Month: September 2019

Bucklin Burials

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Gravesite service of Louis Charles Bucklin in 1927.

I’m not sure when I first saw this first photo.  I must have gotten it from my cousin Joseph a few years ago.  He and his mom Louise (my mom’s first cousin) had been collecting Bucklin family photos for a few years and were sharing them with me.  They were all new to me, so it was exciting to see all of these old family treasures.

This one was not identified, but we assumed it was at the gravesite of my mom’s paternal grandfather Louis Charles Bucklin in 1927.  My mom was born in 1933, so she never knew her paternal grandfather.  (My father’s paternal grandfather died before he was born, too.)  Lou was born April 11, 1873, in Masonville, Iowa.  He died in Elton, Louisiana, on Nov. 19, 1927.  He was buried in nearby Raymond, Louisiana, which was where his father James A. Bucklin was buried in 1890.

You can see Lou’s wife Addie in the front and middle of this photo all dressed in black.  Her husband had died at the age of 54, and she was only 51.  The youngest two children of her eleven living children were only 12 years old.  Though you can’t see her face, her sadness is unmistakable.   That is what made it likely that this photo was from Lou’s burial. 

She was surrounded by her children at the gravesite.  The young man on the left who is looking down is either her son Fred or his identical twin Clarence.  I think the young boy behind him is her youngest son Roy.  Next to him is older son Ralph.  It’s likely that the oldest son Leo is the man standing between Ralph and Addie.  Ruth is the youngest daughter to the right  of Addie.  Behind her (and looking down) is son Herbert, then Robert (I think), Fred/Clarence, and possibly Carl. 

Burial for James A. Bucklin

I went to visit that graveyard in 2015.  It was my last outing I had with my mom and my dad.  The graveyard is called Raymond Cemetery and it is just down the road from the Raymond Methodist Church where the family were members.  It originally was called Fairview Cemetery. 

One of the first graves I noticed was this one that has BUCKLIN written in white that is so easy to ready.  This is the burial place of my great great grandfather James A. Bucklin.  The monument is very nice looking, but it looked like something was missing.  I was informed that there is a pillar that used to sit atop this pedestal.  The pillar would fall over and cause problems for the caretakers when they mowed the property.  So family members placed it in the old garage of a family member. 

Newly acquired photo of James A. Bucklin’s grave.

Fast-forward to this summer.  As I’ve told you in previous posts, I was able to scan several old Bucklin family photos from my mom’s cousin Carla.  And even though one of the photos was a photo of a gravesite, I was excited to see it.  I knew immediately that I needed to compare it to the first photo that I posted.  The word “League” looked familiar.

When I only had that first photo, I examined it to see if there were any clues to the location of the grave.  If you look closely on the left of that first photo, you can see the word “League” on that photo as well.  So the photos were taken at the same event. And this new photo identified the event as the burial of Louis Charles Bucklin.

The other interesting thing about this second photo is what you can see on the left of the photo.  You can see that easy-to-read BUCKLIN name on James Bucklin’s grave.  But more importantly, the pillar is sitting atop the pedestal as it was placed 37 years earlier!  I had wondered what it looked like, and now I know.

Louis Bucklin headstone in Raymond Cemetery

 

Pee Paw on the Stump Circa 1911

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Robert Joseph Landry in 1911 in Westlake, Louisiana – before the Sr. was added to his name and before he was ever known as Pee Paw or Pappy.

Just what was my grandfather doing on that tree stump?  I really have no idea, but I’m going to write a story about it anyway!  I didn’t even notice he was standing on the tree trunk until I started working on the photo.  The main thing I noticed about it is that he looks like he was singing.  In addition to that, there was an aura about him from that white shirt he was wearing.  I got rid of some of that, but there is still a hint of it.

I saw this photo for the first time a few weeks ago at the Landry Cousin Photo Exchange.  It was where we brought together the Tin Can Collection, the Secret Collection, and the Fort Knox Collection.  Those are the names that we’ve been calling the collection of photos in the possession of my cousin Tricia, my cousin Daphne, and myself, respectively.  This photo came from the Tin Can Collection.  The Tin Can Collection got its name from a tin can found in the attic of Tricia’s mom’s (my Aunt Wana) house.  I’m not telling how Daphne’s collection got named.  It’s a secret.

It’s a great old photo of my grandfather Robert Joseph Landry, Sr.  I’m pretty sure he went by the name Bob at this time.  It was about a year earlier than the Man in Black photo I posted previously.  I know this because the back of the photo says that it was taken in Westlake, Louisiana, when Bob was just 18 years old.  Not that everything that is written on the back of photos is correct.  But the age looks correct in relation to other photos of my grandfather.

And it sure looks like he is singing something.  He’s even standing on a make-shift stage, small though it is.  I’ve never heard any stories about him singing.  But this was when he was young and before he suffered any hearing loss from his participation in the military.  Maybe my dad got some of his love for music from his father’s side of the family.

But really, who doesn’t appreciate music?  I wish I could hear what was coming out of his mouth.  A song?  A poem?  A speech?  We’ll never know.  It does make this photo just a little more interesting.

HC and Daisy’s 50 Year Anniversary

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Daisy and Harry Phenice at their Golden Wedding anniversary in December 1950.

I could have sworn that I wrote about this before, but I find no evidence of it.  I know I posted a photo of Harry Clifton Phenice and his wife Daisy Henrietta Martha Keys Phenice at some point, but it must not have been on a Throwback Thursday.  The other photo is the one I think of in association with their celebration of their 50 years of marriage, but this one is the one that I’d rather think of from now on.

Isn’t this a great photo of that sweet old couple?  The other photo is a formal sitting at a studio and this one looks like a more casual photo taken in their home.  I’m pretty sure it was taken at the event celebrating their anniversary. 

For those of you who don’t know, Daisy and HC were my mom’s maternal grandparents.  My mom was Betty Lou Bucklin Landry.  Her mother was Myrtle Sylvia Phenice Bucklin, the daughter of this celebrated couple.

Newspaper article about the marriage of Daisy and H. C. that was in my mom’s collection of family heirlooms. I suppose it was her that drew the heart.

Daisy and Harry were married on December 27, 1900, in Lake Charles, Louisiana.  A newspaper article about the event stated that it took place “in the parlors of the Walker House” in Lake Charles.  It was a local hotel that was used for marriages and such at the beginning of the 20th century.  The article says that the couple was held in high esteem.

The 1950 article about their Golden Anniversary doesn’t state that fact, but I’m sure it was still the case.  The photo for the article was taken on the same day as the first photo I posted, but is slightly different.  I wonder why they chose this one, because I think I prefer the first one.

I have to point out something I discovered through my years of researching my Phenice family line.  They all seemed to live rather long lives, and when they got married, they tended to stay together.  Daisy and HC were not the first ones to celebrate their 50th anniversary.  They weren’t even the second. 

From what I have found, they are at least the fourth couple in a row to celebrate 50 years together.  His parents Samuel and Kate celebrated 54 years together before she died in 1921.  His grandparents Daniel and Susan were in their 50th year of marriage when she died.  (Not sure of the date of her death.)  His great grandparents John and Margaret were married for around 58 years when he died.

More recently, my grandparents Myrtle and Fred Bucklin celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in 1980 at my parents’ home.  They lived another four years together until Grandpa’s death.  My parents have the record.  They were happily married for 64 years until they died five days apart in January 2017.  

One more thing before I go.  The other thing about the first photo I posted – Daisy’s dress reminds me of a dress that my mom liked to wear in the 70s.  The style is similar and I’m pretty sure they both had embroidery that was done by each of them.  (I was informed by my younger sister Jamie that the dress my mom had was made and stitched by my older sister Jodie.  Thanks Jamie!)  Daisy’s had a stylized flower design, while my mom’s had birds perched on branches.  I wonder if my mom ever thought of grandmother Daisy when she wore that dress.

I know that I’m going to think of great grandpa HC the next time I wear my pin wale corduroy shirt.  It’s actually one of my favorite shirts to wear in cool weather.  Doesn’t his shirt look warm and comfortable?

I could go on.  There are other things I’d like to say, but they can wait for another time.  You may commence to commenting now.

Our Erie the Student Revisited

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I posted a few photos five months ago pertaining to my paternal grandmother’s school days.  The photos were somewhat grainy because they had been taken from school programs or newspapers and they were over 100 years old.  I’m revisiting that topic because I got an improved photo this past weekend.  My cousins and I actually got together and looked through some old photos and memorabilia!  We had been talking about it for a while and it came together at the last minute.

The SLI Class of 1915 included my grandmother Erie Patureau Landry.

This is one of the photos that I had seen a previous version of before.    The difference between my first version and this one is vast.  A wrinkled up school program just isn’t quite as good as an original 5 x 7 photo.  You can actually make out people’s faces and facial expressions.  It’s a really nice photo, which is why I wanted to share it with everyone.

That and the fact that my grandmother is in it.  Since you already read the title, you know that it is about my grandmother Erie.  Her given name was Germaine Erie Patureau.  She was born in Crescent, Louisiana, (near Plaquemine) in 1895.

This photo was taken shortly before March 29, 1915, in Lafayette, Louisiana.  That date is the issue date for the Vermilion, which was the school newspaper for SLI.  It was a special issue for the Class of 1915.  Erie can be seen in the first row, second from the right.  Once she graduated from SLI, she taught in Lafayette for a number of years before she got married in 1921 to my grandfather Robert Joseph Landry, Jr.  They had eight children who grew up and had children of their own.

All through that time, she held on to this old photo.  When meeting with my cousins, I realized she held on to many more photos as well.  Plus there were newspaper clippings and death notices.  They were all relating to ancestors, children, grandchildren, and relatives.  That didn’t include all the things that I had gotten from my dad.  He also had her “Patureau Family Papers,” which was the genealogical information that she collected through the years.  You could tell that all the things she collected had been divided among her children .  Of course this must have been when she died in 1973.  A few of those things got back together this past weekend.

You could also tell that she had an appreciation for her family.  I think she passed that down as well.