Uncle Peg’s Chronicles
May 9, 2024
“These
were their settlements. And they kept good family records.”[1]
Don’t
forget to look for the title which is embedded in the chronicle.
“My Little Girl Self”
FAMILY ALBUM
Portion of Lot 6, aka The Farm. The house in the background is the
little house where Charles R and Phoebe Holmes (on the right) lived after WWI.
Not an ounce of insulation in that place. Not a lick of paint on it in my
memory. On the left is their son, Floyd Holmes, and in the centre, his brother,
Cecil Holmes.
The children in front are Cassie Colpitts, Bryce Holmes, and Phoebe
Colpitts, grandchildren of Charles and Phoebe. Photo c. 1922.
HAPPY MOTHER’S DAY
to all Mothers and Grandmothers, special aunties and mother figures.
Happy Memories of our mothers and grandmothers.
Forget not Mother Holmes, wife of Francis, though she bears no name,
our foremother and mother figure to us all.
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GRATITUDE
Thanks, Grace, for sending your picture of yourselves in
London. You can see the photo, below.
MY GENEALOGY GOALS
- Chronicle
several times, and publish on Thursday morning.
- Keep
writing my next article for Generations, which is about the will of
Daniel Holmes.
- Spend
a bit of time on Moore family research: “Three Peas in a Moore Pod.”
- In
the evening, after chores are done, edit the Charles and Phoebe family
genealogy.
- Index
old newspapers for NBGS. On hold.
- Index
Riverbank Visitors for NBGS. Put old newspapers on hold while I do this.
I spent a bit of time preparing for
the Annual General Meeting, booked my actual presence for a meeting on May 25th
at Kings Landing, and talked to our upcoming speaker for this Saturday about
LIDAR. I told him I was excited about it. I also did a wee bit of genealogy
stuff.
Menu
for our Kings Landing luncheon – very Kings Landy – brown bread, salad, turkey
pot pie, gingerbread, and tea/coffee.
1924 to
1928
Those
are the years that our great or great-great grandparents spent renewing
relationships that had somehow fallen by the wayside but with organization,
letter writing, and challenging travel – by hook or by crook – they managed to
come together again. They reacquainted and rediscovered their family ties. And
then, one by one, they died, and many of those ties died with them.
2024 to 2028
This week, I give you
an excerpt from Mum’s memoirs. It features the children of Charles R and Phoebe
Holmes and their visits to the farm. I wrote it mostly as is, but added a bit
of punctuation, paragraph breaks, and details in [ ]. It
will be good, for those who are interested, when I get the descendant charts
ready to send you. Still a WIP, but I’m getting there. If you’ve been following
along, you know that Daniel did once own the land. I highlighted the names of
the children as they first appear. Floyd lived on the farm, and Cecil
and Ethel nearby. She didn’t mention George, but I know George
did visit. He brought seeds for a different kind of grain, I recall Mum saying. Birth
order of the children of Charles R and Phoebe Holmes: George, Ella, Daniel
(Dan), Emmanella (Emma), Bertha, Arletta (Letty), Ethel, Cecil, and Floyd. Emma
married Guy, son of William N Holmes.
The
farm, left to Dad & U. Cecil by grandfather Holmes – from Daniel. There was
a lumber mill below the bridge (Daniel must have owned some of that land at one
time). There was also a mill down near the brook near the MacKenzie &
Holmes line. I remember what they called a sluice but I don’t know what kind of
a mill it was (Wonder if Burton MacKenzie would know)!! Dad paid U Cecil for his half of the farm
when he willed the property to Nan & I. Since
it was the homestead the Holmes relatives (sic) quite
often. Aunt Bertha came yearly while her parents were living. Sometimes
she brought her adopted son Kegwin and [daughter] Alta Maxfield. I know
one year she brought U. Buell’s first wife parents. Uncle Dan & Aunt
Mae came some. One time she scolded Jim pretty badly, he was counting the
plates on the table & touched them as he counted. He wasn’t very old. Think
Mum had quite a time. Aunt Mae was good in some ways, always brought Mum a
dress & shoes, not new but new to Mum. I only remember Aunt Ella
& U. Carl being there once. He was a very quiet man. He was there one year
the Sunday School picnic was at home. There was always ice-cream (an unheard of
treat) 5 cents a cone & he just stood and paid for ice cream for the kids.
That’s all I remember of Him. Aunt Emma & Lawrence her son came.
Think he was just there once that I remember her twice – Picking blue berries
cleaning out an oil can to take molasses back in. They had a car with a running
board on it & a rack fastened to the running board for their luggage. Aunt Letty
U. Jim Cecil & Ray were there quite a lot. They just lived in Petitcodiac.
I remember the day she died. Mac & Lil were home and he drove her to the
hospital in Moncton. They were talking about how fast he drove. Of course Lil
came every summer & stayed all summer. Bob’s health wasn’t the best so had
to be in the country. We kids sure enjoyed having them & Lil helped so
much. Mac came some but didn’t stay long. Poor Mum she enjoyed having them but
she must have gotten so tired. They came one Christmas time brought ornaments
gifts food. Wonderful! Grebots – something like doughnuts but not as good.
Sometimes Lil brought Ruth and Phyllis but they would go back if someone else
came from Boston. Eddie & Billy came sometime too. One thing I remember Bob
[Minella] & Jim [Holmes] playing was Amos & Andy. They would
be in the inside porch. One was Amos, the other Andy. We’d watch them through a
hole in the wall. They would say Brother Andy Brother Andy What time is it –
then Amos would say Brother Amos Brother Amos it is time to go to bed. It would
go on for ages. To have our baths we’d take soap & face cloths and go to
the brook. Our necks and faces had to be checked when we got home! Lil
would take us to Moncton & we’d eat in a restaurant. Had to make 2 trips. I
don’t know what else we did. Sometimes she would take Barbara & Fran. She
was good to Aunt Nan [Annie ‘Nan’ Colpitts Blakney, sister of Minnie
Colpitts Holmes] They let us pick blueberries and sell them to buy glasses
for her.
I snatched this
one. This is Benjamin Burden, son of Keith and Alisha Burden, of the
Carrie Steeves line. I know Benjamin is traveling with a friend, and this schnitzel
was eaten in Berlin.
TENTATIVE EXCERPT FROM MY DANIEL ARTICLE
From the Appendix
The why remains my little secret for now. The
people mentioned are not family members.
ENTRIES FROM NEWSPAPERS
FAMILY HISTORY LESSON
On Monday evening,
Bill and I watched the last episode of “The Curse of Oak Island” for the
season. At the conclusion, Rick Lagina usually makes a farewell till we
meet again speech and ends up teary. His speech was basically about the little
boy inside him. Did he, he wondered, still have that little boy in there? That
little boy, with lots of good family memories, was entranced with the Readers
Digest article about Oak Island he read decades ago, and eventually became
determined to find the treasurer. As a man, he convinced his brother, Marty, to
join him in his quest to find the buried treasure on Oak Island. Marty isn’t
quite so emotional, and he is interested in digging and finding the treasurer
and moving on. Rick has become passionate at finding out the history of the
island and the who, what, when, where, why, and how the treasure got there in
the first place, even if they never find it. Is
the little girl that was me still there, I wonder? I didn’t really have a
passion for genealogy and family history until shortly before Dad died in 2005.
But, there were things along my way that inspired me, and my Mum’s stories
stayed with me, albeit skewed from time to time. I still remember the details
of the day I found Uncle Billy’s violin. It took me years, but I found the
violin’s story. I wrote about it, and then I found out more about Uncle Billy
and Aunt Maggie. Like Rick, I’m interested in the w’s. I want to know. The
treasures I seek are not often objects, although I do have some objects. They
are the lives of some of my forebears. I’ll never find out about all of them ;
there are too many. I take it way too seriously sometimes. I need an occasional
aha moment to bring out that little girl and get a bit sentimental in my old
age. The details of the past are important, as is the spelling, punctuation,
and sentence structure, but the stories bring the facts to life. A
few items I found this past week to make my little girl inside me happy that I
found them, but overcome with some of my discoveries – a bit too big for my
little girl self. These people are all in the Hattie Holmes Jones line.
Abner Jones Newcomb
“BIRTH
26 Nov 1910, Stoneham, Middlesex County, Massachusetts, USA
DEATH
20 Nov 1944 (aged 33), Stoneham, Middlesex County, Massachusetts, USA
BURIAL
Lindenwood Cemetery, Stoneham, Middlesex County, Massachusetts,
Of Stoneham, MA, aged 34
years. Worked as a local builder.
Death due to accidental
carbon monoxide poisoning.
Survived by wife and 5
children (Mildred, Bernice, Edward, Evelyn and Beverly).
[Source: The Boston Globe, 21
Nov 1944, Tue · Page 8]”
Obituary
“MATTOON, IL – Richard
Ernest “Dick” Rogers, 95, of Charleston, Illinois passed away peacefully
Wednesday, March 2, 2022, at the Odd Fellow-Rebekah Home in Mattoon, Illinois.
A memorial service will be held at 2:00 PM, Thursday, March 24, 2022 at Adams
Funeral Chapel. Visitation will be from 1:30 PM until service time. Burial will
be at a later date.
Dick was born October 14,
1926, in Reading, Massachusetts, the son of Harold and Hattie (Newcomb) Rogers.
He married Phyllis Pletcher on December 25, 1956, and she preceded him in death
on June 16, 2008. Richard is survived by his three children, Charles “Chuck”
(Betsy) Rogers of Bellevue, NE, Ethan (Natalie) Rogers of Alexandria, VA, and
Lucinda “Cindy” (Tony) Williams of Shelbyville, TN; five grandchildren,
Alexander “Alex” (Haley) Rogers of Bellevue, NE, Jordan “Jordy” Rogers of
Bellevue, NE, Justine (Ronnie Yar) Gustafson of Oak Lawn, IL, Micheal (April)
Williams of Shelbyville, TN, and Julie Williams of Shelbyville, TN; thirteen
great-grandchildren; one great-great-grandchild and another due any day. He is also survived by dear friends, Duke and
Linda Bagger, Connie Buchenroth, Lillian Greathouse, and Roger Whitlow. Besides
his wife and parents, Dick was preceded in death by one granddaughter, Erika
Williams; two brothers, Harold Rogers, and Charles “Charlie” Rogers; and two
sisters, Marilyn Simpson and Jean Read.
After his high school
graduation from Reading High School in Reading, MA, Dick served his country in
the Army Air Corps as a cryptographic technician sergeant with the 145th Air
Communications Service Squadron, located in Hawaii. He attained his BA from Carleton College in
Northfield, MN in June of 1950, a MA in theater from UCLA in 1953, a MA in
English from San Diego State College, in 1961; and his doctorate in English from
Indiana University in 1969. Dick taught at Temple University, the Wilkes-Barre
Center at University of Pennsylvania, San Diego State College, and retired from
Eastern Illinois University’s English department in 1993 after 24 years of
teaching at EIU.
Academic achievements were
not Dick’s only accomplishments. While in California, he served as Cubmaster
for the Cub Scouts Pack #354 in Casa de Oro. He was a member of Charleston’s
Elks Lodge #623, even serving as past president. He was appointed District
Deputy (East Central Illinois district) to the National President of BPO Elks
USA, and was a Charleston VFW member, and a member of the local American Legion
post in Mattoon. In Charleston he attended the Unitarian Universalist
Fellowship of Eastern Illinois and also served as a past chairman.
Dick enjoyed all things
theater: acting, directing, set design, and setup. In fact, he met his wife
Phyllis at the Hedgerow Theater in Rose Valley, PA. In Charleston he was active
in both the Charleston Community Theater and the Charleston Alley Theater.”
A rite of
spring: I am picking fiddleheads.
Fiddleheads
and rhubarb are my spring tonic.
A posy of
wildflowers, in memory of my Grams, Alice and Minnie, my Mum, Marg,
and for
Julie, who gave me Winston and Eleanor.
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This ends
week nineteen of our centennial virtual celebration.
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