#52 Ancestors - Week 9: Gone Too Soon

 This post was moved to the Collecting Dead People blog:

Gone Too Soon

Gone too Soon - #52Ancestors Week 9 - Patricia Ann Chamberlain

 This week’s prompt was almost too easy for me, because when I saw the phrase, I knew who to choose without a second’s hesitation.  

I don’t remember when I first heard of Aunt Pat, but I was very young.  She was my mother’s young maternal aunt, and she had died at 17 of leukemia.  My mom was greatly impacted by Pat’s death, as was the rest of the family (her bedroom was kept as a shrine, untouched, for many long years). It’s not an exaggeration that her short life led her to be nearly sanctified by those who knew and loved her.

Pat was born in October 1937 at St Mary’s Hospital and came home to a family of 6 doting siblings ages 13 to 7. All of her siblings except her next oldest sister were named for close family members, and my grandma told me that as the oldest, she was chosen to pick out the new baby’s name. There are several pictures of Patty in dainty little blue dresses, and I now own the little wooden doll cradle that was a gift from my grandma to her little sister.

Patty was just starting school when my grandma and grandma got married, followed in rapid succession by her next 4 siblings, soon leaving only the youngest 2 at home. I also have in an album a lengthy school report written by Pat, full of what at the time were pretty run-of-the-mill social observations regarding what was being taught in school about people of other cultures.  To today’s reader, nothing less than horrifying.  Pat’s parents, my great grandparents, had grown up in the South and her father was openly racist. 

As Pat grew to be a teenager, she became an aunt to a large number of nieces and nephews and often baby-sat.  My mother was the oldest grandchild, and she spent a lot of time with her aunt and grandparents (she was 9 years younger than her aunt). She remembers that Pat would play dress up with her, that Pat’s favorite record was the Tennessee Waltz, which she played until she wore the record out, and that Pat would take me mom on her dates with her, Mom riding along in the back seat.

I don’t know what happened when Pat became ill, or how the news was shared with family.  I do know that in the 1950’s, there wasn’t a great deal to do for leukemia, and that Pat wasn’t ill for terribly long before she died.  She went to prom, and a lovely portrait of her was done in her floor length blue gown.  Her boyfriend, Chester, gave her a ring and the family story is that he would not take it back after her death and that she was buried with it.  It’s unclear if he had asked her to marry him or if it was a promise for later.

Pat’s death was the 2nd relative in my mom’s life from leukemia. A little cousin on my grandpa’s side had stayed with them the year prior for some hospital visits, little Joey had died at age 6. I later learned that My grandma and Pat’s cousin Flo, from Tennessee, died in the 1970’s of leukemia.  I don’t know enough  to know if this was genetic.

I do know that my mother’s experience and the rest of the family’s grief didn’t ever really allow many of them to lay Pat to rest. She was talked about frequently, and as mentioned, her bedroom kept as a shrine for many years. It had been cleaned out and was a guest room when I was a child, but I knew that it was a sacred space, not to be entered without permission.  I don’t believe anyone ever gave those instructions out loud, we just knew.  As I write this, I wonder: would Pat have married and had 9 children like one sister, or been unable to have children and adopted two, like another?  Would she have married Chester at all, or would she have chosen a career first?  It was the mid-50’s after all.  Her 4 sisters were tiny, slim and more than a bit anxious.  Would she have been like them, or very different, this youngest sister?  Most of all, my grandma and her next-oldest sister recently passed, both in their 90s. Would Pat, who would be 86 this year, still be with us, and I could tease her like I teased my gram, taking her to Mass, out to dinner and asking her to tell tales on the younger version of my mom?

Nobody Knows About - How Two Cousins Are Related

 Rachel and Heather

Heather and Rachel

Good coffee, good books (especially Anne of Green Gables), quiet time, irreverent humor and GENEALOGY.

Quite a few years ago, Rachel and I were among the recipients of some emails from a shared yet distant cousin researching our common Pearson ancestors in Virginia. These emails were a spurt of information and no ongoing communication between us or the relative in Virginia continued beyond the few emails.

In the spring of 2018, my daughter and I took a road trip that included 2 days in Pulaski County, Illinois and my grandmother's birthplace in the Missouri Bootheel. My daughter has been my right-hand genealogy-passionate shotgun rider through-out high school and college.  We'd been home for a while and I was doing my regular evening cruise through the genealogy groups I belong to on social media, and as I recall, my intrepid cousin and I recognized each other as names we had seen before in correspondence.

Hmmm...

May I message you?

Friend request sent ✅

This is sometimes how one finds a kindred spirit.  Shared passion, add a dash of DNA. Below is a diagram that Rachel made for me for Christmas a few years ago, currently known to be incorrect.  When the diagram was made, she was known to be a Pearson descendant, and I was known (in error) to be a DOUBLE Pearson descendant.  Now we know that we are both "singles" and have to give up our status as "4th cousins once removed divided by 2" and stay at 4C1R, although given the number of intermarried families and Ohio River back-and-forth, we may yet find another connection.

  We've also found that we share what we believe to be a larger-than-average number of train injury and fatality victims, and once we (finally!) get to meet in person (Hey, 600 miles plus COVID is a barrier. I can't believe this “meet-up” online happened within 6 weeks of literally driving right past!), we have to update our verbal promise to at least pinky promise to STAY AWAY FROM LOCOMOTIVE ACTIVITY!  You can see below that Rachel has a warning to this effect on her desk.  We both have the mug.

We chat every day.  Most of the time we research something, sometimes we don't.  We trade GiFs, memes, frustrations, the occasional recipe and our irreverence for weekends that are too short. I've gained so much more than a research buddy or a new family member.  I've gained one of those friends who the internet and the magazines say "gets" me. And that is more precious than finding what happened to my 3rd great uncle.

#52Ancestors - Week 8: "I Can Identify" William and Rosa Pearson's Father

These Pearsons are a troublesome bunch.  Fairly early on in my genealogical journey, I was looking into my great great grandparents, George William and Emma Katherine (Green) Pearson.  The Pulaski County, Illinois, 1900 census listed the following as their children:

Rosa Pearson	18
William T Pearson	16
Cora L Pearson	13
Benjamin D Pearson	9
Payton E Pearson	8
Harris I Pearson	6
Nettie W Pearson	3

I added all seven of them to my tree as the children of George and Emma, and, blissfully unaware of the mistake I had just made, I went on my merry way.  It was only when I found a marriage record for George and Emma that I started to suspect something was not quite right.  First, the marriage was recorded as May 21st, 1883, which meant that Rosa had been born before their marriage.  (Additional records for William suggested he was born before 1883 as well.) Much stranger, though, was the fact that the marriage record was for a Mrs. Emma Pearson marrying a George Pearson.

At this time, I had very little information on Rosa, so I revisited what I had on William.  His death certificate listed George W. as his father, but his WWI Draft Registration indicated his closest relative was JW Pearson from Anderson County, Indiana.  The date on the registration was after Emma Katherine's death in 1917, and as William was not married, it made sense that William would list his father as his closest relative.  Here, William's date of birth was listed as July 17, 1878 - significantly before the 1883 marriage of George and Emma.  

With only this much to go on, I built out a tree for a JW Pearson living in Anderson County, Indiana. Lo and behold, I found another 1900 census with William listed as living with John W. and Zana Pearson.  In this census, William is listed as being born in July 1881. A bit more digging found that John and Zana had married in July 1883.  I continued to build out John's tree to see if I could place him in the same area as Emma Katherine. Turns out, John Winston was the son of my great great great grandfather's brother, Benjamin Everett Pearson, and Benjamin and his family lived in Pulaski County, Illinois, from roughly 1869-1885.  Even better (see if you can follow along now), Emma Katherine's mother, Ann (Echols) Green married Benjamin Everett in 1869 after divorcing her first husband, Thomas Green.  Yeah, I know...

Back in the Pulaski County records, I kept coming back to an index record for a marriage between JW Pearson and MK Green in 1874.  And then it occurred to me..."Emma Kate" sounds a lot like "MK," and it seemed more than reasonable that the combining of Benjamin's and Ann's households had resulted in a love match.  And obviously, this would explain why George and Emma's marriage record listed her as Mrs. Emma Pearson.  It doesn't explain why John left/divorced his wife so his cousin could marry her, but hey.  To each his own.

Eventually, I found a marriage record for Rosa that listed John W. and Kate Green as her parents.  So, while there isn't a ton of documentation, I think it is safe to say that "I Can Identify" William and Rosa Pearson's father.

For more fun with William Pearsons, go here. 

Dora Isabelle (Green) Gillespie Pulliam Johnston - Week 7, #52 Ancestors

This week's prompt is "outcast," and while I'm not sure this ancestor necessarily fits the exact definition of an outcast, I've always found it odd that she settled so far away from her family for most of her life, only to return to her hometown when there was no one left.

Dora Isabelle Green was the second daughter of Thomas J. Green and Ann Elizabeth Echols.  Her birthdate is uncertain.  While the 1860 census lists her as being 2 years old, most other documents place her year of birth as 1860.  By 1870, Dora's parents have divorced, and Thomas has married a young widow, Harriet Youngblood. Interestingly, Dora is listed in the 1870 census as living with her father and Harriet, but she is also listed as living with her mother, Ann, and sister, Emma Kate. In 1873, Ann marries Benjamin Everett Pearson, and the next year, Dora's sister marries one of Benjamin Everett's sons.  In 1876, Ann gives birth to Dora's half-sister, Virginia.

I could speculate about what happens next, I suppose.  Dora's father has had a son with his second wife, and Dora's only full sibling has married and moved to Virginia.  Perhaps Dora, a young, unmarried woman, is left with the unenviable task of looking after her half-siblings.  Perhaps she doesn't get along with her new stepfather and/or new stepmother. The only thing that is certain is that in October of 1877, Dora marries Henry C. Gillespie in Rock Island County, Illinois - about 400 miles northwest of where she's lived her entire life.  

The Rock Island Argus, 20 Oct. 1877

The most reasonable explanation was that Dora was visiting her Aunt Louisiana Adams when she fell in love, but I find it odd that the article mentions Mr. A. A. Adams (her uncle by marriage) but not Dora's parents.  At any rate, in 1880, Dora and Henry are still in the Rock Island area, and a single son is born to them in December, Lawrence Henry Gillespie.  

Though I have never found a divorce record for Henry and Dora, Henry marries Jennie Williamson in 1884, and Dora marries William Pulliam in 1883.  At some point, that marriage fails, too, because Dora marries John Johnston in Algonquin, Illinois, in 1895.  What she did between 1883 and 1895 is a mystery.  There is no census, and I have been unable to find any newspaper clippings related to this time of her life.  Why, as a single woman with a small child, did she not return to her family in southern Illinois?  Her sister had returned to Pulaski County, Illinois, from Virginia and married another Pearson cousin, and her father was still living in the area. Furthermore, Rock Island to McHenry County, Illinois is no mean trip for the late 1800s - about 150 miles.  How/why did she travel that distance?

In 1898, Dora's father dies.  There is no mention of Dora or her sister in Thomas's obituary.  Only the surviving children of his marriage to Harriet are named.  

However, if Mr. John Johnston's obituary was a true account of his life, Dora had a peaceful and comfortable 12 years until his death in 1907.  He must have left her a significant amount of money because she purchases a milk and creamery business in 1908 and runs it in partnership with her son.

The Herald, 16 July 1908

The 1910 census finds Dora living with a cousin by the last name of Shearer.  I don't have anyone by that name in my tree, but I have not fully fleshed out Aunt Louisiana's family, so my best guess is that this cousin is one of Louisiana's children.  In any case, Dora is working as a cashier in a dry goods store.  Lawrence Gillespie and family don't live far away, and I find it strange that Dora does not live with them.

In 1917, Dora's only full sibling, Emma Kate Pearson, dies.  There is no indication in the obituary that Dora attended the funeral.

By 1918, if not earlier, Dora has relocated back to Rock Island County and is working as a servant in the Watertown State Hospital.  This information is corroborated in a 1918 city directory and Lawrence's WWI Draft Registration Card.  Lawrence and his wife, Rachel, have divorced.  She remarried in 1917 and Lawrence apparently decided to try his luck in New York while leaving his 60 year old mother to try her luck as a domestic worker.  Dora is still working there on the 1920 census.

Who knows what transpires between 1920 and 1930, but by 1930, Dora has made the long trek "home" to Pulaski County, Illinois. She is living with her uncle by marriage, Horace A. Hannon and also her son, Lawrence Gillespie.

A few brief mentions in The Pulaski Enterprise in 1938 tell us all that is apparently worth knowing of the last few days of Dora's life, concluding with her death on December 4th:

SENT TO ANNA

Dora Johnson, 78 years of age, an invalid at Olmstead, who is practically without home or kinfolks and who has been cared for by household aid and pension, was sent to Anna yesterday.  She was one of the sorry pictures of old age, neglected and without family.

MRS. DORA JOHNSON

Mrs. Dora Johnson, 78, who was taken to the State Hospital in Anna Thursday, died at the hospital Sunday morning.  She is survived by one son, Lawrence Gillespie, of Olmstead, four grandchildren and other relatives. The body was removed Monday afternoon to Olmstead, where services were held Tuesday afternoon in the M. E. Church South.  Interment was made in the Masonic Cemetery.

Oops - Middle School to Lifelong Passion

In 8th grade, my American History teacher, Mr. Richard Pearson (RIP) won a special place in the hearts of myself and a good friend.  In addition to being a fine-looking middle-aged teacher (hey, we were 14 and he was Tiger Beat cute!). My memories of him were of dignity and being "woke" before the word was redefined.  He looked out for diversity, he looked out for feelings, and he looked out for and stepped on any bullying that tried to rear its ugly head on his watch.

Sometime during the year, Mr. Pearson assigned the obligatory family history project. I now recognize that this was probably difficult for many of my inner-city peers, but sadly I wasn't aware of this as a teen.  I wonder if my teacher was - I have to think that given my other memories of him, he handled this in the calm and confident manner he handled the rest of his classroom. For me, it was a vehicle to share a newfound curiosity.  My mom's cousin Joe had compiled a family history on the side of my mom's paternal grandmother, and he and his wife had hand-typed what I imagine were several dozen copies of the same book, color-coded for each succeeding generation.  I was enchanted.

The family histories that were turned in to Mr. Pearson covered the blackboard on the side wall of our classroom.  I remember mine (I had copied at much of the book as I could, in "flow-chart" tree format).  I had several sheets of notebook paper taped together, covered in the names of relatives and ancestors in my own printing.  Green felt-tip pen, because we're Irish. What (laughs!)?

I couldn't have known that this penchant for recording and list-making that was developing would lead to a lifelong passion for research, reading, history and yes, list making! I dabbled in family history interest until sometime around the age of 30, when the internet was a baby and Ancestry was new.  About 5 years ago (this May) I made the lovely and enriching acquaintance of my 4th cousin, once removed, my collaborator and friend. We have made some progress on our shared lines, we have found things outside our shared heritage, and we have both coined our own shorthand for our shared passion and tried to play with the math that makes us "only" 4th cousins since, like most families ours was crazily connected and intermarried over generations. 

I couldn't think of a better way to spend my time - researching my ancestors and hanging with one of my best friends!  Thank you, Mr. P.