2022 - A Return to the Old Normal

Future

What shall I write about for this week's prompt FUTURE? 

Understanding the past is the key to the future.

I have always tried to live in the moment. 

As the last moments of 2021 are upon us I honestly can't wait to forget about this year. 

In looking back I'm shocked to realize 2021 is over. 

This has been a hard year for most folks. 

It was the 2nd year of the Covid19 pandemic. 

So much of what was happening personally & throughout the world was overshadowed by the worldwide pandemic.

As 2021 comes to a close I look forward to 2022 with the hopes that we can go back to the old normal. 

When the pandemic first started, and we talked about the new normal there was lots of talk about what parts of the old normal we could let go of. I now no longer remember which parts I said I no longer wanted. I look forward to a return to the old normal. 

There is so little that I remember from this past year. 

There was so little to mark the passage of time.

One good thing that happened this year?

My dad gave us his Harley Davidson. He bought it new in 1986, and babied it. When he decided he was no longer riding it enough to keep it he gifted it to me. It is such a beautiful bike. It's in such good condition it qualified for Collector Plates. Maybe in 2022 we will attend a Show & Shine?  

1986 Harley Davidson, September 2021

Looking forward to a return to the the old normal.

From our house to yours  -  HAPPY NEW YEAR, 2022!!!

This is why I search - 

Cause ... 

You can pick your friends, but you can't pick your family you know!

***Any errors are my own. Please send me any updates or corrections via the comments at the bottom of this blog post***

Links:

Amy Johnson Crow, 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks Challenge
https://www.amyjohnsoncrow.com/

If you reference or use my blog posts in any way please

include a link to the specific blog and

credit http://somehowrelated.blogspot.com/

My blogs are ©Deborah Buchner, 2014 forward.

All rights reserved.

Please & Thank you!

________________________________________________________________

A Griswold Family Christmas ~ Our Bramble Bush

I suspect there is not one person who knows us that would be surprised to hear we have Griswolds in our Bramble Bush. 

When we decorate for Christmas our style can only be described as a 'Griswold Family Christmas'. 

The first time I saw National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation I recognized the style as mine. 

We even decorate the bathroom. 

I don't know anyone else who has a talking outhouse in their bathroom that has the voice of Santa saying things like "What does a guy have to do to get a bit of TP around here", or "Soon I will have to use my good list", and then a long farting noise followed by a Santa chuckle with some ho ho ho's thrown in. 

The shower curtain, towels, and toothbrushes round out the boldly decorated bathroom. 

The first Griswold I found was the wife of my husband's X2 great uncle

William Henry Lee
BIRTH JUN 1864 • Burford, Ontario, Canada
DEATH 23 MAY 1927 • Oxford, Ontario, Canada

who married, November 7th 1888:
Frances Griswold
BIRTH 7 MAR 1874 • Norwich, Ontario, Canada
DEATH 1963 • Burgessville, Canada

Frances was the daughter of 
Barbara Ellen Recknor
BIRTH 4 DEC 1844 • Otterstadt, Pfalz, Bayern, Germany
DEATH 1919 • Norwich Twp., Oxford, Ontario, Canada
and
John Lyman Griswold
BIRTH 16 NOV 1843 • N Norwich Oxford Co, Ontario, Canada
DEATH 24 MAY 1914 • Norwich Twp, Oxford, Ontario, Canada

Now isn't that interesting --- 
Lyman is in my mother's maternal family line.
Looking more closely at the parents and grandparents of John Lyman Griswold I find Quaker records. My Lyman line is Quaker. 
There is little doubt that my husband and I are both connected to the Griswold family line.
This is not surprising. 
BUT it will be a research project for another time!

The tackier our Christmas presents the happier we are.

One year I mailed this card to my mom for Christmas!

Even the folks who send us presents know this about us

Received Xmas 2021

When you aren't surprised to discover that It's in your DNA OR your family married into it!

This is why I search - 

Cause ... 

You can pick your friends, but you can't pick your family you know!

***Any errors are my own. Please send me any updates or corrections via the comments at the bottom of this blog post***

Links:

Amy Johnson Crow, 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks Challenge
https://www.amyjohnsoncrow.com/

If you reference or use my blog posts in any way please

include a link to the specific blog and

credit http://somehowrelated.blogspot.com/

My blogs are ©Deborah Buchner, 2014 forward.

All rights reserved.

Please & Thank you!

________________________________________________________________

Complicated Nellie Line ~ When the Expected Line Goes a Different Direction

Lines -- building family trees is all about researching lines of your family.

Each person has direct lines that double at each intersection: 2 parents, 4 grandparents, 8 great grandparents, 16 great grandparents, 32 great great grandparents.

BUT ... wait

I have 33 great great grandparents that I am researching. 

Lets go back to the beginning --- 

I originally decided to have my Ancestry DNA done to break down brick walls on my paternal family line that was full of secrets. 

After uploading to GedMatch I discovered there looked to be a bigger secret on my maternal side. 

It appears as though my great grandmother, Nellie May Cannon, was not the child of Jack/John Rodger Cannon as expected. It further appears as though Nellie and her two sisters had the same mother but not father. 

The DNA matches appear to suggest Nellie may be the daughter of a coworker of Jack's - John Lamb. They were both Railway Engineers for Canadian Pacific Railway. They both immigrated to Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada from the United States about the same time (1902). Their wives followed about a year later (1903). 

Finding them in the 1906 census we know they lived on the same street in Winnipeg:
Jack & Edith Cannon at 794 Flora Avenue,
and
John & Laura Lamb at 814 Flora Avenue.

1906 Census entries
#621 Jack (32), Edith (25), daughter Nellie (1) Cannon 
#701 Jack (35), Laura (32), adopted daughter Elizabeth Nelson (7) daughter Margaret (5) Lamb

15 year later both families are still living fairly close to each other as we find them in the 1921 census no longer renting on Flora Avenue. 

Both families own their own homes.

Jack (45), Edith (34), daughters Nellie (16) & Kathleen (14) Cannon at 856 Bannatyne Avenue, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada.
and
Jack (51), Laura (49), adopted daughter Elizabeth Nelson (33) daughter Margaret (19), son John (1) Lamb at 670 McDermot Avenue, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada

Both Cannon & Lamb are still listed as Engineers for the railroad in the 1921 census.

When I was first contacted by Lamb descendants I was told that John Lamb and his wife Laura were unable to have children, and adopted - which limits the ability to match more directly.  The census records seem to indicate the older daughter was adopted, but the younger daughter and son were not. Follow up records suggest all three were adopted. All of my DNA connections are not direct descendants of John & Laura. If the 3 were adopted this makes sense. If the 2 younger were not adopted then my hypothesis falls apart even with the matches to other relatives. Unless  their descendants haven't done genealogical DNA which means it could happen in the future. 

When examining the DNA matches I have in common with known descendants of John Lamb's grandparents  the amount of shared DNA matches.

If the hypothesis is correct my 4th great grandparents are
John Robert Lamb
BIRTH 10 JUL 1804 • Crudie Acres, Parish Arbirlot, Forfarshire, Scotland
DEATH 12 JAN 1860 • Crudie Acres, Parish Arbirlot, Forfarshire, Scotland
and 
Elizabeth Deuchar
BIRTH 25 SEP 1818 • Pitteris, Parish of Craig, Forfarshire, Scotland
DEATH 26 JAN 1889 • Baker, Clay, Minnesota, USA

I had started a guessing tree right after contact was made about our possible connection to the Lamb/Deuchar line instead of the Cannon line. At the time I added both my aunt's DNA & mine to the tree seeking matches.

It wasn't long before it became pretty clear why there was almost no Irish in our DNA results. John Rodger (known as Jack) Cannon whose parents were born in Ireland was not my X2 great grandfather.  

My next thought was that maybe the unknown history of X2 great grandma Edith May Lake might be related to the Lamb/Deuchar family. This would allow for the child (my great grandmother) Nellie to not have been the result of infidelity. This hypothesis did not prove our when it became clear that Nellie and her two sisters shared the same mother, but only Nellie's descendants matched the Lamb/Deuchar descendants. 

I began adding notes to all the DNA matches through Nellie's paternal line. I called the group 'Nellie's Complicated Line'. Once the matches were all sorted & examined it was pretty clear that Nellie's father was John Lamb. At that point I added him to my main tree on Ancestry as Nellie's biological father. 

While writing this week's blog I removed John Rodger Cannon as Nellie's father. This was very hard to do. I had been attached to Nellie being a Cannon right up until that message arrived. I continued to believe it was possible that he was Nellie's father up until the DNA evidence clearly showed he was not.  He is still listed as father to Nellie's two sisters as it appears as though he was likely their father. He is also listed as the father to brother John Patrick Cannon who died at 2 1/2 months of age in 1911. 

Embracing what is instead of what was.

The in common DNA matches all support the hypothesis of John Lamb being Nellie's father. There is a part of me that feels it's wrong to add the Lamb/Deuchar line to my tree without some sort of factual proof or permission of the descendants. At the same time the DNA matches have resulted in my arriving at a place of reasonably exhaustive search. It seems the right time to take ownership of the family line the DNA follows. 

When the DNA evidence points your family history in a different direction there is little choice, but to follow the new line!

This is why I search - 

Cause ... 

You can pick your friends, but you can't pick your family you know!

***Any errors are my own. Please send me any updates or corrections via the comments at the bottom of this blog post***

Links:

Amy Johnson Crow, 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks Challenge
https://www.amyjohnsoncrow.com/

If you reference or use my blog posts in any way please

include a link to the specific blog and

credit http://somehowrelated.blogspot.com/

My blogs are ©Deborah Buchner, 2014 forward.

All rights reserved.

Please & Thank you!

________________________________________________________________

Homemade Treats ~ Mom Made the Best

Mom died in March 2015. I miss mom all the time.  At Christmas the loss is felt somehow deeper. 

This week's prompt is homemade.  

Mom was an amazing cook & baker. I have so many memories wrapped up in food. 

Mom always mailed boxes of homemade special treats to our house & the houses of my siblings, at Christmas. 

Every year mom complained about how expensive postage was, and how heavy baking was. She never missed sending our childhood favourites every Christmas. 

My favourite was shortbread cookies.

One year while visiting at Christmas mom noticed that I picked the candied fruit off, and tossed it in the garbage. 

She said that next year she would leave the candied fruit off. 

I look at her horrified. 

Picking the fruit off for the trash was part of my shortbread experience. The little red & green stain left behind on the cookie I was eating enhanced the cookie experience. 

The following years the cookies arrived with the candied fruit exactly as they always had been. 

I suspect mom muttered while she spent money and time attaching candied fruit she knew I would not eat. 

She didn't want to disappoint me at Christmas.

Every Christmas that I don't receive my special delivery of shortbread cookies I am sad. 

Last year (Christmas 2020) my husband made me shortbread. 

He made me the whipped type after I explained that the traditional type would make me sadder since that is the type mom sent. 

Xmas 2015 was our first Christmas without Mom. 

In the years since missing mom at Christmas has not gotten easier.

Every treat I have OR don't have reminds me of mom.

The letter my mom's sister sent (December 2015) that first Christmas  without mom left me laughing and crying.

Mom and her sister

Every Christmas I re-read this letter. 

It helps with missing my mom.

The letter below has been redacted for privacy - only my name remains visible. The original included the names of my siblings. 

In Auntie Bobbi's special way she helped bring mom into that first Christmas without her. 

This letter made me laugh and cry at the same time. Auntie Bobbi had a way with words - she told a story well. 

Auntie Bobbi died this past summer.

This is our first Christmas without her. 

Re-reading this letter from Christmas 2015 helps me hold them both close.

We miss them both

It doesn't get any easier.

Missing family at Christmas time!

This is why I search - 

Cause ... 

You can pick your friends, but you can't pick your family you know!

***Any errors are my own. Please send me any updates or corrections via the comments at the bottom of this blog post***

Links:

Amy Johnson Crow, 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks Challenge
https://www.amyjohnsoncrow.com/

If you reference or use my blog posts in any way please

include a link to the specific blog and

credit http://somehowrelated.blogspot.com/

My blogs are ©Deborah Buchner, 2014 forward.

All rights reserved.

Please & Thank you!

________________________________________________________________

Ford Strong ~ When the Two Families Merge

While researching last week's blog I discovered who I wanted to write about for this week's prompt STRENGTH.

John Strong & Abigail Ford had 14 children. John had 2 children with his first wife Marjory Deane. Of those 16 children  15 lived into adulthood.

This was rare for the time when so many children died. 

John & Abigail's oldest child was Jedediah. 
Jedediah Strong
BIRTH 7 MAY 1637 • Hingham, Plymouth, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH 22 MAY 1733 • Coventry, Tolland County, Connecticut, USA

On November 18th 1662 Jedediah married Freedom.
Freedom Woodward
BIRTH 1 JUL 1642 • Dorchester Suffolk County Massachusetts, USA
DEATH 17 MAY 1681 • Northampton.  Massachusetts, USA

Jedediah & Freedom had 13 children, 8 lived through to adulthood. Losing 5 children was typical of the time. It can't have been easy. 

Their first child, Elizabeth, lived till age 26.
At age 20 she married Ebenezer Wright. 
Elizabeth Strong
BIRTH 9 JUN 1664 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH 17 FEB 1691 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA

Their second child, Abigail, lived till age 23.
At age 17 she married Thomas King.
Abigail Strong
BIRTH 9 JUL 1666 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH 24 JUL 1689 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA

Their third child, Jedediah, lived till age 42.
At age 21 he married Abijah Ingersoll. 
Jedediah Strong
BIRTH 7 AUG 1667 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH 12 OCT 1709 • Wood Creek, New York, USA

Their fourth child, Ford, lived only 2 month.
Ford Strong
BIRTH 2 SEP 1668 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH 1 NOV 1668 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA

Their fifth child was born still, or died soon after birth 
Infant Strong 
BIRTH 11 OCT 1669 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH 1669 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA

Their sixth child, Hannah, lived till age 92.
At age 21 she married Benjamin Carpenter.
Hannah Strong
BIRTH 3 FEB 1670 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH 20 MAR 1762 • Coventry, Connecticut, USA

Their seventh child, Thankful, lived till age 70.
I wrote about her in last week's blog.
At age 18 she married the Deacon Thomas Root.
Thankful Strong 
BIRTH 15 APR 1672 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH 16 APR 1742 • Coventry, Connecticut, USA

Their eight child, John, was born still or died soon after birth.
John Strong
BIRTH 15 NOV 1673
DEATH NOV 1673 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA

Their ninth child, Lydia, lived till age 42.
At age 19 she married David Lee (Brother to Preserved's wife Tabitha)
Lydia Strong
BIRTH 9 NOV 1675 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH 16 JUL 1718 • Coventry, Connecticut, USA

Their tenth child, Mary, was born still or died soon after birth.
Mary Strong
BIRTH 25 MAY 1677 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH MAY 1677 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA

Their eleventh child, Experience, lived 29 days.
Experience Strong
BIRTH 19 AUG 1678 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH 16 SEP 1678 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA

Their twelfth child, Preserved. lived till age 85.
At age 21 he married Tabitha Lee (sister to sister Lydia's husband David Lee).
Preserved Strong
BIRTH 29 MAR 1680 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH 26 SEP 1765 • Coventry, Connecticut, USA

Their thirteenth child, John, lived till age 17.
John Strong
BIRTH 10 MAY 1681 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH 21 APR 1699 • Northampton, Massachusetts, USA

Freedom died one week after giving birth to her 13th child John. 

Jedediah outlived 10 of his 14 children.

After Freedom's death Jedediah married Abigail Bartlett in 1681. She was the widow of John Stebbins. They had one child, Mary, born in 1683. Abigail died in 1689. 

For his 3rd wife Jedediah married Mary Hart. She was the widow of John Lee, and mother-in-law to two of Jedediah's children: Lydia & Preserved.

I think I noticed Jedediah & Freedom while I was researching last week because of the name of their son Ford Strong. My connection to this family is through Ford's grandmother Abigail Ford. She was the sister of my 9th great grandmother Hepzibah Ford.  Ford is my 2nd cousin X9 removed. Once I started looking at the details of the family I decided this couple fit for strength in so many ways.

The name STRONG.

The losses the experienced, and yet they endured. 

I also thought about the Ford company slogan BUILT FORD TOUGH, and wondered if this family is connected to the Ford motor company.  

This is definitely a tale for another time.

I have included The History of the Descendants of Elder John Strong, of Northampton, Mass. written by Benjamin W. Dwight in my sources below.

There is a lot of information about the Strong family & all of the other interconnected families like FORD and LYMAN & more.
It's the full pdf available for downloading. 

Knowing there will always be a new thread to tug in researching family!

This is why I search - 

Cause ... 

You can pick your friends, but you can't pick your family you know!

***Any errors are my own. Please send me any updates or corrections via the comments at the bottom of this blog post***

Sources:

Dwight, Benjamin W. The History of the Descendants of Elder John Strong, of Northampton, Mass. Bibliolife DBA of Bibilio Bazaar II LLC, 2015. Retrieved December 3rd 2021 from
https://ia600206.us.archive.org/16/items/cu31924092508682/cu31924092508682.pdf

Freedom Woodward, FindAGrave. Retrieved December 3rd 2021 from 
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/36163848/freedom-strong

Jebediah Strong, FindAGrave. Retrieved December 3rd 2021 from 
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/36163752/jedediah-strong

Links:

Amy Johnson Crow, 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks Challenge
https://www.amyjohnsoncrow.com/

If you reference or use my blog posts in any way please

include a link to the specific blog and

credit http://somehowrelated.blogspot.com/

My blogs are ©Deborah Buchner, 2014 forward.

All rights reserved.

Please & Thank you!

________________________________________________________________