A Happy New Year's & a little bit of family history :)

Tomorrow might be a new year, but tomorrow is always another chance to start anew. 2013 was a wonderful year for me, but here's hoping 2014 is even better, for us all! Here's a little throwback to New Years' past...have a fun but safe time tonight everyone! Happy New Years!

From The Queens County Sentinel from Jan. 6, 1898, a short story about a New Year's party thrown by my great-great grandmother, Delia Dauch Berg. My 3rd great grandfather, Thomas Dauch, was the guest of honor, and my great-grandmother, Amelia Berg Raynor, (listed in the story as Mildred E. Berg - her nickname was Millie) was also there. She was 13 years old.

Baby's first Christmas

Just a few photos of my daughter's first Christmas. We bought her a stocking, took photos with Santa, put up her special "Baby's First Christmas" ornaments, sang Jingle Bells over and over again just to see her dance, traveled to New Jersey to spend Christmas Eve with her cousin and the hubby's side of the family, and traveled far away, well just upstairs, to spend Christmas day with my side of the family. The holidays can't help but be about family and as genealogists, we all know the importance of family. And everything we did with my daughter to celebrate - well, that's how family traditions get started and handed down from generation to generation.

It's still the Christmas season, so a only somewhat belated merry Christmas and happy holidays to all of you and all your loved ones, both living and dead! :)

Christmas Eve in New Jersey

Opening gifts Christmas morning

 And probably my most favorite photo of the day - visiting my grandmother, my daughter's great-grandmother, at the nursing home Christmas day. My grandmother is 98 years old and the original family historian in my family - love seeing her light up when my daughter comes to visit!

Visiting with Great-Grandma Raynor on Christmas, 2013.

Sunday's Obituary: Hannah Gorry, June 4, 1930

From the Brooklyn Standard Union, June 4, 1930:

Hannah Gorry was the aunt of my great-grandfather, Elmer Gorry Sr. After Elmer's father and siblings all died, his mother continued to live and work in Manhattan and Elmer went to go live with his bachelor uncle, Michael, and his spinster aunts, Mamie and Hannah, in Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Hannah is a bit of an interesting character. She didn't want anyone to know how old she was, so anything we have of hers that used to have a date, the date has been scratched out. She's listed in several census records so we can approximate her age, but even there, she's a different age in every one - meaning, even though each census is 10 years apart, she does not age 10 years in subsequent records. She's listed as 9 years old in the 1870 census and there's a family legend that she was alive when Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. As an adult, she worked as a seamstress, and she lived with her brother and sister her entire life.