Family Time

We are traveling from the East Coast to Colorado so it was a great opportunity to visit family. My dad grew up in Illinois and I have a distant cousin living in Iowa that is also interested in genealogy. We met Harry and Marilyn for lunch and had a great time talking and catching up on each other's lives. We haven't seen them for 5 years so we had a lot to catch up on.

John has a number of relatives living in Iowa and we spent 2 days visiting with them.  The first evening we went to Susie and Jim's house for dinner.  The wine and antipasto were delicious.

Then we adjourned to the dining room for a delicious spaghetti dinner.  Cousin Marilyn joined us.  Jim is Italian and he really knows how to make spaghetti and meatballs.  Thanks, Jim.

The next day we went to the senior housing complex where Marilyn lives.  After a good lunch in the dining room, we enjoyed talking in her spacious living room.

Over two days we talked non-stop for 8 hours with these people. Unusual for us, but we had so much fun we had to keep talking.

Learning from History

For the past couple of months or so, we have been visiting libraries, cemeteries and museums.  Much of the history we have been exploring concerns the Civil War, early pioneers in what was once considered the "west" and slavery.  Both John and I have always enjoyed history, but why this focus?  It's all about family, especially John's ancestors.

From 1865 to 1934, a former slave and Civil War veteran, Benjamin Franklin Robinson, shared his life with members of John's family. He was known as Uncle Ben.  Uncle was a term of respect after Civil War by whites for African Americans they valued. (We learned this fact while touring the Andrew Jackson estate near Nashville, TN.) This summer, we visited the Civil War battlefield at Franklin, Tennessee.  In 1864, Uncle Ben was a teamster in the Colored Troops at that battle.  History has a lot more meaning when you know, or know of, someone who was present during some historic event.

Uncle Ben first came to the Gans-Andrews family in 1865 in Olathe, Kansas.  William Gans was John's great-great grandfather.  The family story is that he came to the home and asked if he could work for the family in  return for a meal and a place to sleep for the night.  Over the years, we had wondered why he came to William Gans' home and why he was in Kansas.  In our research over the past few years, we have learned that Uncle Ben had enlisted in the Union Army in Kansas.  We also learned that William Gans, a minister in the christian Church, moved to Kansas in 1858 in the movement to assure that Kansas was admitted as a free state, not a slave state.  This was part of the result of the  1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act.  We wonder if Gans was a part of the Underground Railroad. Because of all of this family history, we have been interested in museums that concern slavery and the Underground Railroad, as well as Civil War sites.

We know Uncle Ben had been a slave.  We don't know how he received his freedom.  Did he escape?  Did he buy his freedom?  In one museum we visited this summer, we learned that Union troops freed slaves when they occupied Southern areas.  The slaves were considered  "contraband" property and immediately given their freedom.  So, we have even more options to consider regarding how he became free.

In Tennessee, we visited the Shiloh Battlefield National Historic Park.  Since then, we have been reading a series of books by  Phillip Bryant about soldiers from both sides that fought in that battle. A few weeks later, we found that one distant relative had fought and died at Shiloh.

In 1905, another of John's great-great grandfathers, Ray W. Andrews, died in the Old Soldiers and Sailor's Home (now known as a VA hospital) in Leavenworth, Kansas. He had been wounded in the Battle of Pea Ridge.  His application for a VA pension states that he was wounded by shrapnel in the Battle of Pea Ridge in Missouri.  Several years ago, we visited that battlefield.  In our travels this year, we stayed at an RV park in Parker's Crossroads, TN.  We toured a battlefield there, where we learned that the dried wood of the split-rail fences often shattered when hit by artillery shells.  The shrapnel from that wood caused many serious wounds.  Was Ray W. Andrews, John's ancestor, injured by wooden fence shrapnel?  We will probably never know.

During one museum visit, we learned that Abraham Lincoln received so many death threats after his election in 1860 that a private group of soldiers accompanied him on his journey to Washington, D.C. for inauguration.  They also stayed in the White House to protect him for some time.  This all fit in with another aspect of William Gans' history.  We had learned that Mrs. James Lane moved from Indiana to Kansas with the Gans family in 1858.  Her husband, General Lane, was a part of the militia that fought to make Kansas a free state.  He had served in the Indiana legislature and as a US senator from Indiana before moving to Kansas.  He and some members of the militia were the soldiers protecting Lincoln in 1861.

We have also learned about the early settlers in Ohio during our travel this summer.  Ohio became a state in 1803.  In 1787, the Northwest Ordinance had created the Northwest Territory, allowing Americans to settle the area northwest of the Ohio River, land that had previously been a part of Quebec, Canada. John's great-great-great grandfather came to Ohio in the year it became a state. We found Daniel's grave in the Spring Grove Cemetery in Cincinnati. Daniel's son William, born after the family came to Ohio, married a woman in Indiana. When she died, he returned to Indiana where his brother John was living, and met and married his second wife there, as well. Traveling to Indiana, we found marriage records, cemetery records and graves of that part of the family. Sometimes the best research must be done in the locations where ancestors lived. Many members of the same family tend to live and die and be buried together. Looking at the graves often fills in blanks that were left on the internet, like who some members married. "Unknown" dates of death can be filled in.

During our time in Shipshewana, Indiana, we visited the Menno-Hof Museum, where we learned the history of the Mennonite and Amish people. They left Germany because of persecution of all those who refused to be a part of the established state church. The Brethern was another group that fled that persecution and their beliefs are/were similar. That gave us more insight into the Gans family. These groups also were anti-slavery. George Gans, John's great-great-great-great grandfather, came to Pennsylvania from Germany with The Brethren. His son Daniel settled in Ohio in 1803; his son William moved to Kansas to help assure it would become a state that did not allow slavery. All of this research on family, Civil War and slavery is interrelated. Our travels, our research, our seemingly unrelated museum visits, all helped us understand more.

While staying outside Columbus, Ohio, we visited a number of cemeteries. One helped us to appreciate how things had changed since John's early ancestors had lived there. In 1830 and 1831 a great-great grandfather and great-great grandmother, Amasa and Polly Wiswell, were buried in the Kempton Cemetery. Seven years later, a great grandfather, Amasa Wiswell Jr., was also buried there. Since Ohio only became part of the US in 1787 and became a state in 1803, it couldn't have been very heavily populated in the 1830s. Today, the tiny cemetery (it is only about 1/4 of a city block square) is surrounded by a busy road and a condominium complex. Columbus is a major metropolitan area. Very few of the gravestones in the Kempton Cemetery are even legible. Marble deteriorates quickly. We had to rely on internet research to know the family member graves were there. It was sad, while at the same time, an emotional experience to make the visit.

Holiday Weekend

As all full-timer RVers know, it is important to plan ahead for holiday weekends, especially Memorial Day, 4th of July and Labor Day.  These holidays are very popular with recreational RVers and campers, as well as those of us who live on the road.  We made reservations in March for the July 4 weekend.  I knew we would be in Ohio, where we are doing more genealogy research.  We decided on Delaware State Park north of Columbus, a park we had stayed in several years ago.

The park gave us access to the Columbus Public Library, which has a large genealogy and local history section.

They even have rental bicycles out front.  The cost is $6 an hour.  We didn’t take the time to bike around downtown Columbus, though it looked as interesting as Cincinnati.

On the 4th, we needed to do laundry.  We hadn’t been to a laundromat for 10 days, so the supply of clean clothes was about exhausted.  We found one in the nearby town of Delaware.  As we drove down the main street, it was lined with chairs.  Obviously, the town had a parade.  After washing and drying our clothes, we ended up in a line of cars stopped for the parade.

We saw a few parade entries, before making a u-turn and making our way out of town.

Surprisingly, we have heard absolutely no fireworks over the weekend.  We didn’t see any information about local fireworks shows and there wasn’t any here in the state park.  The campground is completely full, but it has been very quiet.

Yesterday, we visited two cemeteries.  On the way, we drove through the town of Mechanicsburg.  Since the local Chevrolet dealer was open, we had the truck serviced.  While the work was being done, we walked around the pretty small town.  There were lots of neat old houses.  Almost every one had a great front porch.

 

One impressive house didn’t have a front porch, but we enjoyed looking at it.

In the downtown area, we saw a small park with this nice gazebo.  The building next door had a pretty mural..

Each of the downtown buildings had interesting fronts and roof lines.

Tracing Family

Cedar Ridge Corps of Engineers Campground in Belton, Texas, is a great place to spend a few days. Belton Lake, which was constructed between 1949 and 1954 to provide flood control and water storage on the Leon River, is visible right behind our RV.



But we aren't here for the fishing. John's dad was born nearly 105 years ago at Evant, a very small town, now nearly abandoned, about 50 miles from here. This is the main street of town.



Texas has done a wonderful job of installing signs all over, tracing the history of the state.



We had been here before, researching the family history. We are especially interested in two counties, Bell and Coryell, where John's grandparents and great grandparents had lived. In 2005, we spent time in the Bell County Courthouse in Belton. The counties in Texas take great pride in their courthouses and they are very attractive.



This year we also visited the Coryell County Courthouse in Gatesville.



Today, we also visited the Lena Armstrong Public Library in Belton and the Belton County Museum. Yesterday, we drove around the area that was once the town of Moffat, which John's great grandparents, Daniel and Colista Wiswell, helped found in the late 1860s. The town was no more than 2 miles from our campground.



We also visited Evant and went to the Pearl Cemetery nearby. That is where Daniel Wiswell is buried in an unmarked grave and where John's great aunt Oshea Stevens is buried.





These communities are not tourist destinations, but places, and their histories, really come alive when you know some of the people who lived here 100 years ago or 160 years ago. Between the family ties and the fact we have volunteered over 7 months at two state parks and a US fish and wildlife area here in Texas, we really feel almost at home here.

Mow the Grass

We made a trip to Topeka yesterday to do research at the Kansas Museum of History. The building is located west of the city on the edge of the prairie.



We didn't find any helpful new information in our genealogy search, but we did enjoy the day. The research center has lots of historical records, both in books and on microfilm. I now remember what it was like to search census reports on microfilm. The computer and internet resources have made the task of finding our ancestors so much easier. However, not everything is online so it is good to have places like this.

The most interesting part of the day was a walk on the nature trail that loops around the museum. It passes through tall grass prairie and woods. During our second summer of volunteering at state and national parks, we learned about the prairie at Fort Parker State Park in Texas. We staffed the nature center each weekend. The American prairie has (or had before modern farming) three forms or types: tall grass, mixed grass and short grass. Look at how tall the tall grass really is. I am 5'6" tall.



We walked through about two miles of prairie and woods.



There were several different bridges built by the early settlers in Kansas.







They have preserved a one-room school, the Stach School which was built in 1877.



We saw evidence of heavy rain or other run-off eroding a creek bank.



And a wood rat nest. I hope I never encounter the rat that built this!



Once before, in a campground on the Texas-Oklahoma boarder, we saw the fruit of the Osage orange. It is very interesting and might make a good Christmas decoration if it didn't rot by then.



Since leaving Colorado, most of our time has been spent driving down the highway, staying in urban RV parks and visiting libraries and towns. It was so good to get out in nature again.

Generations of Family

Today, we met John's cousin Susie and her husband Jim at the Olathe, Kansas, Memorial Cemetery where two of their great-great grandfathers, two great-great grandmothers and a great-great-great grandmother are all buried. Two of those graves are not marked, but we know where they are.

Susie and Jim drove from Iowa, we had just a 40-minute drive from Peculiar, Missouri. We'd all have to journey back in time 108 to 134 years to take part in the funerals of the folks whose graves we visited today.

Here are John and Susie, are standing by the headstone marking the graves of a great-great grandmother and a great-great-great grandmother. Rebecca, born in 1803, died in 1888. Her daughter, Mary, born in 1831, died in 1881.



Great-great grandfather Ray, a Civil War veteran, is buried next to his wife.



Several other Wiswell relatives are also buried here, as are the great-great grandparents named Gans and some of their children. Those are the unmarked graves.

We understand the following photograph is called a selfy. Don't say us old folks can't keep up with the young kids. This was taken in the parking lot after a great, lingering lunch with hours of good conversation at the local Applebees.



It was a great day. We had fun exploring past generations with other members of our family. And we are enjoying spending time exploring Kansas where at least four generations of ancestors lived in the 1800s. Years ago, when this journey into our past began in earnest, we had no idea how important Kansas had been in the family history.

A Friend and Quiet Time in Mesa

Tuesday we had lunch with a man John hadn't seen in over 51 years. We met Fred at a local Olive Garden to catch up on lives over the past half century. There sure was a lot to talk about. John and Fred are two of a dozen youth who attended 12 years together in Castle Rock schools. Fred wasn't able to attend the group's 50th reunion in 2011, so there was a lot of catching up to do.



Other than that good visit, it has been pretty quiet here in Mesa. Winter has finally arrived (temperatures from 40 to 62 degrees), we've had rain, and we've spent a lot of time at home. It is too cool for John to sit outside and carve and I have finished all my current projects in the pottery studio.

So, what are we doing? Both of us have been doing some writing about genealogy and I have been doing a lot of online genealogy research. If you have seen the ads for Ancestry.com, you have seen people talking about the green leaves that show when there are possible family information in the program's files. Right now our family tree includes over 2500 people and there are those green leaves all over the place. It can keep me busy for days, if I have the patience to keep at it. Right not, John is focused mainly on writing a history of his father's life.

I also have plenty of time of clean house (yuk, not my favorite activity, but sometimes it is necessary) and do end-of-the-year filing and record shredding.

We also enjoy watching the birds that are hunting for food around our RV. There is a large family of gamble's quail in the neighborhood.



We also see and hear several noisy cactus wrens.

Alaska -- Day 7

We are in Helena, MT, for a few days to do some genealogy research. John's great-great-grandfather was here for a few years after the Civil War. We didn't know that when we were here eight years ago on our first trip to Alaska. So this year we made sure we had time to learn about his stay here. We had learned that the US Army wasn't able to make this area safe for settlement until after the 1876 Battle of the Little Bighorn (Custer's Last Stand). In reality, that was just about the last stand for the Sioux and soon settlers were able to come to Montana in relative safety. But we're talking about someone coming here in 1865! that was the time of a gold rush. An internet search revealed that the man had been elected to the Third Extraordinary Session of the Montana Territorial Legislature in the fall of 1866. So we knew we would find some information.

We drove to the Helena City and County Courthouse.



There we learned it literally is a court house. It houses city and county courts. So we drove a mile or so to the building where the Lewis and Clark County Clerk and Recorder offices are located. When we asked to see the grantor-grantee books showing the purchase and sale of property and told them what year to start, the woman said, "Oh. That is really old." We found several entries about John's relative.

Next, we drove a mile or so away and parked in front of the Montana Capitol.



It is across the street from the Montana Historical Museum and Research Library. The staff there was just great. We have never done research anywhere that we received such wonderful help. They asked what we were looking for then began bringing us books and maps and even finding the references in those books. It was great and we learned a whole lot. Now, all we have to do is digest it and then John can add this chapter to the story he has written about this great-great-grandfather.

Not an Ordinary Day

Saturday was not our normal, ordinary volunteer day at Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge. On our morning safety run we saw this Indigo snake. It had been stretched out straight, but by the time I got the camera aimed its way, it had doubled back and was headed off the road. These snakes are very large but not poisonous.



It was a humid morning and so our view of the Rio Grande was foggy. This is what we see when we walk down the Jaguarundi Trail on each tram tour (minus the fog).



A dead branch had fallen off a tree and onto the Wildlife Drive. It was small enough we didn't have to call out the fire department and their chain saws. John just moved the pieces to the side of the road.



We picked up some trash as we drove around the refuge, so on our way back I threw it into the trash dumpster. Look at what was staring back at me!



Later another volunteer, Mel, scared the fellow out, only to find there were two raccoons there. We only saw the one when we took the photo.

One more critter before our first tour: John spotted this 9-Banded Armadillo in the garden area near where we park the tram. Now I have seen a Bobcat, John has seen an Armadillo. (He would have been happier if he had seen the Bobcat.)



I have been connecting with some distant relatives during our time here. We have met Harry and Marilyn twice already and during our lunch yesterday, they came to the refuge with Juanita and her husband, Jim. Both Harry and Juanita are related to my dad's side of the family. Harry is on my paternal grandfather's side, Juanita on my paternal grandmother's side. It was fun to meet Juanita and get some of her genealogy materials. Every little additional link--a name, a date--helps fill out the picture of my past.



All of this excitement was in addition to three tram tours with a total of 32 passengers. By the time we got home, it was time to kick back and relax.

Friday was a much quieter day at the refuge. We saw this great sun rise on the way to work. (This was taken at 7:33 am.)

Some Family Time

Nearly six year ago, when we were parked in a Corps of Engineers park along the Mississippi River in Iowa to do some genealogy research on my Longley family relatives, we came back to our RV and noticed that the reservation card on the site next to ours read "Longley." What a coincidence! Harry is a distant cousin. We haven't figured out the exact relationship. He says we might be 42nd cousins.

We have kept in contact and when our Christmas letter in December said we would be spending time here in the Rio Grande Valley, Harry emailed to ask when we would arrive. It turns out, Harry and Marilyn have been coming here for 12 years.

Today, we met them for lunch.



We spent a pleasant two hours talking, learning about each others lives, sharing genealogy research stories and tips. We will see them again before we leave.

It is cool (some would say cold) in the Valley this week. It rained quite a bit yesterday, which is a good thing for the state which has had such a drought and terrible fires last summer. But the rain means mud. Look at the tire on our truck after we drove about two blocks on a dirt road.



Because our running route here is also on dirt, we decided to drive to the refuge and run on the paved road there. It was a good idea and we had a good run. All in all, it has been a very good day.

Trip Through History

On Christmas Day in 1902 my grandparents, George E. Polhill and Lydia M. Doolin, were married in Weston, Colorado, by the groom's father, George W. Polhill, the local Justice of the Peace. George was a mason, working for CF&I Steel Co. and living in Segundo. I began looking into these facts more than a decade ago when it became possible to get specialty license plates if you were from a pioneer family--meaning a family that had come to Colorado before 1900. Weston and Segundo are on Colorado Hwy 12, the Scenic Highway of Legends, that runs from LaVeta over to Trinidad. As we have done before, today John and I drove that beautiful highway.

As we drove through LaVeta, we saw this doe mule deer and her triplets, right in town. I wasn't able to get mother and all three babies on one photo, but you can see two of the fawns.



Here is one of the many stone dikes visible along Hwy 12 through the Sangre de Cristo Mountains.



Our first stop was in Cuchara, a small tourist town, that has a few shops and restaurants and the Timbers lodge and restaurant. John is standing on the covered porch in front of the Timbers. I just love the pine bark slabs that decorate the building.





There was more beautiful vistas as we drove over Cuchara Pass, where my great-grandfather had homesteaded in July 1885.



We spotted this tiny cemetery along the road and pulled off to take a look. There were two headstones with names--neither of them my family.



This is the steeple on an old church in Weston. I don't where my great-grandparents'
home was. Perhaps they lived on the homestead north of here.



Another picture of a church steeple, this one in Segundo, I think. CF&I (Colorado Fuel and Iron) had a steel mill in Pueblo and a number of coal mines up what is now Hwy 12 north of Trinidad. The first coal mine was named Primero, the next Segundo, the next Tercio (Spanish for 1, 2 and 3). When the mines were operating, the company ran a train up the valley each day to pick up children and take them to school. You can read more about the early coal mining in this area here.



This is what is left of coke ovens at Cokedale, a town just outside Trinidad. It was here that local coal was made into coke. For more information about Cokedale, click here.



Now the Post Office and Cokedale Town Hall, this building was originally the Gottlieb Mercantile Company.





We drove on to Trinidad, where we had great meatball sandwiches at Nana and Nano's Montleones Pasta and Deli, then we drove back home to Lathrop. It was a scenic and fun day.