Saturday, January 29, 2011

Random realizations

I was at a wake last night and it didn't occur to me until I was on my way there that I would be related to half the people in the room, as the deceased was my late great-uncle Freddy Stutzmann's ex-wife. And as I looked around the room, I didn't recognize a single person, which made me realize that as much as I'm learning about my grandmother's ancestors, I know very little about her immediate family. Her sister Faith Laidlaw's family was there - cousins and second cousins - and Uncle Freddy's kids and grandkids of course as well, people who are names in a book to me and nothing more. It was a bit of a wake-up call to this family historian that I could tell you everything about Uncle Freddy and Aunt Faith's parents and grandparents and not a single thing about their children or grandchildren. And so maybe part of my new year's resolution should be to research sideways when going backward hits a dead end.

On another genealogical note, my dad's sister sent me an e-mail yesterday saying that someone she works with was talking about how her mom's family was one of the founding families of Freeport - that family was, of course, the Raynors. You can't swing a dead cat in this area without hitting a Raynor relation. 

3 comments:

  1. Such a good point, and one I realized last year myself. At Christmas time I realized that I know more about my dead relatives than I do my living...something I am also looking to change this year.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Whenever I speak to people about starting their family trees, I underscore how important it is to write about yourself. I tell them that in 100 years from now when some great-great-great niece comes across your papers, she will want to know who you were. Family history goes both ways.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Great point, April...and the perfect excuse for continuing to be a packrat :)

    ReplyDelete