Archive for 'Genealogy'
Happy Texas Independence Day
It’s happy now. Wasn’t on this day in 1836. The Alamo was under siege by the Mexican thousands and the Texians, despite today’s issuance of their proclamation of Texas independence, were about as disorganized and fractious as you might expect a fledgling government and its ad hoc military to be.
Four days from now, with the [...]
Posted: March 2nd, 2010 under Genealogy, Texana.
Tags: Alamo, Goliad, San Jacinto, Texas history, Texas Independence Day
Comments: none
What time do they serve the jello?
Getting old means time speeds up. The days fly by, the weeks rush past, pretty soon the season you were just getting used to is being replaced by another one. And before you know it, you’re another year older and deeper in debt. Wait. That was a song lyric. I think. What is this phenom, [...]
Posted: February 4th, 2010 under Blogosphere, Genealogy, Scribbles.
Tags: jello, nursing home, time speeds up
Comments: 2
Signatures
It was inevitable. After two years of forcing Mr. B. to write in cursive (essentially because his printing is sloppier and much harder to read) he has developed a signature. Looping and swooping at the end.
More Dionysian than his late grandfather’s (which he has never seen) which was rather severe. Moreso even than mine [...]
Posted: December 29th, 2009 under Genealogy, Mr. Boy.
Tags: cursive signature, Dionysian
Comments: 2
Before Columbus: The Americas of 1491
I picked up a copy of this young adult cofee-table sized book filled with drawings and photographs at Mr. B.’s school’s book fair back in the fall. I’d heard of the original version by journalist Charles C. Mann and wanted to see how the new, largely theoretical research on Native Americans was being pitched to [...]
Posted: December 19th, 2009 under Genealogy, Library, South of the Border, Texana.
Tags: Before Columbus: The Americas of 1491, Charles C. Mann, landscaping a world, Native Americans, small pox
Comments: 2
Winning the gender wars
My dear mother, in one of her less-perceptive moments many years ago, turned from her dressing table to address my seven-year-old self with the following admonition: "Men work, women stay home."
In other words, I was to steel myself psychologically for being in harness until I finally collapsed in the traces, good for only one thing: [...]
Posted: November 30th, 2009 under Genealogy, Scribbles.
Tags: Matt Patterson, PajamasMedia, winning the gender wars
Comments: 2
One-legged jack bed
Was reading a new genealogy narrative pulled together by a cousin of Mrs. Charm’s and came across the phrase of the headline. The description of this old technology wasn’t clear, so I searched it and came up with this which is. It also has some diagrams and a photo to reinforce it. Pretty ingenious.
Posted: November 29th, 2009 under Genealogy, Library, Mrs. Charm, Texana.
Tags: Alabama bed, jack bed, one-legged jack bed
Comments: none
Polygamy in the family
Through an older cousin, Mrs. Charm has been learning about her paternal ancestry. An aunt already was pulling together the maternal side with a few interesting revelations but no scandals so far. Today Mrs. C. discovered her paternal great great uncle, Richard Jenkins Davis, an elder in the early Mormon church.
Born in Wales, he [...]
Posted: November 24th, 2009 under Genealogy, Mrs. Charm, Rancho Roly Poly.
Tags: LDS, Mormon church, Richard Jenkins Davis, Welsh Mormons
Comments: 2
The Little Emperor
China’s experience with the unintended consequence of their one-family, one-child edict is quite amusing. We’ve struggled with some of that with Mr. B., of course, as probably any parent of an only child can attest. I took to calling him "your lordship" when he was a Terrible Two. But he’s improved.
Via the Seablogger.
Posted: September 16th, 2009 under Blogosphere, Genealogy, Mr. Boy, Scribbles.
Tags: China, one-child policy, only child, Terrible Two, The Little Emperor
Comments: 5
The Disagreement
The beginnings of Winder Hospital, which became one of Richmond’s largest in the Civil War, where my great grandfather, a private in Barksdale’s Mississippi Brigade, spent several months in 1862.
The post title, however, is that of this historical novel I recently finished about the training and coming-of-age of a young Virginia doctor during the war. [...]
Posted: July 25th, 2009 under Civil War, Genealogy, Library, Science/Engineering.
Tags: Barksdale's Mississippi Brigade, bleeding and cupping, Charlottesville General Hospital, Richmond's Winder Hospital, slouch hat, The Disagreement, UVA
Comments: none
Times Wastes Too Fast
A remarkable, very readable Web-centric piece on Thomas Jefferson, warts and all. His Aunt Judith, his father’s sister, was Mr. B’s seven greats grandmother.
Via In Search of Jefferson’s Moose.
Posted: July 5th, 2009 under Blogosphere, Genealogy, Library, Mr. Boy, Obituaries.
Tags: In Search of Thomas Jefferson's Moose, Judith Jefferson, Thomas Jefferson, Time Wastes Too Fast
Comments: none







