Month: April 2018

A Dash at the Bash

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I really like this old photo.  It was probably not something that was cherished, however.  It is a bit of a blurry photo.  I think it came from my second cousin Joseph Connors (his maternal grandfather Herbert Bucklin was the brother of my maternal grandfather Fred).  He found an envelope of old negatives from a special event back in the 1920s.

Oct. 3, 1926 – Grandma Sue with her family at her birthday bash.

The special event was Grandma Sue (Susan G. Stanbrough Hine, maternal grandmother of Herbert and Fred) and her good friend Jennie’s (Edessa Jane Welton Havenar, grandmother of our Keys family historian Edith Keys Segraves) joint birthday celebration.  They both had an October 3 birthday and they celebrated together with a joint celebration for at least 20 years.  I know that because there was a newspaper article about that big celebration in 1926.  There were lots of photos taken of family and friends.

You’ve already seen some of the large group photos of most of the attendees because Joseph and I have shared them previously.  Then there were a few pictures of Grandma Sue with her children and grandchildren.  And then there’s this photo.  It might have been a throwaway photo that only survived because the negatives were grouped together.

But I like the photo.  It’s a photo of the family and it includes Grandma Sue, her daughter Addie (my great grandmother), some of her sons, grandsons, and granddaughters.  The fun thing about the photo is its defect.  It’s either a double exposure with the second exposure being a long one, or it was a long exposure and people didn’t realize it.  Because you can see one of the granddaughters in two places.  You can see that she was initially standing in beside Grandma Sue and then she must have made a mad dash to get to somewhere else.

You can also see one of the Hine men (a brother of Addie) on the right is turning around to look toward the men who are talking in front of their sporty new cars.  Another granddaughter on the left with a Y type collar can be seen walking away to the left.  You can just make out some of the feet of people who have moved forward after the first exposure (or after the initial exposure.)

Meanwhile it looks like Grandma Sue hasn’t moved a bit.  It was her 75th birthday celebration after all.  She might have slowed down a little at that point.  So the picture captures more than just a split second from that day.  It captures some of the movement as well.  It’s the closest thing we have to a video or Live photo from back then.

Article from the Jennings Daily Times Record from Dec. 12, 1906

I thought I would also share an article I found that relates to this annual birthday celebration.  This is part of page 8 of the Jennings Daily Times Record from Dec. 12, 1906.  They are giving the news from the Raymond area.  The first few articles are about people I don’t know nor recognize any names.  Then there is a little blurb about some of the Hine family visiting in Jennings.

After that is some information about the weather and how it affects the farmers of the area.  It’s interesting to see what they wrote in the papers back then.  I’m glad they did, because I have been able to find some interesting articles about my family.  Like the next part of the column.

It talks about the goings on of the birthday celebration in 1906, back when Grandma Sue was just 55 years old.  Younger than I am now.  Even though the main course was oysters, which I don’t really care for, I’m sure there were other tasty items on the menu that I could have enjoyed.  It’s obvious that people were having a good time.  I suppose this was the first celebration and it was such a hit that they decided to continue with it.

I do enjoy these old photos and articles about my family.  It makes them much more personable to me.  And the photos from the birthday celebration are great because so many family members were in attendance.  Not just my Hine family, but the Bucklin, Keys, and Phenice ones as well.  A veritable family smorgasbord.

Patureau Passings

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I heard some sad news yesterday relating to the Patureau extended family.  My dad’s first cousin died.  Melwyn Mary Marionneaux Barker (1930-2018) was the daughter of Sylvie Albine Patureau Marionneaux (1903-1962).  My dad Robert Joseph “Bob” Landry, Jr. was the son of Sylvie’s sister Germaine Erie Patureau Landry (1895-1973).  Sylvie and Erie were the daughters of Vincent Maximilian “Grampa Max” Patureau (1865-1935).  Melwyn was one of the sweetest people that I have ever met.  She always had such a welcoming smile and demeanor.  I’ll miss seeing her at the Plaquemine cousin events.

The other sad thing that happened relates to a sibling of Grampa Max.  Max had an older brother named Leobon (1851-1928).  I posted a photo of the two brothers a while back.  Leobon had a son named Charles Allen Patureau (1887-1956) and on the day before Melwyn died, a son of Allen named Edward Andrew “Ned” Patureau (1933-2018) passed away as well.  He was my dad and Melwyn’s second cousin, and he seemed like a kind and gentle person.  I have read some remembrances of him that make me think he was a genuinely good person.

Ferdinand Pierre Patureau and Marie Emma Landry Patureau’s family circa 1864.

So in honor of these two wonderful people who were second cousins to each other, I’m posting a Patureau family treasure.  It’s the oldest photo that I have of the Patureau family.  It’s a photo of Max and Leobon’s Patureau family in about 1864.  Their parents were Ferdinand Pierre Patureau (1827-1877) and Marie Emma Landry Patureau (1829-1892).  This is the only photo of Emma Patureau that I know of.

It’s not the best of photos, but it’s better than nothing.  It’s actually a scan of a Xerox copy that my dad had.  I don’t know where it came from, but I’m on the lookout for a better copy. (Hooray! The original has survived and it is in a collection in Beaumont, Texas.  In case you were wondering, you are not seeing the terrible Xerox copy, you’re seeing the new improved photo. Updated 1/16/2022) That’s why I put off using the photo before.  But for this occasion I thought I’d share it.  I did work on Emma’s face and the background a little, but it is a rough photo to work with. (Here is an improved version from the original that I found.)

Let me tell you a little bit (or maybe a lot!) about this family.  Emma and Ferdinand were married on Feb. 10, 1847, and she gave birth to their 16 children over a 25 year period.  Doesn’t that sound fun?!  Their first child was Elizabeth Zulma Patureau (1848-1924) who was never married.  I believe she is the older girl in the back on the right of this photo.  I have another photo of her that looks like this.  The next daughter to be born was the other older girl on the left.  Her name was Marie Aline Patureau (1849-1946) and she later married Joseph Omer Hebert.  Their son was one of the banjo players (Ferdinand Hebert) in a previous post.

The next child born was Leobon.  He is the young man standing proudly in front of his father in this photo.  This is a really big family line on its own.  Leobon and his wife Amelia Hebert (sister of Marie Aline’s husband Joseph Omer Hebert) had twelve children, including Marie Caroline Patureau Wilkinson (I posted a photo of her two weeks ago).  Since it was just two weeks ago that I talked about that DNA connection, I won’t mention all of the other DNA matches that I’ve found from this line of Patureau kin.

After Leobon came a daughter named Marie Valentine in 1853.  She lived for just over a year, so did not survive to be in this photo.  Elizabeth Palmire Patureau (1855-1870) was the next one born.  I think she is the young girl standing in the front on the right.  She is in the photo, but only lived for another six years or so.  She died at the age of 14.  After her there was an infant son that was born and died somewhere around 1856 or 1857.  Then in 1857 Mary Zelica Patureau (d. 1925) was born.  She is most likely the young girl in the front on the left.  She first married Roger Allain, but after his death she married Louis Hebert, the brother of Amelia and Joseph Omer.

The next child born was Ferdinand Pierre Patureau, Jr.  He was born in 1858 and only lived for two years.  If you are counting, that would make 8 births in 10 years (only halfway through the children) with 5 children making it past two years in age.  Modern medicine has cut down on infant mortality.  For the most part, we are better off than most of our ancestors in this respect.  This brings us to the next two children who also had short lives.

Anne Emma Patureau was born in 1860 and she survived to be in this photo.  She is the youngest girl standing next to her older brother Leobon.  She looks to be 3 or 4 years old in this photo and she only lives to be about 13 years old. The next child born was Joseph Onesime Patureau who was born in early 1862 and died about six months later.  Next came Rose Elisa Patureau (1863-1940) who lived to the respectable age of 76.  She was married to Hypolite Victor Dupuy and they had three sons and a daughter together.  She was the last child born to Ferdinand and Emma when this photo was taken.  She is the little girl in her mother Emma’s arms.

The date of this photo was determined based on the approximate ages of the children, their sexes, birth order, and how long they lived.  With the number of children increasing and decreasing through the years, the date of 1864 is the only year that seems to fit with the details of the family in the photo.  My only disappointment with the photo is that it was taken just about a year before Grampa Max was born.  I know that he was born in Mexico and I’m not sure when they moved there.  So I’m also not sure if the photo was taken in Louisiana or Mexico. (The back of the original photo I saw in 2021 shows that it was made in New Orleans, Louisiana.)

As you can figure, Vincent Maximilian was born in 1865, followed by Pierre Oscar in 1866 (-1926).  He was married to a Domitille Dupuy.  I’m sure she was related somehow to Elisa’s Hypolite, but I don’t know how closely they were related.  A lot of the information on this family line came from a DNA match at 23andMe, including a sad story that I may share with you all one day. (Here it is: Unnatural Patureau Deaths.)  After Pierre Oscar came Joseph Alcide (1868-1919), another sibling that never married.

I know you’ve been wondering when this next one would show up.  “Where is that other banjo playing Patureau?” you wanted to know.  Well here he is.  Abel Omer Patureau (1870-1917) was a member of Kelly’s String Band and was married to Eunice Constance Pefferkorn.  They had eleven children and their family group is quite large, with many living in southern Louisiana.

And finally we come to the baby of the family.  Marie Victorine (1873-1937) was married to William Albert Cropper and they had a dozen children.  They must have been competing to see who could have the most children.  I never stopped to count how many grandchildren that Ferdinand and Emma had, but I’m sure it’s a rather large number.  Victorine’s family lived in Beaumont, Texas, and a lot of the family still lives in that area.

So there it is.  The family that led to all of the Patureau descendants in southern Louisiana, including our very own Melwyn Barker and Ned Patureau.  Here’s to these two wonderful people.  May we live up to the excellent examples their lives exemplified.

An Orthographic Centennial

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“What is he writing about this time?” you may be asking yourself.  Even if I had mentioned to you what I was writing about this week, you might think that I had changed my mind.  (Or that I’m out of my mind.  Your pick.)  Last week my sister Jamie suggested the topic for this week’s post.  She said that since it was one hundred years since my maternal grandmother Myrtle Sylvia Phenice received a certificate to acknowledge her superior spelling skills, I might consider writing about that.  So I agreed.  Thus the title.

I like to have an interesting title to my posts, which I hope none of you find surprising. Otherwise I have failed miserably!  So I thought I would find a synonym for the word “spelling.”  The word that came up was “orthography.”  Orthography means “the conventional spelling system of a language.”  But I used the adjective form of the word.  In my line of work (drafting or technical drawing), the word “orthographic” has a different meaning.  It is defined as “a method of projection in which an object is depicted or a surface mapped using parallel lines to project its shape onto a plane.”  As you can tell, it is a very different meaning.

So the word has a double meaning.  And hopefully I used the adjective form of the word accurately for the title.  Because it’s supposed to mean a century full of words spelled correctly.  Wasn’t that interesting?  Aren’t words fun?  I think so, and I think my grandmother felt the same way.  She was a stickler for spelling words correctly and speaking with the proper grammar.

April 1918 – My grandmother Myrtle Phenice received recognition for her spelling prowess.

It started early for her, because one hundred years ago she was only eleven years old when she participated in the State Spelling Test.  The test occurred in March, but she didn’t receive her certificate until April.  I’m sure she was very proud of this accomplishment, otherwise we wouldn’t be looking at this old piece of paper.

And if you read it, you’ll see that she spelled five hundred words correctly.  I don’t think I ever had a spelling test with five hundred words on it.  How did they do that?  Pronounce 500 words for a large group of students while making sure that they all heard it pronounced accurately?  That sounds like a monumental task in itself!  It does say that the test was on March 28th and 29th, so I suppose it was spread out over two days.  She was in the second or third grade, so she must have been well-behaved as well.

1920 – Myrtle Phenice at it again.

As you can see from this second document, she repeated the feat two years later.  This time it was only 100 words and just one day.  But she got them all correct again!  That’s an accomplishment.

I wonder if there is a spelling gene?  A few markers in the chromosomes of people who are good spellers?  If there is, I think I got it.  I have always been a good speller, if I may say so myself.  I was looking through some old documents the other day and came across my old report cards.  I always thought that math and science were my strong subjects, but it was spelling that was the only subject I only made As in.  I don’t have any certificates to prove my point, though.

My niece Kelli is an excellent speller like her great grandmother.  She won a district spelling bee when she was in the third grade. (Let’s hear three cheers for Kelli!!!)  When I went to the Keys family reunion last summer, the topic of spelling came up.  It’s funny to hear that other family members are sticklers for incorrect spelling and grammar as well.  It’s that old question of nature vs. nurture.

Grandma was a teacher after all and I’m sure she wanted her progeny to be the best spellers they can be!  Her sisters were also teachers with the same proclivity.  So don’t disappoint them: lets irradicate mispelled words!

 

Marie Carmelite Revisited

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Two weeks ago my post was about my great great grandmother Marie Carmelite Hebert Landry.  Since I wrote that post, I received my DNA test results at AncestryDNA.com.  I really wasn’t expecting much there because I had tested at 23andMe previously and all of the Cajun DNA from cousins marrying cousins is very confusing.  I found a few Patureau and Landry 2nd and 3rd cousins, which was interesting.  Then I came across a DNA match who was a Wilkinson.

Marie Patureau Wilkinson and her first cousin Germaine Erie Patureau Landry in the early 1960s.

I recognize that name Wilkinson because I have a photo of our dear beloved Mee Maw (paternal grandmother Germaine Erie Patureau Landry) with her first cousin Marie Caroline Patureau Wilkinson.

I didn’t do much research into the Wilkinson line when I first saw that Marie had married a Wilkinson, but then I found another Wilkinson connection to the family.  Our cousins Byron and Dana Patureau, son and daughter of Elmo “Pat” Patureau, had a grandmother who was a Wilkinson.  When I discovered that, I was interested to see if I could find a connection between the two Wilkinsons marrying into the Patureau line.

Come to find out, Marie’s husband William was the first cousin of Pat’s mother Geraldine.  William Wilkinson, Jr. was the son of William Wilkinson, Sr and Emily Rivet.  Geraldine was the daughter of William, Sr.’s brother Herman Wilkinson.  I was glad to be able to find a connection at that time.  And then along comes a DNA match with a Wilkinson at Ancestry.

So my first thought was that this match would be a descendant of Marie.  I think I sent a message to her son at some point when I found his family tree online.  I never heard anything back.  But I knew what his family tree looked like, and the Wilkinson DNA match did not have the same tree.  The thing that really struck me at first was that the common ancestors were identified as Diego Hernandez and Anne Theotiste Babin.  Remember them?  Of course you do.  Diego was the grandfather of our little Marie Carmelite.  His daughter Marie Marthe married Simon Hebert in 1800, they had Marie Carmelite in 1802, and Simon died a few months later.

Marie Marthe then married Pierre Rivet, and they had three sons together.  I reported that the three sons had died as infants, but that I hoped that my information was wrong.  Well, when I looked at my Wilkinson DNA match closer, I realized that the actual common ancestor was Marie Marthe Hernandez. (They had her listed as Marie Marthe Marca Hernandez.)  And they showed that they descend from her second marriage to Pierre Rivet!  (I’m referring to my DNA match as ‘they’ because I later found that another sibling is a DNA match to me as well.)

Emily Rivet Wilkinson on the left. Her mother-in-law Frances Johnson Wilkinson is on the right and she is holding Emily’s son Joseph B. Wilkinson. Circa 1904

So Marie Marthe’s third son Auguste Rivet did not die as an infant.  His full name was Auguste Valmond Rivet and he lived long enough to have four children of his own.  So our Marie Carmelite had a brother that survived to adulthood, and she was aunt to his children.  That’s nice to hear after the many tragedies in her early life.

Auguste Valmond’s second son was Joseph Premelia Rivet and he married Marie Amanda Landry (his second cousin through Diego Hernandez!).  They had a daughter name Mary Emily Rivet.  And when little Emily grew up, she married a Wilkinson.

I know you saw that coming.  I already mentioned Emily Rivet marrying William Wilkinson, Sr. earlier on in this post.  So come to find out, Mee Maw’s paternal first cousin Marie Patureau married Mee Maw’s maternal half third cousin William Wilkinson, Jr.  I wonder if she was aware of that?  She might have been because she was into family history and family connections.  I know her brother Vincent would pick her up in Lake Charles and they would visit cousins in New Orleans, which is where Marie lived.

One of the fun things about this discovery was the old photo of Emily with her son and mother-in-law from 1904.  And since Emily’s brother-in-law was Herman Wilkinson, she is not an ancestor of Byron and Dana (and others in the line of Elmo Leobon Patureau, Sr. and Geraldine Wilkinson) and neither is Marie Marthe.  But Frances Johnson Wilkinson is.  The woman in the old photo holding the little boy is their great great grandmother.

Since this family line (and DNA match) comes from Mee Maw’s Landry side of the family, it is also in Pee Paw’s line as well.  No wonder we have common DNA with them; we got a double dose of it.  But since they are half cousins, that should reduce the amount of DNA that we would have in common.  I will leave it up to you to determine the relationships involved and what the expected amount of DNA in common should be.  Get your calculators out and have a few aspirins ready!