Happy 112th Birthday Granddad-The Black Sheep of His Family

 I am late with this post but last Tuesday, Feb. 16th, would have been my paternal Grandfather's 112th birthday.  I don't feel too badly about being late with this one since Granddad was, as they say, "a wicked old screw" and not much of a family man.

Frank Foster Bowman, Jr. died on 5 September 1978.  I remember because my immediate family was a mess at that time and I had been yanked out of college the Fall of 1977 right before the play I was starring in was to be presented because my mother had attempted suicide and was in the hospital and they didn't know if she'd live.  It was deja vue for me the next Fall of 1978 as I had just gone back for my sophomore year of college, only to have my mother call and say my grandfather had died and they were pulling me out of school for a couple of days and my brother was driving to Maryland to pick me up the next day.  

We went to Fairfax,Virginia where my grandfather lived and stayed at a motel with my parents for the night.  I didn't go to the viewing/wake as I had childhood trauma from attending 3 of those affairs as a young child.  My aunt and some of her kids came to the funeral from Massachusetts but her mother, my grandmother Catherine, Frank's first wife, did NOT attend for reasons that will become obvious later on in this post.

What shall I say about Frank in remembrance?  He was born in Bridgeport Connecticut in 1909, the oldest of  6 siblings that survived childhood.  His family moved to New Windsor, New York sometime after 1920 as the family is still in CT in that census year and his third sister, Eleanor, was born in New Windsor in 1922.  

At age 16 Frank ran away from home(this would just be the first time he ran away from family)and joined the U.S. Marines in July of 1925, lying about his age obviously.  He was stationed at the St. Helena Training Barracks in Berkley, VA(now part of Norfolk, VA).

This photo is of Frank in his dress blues in 1926 at the St. Helena Barracks.

I suppose when he went to re-up after his 2 year hitch they discovered he had lied about his age in 1925 so he was mustered out of the Marines in 1927.

Frank made his way up to the Boston area afterwards where he met my grandmother, Catherine McCarthy.  They married in 1928 in Cambridge Massachusetts, probably after a brief courtship, and the story is Catherine didn't invite her own father, Dennis McCarthy, to the wedding.

Frank and Catherine lived in Manhattan, NYC and Frank worked as a salesman in a department store there.  Between the 1930 census and the birth of my father in Nov. 1931 the family had moved to Brooklyn, NY.  

I connected briefly awhile back with a 1st cousin 1 x removed(my grandfather and her mother were siblings)and she emailed me these photos she had....

                                                     

My dad is about a year old in these photos which would make them from late 1932 or early 1933.  I believe they were taken in Upstate NY where my great Grandparents lived in Orange County.

The written caption says "Catherine, Frank and Sonny".  They use to call my father Little Sonny.  

My grandfather Frank's youngest sibling, Bill Bowman was nicknamed Sonny. Frank was the oldest child that lived(a son Richard died shortly after birth in 1908) so there was a 20 year span between him and Bill.  Bill was born in 1928 and my father in 1931 so my father and his Uncle were practically the same age. 8-)

                                                           

This photo is on my father and his mom, Catherine and a big dog.  My Grandmother Catherine is 23 in these photos.  Love that fur trimmed 1930's coat and that short flapper hairstyle!

In the 1940 census the family was still living in Brooklyn and Frank was employed as an Electrician Foreman for a construction firm.  

Frank enlisted in the NY National Guard in 1932 after my father was born and in 1935 won a recruitment medal/award from the National Guard.

Here is Frank in his National Guard uniform sometime in the mid 1930's.....

By 1934 my grandparents had another child, my Aunt Marilyn.

Here's where his story runs off the rails.....

In 1941, after Pearl Harbor Frank left his family, the old "he went out for a pack of cigarettes and never came back".  He enlisted in the US Army on 31 Dec. 1941 and listed himself as single.

I also found a WWII draft card where Frank stated his next of kin was, Albert Martin, a friend he was living with at 121 Madison Ave. NYC.  Here's a photo of that apartment building today located at the corner of 30th St.

Frank lists his employer as Gilliam and McVay which turns out was a real estate broker in NY at that time.  So at this point he had left his wife and kids without a howdy dee do and was living in Manhattan.

At some point after January 1st, 1942 he was shipped out to England.  He served in both the European and the Pacific theaters during the war.  

While in Europe he married 2 British women, yes, he was married to both at the same time.  He was a bigamist, thus I refer to him as a wicked old screw.  Frank told my mother in the 1960's that he was married to two women in England during WWII and my aunt confirmed that he had married in England during the war too.

A few years ago my aunt Marilyn also mentioned that Frank had told her he was "involved" with a WAC also during the war.  She didn't have a name or know if he had married her or what.  This just added to his lovely image of being a womanizer.  But he was an old school, good Catholic and he seemed to always marry them before bedding them(even if he already had a wife back in NY).

Once the war was over in Europe(VE Day)he was shipped out to the Pacific and served there until VJ Day before returning to the US.

When Frank left Europe he never told either wife in England he was leaving and of course neither wife knew about the other.  Since he "disappeared" during the war it was presumed by these wives that he had died in the war.  The other shoe dropped the day the second Mrs. Frank Bowman applied for her widow's pension with the British government and was told they were sorry but Mrs. Frank Bowman had already applied for that pension.

Another 1st cousin 1 x removed Shirley, the daughter of my grandfather's younger brother John "Jack" Bowman told me about 10 years ago that at least one of Frank's English wives had a daughter and she had immigrated to Canada but I've been unable to ascertain where or her name(or the name of her mother).

But I digress....

During the war Frank was not in touch with his family, neither my grandmother and their 2 children nor his parents and his siblings.  Frank's mother, Kitty O'Brien Bowman died in 1945, before the war ended not knowing whether her son Frank was alive or dead.

Here's a photo of Frank's parents, Frank Sr. and Catherine "Kitty".  I don't know what year this photo was taken other than before 1945.

So Frank shipped off to the Pacific Theater after VE Day.  He was a member of the Corp of Engineers at this point.....

He was a Master Sargent and leader of his unit.......

Frank is center front row in this group shot of  his battalion.

I found a book written after the war, "The Corps of  Engineers: The War Against Japan: written by Carl C. Dod, with this foreword by Brigadier General Hal Pattison in 1965......

Contributions of the Corps of Engineers to victory in war, and to our country's peacetime history, are well known and appreciated. The skill and versatility of this talented body of soldiers met a supreme test in operations against the Japanese, many of which were conducted in the most primitive and undeveloped regions of the world. Engineers built the Alaska Highway, Canol, and the Ledo Road in Burma. They cleared the jungles to build airfields for heavy bombers and supervised the work of Filipinos, Chinese, and Melanesians as they built runways by hand. They built ports, roads, and docks where none had existed. Indeed, one of the most familiar recollections of the U.S. veteran of the war against Japan is the ubiquitous engineer operating a bulldozer....."

In that context this next photo cousin Shirley sent me makes sense....

My grandfather Frank somewhere in Asia in a loincloth posing with a machete for the camera. lolz

So after the war what did Frank do?  Where did Frank go?

This has gotten quite long so I'll continue this story in a Part Two about my black sheep, mysterious paternal Grandfather.

Sluggy

John Redfern.....My Wandering Ancestor Part 2

So let's recap our story as of 1850-- So by 1850, John Redfern, his second wife, Mary Hagen, and their children Barnabas, Margaret, Alice, Francis and May A, as well as John's 2 sons William John and James Redfern by his deceased first wife are all in Bedford County PA.

Sarah Redfern is married to Robert Spencer Bowman back in Ireland and they have a 1 year old son, Matthew Bowman.

The next federal census in 1860 finds the Redfern family is no longer living in Bedford, PA.
They are in Richland township, Jackson County, Iowa!
Richland is 20 miles south of Dubuque Iowa right near the Mississippi River.
Today you can travel between these places by car in about 12 hours.  But back in 1860 it would have taken a lot longer to cover that 775 miles in a wagon with a horse and with some people walking alongside on primitive roads or paths.

The Iowa territory was established in 1838 and achieved statehood in 1846.
In 1858 according to a Redfern family narrative, John and his family pulled up stakes and set off west ward again and headed for Jackson County, Iowa.  1858 was about 18 years after Iowa became a state.

The Redfern clan settled near Farmer's Creek in Jackson County.  I don't know if John bought land there or not as no land documents have been found yet.  As he lists farming as his occupation in this 1860 Census it's assumed he either was farming his own land or someone else's land.
 I found a land grant for a John Redfern, signed by Ulysses S. Grant for 80 acres in Plymouth County(which is by Sioux City Iowa on the western edge of the state and nowhere near Jackson County near the Mississippi River)dated 1875.  Perhaps John moved further west between arriving in Iowa in 1858/59 and 1875?  It is only speculation at this point.

This is the sort of land speculation poster(from Wikipedia)that circulated out East to try to entice people out to the now open states of Iowa and Nebraska.  Buy land for no money down.

When John Redfern moved to Iowa he was not a young man, being 48 or 49 years old when they arrived.  His wife, Mary, was about 43-44 years old.
The 1860 Federal census gives us a snapshot of the family and their ages in that year.......

John 50
Mary 45
Alice 14
Francis 12
Peter 9
Anna 9

No longer listed with the family are the oldest sons by John's first wife, William John and James, as well as Barnabas, Margaret, and May A.
New children, born since the 1850 Census are Peter and Anna,both listed as 9 years old, most probably were twins.

Also now living with the Redferns is a Patrick Redfern who is 40 years old.  He is possibly John's younger brother or a cousin of some sort.  I believe this census is erroneous in listing Patrick's birth place as Pennsylvania(unless he is a cousin and his Redfern parents were from Ireland and immigrated).  He is listed as a stone mason just like John's occupation in the 1850 Census.


So how about my ancestor, John Redfern's oldest daughter, Sarah Redfern Bowman.....where is she and how is she doing?

The next record we find for her is the 1860 US Census.  Yes, her and her husband, Robert Spencer Bowman and their children are living in Montgomery, Orange County, NY at the time of the 1860 Federal Census. As for the children....Matthew is now 11 years old and he has younger siblings named John aged 8, Robert aged 6, Adeline aged 4 and Anna aged 1.

So when did Robert and Sarah come to America exactly?
Well in this 1860 Census we can narrow down the immigration year as the younger two Adeline and Anna are listed as being born in New York and the two boys, John and Robert, are listed as being born in Ireland. The last child born in Ireland is Robert, born 1854 and the first child born in NY is Adeline, born 1856.
So that gives us a time frame of late 1854-early 1856.

I found a record of arrival for a Robert Bowman on board the ship "West Point", in NY harbor on April 17, 1855.

An example of a clipper ship from that era courteous of Wikipedia.

The West Point  was built in 1847 by Westervelt and McKay, a company that acquired renown by constructing streamlined clipper ships and fast steamships.  The West Point was built of southern oak in a time when using iron and copper was on the rise.  10 years later, in 1857, it was refitted with iron to keep up with the times.
The West Point was a full rigged vessel for the Robert Kermit Red Star Line, which carried goods, mail and passengers on a route between Liverpool England to NYC and was in service until 1863.
The Ship's Master on that 1855 voyage was William R. Mullins.
The West Point would have disembarked her passengers at Castle Garden, the first official American Immigration Center which was located at the tip of Manhattan in the Battery area.  This is where all immigrants into NYC were processed from mid 1855 to 1890, before the Ellis Island complex was constructed.
Unfortunately a fire at Ellis Island in 1897 consumed all the Castle Garden administrative records to 1890 so if you an ancestor who arrived during this time frame you may never find their arrival date, unless they are listed among the Customs Office passengers lists that were stored in D.C. rather than on Ellis Island.
Let me add that prior to August of 1855 passengers did not have to be processed through Customs and many just walked off the ship into the streets of Manhattan and beyond.  Since my Redferns arrived in April of 1855 the record for Robert Bowman may be the only one I ever find.

Years later on the 1900 Federal Census participants were asked, if they were born outside of American shores, what year they had arrived in the US.  Robert Bowman had self-reported that he arrived in 1852 and Sarah his wife reported that 1855 was the year.  Now it's highly possible that Robert had come over in 1852 as that was often the case with married couples, the husband would come over before his family/wife, establish a home and employment and then send for the family at a later date once he had earned enough money for the passage(s).
But as there were children born to this couple in 1852 and 1854 in Ireland, Robert would have had to have left in 1852 after making his wife pregnant and would have had to have returned in either 1853 or early 1854 to "knock up" Sarah again to be both children's father and then have left for America again with his wife and the, at this point, five children.
Something tells me we will never know if Robert traveled to America by boat from Ireland once or twice.
We do know that he arrived in Spring of 1855 at NY harbor and thus my Redfern/Bowman American story begins.

In 1860, after 5 years living in America the Bowman clan are settled in upstate New York, in the town of Montgomery, Orange County(which is situated along the banks of the Wallkill River) to be exact and Robert is working as a Day Laborer and Sarah is keeping house and rearing, their now, five children.

What changes would the coming War Between the States and the 1870 Federal Census bring to our Redfern/Bowman families?  Will John Redfern get the itch to move yet again?

Stay tuned for the next installment of our saga.

Sluggy

A Couple of Genealogy Break Throughs!

Not that my Hubs is even remotely interested in his ancestry but I have been working on and off on his family tree since I signed up for an Ancestry website account.

His paternal side search has been slow going over the years because A-his grandfather was the first one of that line to immigrate to America and it was in the early 20th century and, B-the spelling of the name is always mangled in official documents in this country.

Since I don't have an international Ancestry dotcom account any document in other countries has been off limits to me, except for a few.
Add in that Hubs didn't even know his paternal grandmother's correct name and there wasn't much on this part of the tree, while his mother's side I can go back at least 3 and as many as 5 on some lines of her ancestry.  A truly lopsided, stubby tree. lolz

Then this past Sunday I went back to recheck if there were any new "hints" on the paternal side of that tree.
And someone evidently had either been to Sicily or had someone in Sicily do some document searching for them because they have a tree on Ancestry with Hubs paternal line(s) going back 4-5 generations past Hubs grandfather, complete with photos of the documents proving it all!

Then also on Sunday someone doing genealogical research for a family emailed that she has found a DNA match with a person in that family and College Boy's dna sample which I uploaded to the GEDMatch website.  It's a family with origins in Italy so I know the match is from genes CB inherited from Hubs and not me.

We have been emailing and we think we have isolated the particular line in common.  Hubs 2 x Great Grandmother on his father's, father's, father's line has the same surname as this family working with the genealogist who contacted me.

And had I not found the information on this other tree for Hubs' ancestors on Ancestry on Sunday, I couldn't have helped make this connection at all!

The problem is I have very little on this line's surname, only the father of Hubs 2xGGrandmother and it dead ends there(dates or places either other than Sicily)so I hope this genealogist can make the link from her family to this fragment of a line in Hubs' tree.

This doesn't help me on my ancestral search but I am nonetheless thrilled.  Having more to pass down to my kids and beyond is great!

Sluggy

My Genealogical Obsession

Ok, some folks refer to stuff like this as the "Family Skeletons in the Closet".
Here's the big one in my father's family.

My father's father, Francis "Frank" Bowman was born 1909 in Bridgeport, CT.
I met the man in 1973 for the first time and he died in 1978 in Virginia while I was away at college in Maryland.
This man came into my life in 1973 and his life story and it's mysteries is my genealogical obsession.

As I've posted before(see HERE)the man who I called grandfather while growing up was "Potty Dave".  He was the man I knew as my grandfather.
Long after "Potty Dave" died in 1966 I was told that my father's dad, Frank, had died years ago and "Potty Dave" was my paternal grandmother's second husband.

Imagine my surprise when in 1973 when my parents sat me down for an "announcement" and said that dad's father, Frank, was alive and well and we were going to visit him tomorrow.

That's the year I got to meet my "real" grandfather.

Here is a photo of Frank Bowman taken during WWII.  He had this taken to send home to his parents and siblings.

As I mentioned in a genealogy post before, I was told by a cousin of my father's a few years ago that Frank ran away from home at the age of 16 to join the military in 1925 or 1926.

If you remember my previous post HERE Frank Foster Bowman, Jr. the oldest son of Frank Foster Bowman, Sr. and Catherine O'Brien was born and raised in Bridgeport, CT.  In 1925, when Frank, Jr. was 16 years old the family had moved to Upstate NY(Orange County).  They may have been other factors at work here but being 16 years old means chafing under your parents rules and being 16 years old and having to relocate from your school and your friends and everything you've ever known means Frank, Jr. may have had a hard time adjusting to all these changes.  Plus when they moved Frank lost his maternal grandfather as well, who had lived with the family while in CT.

1925 was a year of changes for my grandfather.

Here's a photo I have of Frank, Jr. taken 1 year later in 1926.....

The back of the photo notes that this picture was taken at the Saint Helena Training Station Marine Barracks in Berkley Virginia(Berkley no longer exists as an independent town, but is a section of Norfolk, Virginia, where the branches of the Elizabeth River meet).
Frank was 16 or 17 years old in that photo and a long way from New Windsor, NY.

I found the US Marines Muster Roll and it says he enlisted in July of 1925 and mustered out in 1927.
He only served as far as I know for a 2 year hitch(he enlisted during peace time), so he was out by 1928.

The next time I can find Frank Bowman in an official document is 1930 in the Federal Census for that year.  He is married to my grandmother, Catherine McCarthy, and they are living in Manhattan, NYC, and they state they have been married for 2 years which means they got married in 1928.

I have no clue about Frank's movements between the time he left the service and he hooked up with my grandmother.
And this is driving me nuts!
You see, I can't figure out how they were in the same vicinity at the same time and actually met.

My grandmother was born in Cambridge, MA and lived there with her parents until she married in 1928.
The timing of when my grandfather was discharged from the service is right(1928)so he must have made his way to the Boston area shortly after leaving the Marines.
Frank grew up in Bridgeport, CT until his parents moved to New Windsor, NY(Orange County)in 1925, and he ran away soon after that.

If he was discharged and went to the Boston metro area in 1928 and he married Catherine McCarthy in that same year it's pretty clear that my grandparents had a VERY short courtship.
But I didn't even know where they got married until last week when I found this....

The Massachusetts Marriage Index with my grandmother listed as being married in Cambridge, MA in 1928.  My grandfather is listed in the MA Index too as being married in Somerville, MA in 1928.
At first this confused me but Cambridge and Somerville border each other so one of the clerks may have been confused.

So we know Frank Bowman somehow was in the New England/Boston area between his release from the Marines in the Summer of 1927 and the date in 1928 when he married Catherine McCarthy.

And by 1930 they were living together in New York City.  In November of 1931 their first child, my father, was born.

The next record I have found is from 1932.....

In March of 1932, when my father was 4 months old, Francis Foster Bowman Jr. joined the NYC National Guard.  He was assigned to Company M, of the 106th Infantry....or rather the predecessor of the 106th Infantry since this was peace time.

This record goes on to say that Francis(using his nickname of Frank)was honorably discharged in March of 1935 after 3 years.  He reenlisted for 3 more 1 year terms, finally separating from service in 1938.

He was living at 4108 8th Ave. Brooklyn, NY when he enlisted in 1932 and had a change of address to 236 51st St. Brooklyn, NY sometime between leaving 8th Ave. and moving to 5920 5th Ave. Brooklyn in 1935.

The move from 5th Ave. to that 8th Ave. location close to Sunset Park was 1.4 miles.
4108 8th Ave. was the midst of what is now Brooklyn's China Town.......

Their apartment was in the building with the green awning.
 The move from 8th Ave. to 51st St. was another 1.3 miles and closer to the docks on the Hudson River.

Their apartment was in the building with the blue doorway to the right of this photo.

The move in 1935 to 5920 5th Ave. Brooklyn is where the Frank & Catherine Bowman family seems to have stayed long term......if you can call 6 years long term.


There is also this record

Frank Bowman was awarded a service medal in 1935 for Recruiting.  He went on to be awarded 2 Bars on this in 1937.
He is listed as holding the rank of 1st Sargent in Company M of the 106th Infantry National Guard.

The 106th Infantry National Guard was based at the Bedford Atlantic Armory in Crown Heights section of Brooklyn.

Today that building is owned by the city of Brooklyn and serves as a men's homeless shelter among other functions.

And I recently unearthed this photo of my grandfather taken in the 1930's in what I suspect is his National Guard uniform.....

In the next Federal Census, for 1940, Frank Bowman, his wife Catherine and their two children are still living at 5920 5th Ave. in Brooklyn, NY.  Frank is working as an electrical foreman at a Construction Company, Catherine is keeping house, my father, Frank Junior is in second grade and my father's little sister is 5 years old.

World War II started in 1939 in Europe the year before the US 1940 Federal Census.
By late 1941 American knew she would be joining in the fight directly.

On December 7th, 1941 the Japanese attacked the US base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaiian Islands.
On December 8th, 1941 the US and Britain declared war on Japan.
On December 11th, 1941 Hitler declared war on the US.
And on December 31st, 1941 my grandfather, at the age of 32, the sole support of a wife and 2 kids, enlisted as a Private in the US Army to go fight in World War II.

As you can see on this index page of WWII enlistments he says he had 2 years of high school(he left school when he ran away to join the Marines back in 1925)and he says he has NO Dependents(Single without Dependents).

He obviously lied.  I don't know if it was because at his "advanced" age and being with dependents they might not have let him enlist OR if he told them no dependents so they didn't hold part of his service pay to send to his wife(which would have been a mean and unconscionable thing to do in my humble opinion).
We will most probably never know his motives here but the record clearly states what he said and did.

On January 26th, 1942 the 1st US troops began arriving in Great Britain.
I can bet you my grandfather was among those first troops sent to England being as he already had a history of military service and he enlisted 3 weeks after the US declared war on Germany.

At some point in my youth, after the death of Potty Dave, the man I thought was my grandfather, I had been told in an offhand way that my "real" grandfather was dead.

Then back in 1973, when told that the real grandfather was alive we children where also told that, like the old clique, "Your grandfather went out one day for a pack of cigarettes and never came back."

The story my father told was he just left one day without explanation and never came back.  Now my father had just turned 10 years old the month before when his father left to go into the war.
So I am sure it felt to him like his dad had abandoned him.  And in reality, after the war was over, Frank Bowman never went home to his wife and kids and he actually DID abandon them.

My father had great anger over what his father did and I don't blame him for feeling so hurt and angry and wanting nothing to do with him after that.
He wasn't around to be a father when my father was a teen, and show him how to grow up and be a good man.

Later on I found out third hand that while my grandfather did leave his family, his wife and their children did see/have contact with my grandfather's parents and siblings back in NY.

I don't know if any of my grandfather's family supported my grandmother and their kids but I do know that for as long as I was aware my grandmother worked.  Even after she remarried to my step-grandfather, she worked.
She was a strong woman who had basically been on her own with 2 small children since the very beginning of 1942.

Until 1973 and his visit to us in Virginia, my father had been estranged from his father since he deserted his family back there in Brooklyn when he was a 10 year old boy.  That's 32 years of hurt and anger.

I came to find out in 1973, when I was finally told of his existence, that my grandfather at some point had tried to get back in touch with my father but my father had refused any contact with him.  But my mother had, behind my father's back, been in contact surreptitiously with my grandfather for at least 6 years to that point in 1973.  My mother is the one who pushed my father to let his father, our grandfather, back into our lives.  And in 1973 my father acquiesced.
My grandmother, Catherine, did not have contact with her now ex-husband Frank, but my Aunt(my father's sister)did as her father, Frank, had also attempted to renew their relationship.

I recently found a letter that my grandfather had written to my mother, among the papers my brother found and gave to me back in January when I was down in Virginia visiting him.
It's dated 20 October 1967.  I was 8 years old at that time.  I was thinking about perhaps what prompted my mother to write to my grandfather behind my father's back(which was a very dangerous thing for her to do due to my father's control issues over her).
My mother had just lost her own mother the month before this in September 1967.  It's possible she was feeling that life is too short and it was time to build a bridge?  I can't be certain but I like to think this was her motivation.

Anyway,  Frank, my grandfather wrote a 7 page letter back to my mother, written on Department of the Navy, Naval Air Systems Command, Washington, D.C. letterhead.  From the "gist" of the letter this was the first time my mother contacted my grandfather and had sent him some photos of his grandchildren(me and my brothers).  Frank said he had some photos of us already he had been given by my Aunt(my father's sister)and by Frank's youngest brother, Bill.  My grandfather enclosed a photo of himself taken in 1966 on a trip to Carmel, CA inside the envelope with the letter.

Frank goes on to mention he was glad we had stopped to visit his brother Bill and his family while we were on Summer vacation.  This is a trip I have vague memories of, where we stopped for a night somewhere in upstate NY at some family relations house on our way to New England to camp-out.
Now I know who exactly we were visiting and when!

He talked a bit about my Great Grandfather, Frank Foster Bowman, Senior and how he was not doing well physically and had been living with his daughter Mary Bowman Brown in Staunton, VA.
He also talked about his active life, still working at 59 for the Army and traveling the world to such places as the Aleutian Islands, Kodiak Alaska, Iceland and Midway Island.

Near the end he got to the "meat and potatoes" of the letter for me when he said.....

"Carole, I know this isn't any of your concern but I must say it. Twenty seven years ago I made the biggest mistake of my life, I abandon(ed) my family.  I've paid for that mistake ten thousand times over....."

The tears just starting rolling down my face when I read that.
Wow.

He goes on to say that it took real courage to write those letters to his 2 children 2 years ago, which means he wrote my father asking for forgiveness for what he had done back in 1965.
Evidently my father never responded nor initiated contact with his father after that but my mother had gotten my grandfather's address and probably prompted by her own mother's death the month before replied to my grandfather 2 years after he first tried to reach out to his grown children.

Years later, after I was grown, my mother told me that there had been many letters in the 6 years between her first letter to Frank in 1967 and when we were told of his existence in 1973.
They had also met during the day for lunch while my father was at work and we were in school, all without telling my father about this contact.   We lived near 2 large military installations, Norfolk Naval Base and Oceana Naval Air Station in Virginia Beach, VA so he was often in the area for work.
I still have this little figurine my mother gave me at some point back around 1970.

I found out 3 years later that it was from my grandfather and not her.  Mom couldn't tell me because my father would have flipped out had he found out she was seeing and contacting my grandfather behind his back.

I'll continue this missive next time because there are even more secrets to tell!

Sluggy







 

A Proper Genealogy Post....Part Three

Continuing on with the O'Brien/Roche Family.

We know that Mary Roche O'Brien died on 22 Feb 1913.
Her husband Maurice out lived her by 15 years, dying on 19 Jan 1928.

In the 1920 census Maurice was living with his daughter, Catherine O'Brien Bowman(my great grandmother), Catherine's husband Frank Bowman(my great grandfather)and their 4 children--Francis Jr.(my grandfather), Mary, John and Margaret.

NY state has their own census schedule which is done every 10 years, at the midpoint after the Federal census done at the beginning of every decade.(ie, 1905, 1915, 1925, etc.)
Catherine O'Brien Bowman and Frank Bowman, Sr. evidently moved between 1920 and 1925 because they show up in the 1925 NY state census living in New Windsor, NY.
In that census, Maurice is no longer living with them.

Evidently Maurice was left behind in Connecticut when the O'Brien/Bowman family moved to NY state.

We know that Maurice was living in Middletown, CT when he died in 1928.  Seeing he had no means of support then(he was approx. 78 years), and I was told he died in Middletown, CT, that probably means he was living at the Connecticut Asylum for the Insane.
That hospital is now known as Connecticut Valley Hospital.

Back in the early part of the 20th century it was common for the elderly to end up in an Asylum or an Almshouse(Poor House).  With no visible means of support and failing mental faculties(dementia, hardening of the arteries, Alzheimer's before it had a name) the state took in these old folks who were no longer able to care for/support themselves(long before the days of company retirement pensions)or had no family to take care of them.  These elderly were housed at the asylum along with those who were truly mentally insane.  It must have been a very depressing existence and a sad end to his life.

Maurice was lucky in that once he passed away, his family came to claim his body and bury him next to his wife in the St. Mary's Catholic Cemetery in Ansonia, CT.

Almost 1,700 indigent who died at the CT asylum in Middletown were buried on the grounds there, many without even a marker/headstone.  If they were lucky enough to have a marker for their final resting place it didn't even have a name on it, just a number. 

The graveyard at CT State Hospital.  Photo by Larry Brownstone from the "Birding Blog".
You can read about this graveyard HERE.

With the stigma surrounding mental illness back then families didn't want it known that their loved ones had been institutionalized in mental facilities.  Remember that back then mental illness was still thought to be a purely hereditary condition and would bring shame upon the family if it became known in society.

Now let's talk about Catherine O'Brien's husband, Francis Foster Bowman, Sr.
Frank was born 19 Sep 1884 in Newburgh, NY, the son of James M.(probably Michael)Bowman and Mary Elizabeth Foster Bowman.

Putting together the family that Frank Bowman, Sr. was born into has been problematic. 
I have Frank's birth and death information from both his Social Security Index info and his headstone/memorial is on Find A Grave so I have the exact dates for him.

He is found living with both parents as the only child in 1900 census schedule but by the 1910 census he is married and no longer living with his birth family.  So finding the rest of his siblings has been piece meal work.

Frank's father, James M. Bowman, is 14 years and still living with his parents in the 1880 census.

In 1910 a James M. Bowman is found living with his son's family--a William Bowman, wife Ida and their son William, Jr.  This James' birthdate and place match my James' plus this household is also living in Ansonia, CT, the town were James' son Frank Bowman and Catherine O'Brien are living.
Yet I have no census information that puts William AND Frank Bowman in the same birth household. 

It's coincidental evidence and parallels that place people with the same name in proximity to one another.
Notice that James says he is still married, not widowed in 1910.

I then found another person's family tree with my Bowman families on it and they had a Richard, listed as the son of James M. Bowman and Mary Foster on it.

Then I found an obituary for a Richard Bowman who died in 1957 near Poughkeepsie, NY.  That obit lists he had surviving siblings, a sister Mary(married name Maroney) and 2 brothers-Frank and Gary of Little Britain, NY.
My great grandparents lived in Little Britain at the time of my great grandmother's death(Catherine O'Brien Bowman).  My great grandfather was named Frank and he had a brother named James Garrett(who went by Garrett) and "Gary" can be a nickname for Garrett, so this Richard is definitely a brother of my great grandfather Frank.

Plus the obit gave me a sister, Mary who I had no clue Frank, Sr. had either.

In 1910 census Mary Foster Bowman, the wife of James Bowman is living in New Windsor, NY, with her 2 sons, James Garrett and Richard. Richard at 16 is still in school but James Garrett is working but the record is illegible for his occupation.  Mary however is listed as head of the house, married and working at a diary farm.  She also states that she is the mother of 5 children and all 5 are living.  At this point I have Frank, James Garrett, Richard, Mary and William as her children so it's safe to say I have all the James & Mary Bowman kids accounted for on my tree now so I'll stop looking for more.  8-)

In 1920 census Mary is again living as head of house with her sons Richard and James Garrett, James' wife, Catherine and a granddaughter, Clara.
Mary now owns a farm(says general farm not dairy farm)and there is a mortgage on it.  Richard is working on their farm but James Garrett works for the NYS Highway Dept. as an engineer.

At this point using Mary Foster Bowman's info I was able to pull up a NY state census from 1915 and found the daughter, Mary E. living in the household with her mother and her siblings, Richard and James Garrett.  So that confirmed the information that there was a sister.

Next I had to find what happened to Mary E. Bowman.  Since she married a guy named Maroney I started looking around this part of NY for Catholic cemeteries for folks named Maroney buried in them.
This led me to some family trees back on Ancestry and then to the first name of Mary Bowman's husband-Clarence.  This was found on a family tree of someone who is the grandson of Clarence's brother, Henry Thomas Maroney.  I emailed him  and confirmed what I have documented but he isn't much help with this line of Maroneys going forward from Clarence and Mary Bowman Maroney's family.

I finally did make head way after just some dumb luck and guessing and poking around online.  Clarence and Mary Maroney had one son, listed as Leo in one census and then James L. in another census, but no official documentation after 1940 when they were living in New Windsor, NY(Orange Co.)
Then I found a telephone directory listing for 1990 in Newburgh, NY for James Moroney(spelled with an o, not an a) and another for 2002 for same person in Washingtonville, NY(still Orange Co.).

Finally I pulled up this from a website for motorized sports professionals HERE.

This is my James Leo Moroney/Maroney, my first cousin 1 x removed.....

And here is his son, Patrick, my second cousin 1 x removed.  He is 1 year older than me....

And here is Pat's son, Jimmy, my third cousin with his GF.......

They own/run a family business, the link to which is HERE.
When I read this part....."He rode a 1927 30/50 Indian over the pastures of his father's dairy farm and old country roads which are now part of the runway for Stewart International Airport at Newburgh.", I KNEW I had the right person!

So now I am at a crossroads--do I email Pat through the business or do I try to find his home address and send him a letter saying, "You don't know me, BUT we are related......"?

It's not like I want a warm close personal relationship with him but I would like to get into contact as I have so little family anymore and my father's family is mostly a mystery to me.  Maybe he can shed some light on more family facts.
 I just hope he doesn't think I am some weird creepy woman.  ;-)

WWYD?

Sluggy








 

A Proper Genealogy Post Part 1

It's been awhile since I've done a genealogy post so let's rectify that now.

Late last year I decided to turn my attention away from my maternal lines of ancestors toward my paternal lines.

A few of these lines are well documented(not by me but by others)but not many.

One of these researched already lines is connected to my father's father's mother's mother's line(that would be a grandfather's maternal grandmother side).

My grandfather's parents were Frank Foster BOWMAN and Catherine O'BRIEN.
Catherine's parents were Maurice(pronounced Morris)O'BRIEN and Marion(or Mary A.)Ellen ROCHE.
Let's start with the ROCHE/O'BRIEN's, shall we?

 Maurice O'Brien photo shared on Ancestry by b1pilot1

Mary Roche O'Brien photo shared on Ancestry by b1pilot1

Both Maurice and Marion were born in County Limerick, Ireland.  Maurice in 1849 and Marion in 1854.  This was right in the midst of the Great Potato Famine in Ireland.

Map of Ireland with Limerick City pinpointed

Long story short on the Great Famine--Irish Catholics had few opportunities to advance themselves due to restrictive laws of the ruling minority Protestant English who owned most of the land(if not all)in Ireland at this time.  Due to English control of the land, most crops grown were exported out of the country to England for profit. Food source for most Irish commoners was 1 variety of potato and said variety caught the potato blight so the main food source for the Irish dried up.  Even so, the English who controlled the land and crops continued to export said crops to England and grew rich while the Irish who tended the farms and their families grew malnourished and a great number of them died. 

Graphic from Here.  Note that Limerick is in the 3rd worst area for poverty at the beginning of the famine.


The recognized start of the Potato Famine is 1845 and it stretched to 1852 and possibly beyond.  This particular famine(there had been an earlier Irish famine in 1740 which was bad but not as devastating)is thought to have been caused by a blight that originated in Mexico, spread up into the US and then inadvertently brought aboard ships to Ireland in potatoes used to feed ship passengers on the voyage to Ireland.  From these tainted potatoes it took root in Irish soil and in 1845 crop loss was reported to be 1/3 to 1/2 and by 1846 3/4 of the potato crop was lost to blight.

Over 3 Million Irish people were dependent on potatoes as their food staple.  This blight devastated the population.  People starved to death in great numbers.  When tenant Irish Catholic farmers couldn't pay their rent(due to the crop failures), they were thrown out of their homes, so not only were they starving but homeless too.  Faced with almost certain death, many Irish Catholics left the country between 1845 and 1850 and immigrated to England, Scotland, South Wales, the United States, Canada, and Australia.

Graphic from This Article
No records exist to tell us exactly how many people died or left in the Great Irish Migration caused by this famine but a Census taken in 1841 compared with a Census taken in 1851 shows there are 1.5 Million less people in Ireland.
It is said that the population in County Limerick declined by 70,000 during the Famine, though the population in Limerick city rose due to starving paupers fleeing into the workhouses.

Imagine being pregnant and bearing children into a world like this!  Not knowing if you can feed them and being malnourished and sick yourself and not knowing when/if the authorities will be at your door to throw your family into the streets.
This is the world my ancestors were born into.

Maurice and Mary A. Ellen wed in Ireland thought I don't know the date or in what church yet.
I do know they were Catholic however, as they were both buried in a Catholic Cemetery in Ansonia, CT at the end of their days.

Photo by F.A.G. member AlyciaK.


Their first child named Honora "Nora" was born about 1875 in Ireland and the second daughter named Mary about 1877.
I haven't nailed down which ship they took to America but I do know it sailed from Ireland in the Fall of 1879.

And how do I know this?
By June 1880 in that year's census the family is found living in Derby, Connecticut.   Derby is in New Haven County on the Housatonic River.

Derby on Connecticut map. Derby is West of New Haven, North of Bridgeport


The family consists of Maurice, Mary Ellen, children Honora, Mary and Maggie.  The first 4 members of the family are noted as being born in Ireland.
Look at where Maggie(or Margaret as was her given name)was reported as being born..............

Maurice-Ireland
Mary-Ireland
Honora-Ireland
Mary-Ireland
Maggie-Ocean

So Mary Ellen was "great with child" on the voyage and gave birth at sea.  I bet that was exciting, but not in a good way. ;-)

Maurice and Mary Ellen went on to have another 5 children that I can find---Bedina(who might have died in her teens), Catherine(my great grandmother), John, Annie and Josephine(who also died in her teens and is buried with her parents).

But there is a mystery revolving around Annie and/or Josephine and another child someone else has on their version of this family tree that is also a mystery to me.

We'll ponder all that next time.

Sluggy
 

At the Tone, Leave Your Name and Message, I'll Get Back to You

Last week, I made a break through on one of my brick walls.

You see, I have a line of WOMACKS.
My 3 x Great Grandfather, Lewellen SNEAD from Halifax County, Virginia, married a Rebecca WOMACK from Halifax County, Virginia, on 20 January, 1849.
Rebecca's parents were Abraham and Tabitha Jane(nee HUDSON) WOMACK.
Abe was born in 1755 and the speculation is that Abe's father was also named Abraham WOMACK.
This is were this line of WOMACKS ends for me.
This WOMACK line comes off my mother's maternal Grandfather's lines of VASSAR and SNEAD.

But last weekend, while searching around on my mother's paternal grandfather's mother's line of DRISKILL(or DRISCOLL) I made a find.....which led to another unexpected find.

My 2  Great Grandmother, Mary Agnes DRISKILL, was born in Halifax County, Virginia in 1838.  Mary Agnes's Great Grandfather was named Daniel DRISKILL born 1730 in Campbell County, Virginia.
He married a woman named Ann WOMACK born in 1745 in Campbell County as well.

So it seems I have 2 lines of WOMACKS on my mother's side of the family.  It could be that these 2 liens are actually the same line but I have yet to connect Rebecca's line to Ann's line of WOMACKS.

There is much WOMACKS in AMERICA research already done as well as a fair amount of questions, undocumented info and speculation among the WOMACK information stretching from America back to the British Isles.

Even so, I have been able to connect Ann's branch back into a well documented part of the line.....one of the first WOMACKS to come to the New World, William WOMACK from either Lincolnshire or Norfolk, England.  This Womack is purported have come to Virginia in his teens or early twenties(1640's) and eventually died 1 Aug 1697 in Bristol Parish, Virginia Colony(a Crown Colony by the time this ancestor arrived).  Still not sure on whether during his lifetime this Parish was considered in Charles Cittie or in Henrico County.  If this William WOMACK is the one who is purported to have owned land in the Bermuda Hundred then it's Henrico County.

This William WOMACK had a son named ABRAHAM and as families were apt to name their successive generations after themselves, it's possible my other WOMACK line(the SNEAD/WOMACK line)with 2 Abrahams that I know of)is also connected to this WOMACK(on the DRISKILL side of things)line.
But I digress.....

Anyway, I started filling out the tree of WOMACKS with siblings/ancestors on this line from documented source material and on a branch sprouting from my 6 x Great Grandfather, Richard WOMACK JR.(William's grandson), instead of following his son/my ancestor James WOMACK, I started down his son/my ancestor's sibling Richard WOMACK III's branch.

While my branch of the family tree pretty much stayed in Virginia, Richard III's branch meandered around the South--from Virginia, to South Carolina, to Louisiana, to Georgia, to Texas, back to Louisiana, to Texas, to Arkansas, and back to Texas and finally the line led me to Oklahoma.

Richard III's 4 x Great Granddaughter was a woman named Abbie Lillian WOMACK.
She married a man named Charles Bailey MEEK from Arkansas and they settled in Oklahoma.
Nothing special here, except Abbie & Charlie MEEK were the grandparents of  James Scott BUMGARNER.

You may know him as James Garner the actor.

Or from this tv series of the 1960's HERE.
(That's Adam West in this clip, pre-Batman days.)

Jim went on to star in the popular series The Rockford Files in the 1970's, a series of very popular tv commercials in the 1980's for Polaroid, as well as 50 Hollywood films throughout his long career.
He died last month on the 19th of July at 86.

I use to love to watch the Rockford Files with the Hubs when we were young, as well as in movies.  I always thought James Garner was a good actor.
I had no clue back then that Jim was my 8th cousin through our shared ancestor, Richard Womack, Jr., born in 1674 in the Colony of Virginia.

You just never know what you will find when you start researching your ancestry!




Sluggy



 

The Great Summer Road Trip of 2013......Day Eight

Day Eight of the Great Summer Road Trip of 2013 dawned early.

I guess we rose so early because we were so hungry, not having eaten a "proper" dinner the night before.
We performed our morning ablutions and decided to by-pass the meager dining options available in the lobby at this motel, and just check-out and head into the day.  We had a lot we wanted to get done today, which started with this.....

We could see that sign way up yonder from the motel so we got our keesters down the road for breakfast, were I ordered up this.....

A lovely salty country ham slice....almost as good as having Bacon but more filling!

It came with 2 eggs, a biscuit and a big pile of grits.  We don't see grits much around where I live in Yankeeland so I got them and fixed them so any Southerner worth their "salt" could eat them.......

"Proper Grits"....mashed up with fried eggs and pieces of salty ham.
Mmmmmmmm! 8-)

After that plate of YUM, we headed north to the first stop of the day.......

The Wolf Creek Indian Village and Museum in Bastian, VA.
This place hasn't been around long and is well off the beaten path to ANYWHERE!
In 1970, the archaeological remains of a long gone Native American village were uncovered and by 1996 the recreated village was opened to the public, with the Museum following in 1998.  Revitalization began in 2009 on the village structures to what you see today.

Experts have yet to identify which tribe this band of 1st Peoples were part of, other than to say that they were Eastern Woodlands Indians and the village is approx. 500 years old, so early 1500's/late 1400's, and predating any European contact.

You can visit their website HERE.

I didn't get any shots inside the museum, as they don't allow cameras but I did shoot our guided Village Tour.
All 9 episodes of it.
You might want to bookmark these videos and come back to them later at your leisure to watch them all at one time if you are interested in history and the ways of ancient peoples.

The first video was on the ride down to the Village.  It's right by the Wolf Creek so quite the hike down a ridge where the museum and parking lot were, to the village.  Since I could have walked down there but probably not have been able to walk back UP, we took the golf cart ride down and back.  Mr. John was our driver and he handed us off to Mr. Glen who conducted the tour for us.
John was a real character and I would have LOVED to have spent more time with him.  I didn't get one story on film he told us, about his days in the army during Vietnam and how he got the best of all those city slicker recruits which was hysterical.  I just got this little bit of him on that first video.  I am sure he would be Awesome to hang out with!

Mr. Glen did a good job with his tour and we enjoyed it.
I hope you do too.








Mr. John makes a cameo appearance in this video.....


And this last part is a view down by the creek before we headed back up to the parking lot.


After spending quite some time on the village tour and in the museum, we hit the road south.

Next stop, the Big Walker Mountain Lookout.
You will notice in this short clip how my accent has rather thickened after spending a few hours with Mr. John and Mr. Glen. lol
 

 

 Big Walker Lookout Pass is the starting point for the Civil War Heritage Trail concerning the Battle of "Wytheville".  The federal troops under John Toland came to this area to destroy the railroad tracks around Wytheville, plus tear down telegraph lines and capture nearby lead and salt mines.  A local named Molly Tynes used the views from this mountain pass to warn the town of the advance of the Yankee troops.

 

You will notice on the close-up of the map that Wytheville is not too far from Saltville, VA....about 44 miles.  If you've been reading my blog for a few years, you may recall that my 3 x Great Uncle was captured at the Battle of Saltville in Oct. of 1864 and later died of gangrene as a POW at Camp Chase in Columbus, OH.
I talk about him HERE in 2012.

 Here are a couple of shots I took from the ground into the valley below......

And then I gave the camera to Hubs and he climbed the tower and took these beautiful shots of God's Country.......

And then Hubs took a shot of yours truly from high above......

We went into the store and I bought of few of the "what nots" Mr. John talked about and yes, the place was full of touristy "what nots". lol

I got to talking with the elderly lady manning the store(this place has been run continuously since 1947, at least the tower has, by the Kime family)and I mentioned an ancestor had been captured at the Battle of Saltville, which led us into chatting about our respective Southern ancestors. 
Seem she had done some digging into her genealogy/family roots at one point and had found out that her ancestor had been labeled a Confederate deserter during the Civil War.  She was quite upset by that blackmark on the family honor, even now.  But then she got some additional information from a WBTS's buff that often when Southern soldiers were wounded, there was no field medic to treat them and/or no hospital to send them to for recovery and rehabilitation, so usually the wounded, who could get home, would go home to recover and return when they were fit for service again.  And many records show soldiers as deserting when in fact, they were just going home to recover from their injuries and be nursed to health by their families.  I can guess there were some who didn't return but she believed her ancestor had done the gentlemanly thing.

We bid adieu to the Big Walker Lookout and headed South down into Wytheville.

Our next stop was right in downtown Wytheville, Virginia......

 

...for a visit to the Edith Bolling Wilson Museum.
After all, she is family.
Yes, here I go again with the genealogy stuff.  8-))

My 7 x Great Grandmother, Mary Hunt married Field Jefferson(2nd marriage for both), which made her the Aunt of Thomas Jefferson(yes, THAT one!)and his sister, Mary Martha Jefferson.

Mary J. married a fellow named John Blair Bolling and their great grandson was named William Holcombe Bolling.  William Bolling was a lawyer and eventually a Judge.  He married Sarah "Sallie" Spiers White in 1860.  They had eleven children, nine of whom lived to adulthood.  Their 7th child born was Edith White Bolling, making her my 7th Great Grandmother's 3rd Niece.
Edith went on to marry a successful Washington D.C. jewelry store owner named Norman Galt, and after being widowed in 1908, she continued to run the store and made it an even more successful enterprise.  In 1915, she caught the eye of the recently widowed Woodrow Wilson, the then current President of the USA and wed him.
And the rest, as they say, is history.

This 7th Great Grandmother of mine also links me by marriage to another pair of famous Bolling Family members.  Edith's 8 x Great Grandparents are John and Rebecca Rolfe....or as she is better known, Pocahontas. (Though much oral history among the 1st Peoples of Virginia says that their son, Thomas, was NOT in fact John Rolfe's issue.....Thomas' actual father may have been  in reality another European in the VA colony or Pocahontas' native husband.  Native histories and stores have long been ignored by those in positions of power. But that's fodder for another time.)

 

Which makes the Rolfes the 3 x Great Grandparents of the husband of the niece of my 7th Great Grandmother(through marriage).
Got that? lolz

Anyway since we share a tenuous familial bond, it would have been rude not to stop in Wytheville and say "hey y'all" to Edith's home.
I even paid the extra to tour the upstairs of the building which was the family's living quarters from 1866-1899, when the family moved away after the death of Judge Bolling. Judge Bolling has lost the family plantation after the war and his father, Dr. Archibald Bolling had bought this building for the family to move to.  Edith was born in this home and lived there with her parents, her 8 siblings, her grandmother(who considered Edith her favorite), along with 26 canaries(her grandmother's passion)and other assorted pets.

Here's a photo of some of the Bolling children, probably taken about 1874 or so....

My guess from birth order l to r....Annie, Edith, Gertrude. In back....Rolfe.  In front....William.

The upstairs has NOT been renovated and it was interesting to tour the home in it's "raw" state.  Some details remain from the Bolling family's time there but much work needs to be done to keep this treasure from the ravages of time and decay.
Of course, we made a donation to the cause and became a sponsor of the Foundation.
I also bought my daughter a t-shirt.....

The museum did not allow any pictures to be taken or film to be shot but I did get a photo of myself
with Edith's sign.....

I found this video last week.  Some filmmaker from South Africa had his own Summer Road Trip last Summer and we went to some of the same places.
He put some videos on YouTube and while he was in Wytheville he got the person who founded the Foundation/Museum, Farin Smith to let him film inside.
The segment concerned starts at 2:48......




After bidding goodbye to Edith and Mrs. Smith, we went down the street to the end of the building for lunch......

 

To  the E. N. Umberger Store......otherwise known to the world as Skeeter's!

I don't think the décor has changed much in here since the 1960's.  It's been in operation since 1925, selling hot dogs and such.  I think items have been added to the décor since that time but nobody has ever thrown anything away. lolz

Here is Hubs digging into his dog.....

 And here's another short film.....



Sometimes a cold drink and a lowly tube steak just hits the spot, does it not?

Here's the lovely lady who waited on us.  She even let me take her picture but I can't for the life of me remember her name now..........Catherine I think?.....

 So after slaking off our hunger and thirst, we went next door.....

Actually Hubs had been cooling his heels in there while I was doing the tour upstairs at Edith's place.
So Hubs took me into Carter's Beverage Company to check out some interesting brews he had found.

I found that South African guy has also done a short film with Carter, the owner......




Hubs and I talked for a bit with Mr. Pennington.  He had just opened this business earlier last year.  I told him about that hard Root Beer stuff I had become addicted to from Sonya Ann's liquor store and brought him in a bottle so he could check it out and see about trying to get it to carry there since he is all about the unusual but good brews.
Carter is good people and I wish him the best of luck with his shop!

It was getting on to about 4 o clock by now and we needed to head out to our next motel stop.
But before we left Wytheville, I had Hubs stop HERE.
Tucked into this tiny town in the backroads of western Virginia is quite the fabric store.....especially if you quilt or like batiks.
They have a large internet business selling all over the world.
Fabric stores, really GOOD fabric stores intoxicate me.
A hit of fabric is better than booze in my book.

I'll just say, Hubs was tapping his foot impatiently so I showed remarkable restraint by only staying an hour and only buying 3 lengths of rayon batik fabric......rayon batiks are Very expensive in this country......

You do NOT want to know how much this stuff cost.....trust me! lolz
Let's just say I blew my souvenir budget in that store. ;-)

By 5pm, when they roll the sidewalks up in Wytheville by the way, we hit the interstate heading to Alta Vista, VA, our next stop.
Rolled into that town around dusk(8ish), trudged out things into the room and then back out to find something for dinner.  We found a Chinese buffet nearby in a shopping mall so we gorged on Quasi-Asian foods and went back to the motel to pop open some wine and relax for the evening.

Day 8 was quite the adventure but we were worn down to a nub and ready for some down time.

Sluggy