Thanksgiving

Gosh, when did life get so busy?

I wanted to write a VERY quick post for Thanksgiving.

Every year my Grandma Miles brought the same thing to dinner, nobody liked it. Nobody wanted to eat it. She would even put it on your plate.

Rutabaga's .... gross!

DNA

I wanted to share some of my results between myself, my mother, and my father's first cousin (my first cousin 1x removed).

Presidential Memorial Certificates

I learned about this service this past week. Thought I'd pass it along.

Still hunting for the death certificate for my Grandma Marge but I've mailed in requests for the others.

The link is pretty self-explanatory.

Aunt Sarah

The best part of having a legacy name is knowing the face that goes with the name.

Meet Sarah Jones Grant. My Great-Great-Grandmother that I was named for.

A hidden family tree...

A few months ago, my Uncle Tom suddenly passed away. Taking care of his affairs has been, mostly, handled by my cousin.

My cousin is slowly going through his things, including 300 some odd book pages when he came across this gem.

I have a lot more work to do but it's more than I've ever known about the family. My Dad said it was drawn up by he thinks (Herbert) a relative that visited in 1976 from Germany. It was made at my Grandparents home likely with his siblings, Uncle, and cousins. The relatives should all have copies but this is the first time any of us have seen it!

I'm so excited!

May the wind always be at your back ...

Link Roundup

A few (or a lot!) of links to round up this week:

Uncle Nick:

Cleveland Plain Dealer
Find a Grave
American Battle Monuments Commission
ABMC Facebook Post
Omaha Beach Memorial
Les fleurs de la Memoire
505th RCT Page
Special Forces ROH
Cleveland Veterans Memorial
AMBC: We Remember
ABMC: Mom visits Uncle Nick's Grave

E-Bay Round Up:

Isaac Evans (my great-grandfather) - Cleveland Press , Milking a Cow

Dorothy : God's Gift

I'm doing pretty good at this challenge and I'm only a bit behind. I've been putting off writing this one. Mostly, I have a lot to say - or I don't know what to say. How do you begin to write about a woman you greatly misunderstood in life but came to understand in death?

Dorothy is a Greek name and it means God's Gift. Click your heels? No, no - she was my grandmother.

Grandma was born in June 1917 and had an older brother, Bob. Her father was HJ and her mother Isabel. During the 1929 crash the family continued to do well due to HJ's business skills but do not mistake that she was very much a child of the depression.

They went to Europe often. Grandma had a run in with the Gestapo. My father says it didn't happen, my Aunt Linda says it did.

After she died I was able to read her diary. She received a diamond ring for her HS graduation. She graduated Ohio Wesleyan. Her mother died during her college years. She married my grandfather after college and they settled in her native Cleveland Heights. Grandma was a Librarian and kept the schools plants. She carted them home each school break to care for them.

As a child, I thought she was a hoarder. It was her depression upbringing coming into view. Bread bags were lunch bags, stocking held onions, etc.

Grandma loved arts : Ballet, Orchestra, Opera, Museums, etc. She adored the Nutcracker, something that makes me miss her more around Christmas.

She hated pictures, I'm assuming because she literally buried every member of her family (and in-laws) over her life. All she had left was the family she created - children and grandchildren.

We all miss her, I wish I would have known her better but she died a few days after my 14th birthday in 1999.

Dorothy, Isabel, and HJ.