One of my biggest challenges regarding the various families I'm working on is my g. grandmother's family on my dad's side. The Downs were from Delaware but I suspect my g. grandmother was left an orphan and came with relatives to the midwest. I work on this mystery for days until I'm so frustrated, I have to put it away and move on to somebody else.
My daughter recently asked me if I knew if we were related to anybody famous. I told her that ancestry has a special "who am I related to?" section where they tell you who some of your long lost relatives are according to whatever family data you've entered into their program. Some of the people on my list include: Davy Crockett, (7th cousin); James Stewart (10th cousin); Zachary Taylor (5th cousin, 1 time removed); First lady Angelica VanBuren (6th cousin,1 time removed); Woodrow Wilson, Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford, John F Kennedy, Cary Grant, Freddie Prinze, Ruby Dee, Marlon Brando, outlaw Sam Bass, robber Clyde Barrow, Butch Cassidy, Doc Holliday, John Steinbeck, William Woodsworth, Elizabeth Browning, Ray Bradbury, Willa Cather, Robert Penn Warren, William Faulkner, and hockey player Maurice Rocket Richards. I don't know how true all this is but I choose to believe it's entirely possible.
The three-ring binder on my mother has various families I want to work on. Am I repeating myself? Probably. But that's okay. You can skim over the boring parts. Because I was able to find out who her biological family was (she was adopted back in the 20's), I've got notes on both those sides of the family --the Haskells and the Stevens. I also have a file on her adoptive family, The Nisbets and the Blanchards.
My mother married three times so I thought it might be interesting to look over the family stats on those two guys. I met the third husband twice when I was an adult but I don't remember the second husband except remembering I resented his presence in our house.
Leo Grady was a soldier at Fort Worden in the 1950's and he was a year younger than my mom. My mother's divorce from my dad became final in June of 1952. On July 5th, Leo and my mother applied for a marriage license and finally tied the knot with justice of the peace Coulter on Irondale Road on August 22. Us four kids sat in the car outside.
They eventually divorced. Even as a kid, I could have called that one. I didn't find much information on Leo. Even his obit didn't discuss what he did for a living or enjoyed doing on his days off. Some obits are written with care and are a delight to read. Other times they're just a list of survivors. I do know that Leo was an alcoholic so perhaps he didn't accomplish much to write home about. I'll never know, and I don't really have all that much interest in looking further. I do know his father was a coal miner.
Stanley Kwashnik was my mother's third husband. I guess you could call Leo and Stan my step-dads but I never really considered them as such. I don't even remember what Leo looked like but I did meet Stan twice in my adult life when I visited my mother in Pennsylvania in 1977 and 2003.
Stan's father was born in Austria and his mother was born in Poland. The 1930 census showed Stan's dad (named Walter but he went by Blaze or Blazen) was working as a coal miner. The house they lived in was the same one I slept at when I visited my mom. I remember all her floors were slanted and she said it was because the old coal mines of the past had collapsed the ground underneath, causing house foundations to become unstable. There were 13 people living in that house in 1930 and except for Blaze who worked the mines, the only other person employed was a sister of Stan's who was a cigar maker. Two of the kids living there were step-children of Blaze's so his wife, Eleanor, must have been married before. The father of these two children was listed as Russian.
Ten years later in the 1940 census, Blaze had passed away and Stan was living with his widowed mother and 8 other relatives. By this time, two men of the house were coal miners supporting the rest of the family. They were married to two of Stan's sisters. If you want to see the house, go to Google maps and type in 341 Hillside Ave, Edwardsville, PA. Veer the mouse to the right and you'll see the house with 341 on it. It's bigger than it looks but I'm sure having 13 people in it made for close quarters.
Both of these husbands of my mother died at age 77 and within one year of each other. Stan was listed as working in the mines, at a construction company, and for a restaurant.
Tomorrow I may look over my Haskell notes again and see what I can find on my biological grandfather. I do know he lived to be 95 and was a past member of the Clark County Sheriff's Posse.
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