Tuesday, September 29, 2015

Finding Family for my Photos

You might think this title should read "Finding Photos for my Family". But tonight I was able to find a family that will probably want some of my photos, so I'm finding family for my photos. I inherited my mother's photo album from her high school days in the early 1940s. Included in that album were these photos.
Tonight I was looking on Ancestry.com for a listing in any records of a Larry Coats in Plains, Kansas. It turns out that I discovered he was married to Dorothy Haddon, pictured in the photo above. I'm thinking the photos above were taken at the same time, at the same house in front of the same car. I just had no idea there was any connection between these two people in the photos in my mother's album. 
This chart above shows that Dorothy Haddon married Lawrence Coats. Dorothy is a first cousin of Loren Don Haddon, whose mother was Ethel Viola Flanders Haddon. Ethel was my mother's oldest sister.

My mother also had pictures of Alice Haddon.

You can see that Alice Haddon was also a first cousin of Loren Don Haddon, my own first cousin. Alice and Dorothy were both daughters of Earl Haddon, brother of my Uncle Dewey Haddon. 

By finding the Coats and Haddon connections on Ancestry.com, I also found someone who's part of this family and has added their tree to the site. I've written a message to the owner of the tree, offering to share these photos. 

These photos were captioned with identification by my mother in her beautiful handwriting, but until now I didn't know that one was married to another. I love making these little discoveries. Another "Aha!" moment. 

Sunday, September 20, 2015

Flanders Brothers and Sons 1934

Two months ago I had never seen photos of any of my grandfather's brothers, and actually knew nothing about any of them, except his brother Merritt. My grandfather is in the photo above, identified as Milo, 3rd from right. I'm so blessed that my cousin has shared her aunt's family photo collection with me, and among them was this wonderful picture of my maternal grandfather, Milo Flanders, two of his brothers, Clarence and Merritt, along with two of Clarence's sons, Orville and Elvin, and two of Milo's sons, my Uncle Albert and Uncle Cleo. I was also happy that the photo was dated 1934. Based on their birth years, I indicated the age of each man in the photo. 
Here are a few other pictures of my grandfather, Milo Flanders.
Marriage to Nannie Becker on April 18, 1906
As I remember my Grandpa Flanders in his yard in Stafford, Kansas
Milo and Nannie (Becker) Flanders, 50th Wedding Anniversary, 1956

Saturday, September 19, 2015

Rosie and Flossie, two Beautiful Cousins in Fashionable Hats!

One of the treasured photos I received recently from my cousin's collection is this photo of my cousins Rose Ann "Rosie" Rowe and her sister Flora Mable "Flossie" Rowe, daughters of August and Matilda Mayer Rowe. 

These charts show how I'm related to these beautiful girls.

We can see that Rosie was born in 1894, while Flossie was born just a year later, in 1895.

I love the fashion these young women display and am most amused by the hats they're proudly wearing. What beautiful style!

An interesting side note is that, while I haven't known anything about either of these women, my research revealed the identity of Rosie's granddaughter. It happens that I was acquainted with her while I lived in Kansas in the late 1970s. My husband at that time was an electrical contractor engaged in wiring a log home for this granddaughter and her husband. It was a difficult project that caused a lot of discussion in our household. My research also revealed that this granddaughter was later married to a man who was my neighbor in the 1970s and 80s and who served as our attorney at that time. I usually cringe when people reply to me "It's a small world". But in this case, I have to say it myself. What a small world. I had no idea at that time that this granddaughter was a cousin of mine. 

PS: I wrote a companion post to this last year that can be found here: http://www.beckyjamison.com/blog-grace--glory-plus/one-facebook-post-reveals-surprising-connections.

Monday, September 7, 2015

What is the rest of the story in this cousins photo

In the photo above are me and my twin brother and my cousins, two of whom are also twins. The tallest boy in the back is our cousin Duane and at far left is his younger sister Sheryll, standing besides their sisters, twins Pauleen and Paulette. Standing at right are my twin brother Dennis and me. Seated in front is another cousin Rita. Rita's dad, Mervin Flanders, my mother Ruby Flanders and the other cousins mother, Pearl Flanders Harris, were all siblings in the Milo and Nannie Flanders family. If I was just looking at faces in the photos, I'd smile, say "How cute" and go on to the next picture in the album. But as I looked at this picture, I recognized it as being taken while we were all standing on the front porch of my grandparents' house in Hoisington, Kansas. 
I can verify that with the photo above of me and Dennis as we played with our dad's violin in the front yard of his parents' house, when we lived there with them in 1949-52. You can see the same mail box on the front of the house in each photo as well as the grating under the porch, that I know was painted dark green. 

Now let me tell you why I find it significant that my cousins on my mother's side of the family are standing with me and my brother on the porch of my father's parents' house. My mother and father were divorced in 1949. Since my father had custody of me and my brother, we lived with him and his parents in Hoisington, KS from 1949 until he remarried in 1951, and built a new home where we moved back to Great Bend Kansas in 1952. It's my thought that the picture was taken in the Fall or Winter of 1951, based on the fact that we all have coats on and Dennis and I would have been 4 years old. Paulette and Pauleen would have been 3-1/2 years old and Rita would have been 2-1/2 years old. I think that looks accurate, or close. 

I cannot fathom any occasion when members of my mother's family would have visited us at the home of my father's family at that time. But there's the proof that they did. 

It's good, as we enjoy looking at the old family photographs, that we take the time to really look at the whole picture. I wish our family photos could tell us the rest of the story! 

A history lesson from a family photo


I recently came into possession of a collection of family photographs upon the death of my first cousin Ruth Pauleen Harris. It was the responsibility of her niece Edna to settle her Estate. Edna engaged the help of another cousin Nancy to decide what to do with an extensive collection of photographs and family memorabilia. I told Nancy I would be happy to offer my time and energies to scan the photos and archive them, and distribute any that should go to other family members. Upon that offer I received a collection of 1,405 photographs, numerous funeral cards and school souvenirs.

I chose the photo at the top of this post to feature today as it was the first to catch my attention as I started my scanning adventure. At the bottom left of the group photo it says "Hop Pickers Silverton, OR". The handwritten caption says "From Harry Bradley. This is where I was a hop-picking this year. That is me by that girl that is a smiling near that hop house." The front of the post card shows that it was sent to Mrs. Nannie Flanders in Great Bend, Kansas. It's dated 9 Jan 1907. Pretty cool, huh? I've identified Harry Bradley in the photo below.
My hometown is Great Bend, Kansas and until I started researching my family's history 16 years ago, I had no idea that my maternal grandparents, Milo and Nannie (Becker) Flanders ever lived in Great Bend. Oh the things we don't know as we're growing up. 

My first task upon discovering this photo was to look at my genealogy database to determine who Harry Bradley was. This chart below shows his relationship to me, and to Nannie Flanders, to whom he sent the postcard. 
Harry Bradley sent this postcard from Oregon to his cousin Nannie in Great Bend, KS. 

My next research was on the subject of "Hop Pickers", as I'd never heard of them before. From this web site on Hops History in Oregon I learned that there were hundreds of hop farms in the Willamette Valley. The first hops grown on the Pacific Coast were grown in Oregon. Of the pickers themselves, this site tell us "Urbanites and rural laborers, married and unmarried, young and old, men and women alike enjoyed decent wages, additional income, and a retreat from the city."  

It was interesting to learn that I had a cousin who worked in Silverton, Oregon as a Hops Picker in 1907. And what I found just as interesting was that he cared enough about his cousin in Great Bend, Kansas to send her a picture postcard of himself and his co-workers at that time. That is significant to me, as most of us don't follow that practice today. It's unfortunate that as cousins we don't often stay in touch and share our lives with our family. I'm grateful that Harry Bradley stayed in touch with his cousin Nannie. I'm equally as grateful to be in touch with my cousins Nancy, Edna and Edna's father, Duane, who have so generously shared this family photo collection with me.