s Questionnaires (the index is available there as well). I’d heard about these documents and since so many of my Osborne ancestors went to Tennessee from North Carolina, I thought I should take a look. Sure enough, Cousin John took the time out in Tacoma, Washington, to fill out his form and send it in. As the website says, these questionnaires are a rich source of information about family and life in the early 19th century in Tennessee. He was a veteran of Company F, 43rd TN Infantry, serving from Roane (now Loudon) County. As far as I know, these questionnaires are not available online, but the forms used (questions asked) can be viewed here.

This is a rich resource that not many people seem to know about. The information has been transcribed and published in a multi-volume set and is available in many libraries (published 1983 by Southern Historical Press is one printing). The originals have been microfilmed and are available at the Tennessee State Library and Archives. They are also available through the Family History Library.

John’s questionnaire provided me with an interesting picture of his family life and his schooling. Here’s a summary of his response:

John Wright Osborne is living at 1706 N. Alder in Tacoma, Washington, and gives his age as 79 yrs., 8 mos. & 11 days. He was born in Roane, now Loudon County, Tennessee, states that his father, Thomas Osborne, was a farmer and a trader. Thomas was born in Haywood County, North Carolina, and lived 4 miles from Philadelphia, Tennessee, where he had a white man for an overseer of his 22 slaves and 5000 acres of land. He placed a value of about $110,000 on his father’s property at the beginning of the War. Their home was described as built of bricks, two full stories, 9 rooms, with a full basement and attic. He says that his mother had a white seamstress.
His mother was Mary Jane Wright, and her parents were John Wright & Mary Hines who lived at Wrightsville in Roane County on the Tennessee River. John Wright Osborne states that his grandfather Johnothan [sic] Osborne was of English descent, lived in NC and fought with the patriot army against the British in the American Revolution. His grandfather John Wright was born in Ireland, and came to American about 1810.
He states that he attended a school partly supported by public money, and partly by private subscription. His total schooling is described as 27 months in the semi-public district school, 18 months in private high school, and two years at Ewing & Jeff College.
Of his military experience, he says that he enlisted in June, 1861, in Co. F, 43rd Tennessee CSA. This company of infantry was afterward mounted. His company was first sent to Loudon to guard the railroad bridge across the Tennessee River. About six months after his enlistment, his company was engaged in its first battle at Harrodsburg, Kentucky.

His account of the war:
From Harrodsburg we went back to East Tenn. Then to Vicksburg, was sent from there to exchange camp in Georgia. Then became on of Capt Tom Osborne’s scouts, operating in Upper Tennessee. After his death rejoined my old command in Valley of Virginia with Gen. Earley. Took part in battle of Kernstown, White Post, Newtown, Bunker Hill, Perryville Pike and Winchester. Returned to east Tennessee, was captured near Bristol and sent to Camp Douglas (Chicago). Had small pox and suffered from lack of clothes, medicine and nursing.
He was discharged 8 Mar 1865 at Richmond. He was exchanged as a prisoner and sent to Richmond. There he was put on a freight train, taken a short distance east and dumped off. From there he walked to a sister’s home at Franklin, NC, where he was at the time of the surrender.
After the war, he worked with his father on his farm for 2 years and then went to his own place on Post Oak Island which had been confiscated for Freedman’s Co. for 3 years. He engaged in farming on his own land which he inherited from his mother in 1867. This land was the fertile Post Oak Island in the Tennessee River twelve miles from Knoxville. He remained there until 1882 when he sold out and started west. He went through Texas, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho to east Washington. This trip took about 2 years. He settled on some government land in eastern Washington, but went on over to western Washington about 1885. He resided there except for about a year spent in Arizona, and about 2 years in Alaska–1896 to 1898. The first four years in Washington were spent farming government land and in a mail contract. After his return from Alaska in 1898, he engaged in lumber business with nephews in Pacific County, Washington. “I have been exceedingly fortunate in the lumber business and my financial affairs are in very good shape at present.” He attends First Presbyterian Church.
Among those listed in his Co: Walter Lenoir, James Jones, Lt. Reps Jones 2nd, Hardy Jones. He suggests that a complete roster might be had from Mr. Walter Lenoir, Sweetwater, Tennessee. He lists about 6 other vets as living in Tacoma–indicating that he may have been active in some sort of veteran’s organization.

His account is a fascinating depiction of life leading up to the Civil War and his life afterward. He is also not my only ancestor to serve time at Camp Douglas, sometimes known as the “North’s Andersonville.” Three Cooper brothers from Texas’ 18th Cav., Co. A, were captured at Arkansas Post and sent to this dreadful place where two of the three died. More about them later.

I’ve always thought the Osbornes had a wandering gene, connected to seeking land. John certainly exhibits such traits, though his movement west was fairly typical of the time after the War. I thought it was fascinating that he had been such disparate places as Arizona and Alaska.

John never married. He is listed on the 1920 census as living with his niece Harriet Siler, in Tacoma. He is 77 and she is 43. I believe Harriet is probably the daughter of John’s older sister Martha J., who married David W. Siler in Roane County, Tennessee in 1862.

In December of 1922, John Wright Osborne dies in Tucson, Arizona, of a skull fracture, on a railroad right of way. His death certificate is online at the Arizona Department of Health Services site (thank you, Arizona).

And, of course, this document raises so many more questions–what in the world was a man of his age doing in Arizona? Was he hit by a train? How did this happen? Who was the John Owen who provided the information for his death certificate?

John Wright Osborne’s life is an interesting bridge from pre-Civil War time in east Tennessee to the early 20th century migration to the northeast, with at least a couple of interesting side trips to the southwest and Alaska. Along the way are mentions of schooling, Freedman land dealings, and the timber business. His Civil War Questionnaire is unique in that it meets that desire we genealogists frequently express, to be able to interview those who have gone before.

One of the first things I saw in Ireland was this:

Who knew there were palm trees in Ireland? I certainly didn’t.

And then one of our side trips took us to Newgrange. What a wonderful site. I’m so glad my traveling companions made arrangements for this excursion.  This mound is older than the pyramids and I got to go inside!

On the way to Newgrange, our terrific tour guide Mary read us an article from the Irish Times entitled “No Petty People, the Ulster Presbyterians,” published 15 May 2007. She read it to us as we traveled through the Boyne Valley, beside and across the River Boyne, scene of the Battle of the Boyne in 1690. One of those battles I’d probably read about in some history class, but it only came alive to me when I was there and hearing about the Ulster Presbyterians, aka the Scots-Irish, in the article.

These folks came to America in the early 1700s, were largely Protestant, particularly Presbyterian, and worked the land. I’ve come to believe that Christopher Osborne was probably Scots-Irish–he’s found in western North Carolina before 1750, he’s Presbyterian, and he worked hard to acquire land. That, of course, does not prove the issue, but it does provide some clues. I think I remember my dad saying some of his family were Scots (he said “Scotch”) Irish–honestly, I don’t know if he was talking about his father’s Osborne line or his mother’s Cooper and Landrum lines. I do believe the Landrums were from Scotland, however, not necessarily via Ireland, according to the research of others that I’ve read. The earliest Coopers we’ve found in our line were in Hampshire County, WV and Maryland.

I have read both James Leyburn’s The Scotch Irish: A Social History (1962) and David Hackett Fischer’s Albion’s Seed: Four British Folkways in America (America: a cultural history). The latter uses the term “borderers” rather an “Scots Irish,” and notes that these folks have substantial Anglo-Saxon and Viking and/or Scandinavian heritage–again, this matches what the Christopher Osborne DNA test reveals. Fischer says,

Some historians describe these immigrants as “Ulster Irish” or “Northern Irish.” It is true that many sailed from the province of Ulster… part of much larger flow which drew from the lowlands of Scotland, the north of England, and every side of the Irish Sea. Many scholars call these people “Scotch-Irish.” That expression is an Americanism, rarely used in Britain and much resented by the people to whom it was attached. …”

So I have more work to do–learning more about the “borderers,” the Scots Irish, and determining what, if any records exist of their migration. The better I understand the people and their history, the more clues I’ll find in the pitifully small amount of information known about Christopher.

Despite finding palm trees in Ireland and learning more about what I don’t know, I think I can move on.

I know enough about the nature of information to know that the more you know, the more you want to know–sort of a variation on the genealogist’s old saw, “You get one question answered and then you have at least 2 more.”