In Which the Author Breaks a Brick Wall with a Mouse

The other day I had a huge breakthrough on my DOMELLE family.  I started doing genealogy in 1992 and I pretty much had the same information on them since that time - certainly I'd fleshed out some bits, but I never got any further back than my grandfather's grandfather.  That was it, end of the line.

Last weekend after putting the Domelle 1940 census info into my database, I decided to do a random search on the internet and suddenly there I was, in a transcription of information from the "home town" of Domelle's, and I was staring at my grandfather's grandfathers name - along with his wife.  The two names were exactly what family lore had always stated they were.  I had just never had any tangible proof that these two people really existed.




It was huge!!  I've worked on this line, on and off, for TWENTY, yes 2-0 years.

I couldn't believe what I was seeing!

So what did I do?

Like any self-respecting grown-up adult who has a job and owns a home and manages finances and has people at work who think she actually knows what she's doing, I burst into tears.

Why?

Because my grandfather passed away earlier this year.  One day shy of 5 months to the day that I sat at my computer looking at those two names.  I'll never get to tell him.

Ah well.  Such is life.  And certainly we genealogists know that is the way things go.

The good, the excellent news, is that my grandfather's brother is still alive.  I get to tell him all about this.  :-)

So here's how it all went down:

1. My grandfather's name is William Adam DOMELLE.  He was born to the immigrant William DOMELLE, who settled in this country in 1911 (his brother Nicholas came over as well).

Here's my great-grandfather William, probably around the year 1905-ish, give or take a few years:

And here is his brother Nicholas, probably around the year 1920-ish:

2. In naturalization papers, William annoyingly only stated that his birthplace was Austria-Hungary.  But his brother, Nicholas, bless his heart, named the town.  It was Nagy Osz in the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

3. In looking this up, I learned all about the Banat and the Donauschwaben and also that this little village went by 3 names, depending on what record you were looking at.  If you were looking in current Romanian records, you needed to look up the village "Tomnatic".  If you were looking in Hungarian records prior to WWII, you needed to look up Nagy Osz.  But if you were looking at German records (because the settlers of this town were actually German), you needed to look up the village "Triebswetter".

This is a modern satellite photo of Tomnatic, Romania I got from Google Maps.  See how sweet and orderly?  From what I've read, it was laid out by a German.  Named Triebswetter.  :-)

 


4. My grandfather and great-uncle had always told me that their grandparents names were Adam DOMELLE and Christine REISER and that the family had actually originally come from the Alsace-Lorraine region.


5. In doing a random internet search on "Triebswetter", I stumbled into the middle of a site for people who will do research for you in Romania.  The specific page I found was the middle of a discussion around how trustworthy some published transcriptions were.  From that discussion I learned that there are these "Family Books" from various villages that list out transcribed church records.  I also found a link to something called "Das Treffil Buch" which is a book of the personal notes kept by a gentleman named Peter Treffil who lived in Triebswetter (b. 1858 d. 1934).  He basically kept track of who lived in what house in the town, along with notes of children and dates and interesting side notations on some people.  He was the town amateur genealogist/historian basically.  Apparently, some people discount this little book, they say it's in a little used German dialect and how can you trust some guys notes about people.

In my personal opinion, I think that fact that he kept these notes because obviously, he LOVED keeping track, makes it actually very valuable information, no more or less than any "official" church records.  I think we genealogists all know that no matter how official a record is, you can still have a typo or human error of some sort.

So keeping in mind typos and all that, here I was, starting at Adam and Christine. 

It was too much of a coincidence.  I started to believe it was true.


6. And I kept looking through this little Treffil Buch.  Not only was Adam there, but it said who his father was, and who his siblings were!  And it spelled the last name mainly like this: DOMMELE.

So now I had more info on my line than I ever had before:

William Adam DOMELLE, son of
William DOMELLE, son of
Adam DOMMELE, son of
Baldasar DOMMELE

I used the heck out of Google Translate that day because everything is in sort of German, not to mention abbreviations.  Google Translate gets most of it believe it or not, but sometimes it stumbles here and there.  I don't care.  I still remember what it was like looking at old records in other languages back when I started researching.  :-)


7.  There was also one part of my new favorite book that stated a little precious gem of information - it said that Adam's father, Baldasar, came to the village of Triebswetter in the 1830s from the village of Glogowach.

In my google-german I figured out it says something roughly like this about Baltasar DOMMELE:


"The father came here in the 1830s as a blacksmith's apprentice with a knapsack on his back from Glokowacz, his native place, hereafter Triebswetter.  He was very efficient in crafting, felt loved, decided here to stay and married Mary of No. 16.  They had a blessed marriage and healthy children."


Now honestly, can anyone have written anything nicer?  I'm so grateful to Peter Treffil for keeping his little book about his neighbors.



8.  But what about this hometown which was spelled about nine different ways in his notes?  Turns out it's Glogowach - now there is a mouthful!  But guess what, it's actually another village in the Banat.  In Romanian, it's Vladamirescu.  In Hungarian, it's Glogovac.  In German, it's Glogowach.


9.  And sure enough, after another wonderful internet search (oh how I love you internets!) I found actual other people who had done extensive research on the DUMELLE family of Glogowach.  Especially here and here.

Yep, they spelled it DUMELLE, but it was the same family - and my Baldasar was right there.


10.  So not only had I broken down my brick wall, but I had found other relatives who had already done extensive research.

They've hit a collective brick wall with going back further than Glogowach - but even their brick wall matched my verbal history - their ancestors had also stated that the family originally came from the Alsace Lorraine region.  No one is quite sure where yet.


Conclusion:

Even though there is a new brick wall, I get to revel in the fact that I've added 3 generations back for my DOMELLE line.

I also get to revel in the fact that I got my grandfather's DNA tested and in theory, his male DNA should go straight back to that first DUMELLE that showed up in Glogowatz.  Just imagine!

My final revel is in the fact that these records gave me new surnames for the wifes of these new DOMELLE ancestors!  I now get to add REISER, WOLF and KLEIN to my surname list.  And there's info on them too!  I just didn't list in this post since I'm focusing on DOMELLE.

And what did I learn from all this?  Keep doing those searches that never came up with anything before.  You never know what will pop up on the Internet that will save you from making a trip to Romania.

Domelle's in the 1940 Federal Census

Still taking a detailed look through the 1940 census and this time I focused on looking for Domelle families.  It's another unusual surname like my Kleylein surname.  I wrote an earlier blog post that describes what I know about the origin of my Domelle line.  There are 2 variations on the name in the US, it's either "Domelle" or "Domele" and I'm told that the heads of the families of these 2 variants were cousins.  Whether they were first cousins or 15th cousins I have no idea but the name is rare enough that I'm relatively certain they are related.

Today I just looked in the 1940 US Federal census for any occurrence of the name "Domelle" or its variant "Domele".

Here is what I found:


1) There are 9 households of Domelles in the US in 1940 (6 Domelles and 3 Domeles).  There could be 1 or 2 more but they are currently spelled so incorrectly in the ancestry database that I couldn't find them.  I might stumble across them later.  :-)

2) 5 of them are in the northwest corner of Indiana (4 in Newton County, 1 in Lake County).

3) 3 of them are in Chicago, IL (not far from the northwest corner of Indiana - also 2 of those were young Domelle ladies on their own in the big city).

4) 1 of them wandered over to Tompkins County NY (thank goodness since that's where he met my grandmother!).


My direct line is the Newton County, Indiana 2-L Domelle branch of the family.  It's my grandfather there in NY - he left behind the farm in Newton County.

Below is a map showing the distribution.  Just one big cluster except for the 1 outlier over in NY.

Originally all the Domelles were in Chicago, but my great-grandfather and his brother moved down to Indiana to farm land for a family friend that owned it.

My "Heritage Pie" Chart - SNGF

I loved Randy's idea this week for Saturday Night Genealogy Fun! 

Below is a list of my 16 great-great-grandparents and where they were born.  Below that is the actual pie chart showing the birthplaces and how they are weighted.

One of my lines is a little iffy, so I just had to make an assumption of place of birth for this exercise.  Also,  2 of my lines had people born in places that have since changed around since WWI and WWII.  For instance, my DOMELLE line was born in Hungary, but exactly where is not Hungary now, it's now in modern Romania.

My 16 great-great-grandparents are:

1.  Adam Domelle, born Bet. 1850 - 1860 in Austria Hungary.  He died in Austria Hungary.  He married Christine Rizer.
2.  Christine Rizer, born Bet. 1850 - 1860 in Austria Hungary.  She died in Austria Hungary.

3.  Unknown Obendorfer, born in Austria.  He died in Austria.  He married Unknown.
4.  Unknown, born in Austria.  She died in Austria.

5.  John Mix, born 09 Mar 1830 in Tioga County, NY; died 1906 in New York.  He married Mary Ellen Weaver Aft. 1854.
6.  Mary Ellen Weaver, born 19 Feb 1839 in Cooperstown, Otsego, NY; died 13 Jan 1925 in Ithaca, Tompkins, NY.

7.  John Francis Akins, born 13 Mar 1841 in Tioga County, NY or PA; died 13 Feb 1890.  He married Hattie Elizabeth Kirby 17 Apr 1885.
8.  Hattie Elizabeth Kirby, born 19 Mar 1866 in Bennettsburg, Schuyler, NY; died 04 Jun 1963 in Schuyler Hospital, Montour Falls, Schuyler, NY.

9.  Johann Andreas Kleylein-Weltdicker, born 04 Oct 1829 in Unterrodach, Oberfranken, Bayern, Germany; died 26 Feb 1886 in Unterrodach, Oberfranken, Bayern, Germany.  He married Katharina Schaller 07 Mar 1858 in Unterrodach, Oberfranken, Bayern, Germany.

10.  Katharina Schaller, born 24 Aug 1833 in Unterrodach, Oberfranken, Bayern, Germany; died 15 May 1919 in Unterrodach, Oberfranken, Bayern, Germany.

11.  John Pawlak, born 24 Jun 1850 in Posen, Poland; died 20 Apr 1911 in Hale Township, McLeod Co., Minnesota.   He married Branislawa Lewandowski 30 Jan 1876 in St. Adalbert, Chicago, Cook Co., Illinois.
12.  Branislawa Lewandowski, born 30 Sep 1856 in Posen, Poland; died 13 Mar 1910 in Hale Township, McLeod Co., Minnesota.

13.  John Pokornowski, born 21 Dec 1856 in Starawies, Gniezno, Poland; died 21 Jan 1939 in Geneseo, Sargent Co., North Dakota.  He married Pelagia Kautz 25 May 1881 in St. Adalbert, Silver Lake, McLeod Co., Minnesota.
14.  Pelagia Kautz, born 11 Mar 1864 in Posen, Poland; died 15 Jan 1964 in Breckenridge, Wilkin Co., Minnesota.

15.  Nimrod Harrison, Jr., born 19 Apr 1839 in Mt. Airy, Carroll Co., MD; died 1919 in Taylorsville, Carroll Co., MD.  He married Sarah C. Watkins 28 Nov 1860 in Frederick Co., MD.
16.  Sarah C. Watkins, born 22 Aug 1845 in MD; died 1931 in Taylorsville, Carroll Co., MD. 

The birthplaces of my great-great-grandparents are:

Pre-WWII Hungary
Pre-WWII Austria
NY (4)
Germany (2)
Poland (4)
Maryland (2)

And finally, here is the actual Heritage Pie chart I came up with, thanks to the great NCES website:

Oh Just Pick A Name Already!

If you have an opinion on this, I would greatly appreciate hearing what it is!!!

I have this one family line, the "Domelle" line, and they emigrated to the US from what was the Austro-Hungarian Empire at the beginning of the 20th century.

Where they came from is now within the borders of modern-day Romanian.

But the Domelle's are actually German.

Apparently there was a big movement of Germans into Hungary during the 18th century. Much of the land was uninhabited and the Habsburg rulers wanted it more populated to help keep the Turks at bay. So they invited a bunch of Germans to move in, and they did. (See the Habsburg Rule section of this.)

An interesting consequence that resulted from these pockets of german-speaking people in Hungary was that towns and counties and such ended up being referred to by two names, the Hungarian and German versions of each name.

Of course, once all the towns became part of Romania later on in the 20th century, then there was a Romanian name for the towns.

So which name am I supposed to use?

The one my ancestor used on whatever document I'm looking at? What if they switched back and forth depending on their mood? Do I use the modern day name?

For instance, my great-aunt Anna Magdalena Domelle who emigrated to the US in 1919 lists (on her Social Security Application form) that her birthplace was:

Gatga, Tenesmege, Hungaria.

Actually, someone else typed it for her, she just signed it. Which is why that is a horrible mis-spelling.

The town is actually "Gattaja". In German.

In Hungarian, it's "Gátalja".

In Romanian, it's "Gătaia".

(Oh, and thank you german version of Wikipedia for being much more clear on Gattaja than the english version! Now I have to remember to check other languages of Wikipedia to help me along as well!)

I do know that the entire family (according to my grandfather and all the census records) spoke German.

But sometimes, they gave the Hungarian name for things, as in when my great-grandfather William Domelle said he was born in Nagyosz, which is actually Treibswetter in German, and Tomnatic in Romanian.

What do I do??? Naturally in my notes I capture all this information, but in my family tree software, in the main display for each person, which version do I use?

Right now I am using whatever they used the most in their documents. But I would prefer to have a consistent way of capturing it.

Any thoughts from anyone?

SNGF - Surname Distributions

Randy Seaver has posted another Saturday Night Genealogy Fun suggestion! This week it's:

1) Find out the geographical distribution of your surname - in the world, in your state or province, in your county or parish. I suggest that you use the Public Profiler site at http://www.publicprofiler.org/worldnames/, which seems to work quickly and easily. However, you cannot capture the image as a photo file - you have to capture the screen shot, save it and edit it.

2) Tell us about your surname distribution in a blog post of your own (with a screen shot if possible), in comments to this post, or in comments on a social networking site like Facebook and Twitter.


For "Kleylein", I was curious if anything at all would come up, because it is not a common surname at all. Sure enough though, I got some hits:



According to this website, we Kleylein's only exist in 5 countries and within those countries, we're a pretty small percentage (frequency per million):

Germany - 3.05%
Belgium - 0.29%
US - 0.14%
Spain - 0.10%
Argentina - 0.08%

As far as I know, "Kleylein" originated in Germany and in fact is pretty localized to the Bayern region. I visited Unterrodach years ago, which is where my line of Kleylein's came from. That's consistent with this website that says Marktrodach is the Top City for finding Kleylein's.

Once my father gave up and joined Facebook along with the rest of the world, he immediately began searching for all the other Kleylein's he could find and sending them friend requests. Thanks to him, I'm FB friends with one of the Kleylein's in Argentina, which is pretty cool, considering there's even fewer of them there than in the US.

My mom's surname is another unique one ("Domelle"), so naturally I did a search on that one as well:



And yep, even less Domelle's are out there. Interestingly, the website says there are Domelle's in West county, Ireland. I'm not sure I buy that, since I know for sure my great-grandfather immigrated from the Austro-Hungarian Empire. So, that is either a coincidence of spelling, or some person from the family moved to Ireland at some point. I also know for a fact there is a branch of the family in Canada, but Canada does not show any Domelle's for this website. Nobody's perfect I guess!

When I click on the map of the US for Domelle, it is pretty good in it's distribution by state, although I believe one state in the South is missing:


When the Domelle's immigrated, they mostly ended up in Indiana where they were farmers.

This is a fun little website, I did searches on pretty much every surname I have and then some. Thanks Randy!

Surnames and Lots of Other Places that aren't Rehoboth, Mass.

In my last posting I listed out all my surnames that originated (at least once they moved to America) in Rehoboth, MA. One day soon I'd like to visit that town.

Anyway, so below is a list of my other surnames, I like to think of them as "Not-from-Rehoboth-Surnames":

AKINS - the farthest back I have them is the 1800s in Lockwood, NY. They are a brick wall for me.

BROWN - first lived in Swansea, Mass, don't have much on them at all, the name comes from a wife

CHURCHILL - first lived in Wethersfield, CT. Lots of old genealogies try to link my Josiah Churchill to the famous Churchill family but I'm not buying it

COLLINS - first lived in Boston, then moved to Walllingford, CT, came from Herford, England

DOMELLE - immigrated in the 20th century from what was NagyOsz, Hungary (now in Romania) and moved to Lake Village, Indiana

ENSIGN - first lived in Hartford, CT. Some old genealogies try to prove a link to nobility with this one, but again, I'm not buying it.

FIENES - this was a maiden name for the mom of the wife of the first Bliss of mine that came over. Family was from Maiden Newton, Dorset, England

FOOTE - lived in Wethersfield, CT, came from Shalford, Essex, England and Royston, Hertfordshire, England

GEORGE - lived in Braintree, Norfolk, Massachusetts, have little because it was a wife

GIBBS - 1800s in Waterloo, Seneca Co, NY, have little because it was a maiden name

KINGSBURY - another maiden name of a family that first came over, they came from Dedham, Norfolk, England, but that's all I have right now

KIRBY - lots of brick walls in NY in the 1800s - another maiden name in Waterloo, Seneca, NY that comes from who knows where

LYNN - darn those maiden names, it's so hard to prove who the parents were in so many cases! This one was in Connecticut.

MIX - originall in New Haven, CT, then moved to Wallingford, CT, then NY - the cause of all my mysterious maiden names in NY. I know the first Mix came from London, but that's it.

OBENDORFER - married to the Domelle above, so was in Lake Village, Indiana. all I know is that she said she was born in Vienna and that's it!

ROCKWELL - lived in Windsor, CT, came supposedly from Fitzhead, Somerset, England

ROYCE - lived in New London, CT, came suppsedly from Martok, Somerset, England

STEVENS - another maiden name who married a Mix, I got nothing - 1800s in Greene, Chenango County, NY

TROWBRIDGE - lived in Boston, New Haven, CT, Branford, CT. Supposedly came from Devonshire, England

TURNER - like the Mix, I only know he came from London. First lived in Lynn, Massachusetss, then founded New Haven, CT

WHEATLIE - a maiden name of one who came over - is supposed to be from Maiden Newton, Dorset, England


And those are all my surnames to the point of emigration or immigration, whatever you want to call it!!

I Came, I Saw, I Wiki'd

I was lured into joining Twitter not long ago because I didn't want to be left out. But I still maintain my rebel status because I refuse to follow Oprah or Aston Kutcher. I don't do too much on there, mainly I follow genealogists, a couple of twittering cats, and some pseudo-Christopher Walkens (I like to think my tastes are eclectic, which is a much nicer word than inconsistent or weird).

Whilst reading my tweets one day, I came across a genealogy wiki different from the one that I entered myself into before, this one you could create pages for each of your family members. I was intrigued and intimidated at the same time.

After registering, and with encouragement from the gentleman in charge of it, I dove in and started to create some pages for my Domelle line. I have to admit, I was scared! I don't know why, it's not like any mistakes I made couldn't be fixed and the world wasn't going to come to an end if I did something wrong. I know, I am a little uptight, I like things to be Right and Correct and if you aren't going to do it Properly, then don't bother doing it At All. The best part was that when I would go in the next day, magic elves (aka, Robin) would have fixed my grossest errors and explained to me how to do it right the next time. What a great guy!

And so, I debut for you, my in-progess collection of wiki pages on my Domelle family:

Domelle surname page

My great-great-grandfather: Adam Domelle
My great-grandfather: William Domelle
My great-great uncle: Nickolaus Domelle
My great-great aunt: Anna Domelle
My great-great aunt: Lena Domelle
My 1st cousin 3x removed: John Domele
My 2nd cousin 2x removed: Anthony Domele
My 2nd cousin 2x removed: Martin Domele

There is lots more to do, more info to fill out, more citations for information, but I think it's turning out pretty cool. And it gets the info out there in a way that others may understand better, rather than looking at my genealogy reports.

And I encourage others to try it out! I am a pseudo-technical person, I sound like I know what I'm talking about, but when it comes down to it, I don't actually know much at all about the guts behind things (like html, xml, shtml, abcdml, blahblahblahyoupeoplearemakingthisupml) on the web. But it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be once I dove in. I now know the power of these thingies: <> and these thingies: [].

The most amazing part though, is that it's actually helped me at work! Who knew? Suddenly I realized that I could actually contribute to our internal wiki because I actually knew how it worked now. I was in there today, creating new pages and linking and feeling awfully productive and contributory.


see more Lolcats and funny pictures

Tombstone Tuesday - 03-Mar-2009

My mom's side of the family (on her dad's side) has the family name of Domelle (pronounced DOM-lee). Domelle has always been a tough name to research. It looks french, but the census records and immigration records indicate they immigrated from the Austro-Hungarian empire and spoke German. The area of the Austro-Hungarian empire they came from is in modern Romania, but it seems that they emigrated down there from the Alsace-Lorraine region, so maybe they were originally french?

After that, I've got nothing. I have very few photographs, and sadly, it's one of those families where people didn't really keep up with each other. I know I still have family out in Indiana (which is where the Domelle's settled, after a stint of living in Chicago for some of them) and California. There is a branch of Domelle's up in Canada, that I know are related in some way, I believe the original Domelle's who went to the US and the one's who went to Canada were cousins.

It's kind of the bummer part of genealogy - where you hit that wall and then there's just nothing. I think it will have to be one of my resolutions this year that I delve back into the Domelle family and find who else is out there and see who will talk to me!

Meanwhile, several years ago my family took a trip out to Indiana to see all the old places where my grandfather grew up. The farm, the little town, his schools. They were all still there!

My strongest recollection of Indiana (at least the part where we were) is that it's FLAT. FLAT FLAT FLAT. I've never seen such flatness. But then, I've never been to Kansas either, and I hear it's flat there too. And the roads were so straight!!!! My little area of the world here where I've spent most of my life is not flat, there's lots of little hills. No mountains, just hills. And lots of curvy little roads.

We found a cemetery in Indiana where there were some Domelle stones (notice one branch of the family spells it "Domele").

Anthony Domele is my 2nd cousin twice removed, son of John Domele and Mary Tunner. They were born in what was then Hungary (now Romania). Mae was from good ole Indiana though. I wonder if she thought Anthony and his family were exotic?


Anthony (known as "Tony") is my grand-uncle, brother to my grandfather. He was born in Chicago, son of William and Elizabeth Domelle.


Nick is my great-granduncle. He and his wife Barbara were born in what was Hungary (now Romania). Nick is my grandfather's uncle, brother to the William I listed just above.


John and Mary Domele were the parents of the first Anthony (up above). Both emigrated from what was Hungary (now Romania).


So yeah, now I'm going to have to put some more effort into the Domelle's, I've been inspired!

Four Generations

There's a few pictures like this floating around in my family. The women on my mom's side of the family tend to live FOREVER, so there was a great-grandma around to take these pictures with. This picture below was taken sometime between August 7-9, 1973.


Starting on the left is my mom, wearing a lovely lavender checked frock. Actually I do like it. Notice how tan she is - we all still lived in Miami at this point. In the middle, holding me, is my grandma, Ann Mix Domelle (mentioned in the previous post), and next to her is her mom, Cornelia Akins Mix Simpson. I knew her as "Grandma Simpson". She is the "Nelia" I mentioned in the previous post, the one with a million kids. She did divorce William Mix, my grandma's father and married a Leon Simpson.

I'm in the middle staring at the dog rather than the camera.

Grandma Simpson lived up in the Finger Lakes region of New York, that's where this picture was taken. We all think she was part gypsy because no one moved as much as she did. Now that I think about it, maybe she was running from the law. Or maybe she was in the witness protection program. Or a spy.

Probably the answer is that she lived through the Depression with a million kids and moved from place to place, depending on who would let her stay on their land (in a trailor), or who had a house for her to rent. Some of the kids would have already been out of the house (probably the eldest two brothers, my grandma was the youngest). She married Leon Simpson in 1935, so hopefully things improved for her after that.

Why did she get divorced from William Mix back at a time when divorce was so much more shocking? I'm not allowed to say, my grandmother would kill me. :-) Let's just say irreconcilable differences. But rest assured there was no murder or kidnapping or anything like that. Just people not getting along.

I have one sibling. I cannot even imagine having 9 siblings running around with an age range of 22 years. I guess you would get used to not being the center of attention? And you would be pretty good at wolfing down your food to get seconds before it was all gone, huh? And you could sleep through noise really good too I imagine.

Grandma Simpson's maiden name was "Akins". I've had a pretty tough time researching that name. It comes up as Akins, Akens, Aikens, and Aikins.

I know that Cornelia's grandparents were John and Deborah Akins, who in 1850 had a farm in Ithaca, New York. There were 7 kids running around (in 1850 at least). Beyond that, I have no clue, it's been a wall. According to the 1850 census, John was born in NY, but the census's older than 1850 only list the head of the household's name. Gee thanks stupid census people, I guess the only important person was the head of the household? How do you expect me to figure out where John was if he's only a checkmark under the "child aged 10-15" column? Stupid census people.

And don't even get me started on the government letting the 1890 census burn up in a fire. Oh, the humanity!!!!

Ann Mix Domelle

I just got a scanner finally at home, so am very excited to begin scanning old pictures. In the meantime, I got to thinking about pictures of family that I have, and below is one of my favorite pictures of my grandmother (my mom's mom). There is one other that I love, but we'll save that for another day.

I don't know where this was taken, but it is labelled 1960. That would make Ann a few years older than me in this picture and I think she looks just beautiful. As a little girl I always vaguely associated my grandma with Elizabeth Taylor because she also had short dark hair, and whenever we went somewhere, the first stop was in the bathroom to put on red, red lipstick.

Ann Mix was born back in the 20s in New York, in the Finger Lakes area. She talks about that landscape, the rolling hills and farms with a wistfulness. She did not have an easy childhood, she grew up during the depression, and survived going without during the 30s and the 40s during the second World War. Those of us born after that I don't think will ever understand what it is to go without. We have everything we want at our fingertips, at the 24-hour convenience store, at the 24-hour grocery store and Wal-Mart. We (I do, I admit it), get annoyed if exactly what we want is not available. I am wasteful. My grandma still cleans and re-uses ziploc bags. There is nothing wrong with doing that, it comes from the Depression when you used what you had as long as you could.

She speaks of seeing her mother cooking, cooking, cooking. We even took a trip once, a bunch of family, to New York, to track down all the places they lived up there. We found the little old farmhouse where my grandma remembers being a child. We stood in the ramshackle kitchen filled with debris, and she pointed to the corner and said "That's where my mother made pancakes." In the other corner was where she remembered the wooden table and chairs they all sat at. She said, "My father would say to my mother, 'Nelia, can't you control these kids?'". Her mother's name was Cornelia. My grandmother had 7 brothers and 2 sisters (twins). Yikes!

There are lots of little tidbits I could tell you, some good like those above, some not so good. I don't want to say the not-so-good one's in print out of respect for my grandma. She would regret telling me then because she comes from a time when things were not so open as they are now. We regurgitate our entire lives and psyche out into the ether for everyone to see (and comment on). It used to be done in whispers, out of earshot of the children.

My grandmother gave me some of my best memories. She used to wash my hair and comb it out so gently. No one ever combed my hair like my grandma. She called the knots in my long hair "gnarls". She is the first person that explained what the word "buttocks" meant to me. I was about 6 or 7 years old, and we were laying up in the bed in the spare room. It was a summer night, and the windows were open, and the curtains were blowing just a little. The bed was up against the window to get the breeze. And then she told me. I must have laughed for a good 5 minutes, I couldn't believe what a dumb sounding word that was. She laughed right along with me, belly laughs in the dark. I think of that now when I see my mother laughing with her grand-children.

My grandma used to bring me chocolate kisses without me asking! Wow! Mom never did that! :-D Also, in the summer, I guess she must have hated leftovers, because when it was later in the evening and time for ice cream, she would just divide up the whole rectagular package of ice cream between us all! I wonder where my sugar addiction came from! :-)

I can also credit her with my ability to walk softly as a cat. She lives in a twin, and never liked the idea of the neighbors hearing you stomp around. She actually got all of us, whenever we were there, to walk quietly. To this day, I can give my father a heart-attack at any time I deem necessary. Of course, maybe he should stop sitting with his back to the door....pad, pad, pad, WHATAREYOUDOINGDAD?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

My grandma used to feed all us kids off of pink depression-ware plates. Can you believe that? I loved those plates so much. They were "American Sweetheart", I looked it up. I have a sugar bowl in my kitchen. It doesn't match a thing in the house, because it's pink, and glass, but I love that sugar bowl because it represents my grandmother.

My grandmother is very old now, she doesn't remember things so well, it is the hearkbreak of old age that some people start to lose little bits of their lives. But I remember, I will always remember. She did not, has not had an easy life, but that never stopped her from showering love all over me. I was drenched in it all my childhood. And I appreciate it and love her so much for it!!!

Call your grandma today!!! She'll be so happy to hear from you!

:-)