Mystery Monday - Eliza and possible Eliza

Ok I know I've asked you my dear readers to give opinions on family pictures the last couple of blog postings, but I really do value your thoughts and ideas. So here's another chance for you all to give me your 2 cents. I have a wonderful picture of a young woman only recently found in family pictures. Of course there is no label or pencil marking(s) stating or hinting at her identity.

Here's what I DO know:

1. She's pretty
2. The picture is on metal probably tin
3. Her earrings, necklace and lace are painted on or enhanced
4. It was found with my maternal aunt's family pictures - that narrows down the possibilities

Ok here is where your 2 cents come in......

The picture on the left is the newly found picture. The one on the right is a known picture of my great-great grandmother, Eliza Ann (Scott) DeSpain. So I put them side by side so you can see any similarities or differences they may have:

The longer I look at them the more I think they look alike. I will refrain from stating my opinion of their similarities so see what you all come up with.

As always thank you all so much for taking the time to read and comment on this blog of mine.

Hope you enjoyed, glad you stopped by and please come back again ;)

Treasure Chest Thursday - Granny M's Memory Bk pt9

Okay, I'm a little late today with the posting but my husband and I came back from vacation and I think I finally know what people mean by jet lag. I have been playing catch up all week long.

Anyway, here is the next installment of my grandmother/great-grandmother's memory book. When last we left my grandmother, in last week's posting found here, she was writing about what Zelma was doing. So this week we find out that....

Treasure Chest Thursday - Granny M's Memory Bk pt 8

Here is this week's installment of my great-grandmother/grandmother's memory book.

This story is written by my grandmother, Gussie O. DeSpain Munday. Let's see what she has to say:

Treasure Chest Thursday - Granny M's Memory Bk pt 7

I'm a little late with this posting today. Thanks for waiting.

Today's page has a lot of writing that my grandmother, Gussie O DeSpain Munday, did about a lot of different topics. Here we go:

Treasure Chest Thursday - Granny M's Memory Book pt 5

This week's installment of my great grandmother & grandmother's memory book is interesting. Here it is:

"Aunt Lou Wilson died February 13, 1936 She is my mother's oldest sister Sallie May Buckners mother. Aunt Lerie Foster Woolridge died 1952 Sept 30"

Interesting because I am getting better at telling which woman wrote which entry by recognizing their handwriting. This entry was written by my grandmother, Gussie O. (DeSpain) Munday, about the oldest sister of her mother, Alice Josephine (Foster) DeSpain. Aunt Lou Wilson was born Lou Alvery Foster and married Joseph Reed Wilson. Lou as she was known by was born Oct 5 1866, to Josiah Foster and Sarah Frances Fulks. Oh, yeah by the way they were 1st cousins!

Aunt Lerie Foster Woolridge was a sister to Lou and Alice Foster. She was born Jun 1 1872, married 1st George Green Walker and 2nd to Frank Woolridge. A transcribed copy of her obituary can be found here.

Hope you enjoyed, glad you stopped by and please come back again ;)
 

Treasure Chest Thursday - Granny Munday's Memory Book beginning

OK, I guess I have taken a long enough time off from posting. I'm starting back up with another Treasure Chest Thursday series.

This is a book that my maternal aunt has allowed me to scan. I used the Flip-Pal scanner that I received for Christmas from my husband to scan this book turned journal in which her grandmother and my great-grandmother, Emily Calhoun (Slemmons) Munday, kept notes. She died in 1936 in Metcalfe County, Kentucky. The material that is in here after that would have been added by my grandmother and her daughter-in-law, Gussie Otto (DeSpain) Munday.

Sunday's Obituary - Parthana E Hutcherson Shofner

The other day I was going through a binder of family information that my father and I put together when we first started researching and found this obituary. Since it's been a while since I've posted an obituary from my family collection, I thought I would post it: 

Sentimental Sunday - A mother's visit

My mother tends to come to my house about every two weeks or once a month to visit her grandchildren. The one thing I have learned over the years is to expect the unexpected from her. During her visits the subjects we cover are wide and ever changing.

One visit the topics are: Elvis, the kid's school, my job, why don't I have any pictures on my walls, Elvis and gotten leave. The next visit they are: how big the kids have gotten, Elvis, the weather, her sisters' health, Elvis and oh yeah Elvis.....have I ever mentioned that my mother is a HUGE Elvis Presley devotee? I haven't well she is!

Treasure Chest Thursday - Slemmons Photo Album page 22

Here are the next to the last two pages. I am pretty excited about finishing the album so that I start sharing more of the interesting things that I have for this family. So with that said I'll get on with the show.

National Twins Days!!!!

Thanks to the August 1st posting of Miriam at Ancestories: The Stories of My Ancestors, I found out about Twins Day. Well to be honest, I had heard of it before but didn't know the exact date until her posting.

So I thought I would post a picture of my great-grandfather, Benjamin Lewis DeSpain and his twin sister Ida Leann DeSpain Marcum. B L, as he was called, and Ida were born on 1 Sept 1872 in Green County, Kentucky. I don't remember hearing when this picture was taken and it isn't written on the back of the copy that I have. But Benjamin didn't die until 1958 so they are at least in their seventies when this picture was taken.

Left to right: Charlie H Marcum (husband of Ida); Ida DeSpain Marcum; Benjamin Lewis DeSpain; and unknown man.

If you are interested in seeing B L when he was younger, check out my posting of an earlier picture of him in my Traveling Stove Agents posting on 3 August 2010 found here.

Hope you enjoyed, glad you stopped by and please come back again ;)

Traveling Stove Agents

I ran across this in my maternal great-grandparent's pictures.

This is from the time that traveling salesmen would travel the countryside to show their products to people so that they may order them from a company.

The man and woman that are on the right are my great-grandparents, Benjamin Lewis DeSpain and his wife, Alice Josephene Foster. 

I can hear the conversation:
B.L. - "Sir, I can't afford such an expensive thang, why the one that I have is working jus fine!"
Alice - "Oh honey, this one would heat the food so much faster and wouldn't make as big of a mess when we go to clean it."
Stove Agent - "Now, sir if the price is an issue my company will set you up on a payment plan of just 3 dollars a month."
B.L. - "Just 3 dollars ya say! Well, I don't know, let me think on it a bit."

This is the back of the picture.

Someone wrote information on the back that states:
August 21, 1906
Stove Agent                                                  Raymond was baby
Papa 34                                                            6 mo 3 wks old
Mama 29
Ivo 2 yrs 9 mo.

Ivo and Raymond are the children of Benjamin Lewis Despain and Alice Josephene Foster (or as called on the back Papa and Mama).

Hope you enjoyed, glad you stopped by and please come back again ;)

Treasure Chest Thursday - Slemmons Album part 1

As I have said in past postings my maternal aunt is the keeper of the family material on my mother's side of the family. It could be family pictures, bibles, drinking gourds or a chocolate pot, you name it and she probably has one that belonged to someone in our family. Over the years she has been immensely helpful in getting me started with my research. In the past we have talked about me taking digital pictures of all the "stuff" she has so that a record can be created for future generations, especially since she knows so much about and has so many stories about the family.

So it was no surprise when she called me this past Sunday morning asking me to come over to her house because she had found some family pictures that she wanted to look over with me. So off I go with my kids, my digital camera and a full battery.

Madness Monday - Lost Ancestors

I've titled today's posting "Lost Ancestors" because, as many of you know, I recently found a "lost" ancestor of mine, William Lewis DeSpain. While finding him has solved one question, "Where/When did he die?", it also opens up a host of new questions/avenues that will guide me to researching in a new county/area that I have not researched before....I'm like a kid in a candy store! But it also started me thinking about all of those years I had looked for him in the 1880 census (being the next census available after he left the family in 1872) and was never able to find him. This makes me

Sentimental Sunday - My Ancestors Approved Award !

Have you ever had one of those moments when you are reading something and in one part of your brain it is being understood and you are continuing to read like normal, but the other part of your brain is having a hard time registering what you just read because surely you misread a word that would have changed the whole meaning of the sentence? I find that it usually happens to me when I am reading something that catches me so off guard with its information that I have to read it about 3 or 4 more times to really digest what is being stated.

William Lewis DeSpain FOUND!

I can't believe it, I finally found my William Lewis DeSpain!

On Monday my posting for Madness Monday was going to be a cry for help to locate my "lost" William Lewis DeSpain. But now that has changed, let me explain.

Treasure Chest Thursday - My Granny!

My Treasure was my Granny! When I first started doing genealogy, my aunt gave me these pages that her mother, my granny, had written about her family. She had actually written two of the pages a couple of different times and on a couple of them she had information that she had not included on the other copies. If I had known then what I know now, I would have only taken then as a guideline. But being young and naive, I took them for the holy grail of genealogy. Luckily for me when I learned that I needed the actual document or wanted to make sure she was correct, she was! She had 99 % of the stuff correct. If only I had a wonderful fountain of information for my other family lines I probably would have been done with researching 15 years ago. May you all have a granny treasure chest in your research.