Category: Keys

H. C. Phenice circa 1949

This is a photo of my great grandfather Harry Clifton Phenice.  It was taken some time around 1949 in Hathaway, Louisiana.  It doesn’t look like the house that my mom lived in when she was growing up, so I guess it was her Phenice grandparents’ home nearby.

Figuring out where they lived at the time can be tricky.  It seems that they moved often.  In the family history book by Edith Keys Segraves, my Grandma Myrtle wrote about H. C. and Daisy’s (her parents) life.  She listed eleven different places they lived.  Mostly they were in Jefferson Davis Parish in southern Louisiana.  

Before they were married, H. C. and Daisy started out far apart.  He was born in Pennsylvania, where his parents and  grandparents were born and lived.  His family moved to Tennessee at one point, but ended up homesteading in Nebraska for most of H. C.’s growing up years.  Daisy Keys, on the other hand, was born in England and lived there until she moved with her mom and her siblings to Southern Louisiana in 1887 at the age of 11.

H. C. did not make it to Louisiana until 1898.  It must not have taken long for them to meet and become enamored with each other.  They were married Dec. 27, 1900, in Lake Charles.  Their first home together was half a mile west of the J. Anderson place.  This is where Sylvan and Grace were born.  I have no idea where the J. Anderson place is.  That was another piece of information that Grandma wrote about.  She left out the next place they lived – Colorado.  I have photographic evidence that H. C. was in a gold mine in Cripple Creek.  And there is a story about the local women being a little too loose for the likes of the young couple trying to rear their children in an upright manner.  So they moved back to Louisiana in time for Grandma to be born at the McGuire place.  I have no clue where that is either!  I do know that it was in 1906. 

Another tidbit of information from Grandma includes the fact that the family bought their first car in 1920.  I suppose they took a train for their cross country moves, but for local travel they used a horse and wagon.  When the family lived close enough to a church, the children were encouraged to go.   They would either walk, ride a horse, or take the buggy.  I wonder if the whole family fit in that first car they got.  At that time all seven of their children we born and they were from 2 to 18 years old.  I don’t think they had station wagons like we had when I was a kid!  It didn’t have a radio, either.  They got their first radio in 1924 and it wasn’t in their car.

Let’s get back to the time of the featured photo.  After moving around for several years, H. C. and Daisy’s son Orville built a small house on his place for them in 1940.  “When they became ill” the house was moved to the property of my grandparents Fred and Myrtle Bucklin.  That was in 1950.  So the picture was probably taken on the porch of that small house before it was moved to my grandparents’ property.

But all of that information isn’t necessary to enjoy the photo.  It’s a charming photo on its own.  It pictures my mom’s grandfather in the way that she knew him.  He liked to walk around his yard barefoot and in his overalls (the only clothes that his wife didn’t make for him).  And sometimes he took time to pose for a photo for his teen-aged granddaughter Betty Lou.  She would then post it on her blog to share with the cousins.

Oh, wait!  No, that’s me that does that.  Enjoy.

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.

The Harry Clifton Phenice and Daisy Henrietta Martha Keys Phenice family circa 1934.

Here’s an interesting photo of the Phenice family in the mid 1930s.  At least that’s my estimate of the date that it was taken.  The photo is not the best photo as far as clarity and balance is concerned, but it is almost ninety years old.  The person whose face is the hardest to make out is my grandmother’s, who you can see second from the right in this photo.

When my grandmother was born in 1906, her parents H. C. and Daisy gave her the name Myrtle Sylvia.  In 1930 she married her sweetheart Fred and acquired the last name Bucklin.  If this photo was taken when I estimated, she and Fred would be parents already.  Their first daughter Sylvia Daisy was born in 1931, and in 1933 their second daughter Betty Lou, my mom, was born.  (They would later have Alma, Loris, and Austin.) Now that you know how I connect to this photo, let’s see who everyone else is.

In front and center are my great grandparents Daisy Keys and Harry Clifton Phenice.  Daisy was born in 1876 in Hackney, London, Middlesex, England.  She came to Louisiana with her mom and siblings in 1887.  Harry was born in Butler County in Pennsylvania in 1874.  By the time he was six, his family had moved to Nebraska to homestead.  So Harry grew up on a farm in Nebraska.  When he reached the age of 24, he struck out on his own and arrived in Louisiana in 1898.  He married Daisy in 1900 in Lake Charles, Louisiana, and started a farm and family of his own.

Sylvan Austin was their first child and he was born 11 months after they were married.  You can see him on the far left in the photo.  He  married Mary Bucklin in 1926.  They never had any children.  The next child born to HC and Daisy was Grace Leona, who was born in 1903.  She can be seen standing next to her father.  She had married Ray Sowder in 1929 and they did not have any children at the time of this photo.  They would later have two daughters by the names of Patricia and Flora.

The next child of HC and Daisy was my grandmother Myrtle, who we have already discussed.  My good old Grandma!  After Myrtle came Henry Charles, who was born in 1909.  He was the middle child and he can be seen standing next to his mother.  He was married to Irma Hetzel in November 1934.  They later were the parents of Wayne, Charles, and Diane.  After Henry Charles came Bernard Orville, who was born in 1911.  Orville can be seen second from the left in the photo.  He got married to Elta Whitman in the same year that Henry and Irma were married, but they were married in January of 1934.  They had five children together: Marilyn, Kathleen, Linda, Paul, and Carol.

That leaves two more children of HC and Daisy.  Their youngest son was named Warren Algernon and he was born in 1916.  He is the son in the middle of the photo standing between his parents.  He would get married to Wilma Hylton in 1939 and they had four children.  Their two sons were named Terrell and Kevin, while their daughters were named Julie and Lisa.  The last child of HC and Daisy was Martha Marguerite, who was born in 1918.  She can be seen on the far right.  She was a just a single young adult at the time of this photo.  She would marry Thomas Hill in 1943.  Their children’s names are Shelly, Darla, and Warren.

As I was writing this, I realized that I have a lot of memories of my grandmother’s siblings. I remember seeing Uncle Sylvan, Uncle Henry, Uncle Warren, and Uncle Orville from time to time.  I remember lots of laughs at Grandma’s house when Aunt Grace and Aunt Marguerite would come around.  But I don’t have many memories of Grandpa’s siblings.  I remember hearing about them occasionally, but we didn’t see them much.  My dad’s parents were about a decade older than Grandma and Grandpa, and that made a big difference.  Pee Paw and all of his siblings died before I was even born.  Mee Maw and a few of her siblings were alive when I was a kid.  I have just one memory of any of them.

So I think of the children in this photo as my extra aunts and uncles.  That’s what we called them.  There was no “Great Aunt Marguerite” or “Grand Uncle Orville” when we saw them.  Even though we already had 22 ‘real’ aunts and uncles, I appreciated those extra ones.  I appreciate them even more now that they’re gone.