Family Story Matters

  The more I research Mom's family, the more interested I become in her small-town life. Around 1880, Mom's relatives migrated from Alabama ( Miles ) and Georgia ( Dowdy ) to Robertson County, Texas. They settled in Boone Prairie, a farming town about eight miles from the county seat of Franklin.  Over the next several months I plan to dig deep into this little community. But this kind of research is painstakingly slow. The answer to one question leads to three more inquiries.  So while I continue with this investigation, I thought I would share small-town family stories I have gleaned through my genealogy research. Inter-Family Marriage The two primary Genealogy worksheets I use are the Pedigree Chart (which shows direct line ancestors) and the Family Group Sheet (which includes the siblings of those ancestors). While this does create some overlap, it is not redundant information. Familial patterns emerge on Family Group Sheets that otherwise remain hidden. After I comp...

  Genealogy proves our existence by using vital documents to determine the dates on our tombstone.  While this information is invaluable in identifying my ancestors, I am far more interested in the dash in between. I often find myself veering off the document trail to ponder such psychological and sociological questions as: What was family life like for my ancestors? Where did they live? How did that environment affect their perspective on life? How did that perspective affect the decisions they made? How did those decisions affect the next generation? How does the accumulation of those decisions affect me?  Who am I? Why do I act the way I do? What makes me tick?  How do I affect who my children become? While Genealogy research can provide answers to some of these questions, and social history can provide useful context, I also know my family stories will be largely speculative. A definite detour from true Genealogy which is rooted in facts. But this Enneagram 6 is...

A few weeks ago, I shared snippets of Mom's wedding book. She detailed how she and my dad met as sophomores in high school, and how they dated off-and-on until he left for Japan in January 1947. This week the story continues (again, in Mom's own words): He came home in January 1948, but we were unable to understand each other and after a few weeks, we called it quits. Everyone was shocked but I was unable to explain. Gleason entered Texas University in June 1948 and carried a heavy load at school as well as working long hours at the Texas Power Reserve. He still made all As and Bs. We corresponded about once a month and saw each other once that summer and once in the summer of 1949. We enjoyed each other but only as friends. Reagan's class of 1945 was to have its reunion on June 4, 1950, and I sent him the news clipping. He seemed interested in coming and our going to it together. He drove over in his first car - a 1949 black Ford. We both were so proud of it as all our dat...