Airplane and Grandma Bucklin
Another of the old 8mm Bruchhaus films. This video I almost overlooked. There is a good bit that is not watchable, but it has some farming, kids, workers, Addie Hine Bucklin, and an airplane.
Bucklin Home
We got to visit with Arlene Ware, Melvin Keys, and Steven Keys when we visited Louisiana. Here are a couple old Bucklin photos Arlene had that I had not seen before. Roy and Robert Louis Bucklin standing in front of the old Bucklin house. And a photo of the house showing the screened porch.
Eenie Meenie Mee Maw Mo
Germaine Erie Patureau Landry, little Landry children, and Marie Celeste Leveque Landry circa 1930.
Here is a photo that I got from uncle A. J. last month. I think it is from the earlier 1930s. The person with the child in her lap is my paternal grandmother Germaine Erie Patureau Landry. When I got those photos from A. J., I realized there were more photos of my dad’s siblings when they were children than I had ever known. I had seen a few of them ever since I was a youngster. I remember seeing some of my dad when he was just a toddler wearing a dress and thinking that was strange. Other people in my generation must have thought the same thing, because nowadays most people dress their children to match their gender.
After I got home with the photos and scanned them all, I shared a few previews with some of my cousins. This always leads to them sharing some of their photos as well. Yet more childhood photos of those Robert Joseph Landry, Sr. family members! We are going to have to get together and study these photos thoroughly, because they are not all dated and labeled. Like this one. No names, years, or locations. I’m sure none of you neglect to label your photos, especially after I have encouraged you to label them. (On a side note – I could have sworn that I labeled every photo that went into my photo albums. But I would have been lying! I thought I did, but several times I have gone to one photo album or another and looked on the back of a photo to find a date. And I found nothing. Well, not nothing. I did put the frame number from the roll of film that I took. But what good is that if I don’t know when it was taken??? I digress.)
So this photo is of my wonderful Mee Maw who definitely knew who she was holding in this photo! But she’s not talking. I don’t think it’s Marie, since there is an older child showing in the photo. Maybe it is A. J. and that is Marie sticking her foot into the photo. Of course it could be Hubert, Germaine, Bobbie (my dad, Robert Joseph Landry, Jr.), or Wana. They were all born pretty close in age to one another. It couldn’t have been the younger ones, because of who else is in the photo.
On the far right of the photo is Mee Maw’s mother-in-law (and double half 2nd cousin once removed) Marie Celeste Leveque Landry who died February 10, 1934. Though she lived in Lake Charles from about 1890 to 1925, she was living in Lafayette with uncle Seb in 1930 (according to the census; She was buried in Lake Charles.) But I’m sure she had to come visit her little darlings in Lake Charles. I’m sure she knew their names as well.
But we don’t. For me, I like to think that it was my daddy. It looks like some of the photos I’ve seen of him at that age. But my cousin Shirley might think that it looks like her dad. Tricia would say that it was definitely Wana. Daphne will pull out her copy of the same photo and will show that it was labeled as Germaine. Whichever one it was, it was a Landry child being cared for by their loving mother. And that represents all of her children.
I still say it’s Bobbie. (And that cool stroller was his as well!)
Koll Women
On our recent trip to the farm, I was able to scan some old photo albums thanks to Ada and Effie Whittington. This was an interesting photo found in Effie’s collection. My Great Grandmother Ada May Whittington Koll seems younger than most photos I remember seeing her in. Based on the age of the baby, I guess the photo was taken around 1930. That makes Ada about 50 here. I know I have seen a few younger photos, but there certainly are more of her in her later years so that is how I think of her.
On the left is Rosa Andrea Briggs Koll (1886-1976) holding her step-daughter Shirley Mae Koll (1928–1990). She was the second wife of Edward Henry Koll (1899–1983).
In the center is Ada May Whittington Koll (1881-1963) next to her sister-in-law, Maria Dora Koll Compton (1886-1958). And in the background is my Great Grandfather, Ada’s husband, John Rudolph Koll (1884–1965).
Let me know if I got any of this wrong.
A Study of Hine Genes
George Henry Hine with his grandsons in 1919.
I thought I’d do a post about DNA this week. It is directly related to this photo. It is a photo of my maternal grandfather Fred Bucklin as a child. He and his male cousins are gathered around their common grandfather George Henry Hine. (I will try to identify everyone later in this post.) I wonder if Henry was the one that passed on that towheaded or blond hair trait. It was very common in his grandchildren and their children and grandchildren as well. Of course, some of them don’t have this trait. DNA traits are randomly passed on to offspring.
In each generation each parent passes on half of their genetic information. So children are made up of half of each of their parents. But the half that they passed on to their children was not separated evenly from their parents. Most of the time a parent passes on more of the traits of one parent than the other. On average you have 25% of your grandparents genes, but it varies from 19% to 35%. As more generations pass, the differences can be notable. I’ll give you an example.
I am the great great grandson of George Henry Hine. Joseph Connors is too. We both descend from his daughter Addie Mae, so we are 2nd cousins. Chad Foley is a great great grandson as well, but he descends from Henry’s son James. That makes him 3rd cousins to Joseph and me. DNA tests have been done on Joseph, his mom Louise Bucklin Connors, me, and my mom Betty Lou Bucklin Landry. And just recently Chad agreed to share his DNA results on the the website GEDmatch.com, which allows me to compare his results with everyone else who has tested. Thanks again, Chad.
I found the results very interesting. On average a 3rd cousin shares around 1% of their DNA, which comes to around 79 cM (centimorgans – a measuring scale for genetic linkage). Since I discovered Chad’s DNA at Ancestry where aunt Loris tested, I will let you know that the average amount shared for 2nd cousins once removed is 129 cM. Loris and Chad only shared about 62 cM, which was a little low but still in normal range. I was curious to see if her siblings and cousins would share more. And when Chad shared his results, I saw that they did.
My mom and Louise (and her brother Ray) shared more than 100cM with Chad. This was still lower than average, but much more than Loris had. The only one with the average amount was uncle Austin who shared 126 cM with Chad. That’s what can happen with the random mixing of DNA through the generations. And it can be even more random. I compared my DNA to Chad and I share the same amount that my mom had. All of the DNA that matches Chad just happened to pass on to me as well. But when I compared Chad to Joseph, they had no matching DNA. Even though Louise had about the same amount as my mom, she just happened to not pass any of it on to Joseph. (I’m sure there was other Hine DNA that was passed on to Joseph, but the DNA segments that matched Chad were not.)
So this is an encouragement for all of you to do DNA tests. Besides getting all of that fun heritage information and seeing whether you have Neanderthal DNA, you get to see who you are related to. But most of the time it’s better to test the older generation. Sometimes those little pieces that connect to certain distant ancestors get dropped out along the way. There are a few Stanbrough (from Henry’s wife Susan Stanbrough Hine) segments that mom had that were not passed on to me. Some of them were really interesting, too. I’m still related to those distant cousins, but there aren’t any common DNA segments to easily prove it.
Now that I’ve gotten that out of my system, it’s time to try to identify the people in this photo from 1919. At that time George Henry Hine had 11 grandsons. His daughter Addie Hine Bucklin had 8 of them. The rest were from his sons. Let’s see who might be who. The first one born was Leo Bucklin in 1898. That’s him standing tall in the middle of the photo. Next born was Ralph Bucklin in 1902. He must be the one in the overalls. Next born was Carl Bucklin in 1904. He is in the back to the far left with his head turning away. Finally Lonnie Hine gives Henry a Hine grandson in 1905. He was named Arthur Henry and he is standing to the right of the oldest one (sans hat).
The next three are the hardest to identify. They all look alike to me. It doesn’t help that two of them are identical twins. Herbert Bucklin (grandfather of Joseph) was born in 1906 and then Clarence and Fred (my grandfather) were born in 1907. I’ll say that Herbert is the boy 2nd from the right in the back row, Fred is on the right in the back, and Clarence is 2nd from the left (sticking his tongue out. Carla, if you want to switch those names in your mind, that is fine with me. Either one is representative of what he looked like.) The next grandson born was Aulden Hine (son of James and grandfather of Chad) in 1908. He is standing in front to the far left with plaid hat. Robert Bucklin was born in 1911 and is standing in front on the right in the dark shorts.
Okay, we’re almost finished. If there were any more, I’d have to number them and make a chart! Roy Bucklin was born in 1915 and that’s him with his hand to his blond hair in front. And lastly, there is little Kenneth Hine sitting in grandpa Henry’s lap. He was born in 1916 to James. There would be one more grandson born. Bert Hine had a son named Harold in 1921. There is not a photo of Harold with his grandfather because Henry died in 1919 at the age of 72.
So now we’re done. Fini. The end. The case study of Hine genes has been completed. At least for now.
Meet the Patureaus of Patureau Lane
Last week I collected a few new old photos, so we won’t be running out of Throwback Thursday fuel for an additional few months. I know you are as excited about this as I am! A few of you already know that I went to visit my dad’s older brother A. J. last week with some family members. We had a nice visit with him. It was good to see him because I hadn’t seen him in a while. He seemed to be in good spirits despite the challenges of a weakening body from many years of wear. It was also good to see aunt Margie. She’s such a sweet lady.
But one of the other good things about this visit is that they gave me some of the old photos of the family that uncle A. J. had. A nice one of Pee Paw from World War I, a really sharp one of Pee Paw’s mother from around 1930, and a few other family photos from when my dad and his siblings were just kids growing up in southern Louisiana. But the photo this week comes from my cousin Wade. Actually he is my second cousin because his grandmother was Mee Maw’s sister.
I’ve never met Wade, even though I’ve known about him for almost 30 years. (Have I really been in Baton Rouge that long?) I met my other second cousin Kim at that time and she talked about getting together with him. I met with other cousins, but not him. I know he was at my dad’s cousin Patricia’s funeral last year, but I didn’t meet him then either. But I do know that he has a strong interest in genealogy and he knows that I do as well. So he shared this photo with me. He doesn’t remember where he and Kim got the photo years ago, but we are all thankful to that family member whoever they may be.
The Patureau family of Patureau Lane circa 1904.
The photo is of our Patureau grandmothers when they were children growing up in Crescent, Louisiana. They were the Patureau family of Patureau Lane. When Vincent Maximilian Patureau married Marie Therese Landry in October of 1888, they soon started expanding their family in the Plaquemine area. Just ten months later came their first daughter Marie Emma. That’s her on the far left of the photo. It’s kind of obvious that she’s the oldest since she is so much taller than the rest. She would be sixteen in this photo and likely was close to her full height. Her brother on the far right was two years younger than her and would probably be catching up to her height shortly. His name was Romuald Sylvester, but we like to call him “Romy.”
Next up is Marie Lydwin who was born in 1893. That’s got to be her standing straight and tall next to her big sister Emma. And standing next to Lydwin is our very own Germaine Erie who was born in 1895. (Not 1885 like her grave marker shows.) She’s looking kinda cute with that dark ribbon in her hair! The next in line (according to age) is the girl with the light ribbon in her hair standing next to Romy. Her name was Frances Lorena, though everyone knows her as Lorena. Next to her (in age and in the photo) is yet another little girl and I think she is Zita Amelie, who was born in 1897. Those girls were showing up fast and furious approaching the new century.
In 1899 Marie Therese was born. That’s her standing in front of her father. Was she a Daddy’s Girl? One can wonder. The last child in the front row of the photo was not a little girl this time. I know that he looks like he could be a girl. He is wearing a dress after all. That was a tradition at the time, or maybe the family just thought it was easier to dress him up in hand-me-downs. But he was definitely a boy and his name was Vincent Maximilian Patureau, Jr. Since his father went by the name of Max, he could use his first name.
The youngest child in the photo is being held by her mom. Her name was Sylvie Albine Patureau and she was born in 1903. She was my cousin Wade’s grandmother. But she wasn’t the last child born to Marie Emma and Max. It wasn’t long after this photo that the family suffered a few tragedies. Actually they had experienced a few already. After their first child they lost a child at birth. This happened again in 1900 with a set of twins named Alta and Alva. In 1906 a daughter named Yve Lyn was born and lived for two years. In 1907 a son named Ray Hugh was born and lived for a year and a half. Then in 1909 a daughter named Hedwidge was born and only lived a month. But before she could finish out her month long life, her mother died as well.
It was a tough time for the Patureaus of Patureau Lane, but they made it through with strength and determination. He also had help from his family. In the 1910 Census it shows that Max’s older sister Zulma was staying with them. I’m sure the older girls in the family helped Max with those youngsters he was rearing “alone.” But that was years later. This photo was the calm before the storm. If you can maintain your calm when you have nine children under 17 years of age in your house at the same time! At least they all look calm for the photo.
I’m glad I have this wonderful photo. Thanks Wade.
Christmas Eve Eve 1920
It was getting cold that late December day. The following day would be the coldest day of the month and would get down to -17 degrees. That would be a really cold Christmas Eve. So as they gathered around their trash burner/wood stove, thoughts of the upcoming first Christmas of the 1920s may have been crossing their minds. Cathrine would be thinking about the many meals that this stove would be used to prepare. There were many grandchildren who would hopefully enjoy the feast she intended to prepare.
Samuel Charles Phenice with his wife Cathrine Jane Foster Phenice and their two great grandsons Floyd and Elmer Racine (sons of Marie Taylor Racine, grandsons of Anna May Phenice Taylor – listed in Cathrine’s obituary). This was probably in Nebraska circa 1920.
Samuel as well was probably thinking of that feast to come. Of course, he didn’t have to worry about that overmuch because it was probably his devoted wife of 54 years who would be doing that cooking. He may have been recounting to his friend Louis the exciting times he had in years past, such as that long ago day at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, DC. Whatever they were thinking, those thoughts were soon swept from their minds because of what happened next.
Cathrine probably opened the stove to put more wood on the fire as she had done thousands of times during her 72 years on earth. No big deal, just a part of her ordinary life in her 1920s home in Precept, Nebraska. But this was no ordinary day. Either she stood too close to the fire or for some reason there was a particularly strong draft, but something definitely went wrong for her. Before she knew it, her dress was on fire and evidently it was burning quickly. When she realized the severity of the situation, she screamed and began to run in a panic.
I’m sure this was a horrific sight for her husband to behold. Anybody knows how painful it can be to witness a loved one suffer. So to see his beloved wife being consumed by fire must have been heart-wrenching. “Who’s going to cook my Christmas feast now?” he wondered in alarm. I’m sorry. I was doing so well telling this serious and terrible story without breaking the tension, but then my evil humor took over. I’m sure that thought was nowhere near his mind. He sprang into action no matter the consequence to himself.
He got to his wife, caught her, and tried everything he could to extinguish the flames. In the process he burned his hands terribly. His friend Louis Adler witnessed what was happening, filled up a container with water, and did what he could to help put out the fire. The fire had reached her hair, because he poured water over her head to stop the flames. The fire was put out, but not before burning poor Cathrine so badly that her life ended as a result of it.
She did not die immediately. It was said that she suffered miserably. It must have been a very somber Christmas that year for the Phenice family. Their beloved matriarch suffered with blood poison as a result of the burning. It sounded like she had severe burns over a large portion of her body. She was quoted as saying shortly before she died, “I know you if I can’t see you,” which makes me wonder if she was blinded by the fire. She ended up dying at 3:20 p.m. on January 7, 1921, at the age of 72 years, 3 months, and 22 days. I like the way in some parts of the country, the age is given like that in obituaries or on headstones.
Even though she suffered for two weeks, the family reported that she was patient all the way. When writing an obituary, I would think that most people try to make it reflect the person and be true to who they were. The report of being patient was written two times in that one article. I suppose they wanted that to be well understood.
Cathrine Jane Foster Phenice circa 1910.
She sounds like a good woman who relied on her faith to see her through. Generosity to those in need was also attributed to her. I can believe it because of what she inspired in others. Her husband risked his own life to attend to her terrible situation. Then her children lovingly tended to her during her last weeks of suffering before tenderly laying her to rest.
I’ve been wanting to write about Cathrine Jane Foster Phenice for a while now. Like the first picture above, she was kind of in the shadows. Her husband was a witness to the assassination of President Lincoln, so he tended to get most of the attention. It is such an historic event. But his wife deserved to be the center of attention at least once. I was planning on writing her life story, but got carried away with the events surrounding her final days. I will probably write another story about her at a later date. (See the great photo I found and the post I wrote about it here.) Maybe I’ll find another photo to post of her as well. That first photo was another one of the photos that I had taken of my grandmother’s photos back in the 80s and forgotten about until recently.
The portrait of her had been in my mom’s possession for as long as I can remember. I hate to make fun of her, but she always reminded me of Grandpa from the Munsters. My mom must have thought similarly, because she wrote, “Isn’t she a cutie?” on the back of the photo. I may also do a Munsters version of this photo at one point. All in good fun. (Here is the result.)
I’m also posting the obituary from their local paper. I worked for hours cleaning it up so it could be legible. Most of the details from my story came from that. I also looked at historical meteorological data and did a search for (vintage) trash burner (/stove). It answered my question as to why they would have a trash burner inside. After all these hours spent with these photos and articles, I have grown quite fond of my great great grandmother Cathrine Jane.
Bender’s Reach – A Sportsman’s Paradise
My father rowing while my grandfather is fishing at Bender’s Reach on the Calcasieu River in 1942.
I’ve always liked this photo of my father and his father – Robert Joseph Landry, Jr. and Sr. This was taken in 1942 on the Calcasieu River. It was my grandfather’s favorite (and evidently secret – according to my cousin Kenny) fishing spot that is called Bender’s Reach.
My first thought when I look at this photo is, “Aw, Daddy and Pee Paw were fishing alone one early Saturday morning.” But then I remember that it is a photo that had to have been taken by someone in another boat. I don’t know who the photographer was, but I’ll go ahead and make another assumption and say that it was probably one of my uncles. Okay, I won’t be sexist and agree that it could also have been one of my aunts or my grandmother.
Either way, it’s a cool photo from almost eighty years ago. Another thought that runs through my mind is that the photo is reminiscent of many of the paintings that my mom did. In particular, it reminds me of a painting that was in our family home all through the years. I wonder if the painting ever reminded my dad of his long ago fishing trips with his dad? Too bad the original photo was so small that it didn’t come into my mom’s notice. It would have made a nice painting.
I’m glad that these rather small photos scanned so well. You can see that my grandfather was right in the middle of casting his line in that first photo. His hand and fishing pole are just a blur. These other photos show the pole a little better.
Or is that a crease in the photo? I’m not really sure, but I thought I’d post all of the photos I had from the fishing expedition. I’m surprised there are three photos of that day. Nowadays there would not only be photos of the fishing expedition, there would also be photos of the fish being cleaned. And to top it all off there would be a few photos of it being served: Fresh! Local! Organically grown! Caught just today in the waters of the Sportsman’s Paradise – otherwise known as Bender’s Reach.
Parade and Playing with Kittens
I don’t know what year this one is. One of the floats has a Shamrock theme. Did Elton have St. Patrick’s Day parades? Uvonne says she thinks it is another homecoming parade. And her brothers Kurt and Brett with Grandma Ruth playing with the kittens. She thinks 1962.
A Bruchhaus Snowman!
It doesn’t snow very often here so you have to capture it on film.
A second reel with the same snowman.