Twenty-nine

You learn some interesting things when you do genealogy. That is what makes it interesting, really, not just names and dates, but the stories of the people. I am lucky that my families settled in WV in early times (early 1800s) or even pre-Revolutionary War, and so interesting stories are often found in area history books.

I found that all the time I was looking for the antecedents of my grandfather Floyd, I was laboring under the belief that his last name came from his father (naturally enough). But old grandad was an illegitimate son, and the family I was following were that of his step-father and not his father, and thus his last name was his mother's maiden name. When she was 20 and single, she was working as a servant in the home of a young couple with 3 or 4 children, two or three farms down from he father's home. The only other male in the household was a 14 year old boy, so I am guessing that her 30-something boss was the father of Floyd. Guess I'll never know, since that grandfather died before I was born, and my grandmother (Nana) flat refused to talk about him. Dad hunted him up once, after the war, but he was cool and not interested in my dad's life (Floyd had remarried, but no kids). Nana was a flapper in the 20s from a wealthy Washington D.C. family. Her father owned a ranch in Pasadena, and another house in Florida. My dad was born just 5 months or so after Nana married, and I imagine her father was Not Pleased. He cut her off from any inheritance (her mother died early and her father remarried; her stepmother inherited the lot) and Nana went to work for the IRS, and retired to Florida on a very small pension. I have all her things now, and they are a mixture of very poor quality (souvenir stuff) and very good (sterling flatware, sterling baby cup, beautiful wooden box). When she divorced Floyd, when Dad was 1 year old, Nana went through everything and destroyed any photo, letter, whatever, of Floyd's. She even had Dad's first name changed to that of her father, apparently because Floyd had picked the original name. It was pretty uncommon in those days, to divorce. Nana did remarry, and had a daughter when dad was about 8 years old, but the little girl died before she was 5 and Nana divorced that husband at about the same time. Unlucky in love, I guess. My mother asked Nana what the cause of death was for Dad's half-sister, and Nana said "malnutrition" which broke Mom's heart to hear. I still haven't found a death certificate.

Nana's father
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Bumper sticker of the day: "Men are from earth and women are from earth. Get over it."