Month: March 2023

The Landry Family in 1975

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The Landry family on July 24, 1975, in College Station, Texas

This photo has been calling to me for a while now.  I really like the photo, but it is just another photo of my family from the 1970s.  I almost used this photo as the theme of last week’s post, but I thought I was being lazy.  It doesn’t take much research to write about something from you own life.  Yet this photo is from almost fifty years ago and I’m not exactly sure of where it was taken.  But it still calls to me, so I’m not ignoring it.  

I got this photo from my brother Rob about five years ago.  I wasn’t familiar with it at the time.  Of course, I had to crop it, clean it up a little, and sharpen it some.  I didn’t really have to, but I thought it would look better with a freshening up.  I suppose Rob told me the date on the photo, because I wouldn’t put a specific date unless I remembered it or had it written down.  The date July 24 is my brother Al’s birthday.  That may be why the date is known.

I’ve pretty much convinced myself that this was taken in College Station, Texas.  The date and the place bring back a lot of memories for me.  My oldest sister Jodie was married to Dennis Franklin and it was around this time that they moved from Lake Charles, Louisiana, to College Station.  They had met at McNeese when they were in college.  When Dennis graduated from McNeese, he was accepted into the graduate program in botany at Texas A&M University.  So that was their impetus to move.  It also explains why Jodie did not perform with the family much when we started singing at Shakey’s the following year.  She was living in Texas.

And once they were living in Texas, the rest of the family had to go see what it was all about!  I remember riding around the campus and looking at the scenes.  We went into the School of Botany (or Plant Biology?) and saw some of the experiments taking place in the lab.  After that, we stopped to look at the golf course.  (My dad was driving.  He was a golf fan.)  While we were watching, a guy shot a hole in one!  That’s the only time I’ve ever seen that in person.  It was such a surprise.  I’d like to say that I remember the family celebrating Al’s birthday, but I don’t.  Maybe he can remind me of something that happened.  We’ll see.

One of the things we did was to take this photo.  My ex-brother-in-law (yes, her first marriage did not last.)  Dennis took the photo.  Not that I remember that.  It’s just that there is another photo that shows Jodie and Dennis together in it.  So he was there that day and he’s not in this photo.  If someone else had been there to take the photo, he would have been in it, too.  So let me identify those of us who are in the photo.  Starting on the left, you see my father Robert Joseph “Bob” Landry, Jr.  He was 46 years old at the time.  He was so young!  At the time I didn’t think that.  He seemed so old to me.  Now it’s me that’s so old!

Standing in the front are my sisters Jodie, Karen, and Jamie.  Jodie was 21 years old at the time.  Karen had just graduated from Jennings High Schol that May of ’75.  She would be starting college at McNeese in a few months.  Jamie was in junior high school and would be starting the 8th grade. The day before this, Jamie was 13, I was 14, and Al was 15.  Our ages are consecutive like that for only a few weeks a year.   Standing behind the girls and next to my dad is my mom.  Betty Lou Bucklin Landry was 42 years old in this photo.  Parents really do grow up with their children.  Particularly so when they get married and have children at a young age.  My mom had six children by the time she was 29.  

Standing in the back are the boys.  The birthday boy Al is the tallest one.  It was his 16th birthday that day.  All four of his children are older than that now.  Time is zooming by!  The next person is 14-year-old Van.  I think I look kinda cute in this photo.  That’s kinda funny because the absolute worst photo of me was taken earlier this same month.  I have no plans of ever posting that photo.  I’m pretty sure it will never call to me!  On the far right is my brother Rob.  He was getting ready for his third year of college at Louisiana Tech in Ruston.  One of his interests in college was photography.  Since the photo came from him, it was probably taken with his old Minolta camera.

So we can thank Rob for the photo.  I hope you all like it.

 

Three Quarter View Portrait of Ferdinand Patureau

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Ferdinand Pierre Patureau circa 1867

Here is the photo of Ferdinand Patureau that all of my Patureau cousins have been waiting for.  Actually, they didn’t know anything about it.  I didn’t know anything about it before sixteen months ago.  I had only seen one photo of Great Great Grandpa Ferdinand through the years.  Well, there really were two that I knew of.  One was a portrait of him by himself and the other one was a group family portrait from 1864.   Both of them were really terrible versions of the photos that I was able to improve upon by visiting the Pierre Patureau Collection at the Tyrrell Historical Library in Beaumont, Texas.

I’ve shared the improved versions of those two photos already.  I shared early versions of those photos with Patureau cousin Jo Ann.  She’s the one that had the Patureau bed that is now in my home.  As we were texting, she sent me this new photo that I had never seen before.  But I could tell right away that it was Ferdinand Patureau.  It looks like an old tintype photo in a cased frame.  It’s amazing that these old photos have survived through the years in our family.  

And yet again, this photo comes down through the Victorine Patureau Cropper line.  The Patureau bed and the Pierre Patureau Collection in Beaumont both come from that line.  That Victorine was a collector who cherished and protected those old treasures.  And by her example, her offspring followed in her footsteps.  I do not come from that line.  Victorine was the youngest child of Ferdinand Patureau and Emma Landry.  She had an older brother named Vincent Maximilian Patureau.  I descend from Grampa Max.  His daughter Germaine Erie Patureau Landry was my Mee Maw.  She was the mother of Robert Joseph “Bob” Landry, Jr., my father.  My dad and my grandmother spent many years researching the family.  They passed down an amazing amount of information that I am grateful for.  But they didn’t have nearly the number of artifacts or keepsakes that Max’s sister Victorine had.

But I definitely can’t complain – I’ve got the Patureau bed that came from France with my immigrant ancestors in 1840!  And this wonderful photo was generously shared with me as well.  I estimate it to be from around 1867.  It would probably have been taken in Baton Rouge.  Ferdinand was born in LaRoche-Chalais, Dordogne, France, on October 27, 1826.  If my estimated date for the photo is correct, he would be around 40 years old in this photo.  The family was living in Plaquemine, Louisiana, at this time after a short time spent in Mexico.  His large family was still growing, and he was probably busy getting his own sawmill operational and productive.  

It’s nice to have a glimpse into the past of one of our ancestors from over 150 years ago.  Thanks, Jo Ann, for sharing your treasures.

Another (Possible) Irish Connection

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Mary Ann McGrath Bucklin was born in Ireland and immigrated to Palmer, Massachusetts, around1850 with her family.

I know, I know.  It doesn’t sound like I am sure of this new connection, but tomorrow is St. Patrick’s Day and I don’t want to neglect my Irish lines.  Growing up, I never really felt a connection to any Irish ancestry.  I didn’t really hear anything about it.  I knew that my great great grandmother was Mary Ann McGrath and that always sounded like an Irish name.  But for some reason, some Census records show that she was born in England.  So I thought that maybe it was a very distant Irish connection.  It happens.  Families moved about from England, Ireland, and Scotland quite regularly historically. 

So when I heard about the Great Irish Potato Famine, which occurred from 1845-1852, I didn’t associate it with any of my family.  I felt a lot of sympathy for the people who went through the events and the situations of The Great Hunger, but I didn’t feel a personal connection.

But then in 2015 or so, a DNA match helped me to figure out my family’s direct connection to that tragic event.  He had a great grandparent who had written down some family history information about our McGrath family line.  In that information, it talked about a Mary Ann McGrath who married a Bucklin man and moved to southern Louisiana.  Those were my great great grandparents Mary Ann McGrath and James Bucklin!

Mary Ann’s youngest sibling was born in Ireland in 1838, and Mary Ann married James in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1854.  So sometimes between those dates, the whole McGrath family group moved to Palmer, Massachusetts.  That means that my family was directly involved with the Great Irish Potato Famine.  I wish I knew some of the particulars of what they went through during that historic time.  I’m sure it had a great impact on all of their lives.  Mary Ann and James and their children moved down to Louisiana in 1884.  There are still family members in that area today.  Even though I grew up in Jennings, Louisiana, which is where Mary Ann died, I didn’t realize all of those connections.  She did die 60 years before I was born, so that’s understandable.

I just recently discovered an even older connection to Ireland in my family.  Again, it is through my mom’s side of the family.  I’m a Landry, and my dad’s side of the family is almost exclusively French.  Most of his ancestry is from the Acadian connection.  Those were mainly French peoples who settled in the 1600s in the area where Nova Scotia is in Canada.  There are a few other lines who came directly from France and intermarried with the Acadian people who were Exiled from Acadie and eventually made their way to Louisiana.

Cathrine Jane Foster Phenice circa 1890 in Nebraska.

But the other Irish connection is through my great great grandmother Cathrine Foster.  She was married to Samuel Phenice, the Civil War veteran and witness to the Lincoln Assassination.  A few years ago, I discovered that her father’s name was Morris or Moore Foster.  He died when Cathrine was young, so it was difficult to find information about him for a while.

The family was from Mercer County in Pennsylvania.  Any time I have a DNA match that has ancestors from Mercer County, I can be pretty sure that the connection is from Cathrine or Samuel.  Cathrine’s mother was Anne Magdaleen Milliron.  She was from German roots, and I’ve seen plenty of DNA connections to that family line.  They had lots of big families.

But I have started to get DNA matches to Cathrine’s father’s family line as well.  The father of Morris Foster was James Foster.  His whole life was lived in Pennsylvania.  James was actually the oldest child in his family.  He was the son of Hugh Foster and Mary Elizabeth McCullough.  I’m pretty sure Mary Elizabeth lived all of her life in Pennsylvania, but her name sounds very Irish.  I’ll have to look into that name a bit more.

Hugh Foster, on the other hand, is said to have been born in Derry, Ireland.  So there it is, another Irish connection.  When I add people to my tree, I like to have good information about the connection to their children.  You’ve got to prove one generation to the next.  But I always like to see DNA pointing to the same connection as well.  It makes it seem more real to me.  Earlier this week I had a DNA connection that showed the common ancestors to be Hugh Foster and Mary Elizabeth McCullough.  A few other matches had hinted at that connection as well.

When I was deciding on what I’d write this week, I looked a bit at that Hugh Foster connection.  I saw the name of another descendant of him.  That person showed that they had taken a DNA test.  So I decided that her test would be the deciding factor on what I wrote tonight.  If she was a DNA match to my mom, I would write about our connection to Hugh Foster.  If she didn’t match, you wouldn’t have heard about him.  I suppose you know what the outcome was.

Erin go bragh.

My family tree showing Irish lines in green for both of my maternal grandparents.

 

Keys Reunion 1976

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My grandparents Myrtle and Fred Bucklin at the Keys Family Reunion in 1976.

I thought I would share a few photos from the 1976 Keys Family Reunion.  The event was held on Saturday July 10, 1976.  I’m not sure where it was held.  It was definitely in southern Louisiana.  It was probably in Jennings, Hathaway, Kinder, or someplace like that.  I shared a photo from the event back in June of 2018.  It was a photo of my maternal grandmother Myrtle Phenice Bucklin and her Keys cousins.  Her mother was Daisy Keys Phenice, an English immigrant.

This photo is of Grandma and Grandpa.  Grandpa would be Myrtle Phenice Bucklin’s husband Fred D. Bucklin.  They were married in 1930 and my mom Betty Lou was their second child.  Actually, you can see my mom in the background of this photo in the pinkish-looking top.  I think it was actually a red checkered print.  She is talking to her cousin Kathleen Phenice Montgomery.  Behind Grandma is Tommy Campbell.  He is married to Julie, another of my mom’s first cousins.  There are other cousins in the background that I don’t recognize.

The summer of 1976 was an eventful summer.  The whole country was celebrating the Bicentennial that year.  Back then I wrote a few posts on my blog.  One of the posts was about marching in the Bicentennial parade.  Of course I was in the band: my father was a band director!  And since we all sang and played musical instruments, we had a family band.  And it was in June of 1976 that we started playing our most notable gig at the Shakey’s Pizza Parlor in Lake Charles, Louisiana.  I blogged about that back then as well.  I even mentioned a picnic I went on with the Catholic Youth group and another outing with the Baptist group.

The Keys Family Band (AKA The Landry Family Band) sang at the 1976 Keys Reunion. We were joined by some of our musical kinfolk.

But I didn’t mention this family reunion for the Keys family!  I skipped right over it.  You would think I would mention it.  My blog posts now are all about family history.  And as you can see from this other photo, our family sang at the reunion as well.  I’m thinking that we went to the reunion and sang, then later that night we went to Shakey’s to perform our regular Saturday night appearance.  Would we skip Shakey’s to go to a family reunion?  I wish I could remember.  And it’s a shame that young Van was foolish and overlooked writing about it back then.

In the photo from left to right:  Karen, Jamie, and I were sitting at a picnic table.  I never really liked this photo of myself.  I had such terrible posture back then!  I probably still do.  I know I slouch in my chair at work all of the time.  But I don’t have groovy bell-bottomed pants anymore!  Those didn’t make it through the 70s. 

The next thing in the photo is my trombone.  It looks so shiny.  I think this was probably right after we had it relacquered.  It was my dad’s before I got it, and I think he had it back in the early 1950s.  The top of the trombone is blocked by the elbow of Tommy Campbell.  Blocking Tommy’s face is Cousin Kathleen.  Next is Kathleen’s daughter Gwynne Montgomery.  It looks like the cousins are discussing musical choices with Al on the guitar, mom with the microphone, and my dad – Robert Joseph “Bob” Landry – on the electric bass.

The entertainment at the 1976 Keys Family Reunion

The last photo is another one of the entertainers.  That is Kathleen, Tommy, Gwynne, Al, Mama, and Daddy.  Al is playing the guitar that my dad had for many years.  It was always hanging on the wall of our den at 758 Lucy Street in Jennings, Louisiana.  Except when someone was playing it. 

My mom is holding a microphone, but not HER microphone.  She didn’t like the way she sounded on the one she’s holding in this photo.  That’s the one my dad usually used.  My mom thought her voice sounded too shrill with that mic.  That’s why she’s holding it like it’s a snake!

If you look closely, you can see the banjo in the background between mom and dad.  My dad got that one after his uncle Vincent Patureau died in 1956.  I have it now.  My dad is holding a black electric bass.  I have nothing interesting to say about that.  I do have something to say about that little brown box sitting on top of the Fender amplifier.  That is Sticks.  He was the drummer for the Landry Family Band. 

That’s right, we had a drum machine to accompany us on our songs.  It was a newfangled thing at the time, and it had a wide variety of settings.  We had the perfect setting for each song that we played that was written on the top corner of the page.  It was the best that we could do, since none of us played the drums.  Besides, we wouldn’t have had room for a set of drums on that Shakey’s stage.  Sticks didn’t take up much space.

Who Is Maria Francisca Ovispo?

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Joseph Auguste Leveque circa 1885, probably in Lake Charles, Louisiana. (This is a photo edited by Van Landry.)

I can’t believe I haven’t posted this photo more than once.  This is a photo of my great great grandfather Joseph Auguste Leveque.  I shared this photo on Christmas Eve in 2015.  That was when I was first started sharing photos and I only wrote a short little caption with the photos.  Through the years, the number of words per post has increased significantly.  That’s a good thing, right?  I also have access to tools to enhance old photos and I’ve never shared this edited photo before.

J. A. Leveque was the father of Marie Celeste Leveque.  I shared a new photo of her last week.  It was a photo of her with two sets of twins who were her great grandchildren.  Even though I am her great grandchild, too, I was born 30 years later than they were.  When I write a post about a family line, I usually move on to another line the next week.  But earlier this week I saw something about the Leveque line that really intrigued me.

That’s why I had to write about Maria Francisca Ovispo.  You may ask, “What does this Ovispo chick have to do with the Leveque family?”  That’s what I was wondering when I saw the name associated with the profile of a Leveque ancestor.  If you were a linguist, you may not have wondered, particularly if you specialize in Romantic languages.

I saw the name on WikiTree.  It is a website that is striving to connect everyone with one single tree.  You don’t have your own family tree; you enter your parents and previous generations until you find ancestors who are already on the tree.  So everyone adds what they know to anybody in the tree.  It has its benefits and drawbacks.  This week I definitely benefited from it.  Someone entered the baptism/birth record for Maria Francisca Ovispo onto the profile for Joseph Auguste Leveque’s older sister Marie Francoise Leveque.  In the biography, the person said that the baptism entry from the Diocese of Baton Rouge (DOBR) church records for Marie Francoise Leveque used her family name Ovispo.

“Ovispo?” I thought.  “That’s not right!  Her maiden name was Leveque.”  Then it donged on me that it might be a translation.  From dealing with French records, I’ve seen the word leveque in many church records.  Not because there were a lot of Leveque family in France.  I’m sure there were some, but it is usually in reference to a church official.  LeVeque means ‘the bishop’ in French.  So I did a search for the word ovispo (or obispo), and sure enough it is the Spanish word for bishop.  Louisiana was under Spanish rule in the late 1700s and many of the records show names using Spanish versions.  

I’ve never thought to look for records of the Leveque family by anything but Leveque and Levesque.  I’ve seen the name spelled both ways and I’m pretty sure it’s pronounced the same way.  Our family usually spells it without the ‘s’ in the middle of it.  I usually see that with families in Canada.  

Headstone for Marie Francoise Leveque is located in the St. Joseph Cemetery in Brusly, Louisiana.

So Marie Francoise Leveque was Maria Francisca Ovispo.  She wasn’t just my great grandmother’s aunt; she was also my 4x great grandmother and she was married to Joseph Sylvestre Bujol.  The great thing about the DOBR baptism record is that it lists both or her parents and all of her grandparents.  It lists her father as Agustin Ovispo.  That would be our Henry Augustin Leveque.  His parents are listed as Mauricio Ovispo and Julia Verto.  That would be our Maurice Henry Leveque and Marie Julie Berteau.  Marie Francoise’s mother is listed as Margarita Prevo.  I think of her as Marguerite Justine Prevot.  Her parents are listed as Pablo Prevo and Felisa Viso.  I show them as Paul Prevost and Felicite Perpetua Bujol.  

Even though the names are a bit different, it still refers to the same people.  It’s nice to see a record that confirms all of those names.  I won’t get into the different birth dates that we have for her.  The baptism record states that she was born November 15, 1796.  The headstone shows it as November 17, 1797.

Marie Francoise died in 1875.  I’ve never seen a photo of her, even though she lived well into the age of photography.  If anybody knows of one, please let me know.  Who knows? One could be out there.  My godmother has her wedding band.  I’m sure that if she had a photo of her, she would have shared it with me.  She’s generous like that.  She’ll probably share a photo of the ring if we ask sweetly.