My passion for family history, or history in general, has been greatly influenced by my older relatives like my father, mother and grandmother. There are specific stories that are etched in my mind from hearing them over and over while growing up. For instance, my grandmother often retold the story of the time my grandfather was painting the exterior of their garage. While grandpa was painting, she was outside chatting with my mom and my Aunt Delores when they heard a crashing sound of sorts and looked over in the direction of my grandpa. He was covered in paint! They soon realized he attempted to shift the ladder over but had left the paint bucket on the top step of the ladder. When he moved the ladder, down it came on top of him. My grandma had told this story so many times, I can still hear her laughing as she exclaimed, “He took his glasses off, looked at us and said “Don’t you dare laugh!” “
Very often, these are the memories we recollect when we think of our family members or friends. Especially, after our loved ones have passed on from this life. The stories and the memories we have help us remember they were here. And we can pass their story onto the next generation.
Which brings me to this website. For years I have been gathering information on my family history. Whether it was photos, old documents or research of our ancestry. It started after my mom passed away in 2005. My grandma had loaned me her photo albums so we could use the pictures for my mom’s funeral. Looking through the pictures of my mom from her earlier years was extremely therapeutic. She was healthy, young and full of life. It’s how I picture her every time I think of her. Realizing that there was a possibility I would never see these photos again, I began scanning every page into a digital format before returning them. One year my husband painstakingly went through each of those scans and cropped out the photos into their own image. Then he surprised me at Christmas with a printed version of those photos in photo albums. Using these albums, I would ask older relatives who was in the photos or where they were taken.
I’m grateful I had the chance to ask questions of my older relatives about our family history, especially now that many are gone. I’m blessed to live in an era where I can record those conversations on video or a voice recording App. But I’ve also gone old school, and jotted down notes when my family members recalled their stories. For a long time, my desire has been to write down what they shared or what I have discovered in my research of our ancestry. So this website will be just that. A hodge-podge of research, stories, memories and photos. This is my way of passing the stories of past generations onto the next generation. It’s time to share those stories.
My hope is to continue adding content to this website not just for family members who are interested in our family story, but also for for my fellow ancestor hunters. May they find a “link” to a part of their past within these pages. If you don’t see something here today, try again in the future.