Category: Patureau

The Pierre Patureau Collection – Ferdinand and Emma’s Children

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Beginning of the list of the children of Ferdinand Patureau and Emma Landry.

Sometimes, after I have decided on a topic for some of my posts, I’m tempted to apologize for not having something glamorous or exciting to post.  But then I tell myself that if they don’t want to read it, they don’t have to.  There is information that I come across that I find important, so I want to share it.  When I find myself referring back to different documents or pages of information often, I figure other people may find it beneficial as well.  And who knows, they may notice something in it that I skim right over.  

That thing this week is a list of the children of Ferdinand and Emma Patureau in the back of an old work ledger.  The pages come from the Pierre Patureau Collection at the Tyrrell Historical Library in Beaumont, Texas.  The collection reference number is AC-824. I visited it over a year ago and took hundreds of photos of the pages, letters, and photos.  The photos are my favorite things from the collection.  How could they not be?  I’ve shared a few of those amazing old photos of various family members from over 100 years ago.

But I’ve scoured this list for as many details as I can figure out.  It’s a bit tricky for me, because it is in French.  The list includes my great great grandparents Ferdinand Patureau and Marie Emma Landry Patureau and all of their children.  And they had a lot of children!  I thought all of them had been born in Plaquemine, Louisiana, except for my great grandfather Vincent Maximilian “Max” Patureau.  I’ve always known that Grampa Max was born in Mexico.  He was born there during the Civil War when the Patureau family went there to get away from the fighting in Louisiana.  Well, the list showed that a few of their other children were born other places as well.  Nothing as exotic as Mexico, mind you, but they were not all born in Plaquemine.

If you look at the very first line on the page, you’ll see what I’m talking about.  “Zulma Patureau est nee le 5 mai 1848 a 3 1/2 heure du matais. A Brule Landing W. B. Rouge, Louisiane.”  See?  She was born in West Baton Rouge Parish, not Iberville.  So she was born in Brusly on May 5, 1848, at 3:30 in the morning.  So when Ferdinand and Emma first got married, they lived in Emma’s hometown.  She was born in St. Gabriel, but the family moved to West Baton Rouge Parish shortly after.  The next two children of Ferdinand and Emma – Aline and Leobon – were also born in Brusly.

Leobon was born on August 20, 1851, and the family moved to Plaquemine before the birth of their next child Marie Valentine in July of 1853.  There is an entry for her death as well and it was just over a year later.  Elizabeth Palmyre is listed next.  She was born in 1855 and died in 1870.  This entry makes me think this list was written over the years of when the children were born (and died).  I say this because the ink color is different, and it looks like they went back to it 15 years later when she died.  Marie Valentine was born and had died before the next one came along.  It all looks like one entry.  It’s not the same for Elizabeth Palmyre.  It must have been either Ferdinand or Emma writing this information.

The list continues with the entries of Marie Zelica in 1857 and Ferdinand Pierre Jr. in 1858.  F.P. Jr. has a footnote that shows his death on June 25, 1862.  Yes, it says 1862, while the tombstone in Plaquemine shows 1860.  If you want to know which one is correct, look at what one of his parents wrote.  It is written as 1862.  And not only that, the year is underlined to emphasize that year.  I just changed it on my family tree.  

At the bottom of the page is the entry for Anne Emma born in 1860.  I’ve seen her name written as Anna Emma as well.  She died in 1874 after a jump-roping incident.  I don’t see that listed.  There is something about Chalet and July 23 written below her entry, but I don’t know what it is about.  In the left margin, reading from bottom to top, there is an entry for Ferdinand Pierre Patureau who was born in LaRoche Chalais in France in 1826.  Above that is listed the birth date for Emma Landry in Iberville Parish (St. Gabriel) in 1829.  Between their entries is a smaller entry for Emma’s mother Zerbine Dupuy in W. Baton Rouge Parish in 1807.

Second page of the list of the children of Ferdinand Patureau and Emma Landry.

On the second page of the list, the children continue.  Surely you didn’t think eight children would be enough!  We haven’t even gotten to Grampa Max yet.  Ignore the first few lines on the page.  That’s just a reference to an uncle of our Pierre Patureau (1800-1860).  Uncle Pierre Patureau (1774-1827) fought under Napoleon in the late 1790s and received a Legion of Honor Award in 1814.  The list continues with more children born in Plaquemine.  Joseph Onesime was born in January of 1862 and died six months later.  According to this list, Ferdinand Pierre, Jr. and Joseph Onesime died only eight days apart.  It must have been a sad time for the household of Ferdinand and Emma.  I wonder if there was some disease going around at that time?

The last of the pre-Mexico Plaquemine births was next.  Rose Elisa was born in 1863.  She lived to be almost 77 years old.  Only her older sister Aline lived longer.  She made it a month past her 77th birthday.  I don’t know the exact details of why or when the family moved to Mexico.  Some family researchers said it was to get away from the fighting of the Civil War.  Others say it was to pursue a business venture connected to the French ruling in Mexico at the time.  Ferdinand’s sister Victorine Patureau Laulom is said to have moved to a border town in Texas at the time.  Victorine’s daughter Eliza Laulom married Vicente Crixell (rhymes with Michelle) in Texas in 1864.  She gave birth to a son in 1865 in the same area of Mexico where Grampa Max was born that same year.  I do know that the family moved back to Plaquemine later that year.  

And still the children kept appearing.  Pierre Oscar was born in 1866.  Joseph Alcide was born in 1868.  Omer Abel was born in 1870.  The last child was born in 1873.  Her name was Marie Victorine and she was the one that started collecting all of the family information that ended up in the Pierre Patureau Collection.  Ferdinand and Emma were pretty prolific.  Many of their children were as well.  There were over 70 grandchildren of Ferdinand and Emma.  Large families seem to have been a family tradition.  There are over 1000 descendants of Ferdinand and Emma at this point.

And it all started from this little list of children.

The Mystery Of V. M. Patureau

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V. M. Patureau circa 1885 in Plaquemine, Louisiana

Just what is that outfit that my great grandfather Vincent Maximilian Patureau is wearing?  I posted a smaller version of this photo last year.  The photo comes from the phenomenal collection of Patureau memorabilia that I perused last year.  That would be the Pierre Pautureau Collection at the Tyrrell Historical Library in Beaumont, Texas.  (The identifier for this collection is AC-824.)  Pierre Patureau was the grandfather of Vincent Maximilian, thus making him my great great great grandfather.   Pierre and his wife Rose Machet immigrated from France in 1840 and there are now over a thousand descendants of them in Louisiana, Texas, and a few other states.

I descend from Pierre and Rose’s son Ferdinand.  He was married to Marie Emma Landry, and they were the parents of Vincent Maximilian, who I usually refer to as Grampa Max.  But look at him in this photo.  He doesn’t look like a grandfather.  The photo was taken around 1885.  Max was a young man of 20 in 1885.  He was born in Mexico, but the family returned to Louisiana that same year and settled in the Plaquemine area.

1876 newspaper article in Plaquemine, Louisiana

When the family came back to Louisiana, one of the things that Ferdinand did to make money was install and repair lightning rods.  It seems such an unusual thing to do, but I suppose you can make money doing that, especially if you overcharge!  The only reason I say that is because of a newspaper article from 1876 claiming that about F. P. Patureau.  The article was talking about parish government overspending.  Surely, they didn’t know what they were talking about!  Our forefather would do no such thing!

Ferdinand also had his own sawmill, so I don’t know why he would still be going around installing lightning rods.  Tragedy struck in 1877 when Ferdinand had a terrible accident in his sawmill and died the next day.  I believe Emma and their oldest son Leobon kept the sawmill going for a while after that.  Later it was co-owned with someone named Bixler.  At some point Max was involved in the sawmill, but he also did a variety of other things.  In a newspaper article from 1885, it says that Max accidently cut himself on his right knee while he was shaving barrel hoops.  But don’t be concerned – it was a “painful but not dangerous wound.”

1887 news article from the Iberville South newspaper in Plaquemine, Louisiana.

Then in 1887, Max set himself up with a local grocer to deliver groceries to customer’s homes.  An article says that there is no charge for delivery.  He must have had a deal with that grocer.  The person writing the article thought highly of Max and said that he “can be relied upon to do what he says.” In 1888 VMP advertised in the local paper.  He stated that he was available for installing or repairing lightning rods after a recent storm caused damage to existing ones.  So two generations of Patureau men were involved with the business of lightning rods.  Later that year he was married to Marie Therese Landry.

The following year he advertised for both grocery-related work and lightning rod related work.  I know the grocery or retail business involvement continued for a while, because he co-owned a store on Patureau Lane from 1904 to around 1909.  After that he was mostly known as a veterinarian.  He was also involved with the group Woodsmen of the World.

While I find it interesting to see what Grampa Max was up to in those early years of his life, none of it helps me to solve this mystery.  I don’t think there’s a uniform for grocery workers that calls for epaulets on the shoulders of the outfit.  Even more so in the case of a lightning rod installer!  There might be a uniform related to the Woodsmen of the World group, but I haven’t seen such a thing.

When I searched for Woodsmen of the World uniforms, I clicked on a few links and found some uniforms very similar to the one worn by VMP in this photo.  I don’t think they were WOW uniforms, because most of those had the initials W.O.W. embroidered on the collar.  It looked like they were for military colleges.  I don’t know of any military colleges in or around Plaquemine, so I don’t know what this uniform is for.

I hope I will be able to figure it out.  In the meantime, we continue with the mystery.  If you are able to help in solving this mystery, I would appreciate any help I can get.  I’ll even give credit to anyone who can help me out.  Is that good enough motivation?  I hope so.

Pee Paw and Uncle Sidney

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Robert Joseph “Rob” Landry, Sr. and Sidney Cary circa 1930.

I decided to write about my paternal grandfather today.  I thought about posting a photo of him from World War I, but only one of those photos caught my eye and it will take more editing than I have time for.   As I was scrolling through the old photos from the Tin Can Collection, this photo called my name.  So Thanks, Tricia, for sharing the contents of that wonderful tin can found in the attic.  I’m so glad Aunt Wana treasured these items and didn’t destroy them or throw them away.  (I’ve heard horror stories.  Not about Aunt Wana!  Heavens, no.  The horror stories were about people throwing away old family photos.)

This is a photo of my dad’s dad.  My dad was Robert Joseph “Bob” Landry, Jr. and as you might suspect, his father’s name was Robert Joseph Landry, Sr.  He was known as Rob or Pappy by his family and friends.  His eight children called him Papa and his multitude of grandchildren called him Pee Paw.  He was born on January 9, 1893, in Westlake, Louisiana.  He died on August 28, 1957, in Lake Charles.

The great thing about this photo is that the name of the two individuals was written on the back – “Robt. Landry + Sidney Cary.” The main connection between the two of them is that they were married to two Patureau sisters from Plaquemine.  My grandmother was Germaine Erie Patureau and the sister in question was Frances Lorena Patureau.  They both went by their middle names.  Actually “Sidney” was Uncle Sidney’s middle name as well.  His first name was Samuel.

Lorena Patureau & Sidney Cary circa 1920.  We can thank cousin Sis for this old photo of her aunt and uncle.

Sidney and Lorena were married in 1916.  They had a daughter named Marie Therese in 1917 who I think died in infancy.  I don’t have any information about her except for her name.  They didn’t have any other children.  Rob and Erie got married in 1921 and the first of their eight kids was born in 1923.  So the photo of Rob and Sidney was taken some time between 1921 and 1936.  1936 was the year that Sidney died at the age of 47.  The photo was taken in the back of Pee Paw and Mee Maw’s house.  It looks like it was taken around the time of 1930 or so.  I kinda like this photo of the two brothers-in-law.

I don’t really know much about Uncle Sidney.  That’s probably because he died when my dad was just a kid.  I don’t remember hearing any stories about him.  But I do remember Aunt Lorena.  I remember going to her house in Opelousas and I have some vivid memories of going to her funeral in 1972.  Remember?  I’ve told y’all about that before!  I somewhat regret that I didn’t post a remembrance of her on the 50th anniversary of her death on August 17, 2022.  But if you remember, I was busy recalling the events leading up to the 70th anniversary of my parents’ wedding.

When you start looking into the history of your family, you come across many dates that are important in the lives of so many people.  I can’t comment on all of them, but sometimes I see some that I try to remember.  Just tonight in looking through the information about the people I’ve been talking about, I came across two important dates.  I’ve mentioned both of them.  The one concerning the 50th anniversary of Aunt Lorena’s death was overlooked by me.  I’m hoping I won’t forget the other one.  It’s just a month away.  You may have noticed the date when I mentioned it earlier.  The 130th anniversary of my grandfather’s birth will be on January 9th.

So be patient.  It will be here before you know it.  In the meantime, I plan to have three other posts for you to read.  Aren’t you the lucky ones?!

Erie Giving Haircut

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Two years ago I wrote a post about homemade haircuts and in that post I featured my maternal grandmother Myrtle Phenice Bucklin (known to my generation as Grandma).  It was partly an encouragement to people that even if they had to have a homemade haircut during the pandemic, they would survive.  I do my duty when needs call.  The name of that post was “Myrtle Giving Haircut.”  I even followed it up with a photo of myself cutting one of my cousins’ hair.

Last year I was going to write a followup to that post with a photo of my paternal grandmother Germaine Erie Patureau Landry (known to my generation as Mee Maw).  I decided against it at the time because another photo called my name.  But I always planned on posting a photo or two of Mee Maw showing off her scissor skills.  And now I’m following through with that plan.

My cousin was fortunate enough to have our Mee Maw (Germaine Erie Patureau Landry) give him a haircut.

This is a  photo of Mee Maw cutting the hair of one of her grandchildren.  If I had to guess, I would say this is my cousin Kenny.  He looks pretty young in the photo, so it could be his first haircut.  That would be a particularly photo-worthy event.  And even though it looks like he is the center of attention for this photo, the central figure in this story is our dear sweet Mee Maw. 

The photo was taken in Lake Charles, Louisiana, out the back door at my grandparents’ home.  If you could see a little further to the left on this photo, you’d see the rest of the steps and the corner of the house.  Around that corner you would find a ladder leaning up against the house going up to the second floor.  I’m not sure why it was there, but you can see it in many photos.  I need to post one of those photos soon.  I don’t think I’ve shared one of that ladder yet.

My cousin is sitting in a highchair with some artwork on the back of it.  It looks like a little person with wings, but it doesn’t look like an angel.  I don’t recognize it from anything. Then on the tray part of the highchair is a box or a book with some writing on it.  I’m not sure what that is either.  Oh, wait!  I just found out what it is.  I did an online search for Drene Diapers.  That’s what it looked like to me.  But what came up from the search was Drene Shampoo, which makes much more sense!  It also showed an ad for Drene from 1954 that says that this new synthetic shampoo had silkening magic!  Wow, Mee Maw wanted to make sure her grandchildren had the best!  Silky, shiny hair for everyone.

My Mee Maw was the best!  I think I was her favorite!

The Patureau Family After 1864

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Grampa Max – Vincent Maximilian Patureau circa 1890.

Don’t worry, this is not a detailed history of the Patureau family since 1864.  That would take way too long and way too much space.  This is just a continuation of a post that I wrote at the end of last year called The Patureau Family Photo Circa 1864.  I’m actually surprised that it was that long ago that I posted the photo.  It seems like I just recently posted it.  In that post I talked about the Ferdinand and Emma Landry Patureau family in 1864.  That’s who was in the photo.  It was before they had my great grandfather Vincent Maximilian – AKA Grampa Max. 

Pierre Oscar Patureau on Sept. 11, 1888

But he wasn’t the only one that hadn’t been born yet.  They had five more children and they all lived into adulthood.  The first one was our Max, followed by Pierre Oscar, Joseph Alcide, Abel Omer, and Marie Victorine.  They all went by their middle names.  Almost all of their children did.  What’s up with that?  That 1864 photo of the family came from the Pierre Patureau Collection at the Tyrrell Historical Library in Beaumont, Texas.  That collection originated from the youngest daughter of Ferdinand and Emma – Victorine. 

Joseph Alcide Patureau circa 1890

Victorine must have started that collection early.  I’m pretty sure I read somewhere that she started in the 1890s.  She got married in May of 1892 when she was 18 years old.  She was married just a few months after the death of  Emma. (Ferdinand had died in 1877.) One of the things she must have gotten around this time was the bed that I am now in the possession of.  When she and Willie Cropper first got married, they lived in Plaquemine – possibly at the old Patureau home.  They moved to White Castle around 1899 and lived there for a few years.  She must have had some of these old photos and the bed with her then, because if she hadn’t, they would have been destroyed by a fire. On March 18, 1900, there was a large fire that destroyed all of the buildings on the Patureau property.  I wonder if there was other furniture that had come from France with the family?  I only know about the bed and I’ve only known about it for about four years.

Abel Omer Patureau circa 1890.

That collection of photos, letters, and such was passed down to Victorine’s daughter and then to her granddaughter.  Then it was donated to the Tyrrell Historical Library.  Besides having the photo of the Patureau family in 1864, there were several individual photos of the family members.  I already had the photo of Grampa Max, but I did get these other photos of his brothers Pierre Oscar, Joseph Alcide, and Abel Omer.  You may recognize Alcide and Omer from the old photos of Kelly’s String Band.  They were both members.  I like these photos of the younger Patureau brothers.  I can definitely detect a family resemblance.  The oldest brother Louis Leobon was fifteen to twenty years older than these brothers.

The ironic thing is that in that wonderful collection of family photos that was started by Victorine, I was not able to find one good photo of Victorine herself.  I should clarify that and say that I didn’t find any photos that were identified as Victorine.  There were some unidentified photos that could have been her.  Oh, yeah, and then there is the one of her when she was no longer alive.  There is a photo of her in her casket. It’s actually a nice, clear photo.  It’s an open casket with several sprays of flowers surrounding it and a gleaming cross beside it.  I’m just not a fan of postmortem photos.  Call it a quirk of mine.

So I would appreciate it if someone could share a photo of Victorine with me if you have one.  Preferably young and alive.  Old and alive would acceptable.  The only prerequisite is that it was taken when she was upright and breathing.

Star Social Club Initial Ball of 1902

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That title seems like a mouthful, but it says what the topic of this post is pretty well.  The only thing it doesn’t tell you is that the event took place in Plaquemine, Louisiana.  To be a bit more accurate, it was in Crescent, Louisiana, a small community down the bayou from Plaquemine.  Someone posted some information about the Star Social Club on the Plaquemine Facebook group a few weeks ago.  I had to make a comment about it because my great grandfather Vincent Maximilian “Max” Patureau was one of the founding members of the club about 120 years ago.  My paternal grandmother Erie Patureau was just a young girl at the time.  She was one of Grampa Max and Gramma Marie Therese’s ten children at the time.

Invitation from 1902 to the home of Mr. V. M. Patureau

I wasn’t the only one who commented.  There were a few comments that were kind of interesting, but then I came across an amazing one.  It had this old invitation or ticket to the event from the initial ball for the Star Social Club in 1902.  That’s what you see here.  Of course I commented on this old piece of memorabilia with a reference to my very own Mr. V. M. Patureau.

Surprisingly, I heard back from the person in possession of the card and he said that he wanted to give it to me.  I told him I’d happily accept it!  He got it from a friend who found it in some of his old family papers.  I suppose the name V. M. Patureau didn’t mean as much to them as it does to me.  So I told him my address and now the invitation is mine.  Thanks, Mike C!

Article from the May 24, 1902, Weekly Iberville South.

Of course I had to look to see if I could find out the date of this “initial” ball.  Tommy Landry was my grandmother’s first cousin, and in his book about the Landry family, he had an invitation from a December 27, 1902, ball for the club.  So I figured the initial ball was probably from the year before.  After looking through that book, I looked at some old newspaper clippings that I had saved.  It didn’t take me long to find out the date.

In this newspaper article from the Iberville South in May 1902, it gives the date of the initial ball as May 24, 1902.  It, too, mentions that the event took place at the home of my great grandfather.  So it looks like there were two balls in 1902.  I don’t know if they had two balls every year or not.  I suppose it could be that they decided to have two that year because they had actually built the Star Club Hall during that year.  The invitation for the December ball says that it was in the hall.  I’m thinking it was newly completed and they wanted to celebrate that with a ball.  Why not?

But that first ball must have been special.  There probably was a bit of excitement in the air at the Patureau household that third week in May of 1902.  I’m pretty sure their house wasn’t very old at the time.  I saw some writing recently that talked about a large fire that destroyed all of the buildings on the Patureau homestead on March 18, 1900.  It’s a good thing the Patureau bed was with Max’s younger sister Victorine, or it might have been destroyed as well.

So the Patureau home was a newish two years old at most.  I wonder if little 7-year-old Erie Patureau was excited about having a ball occur at her childhood home?  It seems likely that she would have.  The event was the talk of the community.  It was in the local paper after all!  Besides the piece of the newspaper you see here, there was another reference to it on the same page.  It said that the Club would be entertaining that night and that  “No doubt the affair will be a pleasant one.”  I’m sure the family was making sure their home looked the very best for the event.  There was to be dancing and eating and socializing and much merriment.

It makes me think about the scene of the ball from “The Sound of Music.”  Not that the ball in little Crescent would be as grand as that one.  The main part I think about is when the children in the movie sing “So Long, Farewell” as they head off to bed.  I picture little Erie singing, “Adieu, to you, and you and you and you…”  I’m sure that did not happen, but I still think it must have been a memorable event from her childhood.

On left is the Patureau home and on the right is the Star Social Club Hall. I’m not sure who all the people are. This is looking south down Patureau Lane.

A Patureau Keepsake: The Bed From France

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The Patureau family bed has a new home.

I decided to include this post in my Keepsake series, but it is really much, much more than that.  It is the amazing Patureau heirloom that I have hinted at in a few of my previous posts.  It has a long and much-traveled history in my family.  Not that I was aware of any of that history until rather recently.  And I never would have dreamed that I would come to be in possession of such an heirloom. 

There is so much to say about the whole experience of finding out about the bed, being offered the bed, and getting the bed in working order.  And it was definitely not an altogether pleasant experience.  It’s a good thing it has such a powerful story behind it, because I wouldn’t want to go through everything I went through for just any old bed.

And old it is.  This is the bed that Pierre Patureau and Rose Machet brought with them from la Roche Chalais, France, when they moved their family to Louisiana in September of 1840.  How is that for pedigree?  It is a bed that my great great great grandparents brought to the United States when they immigrated.  It must have been a treasured item for them to haul this with them across the Atlantic Ocean. 

So when Pierre died on April 21, 1860, at around 1 o’clock a.m., it is likely that he was lying in this bed when he died.  We don’t know that for sure.  I haven’t found any story about that.  But there is some lore that has followed the bed through the years.  It is said that his son Ferdinand died in the bed in 1877 after he had been injured in an accident in his sawmill.  Ferdinand’s widow Emma Landry Patureau died in 1892 in Plaquemine and it is possible that she died in the bed as well.  I’m thinking that at that point the bed was passed down to Ferdinand and Emma’s youngest daughter Victorine Patureau Cropper.  As I have shared with you recently, she had collected a large amount of Patureau photos and other memorabilia.  She and her husband Willie Cropper moved to the Beaumont, Texas, area around 1903 and the bed must have gone there along with them.  It stayed with that family line for the next 100 years or so.

Victorine had an older brother named Max.  He had married Marie Therese Landry in 1888 and by 1903 they had a somewhat large family.  I don’t know if their daughter Erie Patureau knew about that family bed all those years ago when it left her hometown and made its way to Texas.  She grew up and married a Landry of her own – Robert Joseph Landry.  Their third son was known as Bob Landry.  He grew up and did not marry a Landry or a Patureau – he married outside the family!  Their third son was born in 1960.  That would be me, and I was not aware of that bed for most of my life.

But then I heard a hint of it at some time before 2018.  I’m not sure what I heard or who I heard it from, but I was intrigued to see if I could find out more.  In April of 2018 I had a new DNA match at Ancestry.  Her name was Jo Ann and she had a Cropper from Beaumont in her family tree.  I knew immediately that it was a Patureau connection.  I sent her a note saying that I knew who she was and I hoped we could share family information.  The only photo I had (and still have) of Victorine Patureau is an old Xerox copy of a photo.  I was hoping to possibly get a better copy of that photo.  I told her I was willing to share any information or copies of any photo that I have.  I always ask this because you never know who has what out there.  I assumed that I would have more family information and/or memorabilia than she had.  In most cases I would be right.  In this case I was thoroughly and completely wrong.  Wrong, wrong, wrong. 

She wrote back quickly and one of the first things she mentioned was that she had the old Patureau family bed that came from France and Ferdinand had died in.  I was excited to hear about that and wrote to her, “Sometimes my blog post is about keepsakes in the different family lines.  That one would be really amazing.”  So I asked her for a photo of the bed.  That’s all I asked for.  I wanted to write this story about an old Patureau family bed that was still in the family.  She has shared a lot of great old family photos with me since then.  I have shared some of those on different blogs and still have a few more photos to share.  Some of my best photos have come from her.  But she did not send me a photo of the bed … until later.

Fast forward to October 28, 2021.  That week I had been caught in the middle of a discussion between Patureau family members about the Patureau tomb in Plaquemine.  It was getting worked on and some people were not happy with the progress or the steps that were being taken.  From what I saw, they were all coming from a place of concern for the final resting place of their Patureau kin.  So I wrote a post that night called “Passionate for Patureau” and talked about the many people through the years who had an interest in Patureau family history.

The very next day Jo Ann wrote to me and offered the bed to me.  She said that she didn’t have room for it and no one in her family wanted it.  She wanted to keep in the family and could tell that I was interested in family history.  She told me that the bed posts were 8 feet tall each.  She didn’t have a mattress, but the bed was not quite full size.  We live in an old house with tall ceilings, so we thought it would work.  We agreed to take the bed sight unseen.   I asked her again about the photo of the bed, and this time she was able to find it and send it to me.  I thought it was very impressive looking.  Come to find out, the bed was in storage in Hammond, which is not that far away.

The bed when we first got it to the house. It was missing the pieces to hold it together. It needed some TLC.

So we decided to go get the bed.  We found out that the family members who had the bed were not feeling well so they could possibly have Covid.  That wasn’t going to stop us.  We went to get the bed the day after Christmas.  We also got Covid.  At first I thought it was slowing me down from putting the bed together, but it was a minor delay in what turned into a drawn out effort.

The bed is held together with threaded rods that pass through the bed posts and into the rails that have a connector set into the wood.  The threaded bolts did not come with the bed parts.  Also the top part of the headboard is a separate piece that is called a mattress roller.  It is the rounded piece sitting atop the flat veneered part.  You can see in this photo that part of the scroll is missing on the left side of the mattress roller.  Jo Ann found that piece and sent it to me.  I glued it back together.

I also went to a specialty hardware store and had some bolts cut to size for joining the bed together.  When I tested the different sized bolts to see what size fits, I shouldn’t have been surprised that the size that fit was a metric size M10.  It’s a European sizing system.  That agreed with the story of it coming from France.

After working on getting some of the bed pieced together, we had a Patureau cousin come over to try to get it all put together finally.  Thanks, Byron!  That was toward the end of February.  After scratching a few walls, breaking the fireplace mantel in the room, and almost getting crushed by the massive bedposts, we got the bed put together.  But it was not stable whatsoever.  One of the main problems was that the side rails were warped, so the posts did not stand up straight.  I had noticed that when I had the posts laying on the ground.  Plus some of the connectors would not take the threaded rods and hold together firmly.  It was an accident waiting to happen.  We didn’t want to stand near it, much less try to put a mattress on it. 

So we got professional help.  Mr. L. came and got the bed and brought it to his shop.  All I wanted done was to get the bed stabilized and ready to put a mattress on it.  He pointed out how the side rails were warped and the connectors were stripped.  He said that he’d have to replace them.  He would use new wood on the side rails, but cap it with the old wood that was there previously.  I agreed, because I wanted the bed to be sturdy.  He had asked if I wanted to repair the dings and rough spots on the bed and I said, “No.  I want it to look the same.  It’s an old bed.” 

After a while we got some progress pictures and I was not too happy to see a photo with posts that were sanded and later stained.  Not too happy at all.  But it was already done and the bed was still the bed that my family had brought from France all of those years ago.  Mr. L. said that the bed had probably been a rope bed, which was before box springs came into use.  He estimated the bed to be from around 1800.  So it probably has been in the Patureau family for almost 222 years.  He did a great job of stabilizing the bed and it looks really good.  It is not the way I had wanted it to look, but I can’t always get things my way.  Other people have said it looks so much better.  It is a beautiful bed.

We finally got it back to our house on July 20.  I’m still amazed by the bed.  We measured the bed and had a custom mattress made.  So much for it being a free bed!  While waiting for the mattress, we put a mattress topper on the bed.  I fell asleep on it for a short nap that day.  Last weekend the mattress came in and we were finally able to get the bed made up and ready for guests.  What a piece of history.

And to think:  all I really wanted was to have a photo of the thing!

Another view of the bed.

The Real Photo of Ferdinand Patureau Circa 1875

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I’m pretty sure this is a drawing of the original photo that was taken around 1875.

For the longest time I’ve been aware of a “photo” of my great great grandfather Ferdinand Pierre Patureau.  A horrible version of the photo was used back in the 1990s as an invitation to Patureau family members to come together for a reunion.  The image was a Xerox copy of a copy of a drawing of a photo.  At least that’s what it looked like to me.  But it didn’t stop people from coming to the reunion and claiming that they were related to old Ferdinand.  The scan of the the image I have here is not as bad as the one used for the reunion.  In fact, I cleaned it up and restored it as best I could.  It was better than nothing.

Then a few years ago I got a better copy of the image from my dad’s first cousin Sis of the Patureau line.  I don’t know where she got her version, because it was definitely better than the one I had.  That one had already been edited.  I think some of the programs that restore photos use some type of algorithm that makes an image look more like a photographic image.  I think that’s what happened to this one.  I was thinking that it was a photo.  It was close enough to his likeness that I was able to recognize him in other photos.

Ferdinand Pierre Patureau in a photo from around 1875 in southern Louisiana.

Last November I went to the Pierre Ferdinand Patureau Collection (AC-824) at the Tyrrell Historical Library in Beaumont, Texas.  I’ve shared some of the photos from that collection already.  My favorite photo from that collection is the Patureau family photo from 1864.  There is no question about that.  It is a definite favorite.  It is a photo of Ferdinand Pierre Patureau with his wife Marie Emma Landry Patureau and their children up to that point in time.  Even though it was before my great grandfather Vincent Maximilian Patureau (Grampa Max) had been born, it’s still my favorite.  Then there are runner-ups to that photo.  The real photo of Ferdinand Patureau is one of them.

As you can see in the photo, he looks a bit different.  Yet you can still tell that it is the same person.  He’s got the high forehead, the thin goatee, and the curly hair around his ears.  Another thing that makes me think the other image is a drawing is the detail shown in the clothes.  The lapel of the jacket is outlined, and the white tie outline keeps it from blending in with the shirt he was wearing.  I wondered if it might have been a crayon treatment of an old photo.

Mirror versions of the two sides of Ferdinand’s face. A very different look from one side to the other.

But then I realized what the main difference is.  His face is very asymmetrical in the photo.  Most people have slight differences on the two sides of their faces.  You’ll notice it more when you look at mirrored images.  There is even an app that will show you what you’d look like with one side or the other.  There’s an app for everything!  So it looks like the old drawing was almost an idealized version of the better looking side of his face.  You’d think that while they were at it, they could have drawn him with a hint of a smile on his face!

I’m not exactly sure of when the photo was taken.  He was born in LaRoche Chalais, France, on October  27, 1826.  He died in Plaquemine, Louisiana, on February 25, 1877, after having a terrible accident in his sawmill.  He looks older than he did in the 1864 photo, so I estimate that the photo was taken in 1875.  It was probably taken in Plaquemine.

I’m glad this old photo is being preserved in the collection in Beaumont.  Even though it’s not my favorite, I still like it a lot.

Our Myrtle the Student: Year One

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I thought I’d follow up last week’s post about my paternal grandmother in school with the same kind of post about my maternal grandmother.  After I found those photos of my paternal grandmother Erie Patureau at SLI (Southwestern Louisiana Institute in Lafayette), I decided to look for something similar for my maternal grandmother Myrtle Phenice. That’s because I knew that they had both gone to the same school and became teachers after they graduated.  They were not there at the same time, because Erie Patureau was eleven years older than Myrtle Phenice.

First year class of SLI in 1926 includes my grandmother Myrtle Phenice.

So I looked and I found.  There was a scanned copy of the 1926 yearbook from SLI, or L’Acadien as it was called.  On page 54 of the book was a photo of the first year class.  I’ve looked through the photo and have not been able to pick her out of the group of students.  The class membership certainly increased since the time that Erie was a student!  I know she is in the class, because she is listed in the class a few pages later.

When I was looking through these yearbooks, I found it interesting to see other names that I recognize.   In the first year class Myrtle Phenice is listed on page 58.  In the same class, but on the previous page, is listed Thornwell Fay Landry.  You probably don’t recognize the name, but I do.  I’ve shared a photo of him before, because he is my father’s first cousin.  Their fathers were brothers (Robert Joseph Landry AKA Pee Paw & Louis Joseph Landry AKA Uncle Louie).  He was also Erie’s half first cousin because their mothers were half sisters (Marie Therese Landry & Clemence Babin AKA Aunt Clem).

Naomi “Sis” Landry on bottom right.

Too bad they didn’t do individual photos for the freshman class.  I would have been excited to see a photo of my Grandma that I haven’t seen before.  They did have individual photos of the upperclassmen.  And who was in the class above them?  None other that our Landry cousin Sis.  I have mentioned her before.  She made a video about Landry family history with my dad in about 1990.  She identifies a lot of family members in some of those old family photos she had.  But her name in the book is shown as her real name Naomi Landry.  She looks pretty stylish in the photo of her.  Not the much older lady I know from the video.  She was the sister of Thornwell Fay.   So even though they were more than twenty years older than my dad, they were still first cousins.  That’s because Pee Paw was the youngest of all of his siblings.

The other person of interest that I found in the yearbook wasn’t a family member.  That’s not entirely accurate.  The person I’m talking about is Paul Edwin Marionneaux.  He was also in the sophomore class, but more importantly he is my 7th cousin.  While that seems like a pretty distant relative, his daughter is a friend of mine and we have common DNA according to 23andMe.  And even though her father is about the same age as my grandmother, she is younger than I am.

When I was growing up, I never imagined all of the connections that the older generations might have had.  Just this yearbook shows that my grandmother’s path crossed some of my dad’s cousins’ paths.  And one of those distant cousins had a daughter that I am friends with now.  Things like this make you say, “It’s a small world.”  I’m sure I’ll find more connections like this as I continue to explore my family’s history.

Our Erie the Student: Year Three

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Page 54 of the SLI yearbook from 1913 shows the third year class. My grandmother Germaine Erie Patureau is on the front row, furthest to the right. This was taken in front of the SLI main building in Lafayette, Louisiana.

It’s always exciting to me when I discover another photo of my grandmother that I have never seen before.  This one was taken over 100 years ago, so that makes it even more special.  The grandmother I’m talking about is my dad’s mother.  She was born in Crescent (near Plaquemine), Louisiana, on August 6, 1895.  Her parents were Vincent Maximilian Patureau and Marie Therese Landry.    I knew her as Mee Maw.

I wasn’t planning on writing another post with the title “Our Erie the Student,” because I didn’t know there were any other photos of Mee Maw as a student during her years at SLI in Lafayette.  The first one I posted was just called “Our Erie the Student.”  I thought it was from 1915 because it said that it was a fourth year class photo and that’s the year I thought she graduated.  But the yearbook for her fourth year photo is from 1914.  So, I went back and changed that post to reflect the correct year.  The yearbook also had a better version of the photo for that year.  I’ll have to replace the photo as well.

Page 55 from the 1913 SLI yearbook shows the names of the members of the third year class.

The second post about Mee Maw’s school years was called “Our Erie the Student Revisited.”  Both of those previous posts were written in 2019.  In the revisitation version, the photo was of the graduating class of 1915.  That one is an even better photo, because it came from an original photo that my cousin Tricia has in her Tin Can Collection. 

The photo I’m using this week is definitely the worst quality photo of the three.  But it’s a photo of our dearly beloved Mee Maw from over 100 years ago.  I can’t really complain about that!  And who knows, maybe there is a better copy of it out there that I can discover.  I’m kinda confused at how 1913 could be the photo of her third year class.  But that’s what the information on the next page says and our Erie is on the list of the members.  Other information shows that she finished high school in 1912, so how could she be in the third year already after just one year?

That’s probably because she was so smart.  She was probably one of the smartest people you’d ever likely meet.  She was just Mee Maw to me!

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