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Adventures in family history
This is a work weekend. I'm leaving for Kodiak on Monday for a week (business trip) and hope to get caught up on commissions, get Kismet pages done through early Feb. and get 2 weeks' worth of Freebird done. (Which reminds me that I totally, utterly forgot the Wednesday update again. Here's what I'm going to do: I'll update today or tomorrow with the missed strip plus this week's strips, and then totally forget about updating on Wednesday and just update on Sundays, because clearly trying to do manual updates during the work week does not work for me.)
On a break this afternoon I pulled out our Big Folder o' Geneology to flip through my family history for a while. My dad had sent me a ton of family information awhile back, but I never really took the time to read it, and I *am* interested in that stuff. Just as every town has its interesting little stories that only locals know or care about, so family history is chock-full of intriguing little things and odd stories that you have to read between the lines to figure out. I loved the book "Roots" when I was a kid and used to wish that my family had been able to pass down stories through the generations as Alex Haley's family did.
We did have a couple of people on my father's side who were very interested in researching it and dug up ancestors all the way back to the 1600s. It is heartening to discover that nearly all one's ancestors, especially the women, had absurdly long lifespans, particularly considering the times. Almost every one of them lived into their 70s or 80s, despite having huge numbers of children, and several-greats grandmother Fannie Langston, born in the middle 1700s, was nearly 100 when she died. (She was also the cousin of teenage Revolutionary War spy Dicey Langston, which, based upon the general character of women in my family -- stubborn, indestructible farm wives -- surprises me not at all.) The other thing they seemed to have in common was a penchant for odd names, such as the one who named his three daughters Anaphilda, Grisell and Keziah. (We are descended from Anaphilda, as it happens.)
And then there is Question Mark Hess, my great-great-grandfather, who my father calls "the alien" because he apparently turned up between the 1870 and 1880 censuses, begat my great-grandfather William Hess, and vanished again. There is *a* name on the birth certificate, but apparently not the right name, because completely different names turn up on other records of William's. His mother was never married to a man named Hess (that anybody knows of) and none of her other husbands (there were several) were named Hess, yet that's the name she bequeathed to one, and only one, of her children. Who the hell was Question Mark and why did she give the boy his last name when she apparently never divulged his first name to a living soul, or at least never gave the same name twice? Questions that will never be answered...
On a break this afternoon I pulled out our Big Folder o' Geneology to flip through my family history for a while. My dad had sent me a ton of family information awhile back, but I never really took the time to read it, and I *am* interested in that stuff. Just as every town has its interesting little stories that only locals know or care about, so family history is chock-full of intriguing little things and odd stories that you have to read between the lines to figure out. I loved the book "Roots" when I was a kid and used to wish that my family had been able to pass down stories through the generations as Alex Haley's family did.
We did have a couple of people on my father's side who were very interested in researching it and dug up ancestors all the way back to the 1600s. It is heartening to discover that nearly all one's ancestors, especially the women, had absurdly long lifespans, particularly considering the times. Almost every one of them lived into their 70s or 80s, despite having huge numbers of children, and several-greats grandmother Fannie Langston, born in the middle 1700s, was nearly 100 when she died. (She was also the cousin of teenage Revolutionary War spy Dicey Langston, which, based upon the general character of women in my family -- stubborn, indestructible farm wives -- surprises me not at all.) The other thing they seemed to have in common was a penchant for odd names, such as the one who named his three daughters Anaphilda, Grisell and Keziah. (We are descended from Anaphilda, as it happens.)
And then there is Question Mark Hess, my great-great-grandfather, who my father calls "the alien" because he apparently turned up between the 1870 and 1880 censuses, begat my great-grandfather William Hess, and vanished again. There is *a* name on the birth certificate, but apparently not the right name, because completely different names turn up on other records of William's. His mother was never married to a man named Hess (that anybody knows of) and none of her other husbands (there were several) were named Hess, yet that's the name she bequeathed to one, and only one, of her children. Who the hell was Question Mark and why did she give the boy his last name when she apparently never divulged his first name to a living soul, or at least never gave the same name twice? Questions that will never be answered...
no subject
We are fortunate to have a well documented genealogy on my Father's side. Great-great grand uncle Dewey was Admiral George Dewey. He enjoyed widespread popularity after the Spanish-American war and an actual "Dewey" book resulted from the research into the Dewey ancestors. (people getting on the bandwagon I think) Five brothers came from England in the 1600's and a very large book indeed covers the following generations...
The rampant speculation on the blood lines leading up to said brothers was amusing ( Charlemagne and William the Conqueror come to mind) and the origins of the Deweys (Scottish...or Briton...or Welsh..or Irish...you get the idea) gives some insight into the importance of lineage to the 1900 crowd.
My Dad has a copy of the book...I'd like to have a fresh look at it and see if some new stories reveal themselves to my older eyes.