Author: Van

Susan G. Stanbrough Was Known as Sue

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Susan G. Stanbrough in Jennings, Louisiana, circa 1900.

I’m talking about my great great grandmother Susan G. Stanbrough.  In this photo she looks like a rather serious woman.  I have a few other photos of her, and she looks equally serious in those as well.  Of course, when you look at old photos from that time period, that was usually the case.  But in her correspondence with family that I have found, she would sign off with a casual Sue.  So most of the times I refer to her as Grandma Sue.  In this post I’ll just call her Sue.

Sue was the mother of Addie May Hine, my great grandmother.  Sue had five sons as well.  Addie had more sons and more daughters, with a total of twelve children.  I descend from her son Fred D. Bucklin.  Fred, like Sue, had a middle initial in his name that didn’t stand for anything.  Fred was the father of Betty Lou Bucklin, my dear sweet mother.

Sue started her life in Westfield, Indiana, on October the 3rd of 1851.  Her parents were John Stanbrough and Lydia Jane Mills.  Sue was the seventh of thirteen Stanbrough children, though some of those siblings shortened their last names to Stanbro or Stambro.   Sue spent her childhood in Hamilton County, Indiana.  Her mother died early in 1873, and later that year Sue married George Henry Hine.  They were 4th cousins through their common ancestors William Vestal and Elizabeth Mercer.  Sue and George might not have been aware of that, because their common ancestors died almost a hundred years before the younger couple were born.

Sue and George had all six of their children in Indiana – some in Hamilton County and others in Boone County.  There was family in both counties.  They then decided to move south to Louisiana.  I’m not sure what the motivation was, but it was a time when the railroads came through southern Louisiana and made it more accessible.  There were different people who promoted the area as a great place for farming with mild winters. 

1900 U. S. Census of Jefferson Davis Parish, Louisiana.

The family moved to Jefferson Davis Parish in Louisiana in 1894.  They acquired a homestead in China, Louisiana.  In the 1900 Census, the family included George, Susan, John U. (must be Bert James by year of birth), Romanzo (“Rowe”), James, and Oliver.  But also included in the household is James Stanbrough.  That would be Sue’s brother Jim who was a year older than her.  He had moved down to Louisiana and was living with them.  Addie was not in the household, because she had gotten married and had started a family of her own.  I don’t know where 18-year-old Lonnie Hine was at the time.  Perhaps in the military?  He didn’t get married until 1903.

If I’m correct about the date of this photo, it was taken around the same time as the Census.  The family had been in the South for about six years and Sue had recently become a grandmother.  They probably took the photo in Jennings, Louisiana, because that was the nearest town that was likely to have a photo studio.  This is actually cropped from a photo of the whole family.  It’s a great family photo, but I just wanted to focus on Sue today.  

If you look at this photo long enough, you’ll start to catch a glimpse of a smile on her lips.  Go ahead.  Try it!

Grampa Max in Beaumont

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Vincent Maximilian Patureau and Gertrude Brammer Patureau in Beaumont, Texas, circa 1925.

This is the second photo of Grampa Max that I’ve shared from this particular visit to Beaumont.  I shared that photo in a blog post from over eight years ago.  Eight years!  It’s hard to believe that I’ve been writing these weekly posts for that long.  Do you remember that first photo that I shared from that visit?  The name of the blog post was “Patureau Brothers” and it was a photo of Grampa Max with his older brother Leobon.  The woman that you see was also in that first photo.  When I first shared that photo, I thought it might have been taken in Lafayette.  I’m pretty sure now that the photo was taken in Beaumont, Texas.

My great grandfather’s given name was Vincent Maximilian Patureau, but everyone knew him as Max.  He was born in 1865 in Matamoras, Mexico.  His parents were Ferdinand Pierre Patureau and Marie Emma Landry.  Ferdinand was born in France and he came to Louisiana with his parents and siblings in 1840.  Emma was a Cajun from Brusly, Louisiana.  The Landry family had settled in Louisiana in 1767 after being Exiled from Acadie in 1755. 

Max grew up in Plaquemine, Louisiana, and when he was of marrying age, he got married to a Landry of his own.  His wife – my great grandmother – was Marie Therese Landry.  Her father Trasimond Landry was the first cousin of Max’s mom Emma.  Max and Marie Therese had fifteen children together, including my grandmother Germaine Erie Patureau.  She, too, married another Landry.  My grandfather was Robert Joseph Landry.  He was the son of Alcide Landry, the brother of Trasimond.  Erie and Rob had eight children, and one of them was my dad who was known as Bob Landry.  As I often like to say, he married outside of the family.  There’s not a single Cajun to be found in Betty Lou Bucklin’s family tree!

Like I said before, this is a photo of my Grampa Max.  He’s actually my great grandfather and he died long before I was born.  The woman in the photo is Gertrude Brammer Patureau.   She was married to Max’s nephew Arthur Mitchell Patureau.  Arthur was the son of Max’s brother Louis Leobon Patureau and he lived in Beaumont.  When I posted the first photo all those years ago, I didn’t realize the strong connection that the Patureau family had with Beaumont.  Arthur and Gertrude were both from Plaquemine, but they were living in Beaumont by the time of the birth of their first child Albert Leobon in 1912.  They lived there for the rest of their lives.

The Patureau Bed headboard has a mattress roller along the top. It can be removed. In olden times it was used to smooth out the mattresses. The bed was made around 1800 in France. That’s our little girl cat Bella on the pillows.

But they weren’t the only members of the Patureau family living there.  Max and Louis’s youngest sister Marie Victorine “Aunt Bebe” Patureau Cropper moved to Beaumont with her family in 1903 and stayed.  Aunt Bebe was the Patureau family historian of that generation.  She started an amazing collection of photos, letters, and other memorabilia relating to the family.  That collection is now in the Tyrrell Historical Library in Beaumont.  She also had the amazing bed that the Patureau family brought to the US from France.  I now have that bed.  I like to do my French lessons while I lie in that bed.  This often leads to me having a “Pat” nap. 

But back then it was in Beaumont.  I know that Grampa Max visited Beaumont from time to time.  It’s likely that he would have stayed at his sister’s house.  They probably shared meals there as well.  And in my family, there is a tradition after big family meals.  And that tradition is taking naps.  I’m sure Grampa Max knew the history of that old Patureau bed and would have wanted to use that for his own “Pat” naps.  Right?  And I’m sure that Aunt Bebe would have been willing to let that happen.  She got to keep the bed in her house after all.

It’s what I would do.  That’s right!  Any of you Patureau relatives out there that want to come visit are welcome.  Maybe we could share a meal.  And then maybe, just maybe, you too can have a “Pat” nap!

Samuel Charles Phenice Lost a Son

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My great great grandfather Samuel Charles Phenice circa 1910. Probably in Nebraska.

I wasn’t sure what I was going to write about tonight.  I was busy at work this week, so I didn’t really think about it.  There were a few things that happened outside of work that made me consider a topic.  But I wasn’t sure.  Last week I talked about my dad’s side of the family, so this week it was time for a post on my mom’s side of the family.  Specifically, it was time for a Phenice post.

I looked through the folder of Phenice photos a little, but then thought it might be interesting to find something that happened 100 years ago.  I didn’t know what that might be, so I looked at photos in the 1920s.  Nothing stood out, so I looked at my family tree to see what was happening with the Phenice family 100 years ago.  There wasn’t anything specifically in 1924 that I saw, but I did see an event that happened in 1922.  On 2-22-22 (February 22, of 1922) my great great grandfather Samuel Charles Phenice suffered the loss of his first son Chauncey.

This was actually the theme I had thought of writing about this week, because my godmother lost her son this week.  It’s such a tragedy when a parent loses a child.  When my oldest sister died in 1989, it hit my parents really hard.  My goal for the rest of their lives was to take good care of myself so they wouldn’t have to go through that kind of loss again.  I succeeded.  But things happen sometimes outside of our control.

My great uncle Chauncey Phenice – 1868-1922. This photo was taken around 1900, possibly in Nebraska.

In the case of my great great grandfather Samuel, the death of his first child came just after a year of losing his wife of fifty years – Cathrine Jane “Kate” Foster Phenice.  Most of the time when I think about them, I focus on obvious things.  They had a long marriage of fifty years – a family tradition in this line – six generations with 50 years or more.  Of course, I tell about Samuel being in the Civil War out of Pennsylvania.  Yes, he was a Yankee!  He also was a witness to the Lincoln Assassination.  Kate had a tragic end to her life.  Her clothes caught on fire and she died as a result of her injuries.  As a result, Samuel dealt with the loss of his son without her.  Chauncey was their first – he was the one that made them parents.  

It’s kind of surprising that Samuel didn’t outlive more of his children.  When you live to the age of 95 like he did, it seems to happen.  My great great grandmother Belite Bujol outlived five of her seven children, and she only lived to be 80 years old.  There are sad stories in every family.  Yet it is the family who can help in these times.  Nothing you can say can repair the hole left behind when a loved one dies.  But the love and support from family and friends can make it a bit easier to endure.

This one is dedicated to my godmother and her son.

The Leveque Family in WBR

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Marie Celeste Leveque Landry in 1905, probably in Lake Charles, Louisiana

You might read the title of this post and ask, “What Leveque family in West Baton Rouge Parish?  There aren’t any Leveque families in WBR!”  And you might be right.  I don’t know of any, and all of the Leveque family that I’m familiar with are not there.  The last Leveque post that I wrote (over a year ago!) talked about the family being in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

The Leveque name is from my dad’s side of the family.  And it comes from both sides of his family.  My dad was Bob Landry, the famous band director of Jennings, Louisiana.  He was born Robert Joseph Landry, Jr. in Lake Charles, Louisiana.  His father, of course, was Robert Joseph Landry, Sr.  My grandfather is known as Pee Paw by us grandkids.  He was born in Westlake, Louisiana, and he died many years ago.  He was the son of Simon Alcide Landry and Marie Celeste Leveque.  Alcide and Celeste were born in West Baton Rouge Parish.  They were the ones that brought our family to southwestern Louisiana.  But they weren’t the only ones that left WBR for Calcasieu Parish.

Joseph Auguste Leveque’s grave marker at the Old Catholic Cemetery in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

To get a better picture of what was going on, we have to go back another generation.  Celeste was the daughter of Joseph Auguste Leveque and Marguerite “Basilite” Landry Leveque.  Joseph Auguste was born in Donaldsonville, but the Leveque family was also connected to New Orleans.  It seems like they spent time in both places.  His first wife was Basalite’s older sister Clarissa Doralise Landry.  The Landry family had been in West Baton Rouge Parish since at least 1820.  After Joseph Auguste Leveque married Clarissa Doralise Landry at St. Joseph’s Catholic Church in 1831, they made their home in Brusly (in WBR).  They had at least six children together before Clarissa died in 1840.  

Mrs. J. A. Leveque’s grave marker at the Old Catholic Cemetery in Lake Charles, Louisiana. This Mrs. J. A. Leveque was the second one – Marguerite Basalite Landry Leveque. She was born in 1821 and died in 1902.

Joseph Auguste Leveque then married Marguerite Basalite in 1843.  They had eight children together, which included Marie Celeste who was born in 1847.  Joseph Auguste and Basalite continued to live in WBR with their family until at least 1880.  But not all of the Leveque family stayed in WBR until that date.  Two of J. A.’s sons – Louis and Justinian – made it to Lake Charles by 1867.  A decade later more siblings followed suit.  Lise and Samuel were in Lake Charles by 1880, followed by Aloysia shortly after.  Celeste and Alcide also moved west at that time, but a little further to Westlake.  

Marie Francoise Leveque’s headstone in St. John the Baptist Cemetery in Brusly, Louisiana.

J. A.’s other children who lived to adulthood also left West Baton Rouge.  J. A., Jr. was a doctor in north Louisiana.  The other four – Evalina, Louise, Benjamin, and Mai – moved to New Orleans.  With these four being in New Orleans, and Joseph Auguste being originally associated with that city, I thought we’d be related to all of the Leveques in New Orleans.  But I had a coworker who was a Leveque from New Orleans and I could find no connection to her Leveque line.

Augustin Leveque’s headstone in St. John the Baptist Cemetery in Brusly.

But there are still some Leveque connections to Brusly and West Baton Rouge Parish.  Joseph Auguste wasn’t the only Leveque to move there.  He had an older sister named Marie Francoise Leveque.  I descend from her through my paternal grandmother Germaine Erie Patureau Landry.  Francoise was married to Amedee Bujol and they had eleven children, the first ten being girls.  Some of these families stayed in WBR, but they don’t have the Leveque last name. 

In addition to these two Leveque siblings, they had a first cousin who ended up in Brusly as well.  Her name was Marie Augustin Leveque and she was married to Edmond White.  She was the daughter of our Joseph Auguste Leveque’s twin brother Jean Baptiste Leveque.  I don’t know if they were identical twins or not.   It’s a good thing these headstones have better information than Basalite’s has.  Hers just says “Mrs. J. A. Leveque.”  It has nothing about her name or maiden name.  If these other two women’s headstones were done in the same way, they would say “Mrs. Sylvestre Bujol” and “Mrs. Edmond White.”  I like seeing the Leveque name in stone commemorating their presence in WBR.

Ok, that’s my story for the day.  If you come across the Leveque name anywhere, let me know.  I’ll look into it and see if there’s a connection.  There are connections everywhere.

Addie and Two Grandsons

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Addie Hine Bucklin in 1937 with grandsons in Hathaway, Louisiana.

Here’s a pleasant photo of my great grandmother Addie from 87 years ago.  She looks like such a doting, loving grandmother.  I wish I had known her.  She seems like such a warm, likable person.  She was alive when I was born, but she died just a month later.

Her name at birth was Addie May Hine.  She was born on September 23, 1876, in Noblesville, Indiana.  She was the firstborn of George Henry Hine and Susan G. Stanbrough.  She had five younger brothers.  The family moved south to Louisiana in 1894 and settled in Jefferson Davis Parish.  Addie lived the rest of her life in Louisiana, except for a short stint in Prairie Grove, Arkansas, around 1911.  She was married to Louis Charles Bucklin at that point.  She gave birth to their son Robert in Arkansas, but all the rest of the twelve children were born in Louisiana.  That would include my grandfather Fred Bucklin.  He would later become the father of my mom, Betty Lou Bucklin Landry.

I wish that I had a photo of my mom with Addie like this one.  I’ve never seen one, so I doubt there is one.  I would be happy to be proven wrong.  But we do have this one, and the back of the photo says that the photo was made in September of 1937.  I’m assuming that the photo was taken shortly before then.  If that is correct, I would think this photo is of Addie and her Bruchhaus grandsons.  Her youngest daughter was Ruth, who married William Charles “Budda” Bruchhaus.  They had two sons – Harley in 1933 and Laurence in 1936.  So that would be Harley standing to the right of Addie, and Laurence would be sitting in her lap. 

My mom was just a few months older than Harley.  Why aren’t there any photos of her or her sisters and brother with Grandma Addie?  To make matters worse, the cat made it into the photo.  And it’s not the only photo of this cat with Addie!  I’ve posted a different photo before that is just the two of them.  Why couldn’t there be any of mom and Addie together?  It’s probably the same reason that there were far more photos of my oldest sister Jodie when she was a child than there were of me and my younger sister Jamie.  Ain’t nobody got time for that!  Who’s going to be able to keep track of every event in a child’s life when there are six of them running around.  For Addie, there were 12 children and even more grandchildren.  It’s just a result of being in a big family.  My mom only had positive things to say about Addie.

Another thing this photo makes me think about is Addie’s hair.  It looks like she had it very long, but always seemed to keep it in a bun.  But not only that, her hair is very dark in this photo and she was 61 years old.  I remember my mom talking about that when I was a kid.  She hoped that her hair would get darker as she aged, just like her grandmother.  Addie lived to the age of 84.  In the photo taken on her last birthday, her hair was still pretty dark.  My mom did have a good bit of gray hair, but she had enough brown left to keep her hair from looking white as some people’s did.  Of course, by the time she was in her eighties she wasn’t too concerned about the color of her hair.

There are a few other things that this photo makes me think about.   Like – with all those Bucklin sons, that Bucklin surname didn’t multiply very well.  It seems like there are more Bruchhaus and Landry descendants than Bucklins.  Maybe it’ll make you think of something else.  If it does, let me know about it.  I like talking about old photos.  Have you noticed?

My First Easter

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The Landry boys – Al, Rob, and little Van – on Easter 1961 in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

I thought I’d share a few photos from my first Easter tonight.  I don’t remember anything from that far back, but I do have some photos.  Easter fell on April the 2nd in 1961, so that’s the date I’m going with.  I was only five months old at the time, so I probably wasn’t aware of what was going on.

Rob and Al were aware of what was going on.  Al was a few months shy of his second birthday and he’s got his Easter basket all decked out with greenery.   Rob was almost six, so he knew to show off his prized egg as well as his basket.  Maybe he found all of the hidden eggs before Al had a chance to find any.  I know I wasn’t in the running at all.  I was just sitting there watching all of these strange new behaviors that were going on.  Easter?  What’s that?!

I do remember a few things from back then.  I remember those red shoes for sure.  Not that I remember wearing them.  I think my mom must have saved them for a long time and told me about them being mine.  I do like the bright red color.  Very festive!  I remember playing with my dad and brothers in that back yard over the next year or so that we lived in Lake Charles.  Mainly it was playing with a toy gun that shot little propellers that would fly.  It made an impact on my developing brain.  The toy looked similar to the photo that you see.  At least from what I can remember from all those years ago.

The Landry girls – Karen and Jodie – on Easter in 1961 in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

This next photo is of my older sisters.  I was the fifth child.  I had two older brothers and two older sisters.  Sometimes I think of myself as the tiebreaker.  That didn’t last long.  My younger sister Jamie came along a year later and tied it up again.  But on April 2, 1961, there were just the two brothers, the two sisters, and my mom and dad.  My parents weren’t in any of the Easter photos that I have for that year.  I might have shared a different photo if they had been. 

I like this photo of Karen and Jodie.  They have their new Easter dresses on, and they’ve got their Easter baskets ready for collecting.  Jodie must have had high expectations.  That’s a big basket that she has!  I think it’s bigger than all of the other three combined!  I don’t know where she thought she’d find enough eggs to fill it up. 

I have no idea where we went that year.  In the years after this, when we lived in Jennings, we would go to my mom’s family in Hathaway for Easters.  There was always an Easter egg hunt.  I once called it the Great Bucklin Egg Hunt.  I would think that it had started by 1961.  Grandma and Grandpa Bucklin (Myrtle Phenice and Fred Bucklin) had thirteen grandchildren who would be eager to go traipsing around their property to find colored eggs and other goodies.

But since we were still living in Lake Charles, maybe we stayed in town for the Landry family gathering.  We had even more cousins there.  Mee Maw (Germaine Erie Patureau Landry) was a widow (for some reason that’s a term I never associate with her!) whose husband Robert Joseph Landry, Sr. – our Pee Paw – had died a few years earlier.  She had over twenty grandchildren at the time.  I’m sure they were just as eager to go a-hunting. 

So there you have it.  The Landry children dressed up for Easter, with their eggs and baskets ready for something.  A Great Bucklin Egg Hunt?  A Landry Pocking Contest?  Showing off their cute little new brother with his bright red booties?  Whatever happened, it must have been something good.  Otherwise, I would have heard stories about it when we looked back at these old photos.  But all I remember hearing about was how much they liked that dress, how much they liked that hair cut, and how much fun I was when I was that age. 

Ok, maybe that last thing wasn’t said.  But I’m sure it was thought.  Right?!  Just look at those booties.  What’s not to like?

Have a happy Easter.

Mee Maw and the Fig Tree

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Germaine Erie Patureau circa 1950 in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

Here is a photo of my paternal grandmother Germaine Erie Patureau.  I’ve always known her as Mee Maw.  I saw the first version of the photo in 2019.  It was in the Tin Can Collection that originally belonged to my Aunt Wana.  It has since been taken over by her children Tricia and perhaps Tim.  Both of them have shared photos from the Collection, but it’s usually Tricia.  She’s the one who showed me the image in 2019 when a few of the cousins got together.  Wow.  It’s almost five years now.  I took a photo of the photo because I liked it.

It wasn’t until tonight that I realized that I had two versions of this photo.  I discovered this improved version in 2021, when I looked closer at some of the things that I took from my parents’ home when we moved them to Assisted Living.  As I looked through the old photos and such, I found an old packet of negatives.  Some of them were really old.  Those were from the 1930s when my dad was a kid.  Then there were others like this one that look like they came from the 1950s.

So I scanned those old negatives, and this was one of them.  I didn’t recognize it from two years earlier, but I did like it.  I like discovering new photos of my grandmother who hasn’t been around for over fifty years.  I had to guess the approximate year the photo was taken.  I compared it to known photos of her through the years and decided it looked like some time in the early 1950s.  Does that sound about right?  She was born in 1895, so that would put her in her mid to late fifties.  Hmmm.  Maybe it was taken earlier.

And I’m not even sure where the photo was taken.  I had thought about calling it “Mee Maw In the Back Yard,” but I wasn’t sure I was correct about that assessment.  I don’t remember the house that she lived in back then.  I recognize the back of the house because there are several photos of the family taken there.  But this area does look like a back yard with fig trees and other plantings.  I can tell that it was probably winter, based on the bare branches of the fig tree.  The bare arms of my grandmother say that it wasn’t a particularly cold winter day.  If I knew the color of her dress, I would have used that in the title of this post.  But I’m not familiar with the dress and don’t remember seeing it.

I don’t know much about the photo, it would seem.  Yet I am still drawn to it.  I like her determined pose and the way she’s standing firm.  Most of the photos of her from this time period are group photos.  She’s either with her husband and her eight children, or she’s with a gaggle of grandkids.  There were new ones appearing every year.  So to have a nice, sharp photo of her all by herself is a gift. 

I share it with you.

More Irish in the Foster Line

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Cathrine Jane “Kate” Foster Phenice was from Mercer, Pennsylvania – or was she?

I wonder if my great great grandmother Kate Foster was ever aware of her Irish ancestry.  She was born Cathrine Jane Foster on September 16, 1848, in Cherrytree, Pennsylvania.  Her parents were Morris Foster and Anne Magdaleen Milliron.  Her father Morris died in 1852 at the age of 35.  I’m sure it was a tough time for the family.  Anne Magdaleen was left with four children under the age of 8 years old.  She took herself and her children back to Mercer, Pennsylvania, which is where she was born and where most of her family lived.  

Anne married George Richael in 1853 and quickly started increasing the size of the family.  With all of these younger siblings about, it’s very likely that Kate never heard much about her father’s family.  In fact, it was always reported that she was born in Mercer, Pennsylvania, but that isn’t true.  The family lived in Cherrytree when she was born.  The confusion around that was probably one of the reasons her descendants had difficulty tracking her ancestry.

But Morris Foster did in fact have Irish ancestry.  I’m not sure of his mother’s ancestry.  Her name was Catherine Moore and I don’t have much information on her.  His father’s name was James Foster and there are more details about his ancestry.  Last year I wrote a post about his father Hugh Foster who was born in Derry, which is in Northern Ireland.  I don’t know when he immigrated to the United States, but he ended up in Liberty, Pennsylvania.  Liberty and Mercer are both in Mercer County.

1778 will of James McCullough

Hugh Foster wasn’t the only one with Irish heritage.  He was married to Mary Elizabeth McCullough.  Like I said last year, that sounds like an Irish name for sure!  I said that I would look into her history, but I didn’t actually do that until this evening when I was looking for something to write about.  I read last year’s post and realized I had been remiss.  Lax, lax, lax!  So I started looking into her family, and it didn’t take long to find some interesting things.  I like it when that happens.

Mary Elizabeth McCullough was the daughter of James McCullough & Martha Hance.  One of the first things I found was James’ will, which was written in 1778.  He lived from 1720 to 1781.  He wills to his beloved wife Martha her bed and bed furniture, her choice of bay mares and her saddle, and her choice of two cows and six sheep.  She also has the use of the back bedroom of their house during her natural life.  She is also allowed to use the pasture to keep the animals that he left her.  The “plantation” was left to his sons John and Hance. 

From book about several counties in Pennsylvania that was compile in 1846

He instructs his sons to pay his two daughters – Jean McClellan and Mary Foster (my ancestor) – the sums of eighty pounds each.  It’s interesting to see the things that are listed in an ancestor’s will.  He mentions a wagon, a windmill, and a Bible.  He mentions other books, which shows that he was literate.  I’m not sure if the will is written in his own hand or not.  The spelling of the last name varies in the document.  They may have been ancestors of my grandmother Myrtle Phenice Bucklin, but they didn’t have the spelling superpower that she passed down to me.  He also leaves some items to other people.  I’m not sure if they are family or not.  I’ll have to explore his extended family.  Maybe I’ll do that next year!

I already know a little bit about his extended family from this blurb in an old book about Pennsylvania.  It reports that James came from Ireland with his two brothers and an unmarried sister (Anna).  It says that he is the founder of the American McCulloughs.  But more importantly, it tells us when he came to America!  Finally, I know the date of immigration for one of my Irish lines.  James first settled in Delaware in 1743.  A decade later he moved the family to Franklin County, Pennsylvania.  At that time the family consisted of himself, his wife Martha, and their son John.  If you read the clip, you can see that it was a difficult time in American history.

So this year I’ll be thinking of James McCullough for St. Patrick’s Day.  He and Martha and their daughter Mary.  Erin go bragh!

 

A View From 1974

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Karen, Al, and Van Landry in March 1974. We took this ‘before’ picture with glasses to commemorate the time that we got our first pair of contact lenses. I promised them back then that I’d post the photo on my blog for the 50th anniversary. This photo is such bad quality, but it is the only one from this important life event.

I have planned on writing about this 50-year anniversary for a few years now.  I’ve been waiting anxiously to be able to write about this topic.  You would think that I would have thought about some really interesting things to say about it, perhaps in relation to family history.  That is the main topic of my blogs, if you haven’t noticed.  But I’m sticking with this story that I’ve planned on.  My main problem is usually that I haven’t thought of or planned on a topic for the week.  So I have to follow through with my years-long planning.

Here is the important announcement: Today completes 50 years of wearing contact lenses.  My first pair of contact lenses were first worn on March 8, 1974, and I have been wearing them ever since.  Not the same pair, of course.  I’ve had about seven or eight pairs.  I’ve gone without them for a few days here and there, but I’m a consistent contacts-wearer. 

Of course I was 13 years old at the time, so I didn’t just go drive and pick them up myself.  It was a family event.  See, it is family related!  In early 1974 there were three Landry family members who wore glasses – Karen, Al, and me.  Karen and Al had been wearing them longer than I had.  I had only worn glasses for two years.

Van and Karen on the left, and Al on the far right. This photo was taken at Astroworld on July 24, 1974, which was Al’s 15th birthday.  Note that the glasses are no longer in use.  The best ‘after’ picture I could find.

My parents didn’t have a lot of extra money back at that point.  This was before we made the big bucks (not!) at Shakey’s Pizza Parlor as the Landry Family Band.  But there was a Texas State Optical store in Orange, Texas, and that business had a good deal on contact lenses.  My parents decided that all three of us would get contact lenses.  Early one Saturday morning, the family got in the car and headed west to Orange.  This is terrible, but I can’t remember exactly who went with the three of us.  Was it Mama or Daddy?  Did Jamie come along with us?  I just can’t remember.  Sorry, Jamie, if you were there and I forgot.

What I remember is the sun coming into the car and coming over our shoulders as we heard the song “Sunshine on My Shoulders” by John Denver.  We made a big deal of that.  Then we stopped at some gas station store and bought popcorn that was “Popped Fresh!”  We joked about it being “popped fresh” five days ago.  We thought we were so clever.  When we were at TSO, we joked about how the doctor there told us how to rinse the contacts.  He pronounced the word rinse like the word wrench.  We’ve laughed about that for years.

I remember reminiscing about that day through the years, but it was usually with Karen.  But Karen is not with us any longer to reminisce with.  This made me think of her a bit more this week.  She passed away on April 8, 2020, from Multiple Systems Atrophy at the age of 63 years, 4 months, and 6 days.  (Not 5 months as I erroneously wrote last year!)  When I was planning on writing this post, I realized that the 50th Anniversary of the Contacts (no I did not make a cake or have a party!) was falling at the same time as when I reach the age that Karen was when she died.  So now I have outlived both of my ‘older’ sisters.  I’ve actually lived longer than all three of my sisters.  But with Jamie, it’s just that I was born before her.  I hope she outlives me.  

The other thing I remember about that long ago day in March was that I could see so much more clearly.  The pink azaleas were in bloom at the time, and they were so pretty in front of all the houses along North Cutting in my hometown of Jennings, Louisiana.  They are not quite in full bloom yet this year.  But it won’t be long.  You’ll see.  I will, too… with the help of my contacts!

Keys Family Reunion 2024

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2024 Keys Family Reunion

Calling all Keys!  Calling all Keys cousins.  It is time for a reunion!  Definitely time.  The reunion this year will be on June 15, 2024, starting at 10:00.  It will be held in Hathaway (Raymond), Louisiana, at the St. Lawrence Catholic Church.  That’s right.  This year it is at the Catholic church.  The last few times it was at the Methodist Church right across the street.  So if you know how to get to the previous reunion, all you’ll have to do is show up at the place across the street to the south.  The physical address is 5505 Pine Island Highway.  It’s at the crossroads of Pine Island Highway and Raymond Highway.

As you can see by the flyer, the festivities begin at 10:00.  As usual we are encouraged to bring food to share for the covered dish feast.  That will commence around noontime.  The forenoon will be for socializing and sharing old family photos.  Wait!  It doesn’t say that.  But I am.  I want to see any interesting old family photo, especially ones that I don’t have yet.  How can I continue writing posts about old family photos if I run out of them?  We’ve got to keep it going!  You can also bring a door prize.  If enough people bring one, it’ll be like a Christmas gift exchange.

Painting of Martha Cook Keys circa 1865 in England

One thing I wanted to point out is that this is an anniversary year.  It was 130 years ago that Martha Ann Cook Keys had a party at her house for friends and family.  The local Jennings paper reported that the party was a hit and “enjoyed by all present.”  It was just seven years after she had immigrated with her five children to Louisiana.  They came from the London area of England and moved to get away from the increasing crime at the time. Her husband Henry Keys had talked about the family coming to America and was planning on doing just that.  But sadly, he died at just 63 years old.  That’s the same age that I am!  

So it was quite an accomplishment for Martha to follow through with the plan and bring the family to a new place to live.  She was very motivated to come here and it is said that she never regretted her decision.  She loved her new home in America.  I’m not talking about the house she built.  I’m talking about the country that she felt welcomed by.  Perhaps that was the reason for the party in 1894.  She and her five children had made a home in America.  

At that time, none of her children had married yet.  The oldest was only 24 years old.  Martha didn’t live long enough to see any of them marry or have children.  She died in 1896 at the age of 59.  It wasn’t until 1900 that the first one was married.  That was my great grandmother Daisy Keys who married Harry Clifton Phenice.  Her younger sister Ruth followed suit less than a year later.  Eventually, all of the children were married and started having children.  Altogether, the five children had over thirty children between them.

I’m excited about this photo that I put together.  It was just last week that I did the same with my Landry grandfather’s family.  This time it is a grouping of the photos of all five of Henry and Martha’s children – Henry “The Judge” (1870-1950), Leonard (1873-1959), Daisy (1876-1952), Ruth (1879-1967), and Mabel (1881-1962).  I’ve posted a photo of the three sisters together previously.  Those three images come from the same photo.  I got a photo of Leonard from Carolyn, the daughter of Edith Keys Segraves.  Edith was the one who wrote the amazing book about the Cook and Keys family.  

So tonight I was wanting to have all five of the families represented, because I want to encourage descendants of all of them to show up for the reunion.  I didn’t have a good photo of the oldest son “The Judge.”  I was looking through the old book by Edith Segraves and found one of him.  It was a grainy old photo, but I had hopes of improving it with the great software that is available nowadays.  I worked on it a while and I am satisfied with it.  It goes well with the rest of them.  And now I have a group photo of all five of the Keys immigrant children.  The ancestors of all of us Keys relatives who will be attending this reunion.

Behold!

Henry Alfred “The Judge”, Leonard James, Daisy Henrietta Martha, Rosetta “Ruth”, and Mabel Olive Keys circa 1894-1899.

 

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