Category: Landry

The Leveque Family in WBR

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Marie Celeste Leveque Landry in 1905, probably in Lake Charles, Louisiana

You might read the title of this post and ask, “What Leveque family in West Baton Rouge Parish?  There aren’t any Leveque families in WBR!”  And you might be right.  I don’t know of any, and all of the Leveque family that I’m familiar with are not there.  The last Leveque post that I wrote (over a year ago!) talked about the family being in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

The Leveque name is from my dad’s side of the family.  And it comes from both sides of his family.  My dad was Bob Landry, the famous band director of Jennings, Louisiana.  He was born Robert Joseph Landry, Jr. in Lake Charles, Louisiana.  His father, of course, was Robert Joseph Landry, Sr.  My grandfather is known as Pee Paw by us grandkids.  He was born in Westlake, Louisiana, and he died many years ago.  He was the son of Simon Alcide Landry and Marie Celeste Leveque.  Alcide and Celeste were born in West Baton Rouge Parish.  They were the ones that brought our family to southwestern Louisiana.  But they weren’t the only ones that left WBR for Calcasieu Parish.

Joseph Auguste Leveque’s grave marker at the Old Catholic Cemetery in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

To get a better picture of what was going on, we have to go back another generation.  Celeste was the daughter of Joseph Auguste Leveque and Marguerite “Basilite” Landry Leveque.  Joseph Auguste was born in Donaldsonville, but the Leveque family was also connected to New Orleans.  It seems like they spent time in both places.  His first wife was Basalite’s older sister Clarissa Doralise Landry.  The Landry family had been in West Baton Rouge Parish since at least 1820.  After Joseph Auguste Leveque married Clarissa Doralise Landry at St. Joseph’s Catholic Church in 1831, they made their home in Brusly (in WBR).  They had at least six children together before Clarissa died in 1840.  

Mrs. J. A. Leveque’s grave marker at the Old Catholic Cemetery in Lake Charles, Louisiana. This Mrs. J. A. Leveque was the second one – Marguerite Basalite Landry Leveque. She was born in 1821 and died in 1902.

Joseph Auguste Leveque then married Marguerite Basalite in 1843.  They had eight children together, which included Marie Celeste who was born in 1847.  Joseph Auguste and Basalite continued to live in WBR with their family until at least 1880.  But not all of the Leveque family stayed in WBR until that date.  Two of J. A.’s sons – Louis and Justinian – made it to Lake Charles by 1867.  A decade later more siblings followed suit.  Lise and Samuel were in Lake Charles by 1880, followed by Aloysia shortly after.  Celeste and Alcide also moved west at that time, but a little further to Westlake.  

Marie Francoise Leveque’s headstone in St. John the Baptist Cemetery in Brusly, Louisiana.

J. A.’s other children who lived to adulthood also left West Baton Rouge.  J. A., Jr. was a doctor in north Louisiana.  The other four – Evalina, Louise, Benjamin, and Mai – moved to New Orleans.  With these four being in New Orleans, and Joseph Auguste being originally associated with that city, I thought we’d be related to all of the Leveques in New Orleans.  But I had a coworker who was a Leveque from New Orleans and I could find no connection to her Leveque line.

Augustin Leveque’s headstone in St. John the Baptist Cemetery in Brusly.

But there are still some Leveque connections to Brusly and West Baton Rouge Parish.  Joseph Auguste wasn’t the only Leveque to move there.  He had an older sister named Marie Francoise Leveque.  I descend from her through my paternal grandmother Germaine Erie Patureau Landry.  Francoise was married to Amedee Bujol and they had eleven children, the first ten being girls.  Some of these families stayed in WBR, but they don’t have the Leveque last name. 

In addition to these two Leveque siblings, they had a first cousin who ended up in Brusly as well.  Her name was Marie Augustin Leveque and she was married to Edmond White.  She was the daughter of our Joseph Auguste Leveque’s twin brother Jean Baptiste Leveque.  I don’t know if they were identical twins or not.   It’s a good thing these headstones have better information than Basalite’s has.  Hers just says “Mrs. J. A. Leveque.”  It has nothing about her name or maiden name.  If these other two women’s headstones were done in the same way, they would say “Mrs. Sylvestre Bujol” and “Mrs. Edmond White.”  I like seeing the Leveque name in stone commemorating their presence in WBR.

Ok, that’s my story for the day.  If you come across the Leveque name anywhere, let me know.  I’ll look into it and see if there’s a connection.  There are connections everywhere.

My First Easter

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The Landry boys – Al, Rob, and little Van – on Easter 1961 in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

I thought I’d share a few photos from my first Easter tonight.  I don’t remember anything from that far back, but I do have some photos.  Easter fell on April the 2nd in 1961, so that’s the date I’m going with.  I was only five months old at the time, so I probably wasn’t aware of what was going on.

Rob and Al were aware of what was going on.  Al was a few months shy of his second birthday and he’s got his Easter basket all decked out with greenery.   Rob was almost six, so he knew to show off his prized egg as well as his basket.  Maybe he found all of the hidden eggs before Al had a chance to find any.  I know I wasn’t in the running at all.  I was just sitting there watching all of these strange new behaviors that were going on.  Easter?  What’s that?!

I do remember a few things from back then.  I remember those red shoes for sure.  Not that I remember wearing them.  I think my mom must have saved them for a long time and told me about them being mine.  I do like the bright red color.  Very festive!  I remember playing with my dad and brothers in that back yard over the next year or so that we lived in Lake Charles.  Mainly it was playing with a toy gun that shot little propellers that would fly.  It made an impact on my developing brain.  The toy looked similar to the photo that you see.  At least from what I can remember from all those years ago.

The Landry girls – Karen and Jodie – on Easter in 1961 in Lake Charles, Louisiana.

This next photo is of my older sisters.  I was the fifth child.  I had two older brothers and two older sisters.  Sometimes I think of myself as the tiebreaker.  That didn’t last long.  My younger sister Jamie came along a year later and tied it up again.  But on April 2, 1961, there were just the two brothers, the two sisters, and my mom and dad.  My parents weren’t in any of the Easter photos that I have for that year.  I might have shared a different photo if they had been. 

I like this photo of Karen and Jodie.  They have their new Easter dresses on, and they’ve got their Easter baskets ready for collecting.  Jodie must have had high expectations.  That’s a big basket that she has!  I think it’s bigger than all of the other three combined!  I don’t know where she thought she’d find enough eggs to fill it up. 

I have no idea where we went that year.  In the years after this, when we lived in Jennings, we would go to my mom’s family in Hathaway for Easters.  There was always an Easter egg hunt.  I once called it the Great Bucklin Egg Hunt.  I would think that it had started by 1961.  Grandma and Grandpa Bucklin (Myrtle Phenice and Fred Bucklin) had thirteen grandchildren who would be eager to go traipsing around their property to find colored eggs and other goodies.

But since we were still living in Lake Charles, maybe we stayed in town for the Landry family gathering.  We had even more cousins there.  Mee Maw (Germaine Erie Patureau Landry) was a widow (for some reason that’s a term I never associate with her!) whose husband Robert Joseph Landry, Sr. – our Pee Paw – had died a few years earlier.  She had over twenty grandchildren at the time.  I’m sure they were just as eager to go a-hunting. 

So there you have it.  The Landry children dressed up for Easter, with their eggs and baskets ready for something.  A Great Bucklin Egg Hunt?  A Landry Pocking Contest?  Showing off their cute little new brother with his bright red booties?  Whatever happened, it must have been something good.  Otherwise, I would have heard stories about it when we looked back at these old photos.  But all I remember hearing about was how much they liked that dress, how much they liked that hair cut, and how much fun I was when I was that age. 

Ok, maybe that last thing wasn’t said.  But I’m sure it was thought.  Right?!  Just look at those booties.  What’s not to like?

Have a happy Easter.

A View From 1974

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Karen, Al, and Van Landry in March 1974. We took this ‘before’ picture with glasses to commemorate the time that we got our first pair of contact lenses. I promised them back then that I’d post the photo on my blog for the 50th anniversary. This photo is such bad quality, but it is the only one from this important life event.

I have planned on writing about this 50-year anniversary for a few years now.  I’ve been waiting anxiously to be able to write about this topic.  You would think that I would have thought about some really interesting things to say about it, perhaps in relation to family history.  That is the main topic of my blogs, if you haven’t noticed.  But I’m sticking with this story that I’ve planned on.  My main problem is usually that I haven’t thought of or planned on a topic for the week.  So I have to follow through with my years-long planning.

Here is the important announcement: Today completes 50 years of wearing contact lenses.  My first pair of contact lenses were first worn on March 8, 1974, and I have been wearing them ever since.  Not the same pair, of course.  I’ve had about seven or eight pairs.  I’ve gone without them for a few days here and there, but I’m a consistent contacts-wearer. 

Of course I was 13 years old at the time, so I didn’t just go drive and pick them up myself.  It was a family event.  See, it is family related!  In early 1974 there were three Landry family members who wore glasses – Karen, Al, and me.  Karen and Al had been wearing them longer than I had.  I had only worn glasses for two years.

Van and Karen on the left, and Al on the far right. This photo was taken at Astroworld on July 24, 1974, which was Al’s 15th birthday.  Note that the glasses are no longer in use.  The best ‘after’ picture I could find.

My parents didn’t have a lot of extra money back at that point.  This was before we made the big bucks (not!) at Shakey’s Pizza Parlor as the Landry Family Band.  But there was a Texas State Optical store in Orange, Texas, and that business had a good deal on contact lenses.  My parents decided that all three of us would get contact lenses.  Early one Saturday morning, the family got in the car and headed west to Orange.  This is terrible, but I can’t remember exactly who went with the three of us.  Was it Mama or Daddy?  Did Jamie come along with us?  I just can’t remember.  Sorry, Jamie, if you were there and I forgot.

What I remember is the sun coming into the car and coming over our shoulders as we heard the song “Sunshine on My Shoulders” by John Denver.  We made a big deal of that.  Then we stopped at some gas station store and bought popcorn that was “Popped Fresh!”  We joked about it being “popped fresh” five days ago.  We thought we were so clever.  When we were at TSO, we joked about how the doctor there told us how to rinse the contacts.  He pronounced the word rinse like the word wrench.  We’ve laughed about that for years.

I remember reminiscing about that day through the years, but it was usually with Karen.  But Karen is not with us any longer to reminisce with.  This made me think of her a bit more this week.  She passed away on April 8, 2020, from Multiple Systems Atrophy at the age of 63 years, 4 months, and 6 days.  (Not 5 months as I erroneously wrote last year!)  When I was planning on writing this post, I realized that the 50th Anniversary of the Contacts (no I did not make a cake or have a party!) was falling at the same time as when I reach the age that Karen was when she died.  So now I have outlived both of my ‘older’ sisters.  I’ve actually lived longer than all three of my sisters.  But with Jamie, it’s just that I was born before her.  I hope she outlives me.  

The other thing I remember about that long ago day in March was that I could see so much more clearly.  The pink azaleas were in bloom at the time, and they were so pretty in front of all the houses along North Cutting in my hometown of Jennings, Louisiana.  They are not quite in full bloom yet this year.  But it won’t be long.  You’ll see.  I will, too… with the help of my contacts!

Pee Paw’s Landry Family

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I’ve talked about my Landry grandfather many times.  Of course, I have.  I’ve written over 450 posts over the past eight years.  Once a week, every week, through sickness and health.  I should go ahead and skip a week just to get it over with.  There is a bit of pressure I put on myself to keep it going uninterrupted.  Can you feel the stress and concern in my writing?  I hope not.  I was mostly kidding about that.  It’s more enjoyment than work.

Elie, Sebastian, Louis, Joe, and Rob Landry from Westlake, Louisiana, in the early 1900s.

Here is a photo of my grandfather and his brothers.  I’ve shared a similar grouping before, but it was missing the oldest brother Elie.  He is the one on the far left.  I got it from a photo of him with his wife Gussie Parker and their son Joseph Sylvester Landry.  It’s a very blurry photo and I spent a bit of time working on it from time to time.  It’s not as good as the other photos, but those other photos were better quality.  I’m thinking that it was taken in 1903 when their son Joseph was a toddler.

Part of my motivation was a cousin Katherine who I discovered through a DNA matching website.  I didn’t know what the connection was when I first saw her name on my list.  But she was a strong match.  I had as much common DNA with her as what I shared with first cousins of my parents.  Who was she?  I sent her messages at first, but she didn’t respond.  (Contrary to popular belief, not all Landrys are nice people.  Her experiences with her Landry people were not pleasant.  We’ll fix that!)  Her tree showed Joseph Stalin Landry, but I didn’t know anyone with that name.  

Marie Marguerite Carmelite “Lily” Landry circa 1888.

Then I watched the video that my dad made with cousin Sis.  Her given name was Naomi Landry and she was the oldest daughter of Pee Paw’s brother Louis.  In the video Sis talked about all of the siblings of that family.  First, she started with their parents Alcide Landry and Celest Leveque, then went on to talk about all of their children and their families.  The oldest in the family was Lily Landry who was born in 1870 in Brusly, Louisiana.  That’s where the oldest children were born.  Sometime in the 1880’s the family moved to Westlake to work with the railroad.  Lily did not have a family, because she died when she was still a teenager.

The next child was Elie, who had little Joseph with his wife Gussie.  When Sis talked about this family in that amazing video, she talked about a daughter named “Cheryl K.”  That matched the tree that cousin Katherine had.  Her “Joseph Stalin” was our Joseph Sylvester!  No wonder she is such a strong DNA match – she’s a second cousin.  Her family group lost touch with our Landry family group because Elie died at a young age in 1913 in a railroad yard accident.  He was crushed between two rail cars.  One of the brothers was with him when he died.  After that death, there was less and less contact with the Landry family through the years.  A visit here, a postcard there, then it all stopped.  Now we have started to reconnect.

That is a very different story than the next son in line had.  Sebastien married his first cousin Marie Manette Landry in 1902.  In 1904 Marie Manette gave birth to a little daughter who was also called Marie Manette.  But the older Marie Manette died from complications.  After that happened Sebastien and his daughter went back to live with Alcide and Celeste.  So little Marie Manette was almost like a younger sister to Sebastien’s younger brothers.  Those families have remained close.

After Sebastien was Louis.  He was the father of Sis and five other children.  Like the family I grew up in, there were three boys and three girls.  His wife was Clemence Babin, who was the half-sister of Marie Manette Landry.  Clem was also his second cousin through the Landry family.  At least he wasn’t like the next brother, who married somebody with the same last name!  Joe married Azema Landry.  They were only 3rd cousins through the Hebert name.  They also shared common Landry ancestors.  Uncle Joe and Aunt Zim did not have any children.

Marie Therese Landry circa 1900

There were three other sons born to Alcide and Celeste, but they didn’t live very long.  I’m not sure of their ages when they died.  None of them lived to the age of 10.  Their names were Sam (1879 – twin of Louis), Sam (1882), and Alcide (1885).  The next child born was Marie Therese.  She lived only to the age of 20 and she did not have any children.  And then, finally, at the age of 43 Marie Celeste Leveque Landry gave birth to her tenth and final child.  That would be my Pee Paw!  Robert Joseph Landry, who went by Bob, Rob or Pappy, was born on January 9, 1893, in Westlake, Louisiana. 

He would go on to marry my grandmother Germaine Erie Patureau.  Erie’s mother was a Landry and Rob’s first cousin!  So three of the brothers married Landry cousins at the first or second cousin level.  Another one married another Landry who was a little more distantly related.  I don’t know about the wife of Elie, Gussie Parker.  I haven’t been able to find anything about her ancestry.  But it wouldn’t surprise me if she was related to the family. 

Then again, he may have been an early adopter of the practice of marrying outside the family.  There are still more family mysteries to discover.

 

My Parents Were Bob and Betty

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This week marked the seventh anniversary of the end of an era.  The era of Bob and Betty Landry started in the early 1950s and continued until the third week of January in 2017.  It was a long run.  It was a good run.  My siblings and I were pretty sure that when one of them died, the other would be following along not long after.  Yet, we were taken off guard when they both died in the same week.  Having both of your parents die at the same time and having a joint funeral made for a difficult time.  But it was appropriate that their close-knit relationship would end at the same time.  They were happily married for 64 years.

Betty Bucklin Landry and Bob Landry on April 8, 1966. Easter in Lafayette, Louisiana.

So, when I was thinking about them all week, I knew I’d be writing about them tonight.  But I didn’t know exactly what I’d say or what photo I would use.  I surely couldn’t use a photo I used before!  (I hope I haven’t used this one before!)  That’s no problem, because I have lots of photos of my parents through the years.

I considered using the photo from their second wedding anniversary, but then thought I’d use it later this year around their wedding date.  I also thought about using a photo that they posed for while singing together at some function.  I do like photos of them showing them doing what they loved to do.  We had a very musical family.

When I went looking for a photo, this one caught my attention right away.  I had already edited it previously, so it just took a little more tweaking for it to be ready for publishing.  It’s also another one of those photos that is very calming to me.  They just look so content with each other.  This is what my parents looked like when we were kids.

This picture was taken at the Bucklin family Easter get together for 1966.  It was held by my mom’s older sister Sylvia Bucklin Pilcher and her husband Ronald Pilcher.  The Pilcher family lived in Lafayette, Louisiana, on Leonpacher Rd.  One of my most memorable events from one of those times we got together was when my mom’s younger brother Austin’s family moved back to Louisiana after being in Australia.  He had gotten married and had three children at that point, and they were introduced to the family.  So when someone told my cousin John that all of the other kids were his cousins, he pointed at me and said, “I don’t want that one!” in a cute little Australian accent.  That story has always made me laugh.

Back to the photo.  My dad’s name was Robert Joseph “Bob” Landry, Jr. and my mom was Betty Lou Bucklin Landry.  Most people knew them as Bob and Betty.  My dad’s family may have said Bobbie and Betty, while my mom’s side would say Betty Lou and Bob.  They were in their 30s when this photo was taken.  I remember thinking that they were old back then.  I would look at old photos of them and was so surprised that they still looked similar.  What was I thinking?  They had only been together for 15 years.  

Look how cute they were.  And they were not pretentious in the least.  They were just happy to be together raising their kids in Southern Louisiana.  What could be better than that?

Cajuns By the Dozens

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Jeanne Zerbine Dupuis Landry Comeaux circa 1864 in Southern Louisiana.

Last week I wrote about my maternal great grandmother Addie May who gave birth to a dozen children.  When I think about that, I remember enjoying the story “Cheaper by the Dozen” when I was young. That’s what inspired the title for today’s blog. But what inspired the post itself was a notice I got in an email.   Over the weekend I got a notice about a Marguerite Babin.  That would be a name from my dad’s side of the family.  His heritage is Cajun and French, and Babin is one of the surnames that came from Acadie.

The link led to Marguerite Babin (born 1690), who was married to Antoine Dupuis (born 1688).  When I looked at information on Marguerite, I saw that she was one of a dozen children born to Charles Babin and Madeleine Elizabeth Richard.  I descend from Charles and Madeleine, who were from families of a dozen children as well.  So she must have had a lot of cousins.  I’m not going to count them.  That’s too much trouble.  Once I get an AI assistant, I may have that information at my fingertips.

When I look at Antoine Dupuis’ family, I see that he was from a family of thirteen children.  His parents were Martin Dupuis and Marie Landry.  They were both from families with more than a dozen children.  Big families were very common in Acadie back then.  And what is surprising is that the survival rate was pretty high.  Most of the time.  (As you read that last sentence, imagine somber music beginning to play.)

1712 marriage record for Antoine Dupuis & Marguerite Babin

Marguerite Babin and Antoine Dupuis were married on July 4, 1712, in Grand Pre, Acadie.  As you can see from this 1895 transcript of a rare document from that time, it names Antoine and Marguerite and both sets of parents that I talked about earlier.  So Marguerite and Antoine were married in 1712 and started their married life.  But unlike the two generations before them, no children came.  One year, then two years.  People must have started to wonder.  Most couples back then had a child almost every year for the first few years.

Maybe they wanted to have children, but things went wrong.  They were together for seven years, and there is no record of any birth.  Then around 1718 or so, Marguerite died.  Perhaps she was finally able to carry a child to term, yet they both died during childbirth.  No records are available.  We just know that Antoine remarried around 1719 to Marie Josephe Dugas.  She, too, was from a family of a dozen children.  Cajuns by the Dozen!  Antoine and Marie Josephe had their first (of a dozen) child in 1720.

So I didn’t descend from that Marguerite Babin who was born in 1690.  But I did descend from her aunt that she was named for.  Her father Charles had a younger sister named Marguerite who was born in 1670.  I descend from her and her husband Antoine Breau.  Guess how many children they had!  If you guessed a dozen, you’re wrong.  They only had eleven.  How shameful!

The photo I’m sharing is of the most recent Dupuis ancestor that I have – Jeanne Zerbine Dupuis.  Let me tell you how she connects to Antoine Dupuis and Marie Josephe Dugas.  They had a son named Joseph whose life was greatly affected by the Grand Derangement.  After a dozen years of struggle with family members dying around him, he made his way to Louisiana.  He ended up serving in the militia out of St. Gabriel with Bernardo de Galvez.  This was an effort that aided the newly independent United States during the Revolutionary War.  We descend from a Revolutionary War hero!  Joseph married Anne Marie Hebert.  They had a son named Magloire Dupuy, who was married to Henriette Serrette.  Magloire and Henriette had Zerbine in 1807.  

Zerbine was married to Elie Onesime Landry and their daughter Emma Landry married Ferdinand Pierre Patureau, a French immigrant.  They had more than a dozen children and many of those families continued that tradition.  So, to suffice it to say, I have hundreds of dozens of cousins.  That’s a lot.

Here is the path from me to Joseph Dupuis.  Also, Pierre Breaux (shown fifth from the top on the far right) was the son of Antoine Breau (1666) and Marguerite Babin (1670).

The Landry Kids and Aint Zita

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Last week I had a hard time deciding on a photo to talk about, while this week this photo just reached out and grabbed me unawares!  It’s not a photo that I’m real familiar with.  I got it from Cousin Sis a few years ago when we got together to share photos and information.  And for some reason, today it looks particularly charming.  It reminds me of other photos I’ve posted.  In 2016 I posted a photo of Aunt Marie and Uncle A. J. in a washtub like you see in the photo.  It was from around 1925.  In 2019 I posted a photo that included Aunt Zita (more often pronounced as Aint by my dad and his cousins) when she visited the Landry family in 1939.

Marie, Germaine, A. J. and Bobbie Landry with their aunt Zita Patureau circa 1929 in southern Louisiana.

This is a photo of Aunt Zita with my dad and some of his siblings in 1929.  My dad’s name was Bob Landry.  His parents were Robert Joseph “Rob” Landry, Sr. and Germaine Erie Patureau.  Back then they were known as Mama and Papa.  On January 31, 1929, Erie Patureau Landry gave birth to their fifth child who they called Bobbie.  And that’s what the family called him for the rest of his life.

Marie (Marie Therese) was my dad’s oldest sister.  She was the firstborn child, and she was born in 1923.  She is the child standing up in the middle of the photo.  She had cousins on both sides of her family, but on the Landry side they were much older.  Rob Landry was the youngest of ten children.  Marie did have cousins closer to her age on the Patureau side.  Therese Wynhoven was two years older than her, and Mona Mell was just a few months older.

Marie was an only child for just 14 months, then along came Alcide Joseph.  He was always known as A. J. to the family, though some people did refer to him as Al.  He is the little boy standing in the middle of the photo.  He had some cute little curls on his head.  The next sibling to come along was Hubert, who was born in 1925.  For some reason he is not in the photo.  Too bad.  After Hubert came Germaine, who was born in 1927.  Germaine is the little girl sitting in the tin washtub.  She isn’t really paying attention to anybody else around her.  My dad seems to be paying attention to her.  He’s the baby being held by the woman in the photo.  And he seems to be fascinated by his older sister in the washtub.

By now you must realize that the woman in the photo is Aunt Zita.  If you don’t know the connection, it is through my grandmother Erie Patureau Landry.  Zita was Erie’s younger sister.  There is two years difference in their ages, but still enough room for another sister – Lorena – to be born between them.  My grandmother didn’t waste time having those kids, and neither did her mother.  Zita was 32 years old at the time of the photo and she wasn’t married.  She didn’t get married for another ten years.  Then after their sister Marie Therese or “Bee” died, Zita married Bee’s husband and helped to raise Bee and Clarence’s two young girls.  

I’m not really sure where this photo is taken.  I don’t recognize it as being the house that my grandparents had when my dad was growing up in Lake Charles.  Of course, I’m probably not familiar with all of the views of the house.  In 1929 Zita lived on Lee Avenue in Lafayette, Louisiana, with her father Max Patureau (Grampa Max) and other siblings.  I am not familiar with that house at all.  I don’t know that I’ve ever seen photos of it.  Maybe this is one.

It’s not that important, though.  The main focus to me are those little Landry children.  Particularly the young one being held by his aunt.  He is why I’m here.

Family Christmas 100 Years Ago

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When I was thinking about what I’d write about today, I kept being pulled toward posting our family recording of “The Carol of the Star” that I shared three years ago.  But when I sat down to write, I had to find a photo to share as well.  It wasn’t long before I saw the photos of the Christmas of 1923.  I couldn’t pass up on a 100-year anniversary story!  I’ve shared a few photos from that memorable Christmas previously, but I haven’t shared all of them.  So that settled that.

Grandma Amelie + the men who spent her last Christmas with her in 1923

The first photo I remember seeing from the Christmas of 1923 was a slide that came from my dad’s collection.  Someone had written on the cardboard frame of the slide and it said, “Grandma Amelie + women who spent the last Christmas with her 1923.”  I figured it was my great great grandmother Amelie Bujol, who had been married to Trasimond Landry.  He was a Civil War hero from Brusly and the two of them married after the Civil War.  I think there are some letters that she wrote to him during the war.  I really need to look into that more.  I have not put forth enough effort in finding out what is out there.  Amelie, or Belite as I like to call her, and Trasimond’s first child was Marie Therese Landry and I descend from her and her husband Vincent Maximilian Patureau. One of the seven daughters of Marie Therese and Max was Germaine Erie Patureau.  She was my paternal grandmother.  She was married to Robert Joseph Landry, Sr. and their son Robert Joseph Jr. was my dad.  I knew them as Mee Maw, Pee Paw, and Daddy.

Back to the photo of Grandma Amelie + women.  When I read that label, for some reason I thought it was a photo of Grandma Belite with some women she went on a retreat with.  But really, what 80-year-old woman goes on a retreat the month before she dies?  Of course, she didn’t know she was going to die the next month, but you know what I mean.  I later found more photos of the event and identification of the people in the photos.  They are all family members on my dad’s side of the family who are closely connected to Grandma Belite.  It was taken in Lafayette, Louisiana.  Maybe if I had seen the photo of Amelie + the men, I might have realized right away that she was posing with family members.  I think I would have known Grampa Max back then.  I’m much more familiar with these faces now, aren’t you?  Surely you noticed Grampa Max on the far left of this photo!

Grandpa Max was married to Grandma Belite’s oldest daughter, but besides that, he was biologically related to her as well.  Max Patureau’s mother was Marie Emma Landry, the daughter of Elie Onesime Landry.  Belite Bujol’s mother was Anna Adele Landry, the daughter of Joseph Emmanuel Landry.  Onesime and Emmanuel were half-brothers, so that makes Max and Belite half second cousins through Joseph Ignatius Landry.  I’ve said before that they were related, but didn’t explain how.  So now you know!

Also in the photo is Vincent Patureau, who is standing between his father Max and his grandmother Belite. Behind Vincent and Belite is Anthony Joseph “Toby” Mouton.  He’s not related to Belite, but he was married to her oldest granddaughter Emma Patureau.  The other tall man in the back is Belite’s son-in-law Louis Joseph Peter Landry.  He was married to Belite’s daughter from her second husband Pierre Magloire Babin – Clemence Babin.  They were known as Uncle Louie and Aunt Clem.  Uncle Louie was one of Pee Paw’s older brothers.  The three boys on the right of the photo are the sons of Louie and Clem.  Their names are Ethelbert “Bert”, Henry Louis “H.L.”, and Thornwell Fay “Fay”.

I really like those old photos from that Christmas 100 years ago.  And even though Mee Maw was not in the photos, she cherished them and took care of them.  Otherwise we wouldn’t have them to look at now.  That’s because these are the people who made her Christmas memories special from her early years.  It’s all about family.

Merry Christmas for the new ’23.

My First Christmases

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Van Landry in Lake Charles, Louisiana, at Christmas 1960.

It has become a tradition on my blog to write two Christmas posts every year.  So I’m following through with it this year.  Our company Christmas party is tonight, so I was thinking about Christmas parties of the past.  That led me to think of my first Christmases.  Not that this family history blog is all about me.  But I am the one talking about the history of my ancestors.  I also write about some of my own family history.  So maybe it is all about me!  I am the one writing all of the words for you to read.

I might as well make the first photo be all about me.  This is a photo of me under my first Christmas tree.  I look pretty happy despite having a gun pointing at my head!  Ignorance is bliss.  I was only about two months old and have no memory of this event.  I do know that the photo was taken at 1317 Clover Drive in Lake Charles, Louisiana.  That’s where the family lived for the first two years of my life.

I’ve shared a photo of this Christmas on Facebook before, because I remember people commenting about me being in a laundry basket.  I have two photos of me at Christmas that year, and both times I was in the basket.  The other picture includes my siblings and my dad, though.  I am the center of attention in this photo.  When you are the fifth child in a family, you don’t get many of those.  It’s mostly group photos with all of the siblings.  I wouldn’t have wanted it any other way.

(1 of 3) 1961 Landry Christmas party in Lake Charles, Louisiana

I have a photo of the following year and it shows a lot more people in it.  But best of all, they let me out of the basket!  I’m still sitting near it.  Maybe it was like a security blanket for me.  I don’t know.  The basket is still in the center of the photo at the bottom, and I am the little boy sitting next to it.  I can’t really tell what I’m doing.  It is the first picture of me at a Christmas party.  This was the Landry family get together that we had every year on Christmas Eve.

(2 of 3) Christmas 1961 with the Landry family.  Mee Maw was the hostess.

The family got together at my paternal grandmother’s house.  It was better known as Mee Maw’s house, and it was at 509 Nichols Street in Lake Charles.  Mee Maw’s name given to her at birth was Germaine Erie Patureau.  She later went by Erie Landry when she married Robert Joseph Landry in 1921.  He was known as Rob Landry, but the grandkids knew him as Pee Paw.  I never knew him because he died in 1957.  

As you can tell from photo 1 of 1961 Christmas, there were lots of family members around.  Look at all of those presents in the background!  My dad had seven siblings and they were all married by that time.  With my grandmother, her children, and their spouses, that’s nineteen people right there.  There were an additional twenty-one people – my siblings and first cousins.  It was a large family and it was still growing.  My mom was pregnant for my younger sister at the time.  Starting with me at the bottom and going counterclockwise, you can see my dad (Bob Landry), my aunt Margie Harrington Landry, my aunt Germaine Landry Winn, two cousins (I think) sitting down, and my cousin and godmother Shirley Landry standing up.  It looks like she may be handing a present to Uncle A.J.  I think the three kids in front of the TV are my siblings Rob, Jodie, and Karen.  Looking toward the camera is cousin Tricia Duffy, who is looking past cousin Dennis Landry’s head.  I see a head between Tricia and Dennis and a face along the far-right edge, but I can’t tell who they are.  I’m also not sure of the identity of the little girl sitting in the middle of the room.

(3 of 3) Christmas 1961 with the Landry family in Lake Charles, Louisiana

I can’t stop without sharing a photo of the hostess of the party.  That would be my dear sweet Mee Maw who is seen in photo 2 of 1961 Christmas.  She definitely loved her children and grandchildren.  We all wanted to be her favorite, and many of us still claim that title.  No fighting is involved.  Mee Maw would not approve of that!  It looks like my aunt Frances Landry Raley is giving her a gift.  To the right of her is uncle Norman Duffy. Watching from the other side is my aunt Mildred Sutherlin Landry.

I wouldn’t want to talk about all my cousins without sharing this photo from that Christmas that shows most of them.  They were all so cute.  Most of them still are!  In the back row we have Douglas Winn holding Lauren Duffy, Phyllis Winn, Jodie Landry, Mark Reeves, Daphne Winn, Shirley Landry holding Jeanne Raley, and Tricia Duffy.  In the front row are Karen Landry, Scott Raley, Stephen Duffy, Gene Duffy, Rob Landry holding little brother Al, and Dennis Landry.

I probably got a name or two wrong.  I’m sure some of my older cousins will correct me.  Did I tell you that my godmother Shirley was The First?  We can’t forget to give her the respect that she deserves.  She helped to make those early Christmas parties memorable for me.  I always looked forward to the opening of the gifts.  I knew that I’d get at least three!  One from Mee Maw.  (How did she afford to buy all of us something that was just perfect for us?  Sorry, Jamie, I could not resist!)  One from my godfather or parrain.  (The first French word that I remember learning.)  And one from my wonderful godmother.  She was just a teenager at the time.  Thanks for helping to make little Van a happy boy at Christmas.

I have to admit that those Christmas parties are my most cherished.  I will go to my company party later and I’ll have a good time visiting with my coworkers.  I really do appreciate them.  But it doesn’t compare to family.  And even though the company likes to talk about themselves as if they were family, they aren’t.  If you grew up in a big loving family, you know what the real thing is.

These photos are of the real thing.

 

Bobbie Landry as a Young Teenager

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Hubert, AJ, and Bobbie Landry in Lake Charles, Louisiana, circa 1943

I thought I would share a photo of my dad tonight.  This picture caught my interest when I saw it.  I got it in 2019 when some of the cousins got together to share photos and dinner.  I can’t believe it’s been four years already.  Time sure does fly.  There were lots of great photos that I saw then that I had never seen before.  This is one of them.  It was in the Secret Collection that my cousin Daphne is the curator of.  Thanks, Daphne, for sharing those treasures with us.

What’s interesting about this photo is how it shows the changes that a few years can make when you look at photos of a family.  My dad was part of the Landry family in Lake Charles, Louisiana, during the early thirties and forties.  His father was Robert Joseph “Rob” Landry, Sr. who had grown up in Westlake, Louisiana.  His mother was Germaine Erie Patureau, and she had grown up in Crescent (Plaquemine), Louisiana.  Erie’s mother was Marie Therese Landry Patureau.  She had died when Erie was just a young girl of 14.  That’s about the same age as my dad in this photo.  Marie Therese was also the first cousin of Rob Landry.

So, yes, my dad’s parents were first cousins once removed.  But that was a long time ago, and that’s what everyone did back then.  In fact, all four of my dad’s grandparents were related to each other through the Landry family.  That’s probably why I feel so connected to the Landry name.  That, and it is my last name!  So Rob and Erie were married and they started a family.

My dad and I were both the fifth child of our families and the third son, as well.  We both had two older brothers and two older sisters.  But his older brothers were only a year apart in age, and they were 3 and 4 years older than he was.  That bit of difference is very noticeable in this photo.  Hubert on the far left and AJ in the middle look almost like adults while Bobbie (Robert Joseph Landry, Jr., my dad) still looks like a kid.  I think it’s one of a few that shows this time period.  Before long, he would catch up and become the tallest of the four brothers.  He remained the tallest even when younger brother Johnny reached his full height.  I was not like my dad in this.  My dad was 6’1 and I was only 6′.  My older brothers are taller, or at least I always thought so.  I’ve measured lately and found that I’m 6’1, so I may not be the shortest after all.  Either way is fine with me.

So there you have it.  A photo of my dad as a young teen.  A discussion of family make-up.  And a discussion of growing up.  I thought about saying something about how pleased my dad looked or how handsome they were, but I didn’t.  If you would like to address that, feel free.  I’m pretty sure the photo was taken around 1943 at my grandparents’ house in Lake Charles.

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