Rob Landry (Pee Paw) in 1919

This is not the photo that I wanted to post tonight.  I was looking for something on my phone earlier today and came across a photo that I didn’t remember ever seeing before.  It was a pretty blurry photo, but it was from around 1915 or so.  It was of my paternal grandfather Robert Joseph “Rob” Landry with what looked like a group of his baseball friends/teammates.  It had a very pleasant look to the smile on his face, and everyone looked relaxed like they were having a good time.  I kept looking for the photo I was originally looking for, but in the back of my mind I decided that the photo I had seen would make a good one for tonight’s post.

So later at home I decided to start working on this post.  I got my phone out and started looking through my photos.  I was sure that it was taken in June 2024 when the Landry cousins got together for one of the funerals we had last year.  But I can not find that photo that I discovered earlier.  Was I dreaming when I saw that or did my mind just go astray?  It was a prince of a photo and now it’s just gone away!  (I’m humming now.)

But in the meantime, I noticed this old photo of Pee Paw looking kind of cool.  Of course I really should be calling him Rob since he was so young at the time.  This photo is from the years before he was married.  I’m estimating that it was taken around 1919 in Lake Charles, Louisiana.  Robert Joseph “Rob” Landry was born on January 9, 1893, in Westlake, Louisiana, to Simon Alcide Joseph Landry and Marie Celeste Leveque Landry.  He was the tenth and last child of the couple.  He did have a young niece named Manette by his older brother Sebastien who like a sister to him.  I was looking for a photo of her earlier when the mystery photo appeared. 

So Rob was around 26 years old at the time of this photo.  For some time during his twenties, he was a semi-professional baseball player.  He went off to military training in Virginia during the latter part of World War I.  He found a few other baseball enthusiasts while he was there.  I have photos to prove it.  He was never deployed and was honorably discharged due to the ending of the war and some damage to his hearing.

He looks so at ease in this photo.  Cool and relaxed.  He has somewhat of a sneer on his face like he might have been ready to start singing a song.  Not like Prince, more like Elvis Presley.  There is another photo of him from a few years earlier where he was singing.  I don’t usually think of my ancestors as young and going out to have a good time, but maybe he was getting ready to party like it was 1919.