The Long Reach of Christmas

A not too distant Christmas Past. My wife and I. Moore Family Picture

In her book, The Secret Life of Objects, author Dawn Raffel shows how seemingly everyday objects found in people’s homes hold stories about family history. It is pointed out in the book that the stories these objects hold must be told and recorded; otherwise, they will be lost all too soon with the passing of time. In many of our homes, the objects that have some of the oldest and most tender stories can center around special occasions and holidays. Perhaps no holiday can pack more of these emotions and stories than Christmas. Each year countless millions of homes unpack these objects so full of memories and set them in places of honor where they will decorate our home and warm our hearts. Then when Christmas has come and gone, they will be taken down and repacked and stored in their keeping place until they are brought out once more to bring back our cherished remembrances.

The Nativity Scene a center piece in our Christmas. Moore Family Picture 2018

In our nearly fifty years of marriage, my wife and I have managed to make a few memories around Christmas and to preserve a few from our childhood. It was among our first Christmases that we put together a nativity scene. In the first few years, they were very small, cheap, and disposable, as they did not hold up very well. The one pictured above we have had now for about forty years and has been on display in our many homes for most of our Christmases. The village pictured below has been a very long prosses to obtain. It has many parts from a park, churches, one Catholic, and one we believe is Methodist. This is for the two main religions in our family, but trust me, we have more. We have shops and places of businesses that mirror our family’s interests and areas of work. You can see a little bit of our family history by looking over our village. The village has grown over the years, and our personal dwelling has gotten smaller, so it is rare when the whole town is on display.

Small part of the Christmas Village. Moore Family Picture 2018

We also have a few Santa’s that make it out of the boxes each year. Pictured below is a ceramic Santa that my wife made sometime in the 1970s.

Santa! Moore Family Picture

However, we have a much older Santa that is also pictured below. I do not remember a Christmas without this Santa. It is made out of plastic, and as you can see from his damaged foot and the bandaged hand, he has served long and well. He used to be in the thick of the action right under the tree, but he is now retired to a much safer and quieter place. In the second photograph below taken in 1954, you can see him on the floor in the lower left-hand part of the picture.

This Santa has been part of every Christmas that I can recall. Moore Family Picture 2018

My parents Veronica Deloria Moore and Charles H Moore. Christmas 1954. Moore Family Picture

When my wife and I had to close up her parents’ home, one of the few things we kept for ourselves besides pictures were the ornaments that were used on her Christmas trees when she was growing up. A few were all that we managed to save. One of them is pictured below.

Christmas Past, for my wife. Moore Family Picture

My wife, over the years, has made each member of the family their very own Christmas Stocking. The front part is pieced and quilted with a solid fabric for the back. These stockings are very sturdy, with many over twenty years old. Pictured below is the newest stocking, which was made this year for our great-grandson, the newest member of the family.

The newest Christmas Stocking. Moore Family Picture 2019

Great Grandma with our Great Grandson Christian. Moore Family Picture 2019

Also pictured below is one of the many quilts my wife has made over the years. This Christmas quilt was pieced together to look like an old fashion tree ornament with the light being reflected off it.

Christmas Quilt by Sandra Moore Moore Family Picture 2018

Many things of value and family history cannot be packed and unpacked from a box. That will be a blog for perhaps next year. However, two I would like to share at this time. Below is pictured the inside of St. John The Baptist Church, in Plattsburgh, New York. I cannot begin to tell you what an oasis the Christmas Midnight Mass was for me during my mid to late teens. In those years, this was my Christmas.

The front altar at St. John The Baptist Church.

But as everyone knows who truly understands genealogy and family history, it is the people that count. All those that have come before us and those with us now and those to come is what this is about. This year when you gather tell some stories, write them down and take a few pictures of your objects and write their story’s down. So, when you pack things away, you will also pack away for safekeeping a part of your family’s story. So that long after we are gone, our story and those of others that we have preserved will still be with the family. Then the laughter we share at Christmas and other family events will echo for generations.

“When we remember a special Christmas, it is not the presents that made it special, but the laughter, the feeling of love, and the togetherness of friends and family that made that Christmas special.” Catherine Pulsifer. Moore Family Picture

Girl Collides with Moving Auto. Read about it in the Newspaper.

Two newsgirls selling papers. Location: Wilmington, Delaware. May 1910 Repository: Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs Division, Washington, D.C.

As family historians, we have many records and sources in which we can find our family story. The Censuses and DNA testing being two of the most popular. While I have made good use of these sources, I find myself going more and more to online newspaper archives. No other source has put more flesh on the bare bones of the genealogy facts of birth, marriage, and death. The following is a small example of how newspaper research can tell a story.

My mother often told the story of how a little girl ran into the road and struck her moving car. The girl was then thrown to the pavement where another car ran over her. My mother told how the other driver attempted to drive away, but she confronted the man and told him he was not going anywhere and that she had his license plate number. In short order, police and medical help were on the scene. My mother always pointed out that she was never ticketed and that the little girl recovered. Then she would end by saying to always look both ways before crossing a street and never run into the road. While doing some research on my mother, I came across the news article regarding the accident. While I know my mother’s story after the accident, I became curious about the little girl. That was the beginning of my investigation using archived online newspapers.

Plattsburgh Press Republican, March 31, 1952. Plattsburgh N.Y.

Above is the newspaper article telling about the accident. At the time of the accident, I was less than one year old. My mother was only 27. The driver of the other car was Mr. Hormidas Rousreau, and the little girl is Patricia Ann McDonough. In this article, we learn that Patricia has suffered a broken leg and possible internal injuries and shock. Patricia’s condition was given as serious at Champlain Valley Hospital. Later that week, in an article in the April 5, 1952, Plattsburgh Press-Republican, we learn that Patricia is improving and that she also suffered a broken shoulder as well as a broken leg and internal injuries. Below is the headline and the small part of the article that concerns our story. It seems Matthew McDonough, Patricia’s father, was bringing everyone to court regarding the accident. I learned through the newspapers that Mr. McDonough was a man who wore many hats. He was at one time or another a funeral director, school bus driver, sheriff deputy, chief of the Keeseville Fire Department, and a justice of the peace. I was not able to find out how the court case was settled. I do not recall my parents ever speaking about it.

Part of a long news article in the Plattsburgh Press Republican. Nov. 11,1952. Plattsburgh, N.Y.

In a September 1963 article in the Plattsburgh Press-Republican, we learn that Patricia has entered the Champlain Business College at Burlington, Vermont. Below I found a news story a few years later that tells of Patricia’s successful completion of her college studies.

Plattsburgh Press Republican, June 17, 1965. Plattsburgh, N.Y.

Patricia also met Robert Fisch while at Champlain College and were married in 1966. Their wedding story, as it appeared in the Plattsburgh Press-Republican, is below.

Plattsburgh Press Republican, December 13, 1966. Plattsburgh, N.Y.

Patricia was married almost 49 years before her death in 2015 at the age of 70. I found two obituaries for her one in The Tribune of San Luis Obispo, CA. the other in the Plattsburgh Press-Republican, of Plattsburgh, N.Y. Patricia, at the time of her death, had two sons and four grandchildren. She and her husband Robert moved to California in the 1970s, where she worked in several technology companies. Using the information I was able to gather through the newspapers, I was able to make contact with Patricia’s sister Susan. She was kind enough to give me a little more of the story and to send me the picture of a very young Patricia. The picture is dated June 1955, and the inscription on the back says in part, “Pat’s last stage of recovery from her accident.”

Patricia McDonough about age ten. Photograph Courtesy of Susan Giroux..

In order to gather the information on Patricia, I used two pay subscription sites, Newspaper.com, and Genealogy Bank. I also used the free site NYS Historic Newspapers, which is a must-go-to site if you are researching family in New York State. NYS Historic Newspapers is easy to use and covers every county in the state. I recommend that everyone make online archive newspapers a must for all their family research. I found many different articles regarding Patricia and her family that assisted me in learning her story. My advice is to use these newspapers whenever you can. They will give you a much more complete family story.

Can We Keep Him?

Nicole hugs Clifford the Big Red Dog. Moore Family photograph. Burlington Vermont.

The above photograph is kept in a frame and is on display in our home. It was taken almost twenty years ago in Burlington, Vermont. The two main characters in the picture are Clifford the Big Red Dog, of course, and my Granddaughter Nicole. However, I would like to tell you the story that the image does not tell, nor would anyone else in future generations know about unless someone records the story so it won’t be lost.

My daughter was to find herself a single young mother of two daughters who was working full time and going to college full time also. It was at this time that she and my two granddaughters lived with grandma and me. Nicole was the younger of the two daughters. At the time, I was the manager of a movie theater and would work late into the night coming home at about one in the morning. Many mornings I helped to get breakfast for the girls (and truth be told for the rest of the family) and get the oldest one off to school. That gave Nicole and me the morning to find things to occupy our time. Our local PBS television station had some great programming for children at that time of day, so as often as not, we ended up watching it curled up on a chair. Needless to say, Clifford the Big Red Dog was a favorite with Nicole.

One summer, we were vacationing in the Plattsburgh, N.Y. area, and decided to take the ferry across Lake Champlain and spend the day in Burlington, Vermont. Part of the downtown in Burlington is closed off to automobile traffic and is for pedestrians only. On the day we were there, they were having a parade of dogs. The parade was being led by the biggest dog of all, Clifford. Now I swear I had a firm grip on Nicole’s hand, but somehow she broke free and streaked across the walkway and ended up giving Clifford the biggest bear hug she could muster. I mean, she would not let go. We had to go out there and pry her off from Clifford so that the parade could continue. Someone in our family had the presence of mind (it could have been me, but I am not sure) to take the picture of Nicole and Clifford.

Where has the time gone? I have no idea; it has passed way too fast. I am sure it is the same for all of you also. We must tell our family stories because if we don’t, they will be lost within a generation or two. The picture below is of Nicole. The time has gone way too fast.

Nicole Moore. “The years just pass like trains I wave but they don’t slow down” ― Steven Wilson

Moore Family Picture

The Hidden Life of Raymond Stone

Find A Grave photograph. Used by blanket permission granted by photographer Brian Newark.

Long ago, I made a vow to myself to learn the story of what happened to my father’s family and what happened to each of his brothers and sisters. I had no idea it would take me over 50 years and then still not know the complete story. This is a story that centers on Raymond Moore, one of my father’s younger brothers, who was adopted out of the family. Raymond was one of seven children that were living in 1924 when the family was to fracture, sending the children off in all different directions. While I have spent many years tracking down and gathering information about these seven people, Raymond has been one of my greatest mysteries. Raymond was adopted and would, in time, leave his Moore family origins behind. I have discovered that he was adopted by Harry and Emogene Stone. But let’s start the story a few years before in 1920. That is when the following news story appeared in the Potter Enterprise newspaper.

The Potter Enterprise Thu, Mar 11, 1920

In an interview with a daughter of one of the children described in the above article, she told me that her father described how “the men came in and wrapped the body of his mother in a white sheet and carried her out of the house.” A few years later, in a 1924 news article in the Potter Enterprise shows that things had gone even more terribly wrong. The article reported that “Conditions squalid beyond belief…seven children who range from a wee tot to a daughter about twenty years of age… Five of the children are now being cared for at the county home but will be taken to the Tier Children’s Home in Harrison Valley later…” The Harrison Valley Children’s Home will figure in this story a little later.

However, I believe this story had its’ start in the year 1918.1918 finds Harry and Emogene Stone grieving over the loss of their only son Newton. In the extraordinary for the time period obituary, because of its’ size and the fact it was for a very young child, we learn some interesting facts about the Stone family. We learn that they have a daughter named Leah and no other children.

This sad and detailed obituary I am certain was placed by the sorrowful parents. Raymond is not mention although he was born by this time. In fact it says Newton was their only son. The Potter Enterprise Thu, Apr 11, 1918

The fact that the Stone family had no other children is also supported in the 1920 Census with part of a transcript from the Potter County Historical Society, which is shown below. Please note the occupation of Harry Stone is listed as “drill oil wells.” My father always said that Raymond was adopted by a family named Stone and that “he took their name.” This was again backed up when I found my cousin Susan in 2004, living in Shinglehouse, Pennsylvania. Susan is the daughter of another of my father’s brothers. She introduced me to an old family friend who was born in 1927 and lived in Shinglehouse her whole life. She had known Raymond and his family. She stated that Raymond Moore was, in fact, adopted by the Stones. While she could not be sure of Mr. and Mrs. Stone’s first name, she did give a few clues. She said that Mr. Stone was in the oil business and also was a judge.

1920 Census

Now, if you look at the 1930 census below, you will note a few key items. Raymond has made his first appearance in this family. He is listed as 13 years old. That would be old enough to be mentioned in little Newton Stone’s obituary and certainly should have been recorded in the 1920 census. Also, if you look at Harry Stone’s occupation, you will see it listed as; “driller oil lease.”

This is the first record I have found showing Raymond as a member of the Stone family.

Even with all of the above, it still was not enough to be able to say positively that Raymond Moore and Raymond Stone were the same person. In all the records I researched when Raymond Stone appeared, Raymond Moore disappeared. I have, over the years, been to and been in contact with the Potter County Historical Society, which is the county that Shinglehouse is found. In a letter from them dated September 18, 2015, which in part says the following. “Enclosed are the materials that I emailed you about…I could not find an adoption record for Raymond or Ainslee in the Potter County Courthouse. It is quite possible that both of those adoptions were recorded in New York. The Hulett family had children quite older than Ainslee, so they must have been forthright in her being adopted and listed her as so on at least one census. The Stone family, however, did not…but I am most sure that Raymond was the son of Frank and Elzada.” Also, at the Potter County Historical Society was an elderly research volunteer that I met in 2004 who stated Raymond stone was, in fact, Raymond Moore. Also, I would like to point out this person was not the letter writer. My big break came while searching online newspaper archives. How I love those sources of information. Below is what I found.

I now knew for certain that Harry and Emogene Stone had adopted a child. From The Potter Enterprise, Thu, Oct 30, 1924

There it was, Harry Stone adopts a boy, and the boy was from the Harrison Valley Orphanage. I have not found another Harry Stone in the area other than the Harry and Emogene Stone family. In 1958 Harry Stone died, and I was able to find his obituary. The information confirms that he was a driller and that he held the office of Justice of the Peace. It also showed that Raymond was now living in Rochester, New York. He was to marry Sephronia McCarthy, and they would have at least three children. He was later to settle in Wellsville, New York, less than 30 miles from Shinglehouse, Pennsylvania. Raymond worked at Burke Steel in Rochester, New York.

Harry’s daughter Leah married Leon Moore. I have not researched yet to find out if he belongs to my Moore family. However if I was to bet I would bet that he does. Also note that he did hold the office of Justice of the Peace. The Potter Enterprise Thu, Feb 27, 1958

I now felt confident that Raymond Stone was, in fact, my Uncle Raymond Moore. But I continued to search for more proof. Once again, old newspapers that have gone online gave me more proof. When I spotted the newspaper article below, any lingering doubts disappeared.

Potter Enterprise Thu, Nov. 19,1942

How did this rather short piece of social news cement for me that I had indeed found my father’s missing brother? The answer lies with the conversations I had with my father. My father was a combat veteran of World War Two. I had asked him if he was ever hurt in the war, and he informed me that he never got hurt at all. He did tell me about his brothers who did. He said his brother Raymond broke his leg. Somehow he had known this about his adopted out brother. I suspect most likely he learned this through his older sister Ethel Moore Hunter. She is, in fact, a story that will be told in the future. I must have read that 22-word news article a hundred times. I now had all the proof I needed. I found some other articles regarding Raymond, being transferred to a hospital in Brigham City, Utah, and his being discharged after serving about four months in occupied Japan. Below you will find Raymond’s draft registration card.

Raymond’s draft card. Note the date of birth.

 Note his date of birth is December 31, 1916. Proof he was alive when Newton Stone died and should have been included in his obituary and the phrase “Newton D Stone, the only son of Mr. and Mrs. Harry D Stone…” should have never been written. It also shows once more his father as Harry D Stone.

Raymond died in 2005 well before I had the chance to meet him. At least I have learned a little part of his story. I have reached out to some of his family, but the people I contacted do not think that Raymond was adopted and do not accept what I believe to be the true story. Raymond had decided to leave the Moore family behind and fully embrace the Stone family. But he had so many answers to questions I have to ask, and now I have no one to ask. I do take some solace that what I believe to be the true story has been discovered and now is known to my branch of the family. I would have liked to have gotten to know his family better, but at least one more family mystery has been solved. The picture below is one of several I have been able to obtain in my research.

Raymond is the number 8 standing in the back row.

Family Pictures Found–Unidentified!

A lesson for all of us regarding labeling our pictures. Perhaps some of you may be able to help Helen come up with ways to identify these people.

Heart of a Southern Woman

A recently discovered family picture with  no one identified. We are working to identify  these people!

Family pictures and portraits–don’t you love them!?  A couple weeks ago, my sister found a small album, about 3″ x 5″, full of old family pictures! The picture above is one of those pictures!  I love that picture, but who are those folks?!    What a treasure!  There were maybe 50 pictures–but only two were actually labeled as to who was in the picture!  Now my sister and I are in our 70’s—born in the 1940’s, as was my older brother.  Our younger brother was not born until 1955.  These pictures look like they were mostly taken in the early 1920’s!  Some people looked familiar, but we are just guessing! A treasure and a puzzle!

Our Mom died in 1980, Dad in 1988.  After Dad died we cleared out the house that had been ours…

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The Cost of Genealogy

The above picture represents what many of us put into our genealogy research, time, and money. I believe that if we wish to have a complete as possible family history, then we will have to utilize both of these resources. How much we use them depends on how much we have of these items to give in this pursuit, or in many cases how much we are willing to give.

Time is perhaps the more important of the two. If you are not willing to spend time in the hunt for our family history, then take up another pastime. Unless you have an unlimited amount of money to pay people to do the work for you, then spending time is something you cannot avoid. On occasion, I help people (free of charge) in their genealogy research. I met one gentleman at a local library with a subscription to Ancestry.com for its’ patrons to use. After spending some time with him learning about his family and what he was looking for, we logged on Ancestry.com to look up some records. Within 15 minutes, we had found many new records and new information. Using what we had learned, we found some more records that had several hundred possible finds for him. I showed him how and what to look for. I was then going to work on my research while he did that. About ten minutes later, I looked up, and he had not even started. I asked him if he had any questions. He told me that there were too many records to look through and wanted me to do it for him. I explained at most he had only an hour’s work and perhaps only five minutes if he got lucky. A few minutes later, he was packing up his stuff, saying he did not have time to “Look through all those records.” Also, he was upset that I would not do it for him. He just was not willing to spend the time and make an effort. I wish I could say this is my only example. Time is something we all spend while doing genealogy. Perhaps that means giving up our television watching, spending less time with our other hobbies, or just becoming better organized in our time management. As you will see, even when we spend money, it necessitates the spending of time.

Now let’s talk about money. I have heard many times that there are many avenues in which you can do your genealogy research without spending money. While this is correct, the fact of the matter is that your finished result, which is your family history, is only as good as what you put into it. I am not saying that you have to throw money into an endless pit, but the wise expenditure of your money (and time) will give you much better results. We have so many subscription sites that offer so many services and records that everyone should at one time or another take advantage of them. If you are not sure which one to use most of them offer a free trial period for you to explore them. One area I have spent money on is the online newspaper repository sites. Everyone should look into this resource in their genealogy work. I have discovered so much more about my family by doing this that I rank them as important as the census, and DNA. But if you only spend money on the for-profit subscription sites, you miss out on so many other genealogy tools. Other areas that money could be well spent on are equipment, education, travel, genealogy magazines, historical society memberships, and much more. It also goes without saying that for each expenditure of money we make, time must be used to make it worthwhile.

I understand budgets and all those daily expenditures that we all must face. I have been working on my family’s genealogy for years, and many times I had to put off spending money on genealogy for more essential items. But I have had conversations with too many people who proudly state “I’ve never spent a dime on my genealogy” and after looking over their work I would have to agree with them. In the end, we all decide what we want to spend our money and time on. For me, my genealogy research has been enjoyable and very educational. But the very first piece advice I give anyone who wants to do their family genealogy is that “genealogy is a long term commitment.”

What You Find in the Tall Grass

Photograph taken 1903, Holcomb home, Vermont. Left to right. Dr. Luman Holcomb 1865 – 1950, Elma Holcomb Deuel 1863 – 1946, Cyrus Holcomb 1824 – 1907. Photograph from the Carl Gonya collection

Here is one more example of what I call front porch pictures family photographs taken outside. The people shown in the above photograph are members of the Holcomb family from Isle LaMotte, Vermont.  Sandy, my wife, and I were going through boxes of pictures that we obtained from her parent’s photograph collection. We noticed some had the name, Holcomb. We had no idea who or what these people were in relation to her family.

I started an investigation into the Holcomb family, and one of the first things I did was to speak with Sandy’s cousin Carl Gonya. Carl has spent years researching family history. We were to find out many details of the Holcomb’s, namely how they were related to my wife, Sandy. The people in the above picture are my wife’s 2nd cousins four times removed. I did a little more research and found even more interesting facts.

Cyrus Holcomb is the gentleman sitting on the chair. He is the father to the other people in this photograph. Like many people of his times, Cyrus wore many hats in life. He was for five years the postmaster of Isle LaMotte, Vermont and even served in the Vermont Legislature. But throughout his life he was a carpenter and a fruit farmer, having 700 apple trees in 1882.

The man relaxed on the grass is Dr. Luman Holcomb, a well known local physician. Dr. Luman received his education at the University of Vermont. I read numerous accounts in the newspapers of his time, regarding his many community activities. He was a well-liked and respected doctor who was mourned by many upon his death in 1950. 

The lady in the picture with her father and brother is Elma Holcomb Deuel. She was a remarkable lady not only in her time but even by today’s standards. She married George Deuel, a Methodist Minister. Elma went with her husband to the Garrett Biblical Institute and received the same degree as her husband. While not herself a minister Elma would fill in for her husband on occasion. She was an accomplished musician and president of the Women’s Missionary Society. Elma was also a teacher who worked with children of former slaves teaching basic reading and writing skills.

I also found out something interesting about the Holcomb’s. They are my 7th cousins three times removed. That makes my wife and I cousins. I guess with both our family lines going back to the 1600s in America, they were bound to become acquainted. While this was the first time we were to learn that our family lines crossed, I have since found two more common sets of grandparents.

So my advice is to go through some old photographs and do some research. Not just on your direct ancestors but also your cousins. You never know what you will learn.

On the left is Elma Holcomb Deuel. Date of picture unknown. Photograph from the Carl Gonya Collection