Category: Landry

The photo I’m using this week is another one of the recent photos I acquired.  It’s from Box 301 that was in my Aunt Wana’s attic.  She passed away almost ten years ago, so that box was up there for many, many years.  A few of them were in bad shape, but considering the heat, the dirt, and years of no care, most of them were in good shape.  As I said two weeks ago, there were some real treasures in there from the Patureau side of the family.  But there were also some nice ones from the Landry side.  As usually is the case when there are lots of old photos, some of them are not identified.  I will definitely be trying to work on figuring out who some of them are.

I chose this picture because it’s a fun picture of my paternal grandfather Robert Joseph Landry, Jr. around the year 1918.  Everyone looks so happy in the photo.  My grandfather Rob is in the back row toward the middle.  This was before he was married to my grandmother Erie Patureau.  The only other person I can identify in the photo is the other guy on the back row.  The one on the left.  I have another photo of him with Pee Paw (that’s what us grandkids call him) from around the same time.  His name was Lloyd Lynch.

This is one of four photos from the box that were taken on the same day.  One of the girls is missing from this photo, so she must be the one taking it.  From looking at all four photos, it is obvious that the four guys are all good friends.  As you can see in this photo, they have their hands on the shoulders of the friends in front of them. 

I think they could all be friends from Rob’s baseball days.  He was a semi-professional baseball player back then.  He made his name as a pitcher in the Sawdust Baseball Circuit.  These four must have had some formal event to go to and they decided to go together with their dates.  The dates don’t really seem like serious girlfriends.  The guys show more affection toward their buddies than to any of the women.  There are no couple photos, but there is a photo of just the four guys together.

The girls must have just been friends, too.  At least for Rob.  If she had been serious, Erie would likely not have kept it all of those years.  Who wants a picture of their partner with a previous partner?  Sure, Mee Maw was a sweet grandmother who treated everyone wonderfully.  But she had been a young girl who was subject to jealousy or insecurity like most people. So, just friends.  That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.  Just a bunch of friends going out to a nice event and having a fun time.

It’s a good thing that I’ve thought about and planned on what I’m writing tonight, because I haven’t done much to prepare.  Plus I got distracted tonight with the four little kittens that we got this week, and I ended up cleaning our front brick steps with a pressure washer.  It has to look good for the garden tour on Saturday!!  And now it’s 9:00 pm and I’m just getting started.  I can’t pay attention to anything else at the present, so hold your calls!  

This is slightly different than usual, because instead of talking about my ancestors, I’m talking about relatives.  But these relatives on my dad’s side of the family are special.  In many ways.  I’ve mentioned them a few times on previous blogs.  Mainly because they are part of the big entanglement in my dad’s family tree.

The central person to this post is Marie Manette Landry.  She was my dad’s (Robert Joseph Landry, Jr.) first cousin and she was a bit older than he was.  She was born in 1904, while my dad was born in 1929.  That was mainly because her father Sebastien Landry was almost 20 years older than my grandfather Robert Joseph Landry, Sr.  They were known as Seb (rhymes with dweeb) and Rob.  Uncle Seb married his first cousin Marie Manette Landry (yes, the same name as her daughter.)  When Manette-1904 was born, Manette-1876 died just 9 days later.  I’m pretty sure it was from complications from childbirth.

Uncle Seb never did remarry.  He lived with his parents for a while, so Manette was like a little sister to Rob.  When Rob was older, he married a cousin as well.  Manette-1876 had an older sister named Marie Therese.  Marie Therese married Ferdinand Patureau and they had many children, including Germaine Erie.  Rob and Erie got married in 1921.    They had the first of their eight children in 1923.  On May 9, 1924, (100 years ago today) Manette-1904 married Adnes “Bibb” Bouquet.  They had the first of their nine children in 1925.  So even though Manette was his first cousin, it was her children who were more like first cousins to my dad and his siblings.  The families have always been close.

I remember cousin Manette from when I was a young teenager.  I’m sure I saw her on several occasions through the years, but I distinctly remember going to their 50-year wedding anniversary in 1974.  It must have been in Lake Charles, Louisiana.  I remember eating snacks from the different tables and coming across an old photo of the couple when they were newly married.  It was so fascinating to me to see the photos of those young people and see how they had turned into these old relatives of my dad!  I seem to remember her having her hair in a bun and I wondered how long her hair was.  If she had let it grow all those years, it was probably REALLY long!  LOL  

I also remember when they took the photo from 1974.  I didn’t think anything of the wild patterns of their clothes.  That was the norm at the time.  I remember they looked like a big happy family, similar to my own family.  When I correspond with these family members now, sometimes they’ll ask exactly how we’re related.  Well, since Manette’s father and Rob’s father were brothers, they were first cousins.  Since Manette’s mother was the aunt to Rob’s mother, they were first cousins once removed.  There are more relationships that make it even more confusing.  It was always talked about like it was no big deal.  Most people nowadays don’t see it that way.

I remember hearing someone at a family gathering say, “Oh, yeah.  I remember when Uncle Rob married cousin Erie.”  I’m thinking that it was Manette that must have been the one speaking.  She definitely wasn’t insinuating anything bad about it, her own parents were first cousins.  She was a sweet lady and I’m glad to honor her on the 100th anniversary of her wedding.

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.

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.

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.

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!

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.

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.  

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.

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.