I haven’t been blogging much of late because I’ve taken it upon myself to transcribe a thirty page, hand-written history of my grandfather’s family tree that dates back to 1590. It was written between 1910 and 1925 by a lady named Daisy Jameson who was my great uncle’s wife until the dirty dog left her for another woman. Of course, this bit of sordid family history was never mentioned while my mother was alive. And so I had to figure out it myself. Hum, why is Daisy buried in Chicopee Mass but Henry is buried in Virginia and who’s this Marie Ange woman buried in the same plot as great uncle Henry? That kind of thing. Thank goodness for google and funeral registries.
Anyway, it’s easy to understand why the document is just a collection of births, marriages and deaths (taken from church records) and snippets from letters and bits of family lore passed down through the generations. After old Henry dumped her, Daisy probably wanted nothing more to do with the Jamesons! Making sense of this document is further complicated by the huge number of offspring on both sides who lived to adulthood and propagated like rabbits. Especially in the coastal seaports of Maine and the town of Chicopee Massachusetts. It’s depressing to know that I am not a rare bird from an unusual family but just a chickadee from Chicopee. But, although they might have been just common folk, they did live through some interesting times: The Siege of Derry, voyages to America, battles with the Indians and French, injuries during the Civil War, etc, etc. And so I’m peppering the narrative with accounts of what it must have been like to live during those times. Then I can seal the document away and forget about it.
So I will be blogging less than usual but here are some pictures of a winery near Santa Rosa, beautiful even in the smoke. And my attempt at an artistic peach.
Saying nothing in particular 
Four hundred years! That’s amazing! I don’t know anything past 1900, and almost nothing at that.
I don’t know that much about my father’s side but I suppose it is much the same as they were Scotch Irish and came over to Canada at about the same time (and they were Protestant).
That’s some effort. Good luck. I can’t be the only one concerned at the health of the penis plant. Does it thrive?
The penis plant is still sleeping. Last year it didn’t pop up until we had a sustained heat wave and so far it’s been a cool summer. So we’ll see!
A cool summer! I bet that’s a blessing!!
It has been but September and October are our hottest months here in the Bay Area so … we’ve got a ways to go unless the rains come early.
Good luck with your project. It’s a big one.
Yes, I will be happy when it’s finished and I can put aside those papers knowing I at least tried to make sense of them.
I think that’s very cool and interesting. A nice tribute to Daisy Jameson too. Maybe a future blog post – or 2 or 3? I have an ancestry mystery I’ve tried to figure out also.
In fairness to my great uncle, Daisy could have gone quite mad, another thing that was never spoken of. Good luck with your mystery! I’d love to hear about it.
This is a cool project. Good for you to take it on. I’d guess it’ll be worth the effort when you see the end product. I like your artistic peach, btw. Very peachy. 😁
Thanks! I did it mostly for the grand-kids. So that history isn’t just a punch of dates and important names but also the obscure ones.
This sounds very interesting good luck with it all. Those photos are beautiful 💜