Just a Walkin'

It's been a day of surprises here for me.

First -beginning early-early in the day -at a hour when most people are sound asleep (but I was sitting in my chair, working away on the "Rooster" tabletopper for my cousin Ruth Ann and watching re-runs of one of my favorite shows on the Hallmark Channel (Cheers) when I heard noises on the stairs, little feet carefully come down the steps and into the living room then pops Miss Maya!

I asked her why she was up as she really should be in bed, sleeping -and dreaming -away so she would be all rested and ready to hop out of bed in the morning to get ready for school. She told me she needed a drink.

So, I told her to go and get a little glass of water and to that, she informed me, in a tone of voice that was almost haughty -"Some people drink things besides water, you know!"

Oh yes, my dear little one, that is quite true. And your Grammy, for example does love occasionally to indulge in beverages other than water or those that are made with water as a main component -like coffee, tea (hot or iced) and yes, Gram likes certain other beverages too that are -at least for several years I would hope -out of Miss Maya's range and liking. Things like oh, maybe a nice cold can or bottle of that fermented stuff called beer! Although my intake of that frosty beverage has dropped considerably over the past few years, I still do enjoy a good cold brew -or two -or sometimes more. LOL

So anyway -back to Miss Maya -I told her to go get herself a drink -of her choice -knowing full well that would involve her putting a little chocolate syrup in a cup and adding a dabble of milk to it and stirring it all up with as much, if not more zest and energy than one would use in mixing up a cake or some other concoction.

The milk having been devoured, I told her she really needed to go back to bed but again, she has a speedy response for me to that suggestion.

"I' m really not very tired or sleepy at all, Gram!"

I thought about forcing the issue and making her go back upstairs and to bed and then thought if I do that and she's not all that sleepy at the moment, she'll be awake upstairs and in no time, I could envision she would also wake up her brother and then, I'd be stuck with both of them up and fighting, and Kurtis having some kind of hissy fit so picking my battle carefully then, I told her she could stay downstairs with me but she had to either go lay down out in my room or lay down on the loveseat or the sofa.

Although there was plenty of room on the sofa for both her and Sammy -who was curled up at one end there -she couldn't lay down there and share the couch with him, so she got herself a lightweight blanket, found her special teddy bear and fluffy dog stuffed animal and curled up on the loveseat. That was shortly after 1:30 a.m. and it was just past 2:30 a.m. when I saw that her eyes had finally closed completely and that she was asleep then!

I just left her there then to sleep the rest of the night on the loveseat cause I sure as heck wasn't about to try to carry her upstairs nor was I going to rouse her and make her walk up the steps either! Best to let sleeping dogs lie you know!

This afternoon, I went out to our church around 1 p.m. to meet up with seven other women from our Women's Group and we set out to give the social hall there a darned good housecleaning!

Cupboards in the kitchen were all cleaned out and scrubbed; the stove and oven cleaned plus windows in the hall, wainscoating, heating vents -all given a good wipe-down. All the tables and folding chairs were given a thorough once-over and finally, the floor swept and mopped up. If anyone were to come into the social room now, I would defy them to find any dirt, anywhere, left over there!

While I was working on the wainscoating and heat vents, my neighbor and good friend, Kate, was doing each table and the folding chairs. We talked a bit as we worked - a nice feature of having a group of people sharing in those chores you know- and when I got to the end of one wall and went to get up from working on that stuff on my hands and knees, I realized I had a bit of a problem.

I was beyond the reach of the last table so I had nothing stable then to grasp hold of and balance myself while trying to pull myself up to my feet!

I thought maybe if I got myself up on one knee and I could put the weight then onto the other leg and do a balance act there, I could stand up. But that knee didn't want to cooperate, so I reverted then to trying to do the same thing but with the other knee and it did seem, momentarily, that it was going to work and then, BOOM! I lost my balance and did a semi-split there on the floor with my left leg bending at the knee and kind of causing my left leg then to splay out a bit and my left ankle was slightly bend under all of that weight then too!

Yeah, it was quite the sight -a not very neat and tidy three-point landing for sure, but thankfully, nothing injured except a bit of pride you could say. Although it did take me very much by surprise and when I made my landing, although in my mind, I meant to say "Oh Sheesh!" but a slip of the tongue and the other women probably thought I was calling out in prayer because what I said was "Oh Jesus!"

I should have known better than to try to get up off the floor in the first place without having anything to hold onto and to give me some leverage but no, I had to prove it to myself, for once and for all I guess, that there are certain moves my old body doesn't approve of and that happens to be one of 'em!

When we were about finished up, my stomach -or intestinal tract actually -began to give me fits with lots of cramping and such so I made a speedy exit out of there then and came home to sit back and put my legs up, rest my back a bit too that way and try to get the intestines to settle down.

Finally, about 5:30 -feeling a little tired but not wanting to fall asleep right then and there -I opted to take Sammy for a nice long walk as an effort to keep my legs and back from stiffening up too much on me.

We walked down the road -in the opposite direction then of the neighbor who complained -and headed down towards the ghost town of Peale.

It had been about 3 weeks since I had last been down that part of the road and what a treat I had today.

Three weeks ago, there were dandelions blooming all over there. Today, still lots of bloomers in that category but lots of them already going to seed and ready to have their fluffy tops blown off and spreading their seeds deeper then into the forest.

Trees that had only the faintest hint of a bud on them three weeks ago now showed many of them to be in full blossom. White flowers, pink ones denoted apple trees among the firs, hemlock and pines. Maple and oak trees had buds coming out and some even had tiny leaves beginning to form. And those evergreens -many of them had lighter green showing on their tips which indicates the new growth coming on to those trees too.

Just beautiful! Seeing all the colors, the different shades of greens and the flora along the road showed how this had all sprung back to life in those three weeks then since my last visit.

It's been many, many a year that has passed since I was a youngster and used to walk down that road or along the old railroad track and see the new blossoms, the new ground flower growth popping up along the way. Back then, when my cousins and I would walk with their aunts along those routes, they told me the names of all the little tiny white or purple flowers we saw blooming but when you stop visiting places like this for a long period of time, don't pay any particular attention over those years to the growth around you, those names, the ability to identify plants leaves you.

And sadly, that's exactly what has happened to me.

I saw some lovely little white blooms as well as some tiny purple and lavender ones too but I couldn't tell you now what plants they were from! I saw the bushes along the roadside beginning to turn from the winter brown to the lovely light green shade and I'm pretty sure many of them will be producing a great crop of huckleberries this summer. I "think" I can still recognize those plants! I know I did see some leaves of some other vine type things growing in and around those bushes and I'm pretty sure they were wild strawberry plants getting their foothold in the ground again.

But when it is time to go pick those things, those bushes, those fir trees and other ground cover growth will then be so thick along the road that it will be hard to reach in and pick their succulent fruits because by then, the wildlife of the area will be out then too. And those woods are really full of creepy crawly things that I hate and am also terrified of encountering one of 'em too -copperheads and rattlesnakes!

Funny isn't it though, how -when I was a kid -my friends and I would take our little pails and head down that road and pick berries with very little fear of those creatures! Usually, we would have one adult with us -for protection and to beat the bushes a bit to roust out any unwanted snakes -but I know and fully understand today why my Mom -and my Grandmother too -were always worried from the time my pals and I would leave on one of these berry-picking expeditions until we got back home with no bites on us other than from some pesky mosquitos or insects of that type.

But these days, I'll enjoy going for walks down there, along that road and trying to imagine what it may have been like there well over a hundred years ago when my Grandfather was growing up in that ghost town and how different the sights there are today than from when he saw them.

Hard to imagine a young boy of 9 or 10 years of age going out and picking berries after having put in a full workday -10 hours or so -loading coal into the mine cars and leading the mules out of the mines, pulling their heavy loads behind them, isn't it?

But that's what life was like back then for him and for many, many other youngsters his age and up. Work from dawn until the late afternoon and then come home and tend to a garden or go picking berries and other things from the woods around them to sustain them with fresh food during the summer months and through the hard work of canning and preserving those items, food to keep them nourished through the long, cold months ahead.

I don't know about you but it makes me marvel that they had that strength to persevere, to push on, to harvest any and all foods they could.

How many of us today could do that? How many of the children today would even be willing to do all that?

All of that makes me very thankful that they could and did and also, that today, we don't have to endure that much work, that kind of hardship, in order to have fresh food to eat.

Enjoy the produce on your tables today and remember how hard our ancestors had to work to have the bounty of the land around them to carry them through.

How Does My Garden Grow?

Remember, many years back -like probably 40 some, it was the in thing to take nursery rhymes and kind of twist them around a bit? I used to know a kazillion of those back then. One of my favorites was "Mary, Mary, quite contrary. How does your garden grow? With silver bells and cockle shells and one gosh darned potato!"

Well, my little garden doesn't have any silver bells, or cockle shells, nor does it even have any potatoes in it but by gosh, by golly, it is definitely growing!

Just check these pictures out here if you don't believe me.
Here's what my garden looked like back on June 17th -a mere 12 days ago.

And, here's what it looked like this past Saturday -June 27th.
Here's the lettuce, beets, carrots, peas and first row of the green beans as they were two days ago -on Saturday.
This is what the lettuce, beets, carrots -and that tiny bit of green you can maybe see if you enlarge the picture, between the lettuce and the beets/carrots row, is my green onions and this was TODAY - a mere two days later!
This -above -is the middle section of the garden -from left to right as the picture faces you -peas, two rows of green beans and my cukes -then the corn at the far right.
And here's the peas and green beans as they are today!


And finally, here's the cukes and corn as seen today.
Trust me when I tell you this, considering I am the original "black-thumb gardener" that I am absolutely astonished to see these things flourishing like this in my own backyard! Amazing. Incredible, the sights I saw there today!

It's been well over twenty years since the last time I got brave and/or crazy -call it what you wish -and tried to have a vegetable garden here. Two, maybe three years running, I had the back lot all plowed up and harrowed and meticulously marked out rows in which I planted oodles more than I have in this little "victory" garden (if you will) this year. Heck, I planted lettuce, radishes, onions, peas, carrots, beets, green beans, tomatoes, potatoes, corn, cucumbers, squash -all that good stuff in that big old plot.

And, each year as the stuff would start to come up, it would either be eaten immediately by either deer or rabbits -or some other wildebeast known in these parts maybe, or it would just flat out die on me!

My late neighbor, Howard Nelson, who was a fantastic gardener and one who often would swap trade secrets of the home gardening trade with my Grandpa -who, by the way, always had huge and beautiful veggie gardens -would tell me that if my Grandfather were alive to see my attempts at growing stuff, he would be shocked and immediately sent on to eternity by the sight there.

Well, I hope by saying this that I don't jinx myself now, but I hope Grandpa can see this little bit of a garden of mine from where ever he is in heaven and can quit laughing like a loon at my misfortune in the garden department.

Now, let's see how much produce I actually will be able to glean from this puppy in the near future too. My last garden yielded one (yes, 1 -one) cup of peas and that was it!

So let's all cross our fingers and pray! Okay?

Visiting and Visitors

Lots of neat things to tell about from Sunday's events!

Mandy, the two little ones and I took a little jaunt down to Indiana, PA Sunday afternoon. The purpose of our visit was two-fold. One was to have a chance to see Mandy's best friend - since Kindergarten and her husband (Missy and Matt) and to have dinner or supper - whatever you care to call it - with them. The other reason for our trip was to have a little time to visit with a cousin of ours.

The cousin - Arline - is a first cousin of my Mom's. Her mother was my grandfather's baby sister I think my Grandpa was 20-22 years older than Arline's Mom - somewhere along that kind of timeline anyway. Arline will be celebrating her 80th birthday on Wednesday of this week and because she is really one very special lady we wanted to have a chance to take a card and a small gift to her to honor her on this auspicious occasion. She always amazes me - the things she does, the things she is involved in too -always busy! And, she is sooooo very much like her mother too -my great Aunt Elin. When I was a kid, we generally would stop to visit Aunt Elin and her husband either on our trip down to Monroeville to visit my uncle and his family - or else, on the way home. And, the way Aunt Elin operated always amazed me as a kid and still does today when I think back on those visits.

Usually, when we stopped at her house, she had no idea that we were going to drop by but within five minutes of our entering her house, the coffee pot would be on and brewing and she would be busy, digging around in her refrigerator and pulling out this or that or something else and within a half hour - 45 minutes tops - she would have pulled together a meal fit for a king! Where on earth she had all this food stashed and at the ready to pull together the way she could do is beyond me! And, I never ever had food that wasn't really good and tasty at Aunt Elin's house; never ever walked away from there hungry either!

The same type of treatment is the norm if you ever go visit my cousin Arline too! Sometimes, I hesitate, almost hate, to call her and let her know we are going to try to take a quick trip by her place because it is inevitable, she will have a spread on the table. But, if you don't call and make sure she's going to be home, then you run the risk of missing her completely cause she's always busy, got lots of friends, does things for her church. Two weeks ago when I tried to contact her to tell her about the four people coming here from Sweden, I couldn't reach her. She called me back the day the Swedes were to arrive here, telling me the reason I couldn't get in touch with her was because she was on a cruise to Jamaica and Haiti! Now, if I were to call her a couple days in advance, there is no question in my mind what she would have in store when we'd arrive at her home - all kinds of entres - lasagne, meatballs, lunch meats, cheese, breads, cooked vegetables, salads and always some type of dessert too! And today, since we knew we didn't have that much time to visit, I really didn't want her to go to a bunch of trouble and fixing anything. But, when we got there, the table was all set, coffee was made and we had a really yummy pasta and vegetable salad (tortellini with pieces of zucchini and yellow squash, grape tomatos with a light, very tasty Italian dressing on it, a fruit salad of honeydew and strawberries, components to make either ham salad or egg salad sandwiches (or combine the two) and cookies! All really delicious!

If you were to meet Arline, I am betting you would never know her age because she sure doesn't look like she will be 80 in three days and she definitely doesn't act that age either. Although, I don't know now exactly how or what someone who is almost 80 is supposed to look like or act like. Well, suffice it to say, this is one lady - in every sense of the word - who has never lost her looks, still has loads of appeal. Must be some pretty good genes at work there, don't 'cha think!
Here's a picture of Arline -taken quite a few years ago, probably in the early-to-mid 50's. And then, to the right is a picture of her and some members of her family taken I think around 2001 at her home around Christmas of that year. You have to admit now that I'm right in what I've said about her appearance and hiding those years pretty doggone good, don't 'cha now?

If I have the identification correct on this photo, in the back row, a niece of Arline's, then her daughter, Sandy. Next to Sandy is her brother Carl's wife, Eleanor, a nephew-in-law (I think) and her brother, Paul. In the bottom row, is Paul's wife, Melda seated beside Arline.

Just a few members of my extended family to share with ya'll today.

On the way home from Indiana, we had to stop at the local Walmart to pick up a few things. Mandy had the baby with her and I had Miss Maya in my cart and Miss Maya was not exactly in the ideal humor today at that time. She probably was a little bit whiny and crabby from being tired of riding, etc., but she was definitely exercising her vocal chords telling me, over and over, what she wanted. "Wan see princesses, wan se Bratz, wan see" this, that and everything imaginable. The funny part though was when our cart was side-by-side with that of a couple who had a little guy -maybe 8-10 months old, sitting in the cart and Maya told me "Wan see baby?" She was, of course, meaning the baby in this adjacent cart but was is comical about that request is that she has a little brother, just turned 13 months last Sunday and who she barely even acknowledges that he exists most of the time. Go figure with kids, huh?

Tonight though, I got an e-mail from a fellow blogger - who shall remain unidentified at this point in time - telling me that there is a very good possibility she and her husband will be coming through the area where I live tomorrow - actually sometime today now - and that they are going to stop by and we'll have a chance to meet in person, visit a little bit. Now, how cool is that? I won't tell you who this surprise visitor will be so that when I get pictures (that I intend to take - provided of course the Altzheimer's doesn't kick into gear and I forget to TAKE some photos) developed I can post them on my blog for you all to see my surprise visitor!

And now, enough of my ramblings about family, friends, trips, the future, etc. Time for me to go to bed now I do believe. So, I'll leave you now with the Bushism for today, Monday, May 21, 2007!

"Just remember it's the birds that's supposed to suffer, not the hunter." - Advising quail hunter and New Mexico senator Pete Domenici; Roswell, New Mexico; January 22, 2004.

(Obviously this is prior to the now infamous hunting trip of our VP who our blogging buddy, Tomcat, refers to as Deadeye Dick, isn't it?)

Some Really Good Years!

The above photo - a collection of photos actually - represents to me, some of my favorite things about my Mother's family.

Starting with the photograph on the bottom - which obviously is also the oldest picture of the group - this is one of my favorite pictures! This is my cousin Ray Eld, who never fails to harrass me about how very much older I am than him - all of three whole days, you know! This was taken on the front steps of the house where his family lived back in the 40's on Blackadore Street in Pittsburgh. I'm not sure how old we were exactly on this picture but I think we were three, maybe four years old. Ray figures that most likely it was taken shortly before my grandparents, my Mom and I were getting ready to leave there and return to our home in Clearfield County, which is pretty much dead-center in the state of Pennsylvania. His reasoning behind that is because I am dressed up a bit, cleaned up, whereas he is looking a bit on the ragamuffin side on this shot! Therefore, he says that means I was about to go for a long ride and he was staying put, no need then to get him all decked out in Sunday-go-meeting clothes if he wasn't going anyplace. Yeah Ray, your logic makes sense to me for sure!

The couple on the right hand side of this grouping is my Mom's baby sister and her husband - Edward David and Marian Theresa Eld Bird! Uncle Ed was originally from Niagara Falls, NY and was Irish in ethnicity and of the Roman Catholic faith too - all things which normally, by my grandmother's standards for one to marry a child of hers should have made him absolutely TABU! By comparison to the rest of the children in the family, Aunt Mamie was a bit of a rip - not bad, but she sure didn't live a quiet, calm, staid lifestyle like her siblings and their spouses did! Not by a long shot! Of the girls in the family, she was the most fun-loving. My Mom and the older sister, Aunt Ethel, were by comparison "houseworkaholics"!!! Aunt Mamie liked to dance, sing, play the piano and not just church music either and go out, have a few beers and enjoy life! Uncle Ed operated much in the same vein. I spent the summer of 1951 living with them and my Mom just outside Fort Niagara, along the Niagara River. The best thing about where we lived there - it was a huge old farm house and the second floor had been converted into an apartment of very nice proportions - was that they had a beautiful full-blooded collie -named Coral - who was smart as a whip and just a really great dog for a seven-year-old to romp around the yard and play with. The next best thing was that they had a tv set too and since the location was fairly close to Buffalo, NY, we got quite a few good stations and Uncle Ed and I used to love to watch the equivalent of that era to today's World-Wide Wrestling matches! Ah, such fun!

The photo to the left in the middle is one of my favorites for the people in it and the occasion of the event. It was taken by my cousin Ken Eld on the day I graduated from Penn State University (May 14, 1994) with my B.S. in Rehabilitation Education. And those around me are my daughters, my oldest, Carrie, on the left, then me, then my Aunt Mary Mawk Eld and Amanda (or Mandy), who is my baby. She was probably the one who, next to me, was the happiest to see that day finally arrive! She and her late husband, my Mom's yonger brother (Uncle Cookie) had always wanted to see me go to college but I never was able to get around to going to school until 1990, eight years after my uncle's death. When I told Aunt Mary of my decision to go to college, fulltime, while working fulltime, and with two teenage kids at home too, she was probably also my strongest supporter, giving me loads of encouragement every step of the way over those four long years! I'm so grateful that I had her beside me while trying to achieve that goal of my college degree. I just wish that things would have worked differently and I had been able to find employment in the area of my major to show her that I really had learned a lot in college after all!

And finally, the top photo was taken at one of the Annual Eld Reunions! We have been having this family reunion since July of 1950 and since 1967, we hold it at a very small private park about five miles from where I live in the village of Lanse, PA. It's a very pretty, quiet little secluded place with a very nice sized enclosed shelter that also has indoor bathroom facilities (a bonus in parks) and also a nice sized kitchen with an electric range and refrigerators too. Today, it even has a microwave oven in the kitchen. And it has always been large enough to accomodate some of the largest reunions our family has ever held but sadly, the past few years, it seems to dwarf those few of us who still faithfully attend this annual picnic.

Those on this photo are all grandchildren of the Adolph and Ellen Johnson Eld branch of the family tree and those on this picture - around our Aunt Mary Mawk Eld are as follows from left to right (sort of): Becky Eld Reid, daughter of Clarence "Cookie" and Mary Eld and the youngest of my grandparents grandchildren, next there is Carl B. Eld and his older sister, Nancy Eld Lang - children of Bertrum and Nellie Simpson Eld. Carl was the first grandson and Nancy was the first Grandchild in the family. The next cousin is Barbara Eld Donaldson, Daughter of Ralph and Hazel Stoughton Eld, followed by Aunt Mary Mawk Eld, then me and my cousin, Kenneth A. Eld, oldest of Clarence and Mary Mawk Eld's children is directly behind me.

I wish I had a photo now of all the children of those of the six of us in that picture. Beck and her husband have four children, all adopted from Korea; Carl and his wife have two daughters and a son and now have 8 grandchildren as well as a great-granddaughter; Nancy and her husband Howard have three children - two boys and a girl and 3 grandchildren; Barb has a daughter and a son and three grandsons; I have three children, two girls and a boy and two grandsons and a granddaughter plus two stepgranddaughters and a stepgrandson and Ken - he's the late bloomer I guess, with two daughters and his first grandchild due in May of 2007! I keep telling him that he and his wife Laura have no idea how great kids really are until they finally have their own grandchildren - who in my opinion, are soooo very much better than the first edition! Probably only because the full responsiblity of raising those kids falls onto someone else's lap other than your own, you know!

There were 11 grandchildren born to Adolph and Ellen Johnson Eld - my Mom's parents but today, there are only ten of us left. One cousin, David Eld, took his own life back in March of 1982, which probably was the last time all but perhaps one of my first cousins and I were together for Dave's funeral. The other four of my cousins still around but not at the reunion that year are: Joan Eld Kujava, Ray Eld, Tom Eld and Sue Eld Gerecke. Maybe one of these years I will get all my cousins together once again at this gathering spot. However, because we're all getting old way to fast, our kids are now almost all grown, married, on their own, and several of us have had some major health issues the past couple of years that make it really difficult now for us to get together once more as a strong family unit, but it's still a nice thought to think about anyway.

Some Family History

I'm trying something totally foreign to me today in my blogging experience. I'm trying to place a photo into this particular blog but I have no clue as to whether I am doing this correctly or not.

The photo shown here is of my Dad's family - although not all of his siblings are shown on the picture, nor do I know the exact year it was taken, I would estimate it was probably taken around 1912. Shown here are from left to right, front row - Bill, Lizzie and Archie Hill. In the back row, from left to right are Alex, George and Jim Hill, the latter being my Dad. Missing from this photo, for some reason or other, is my uncle, Robert "Rab" Hill, who if present would be between my Dad in the back row and Uncle Arch, in the front row. I think I have the names listed correctly for them although I am not completely sure on the back row because I can't seem to get the lovely photo software, that one that you've heard me complain frequently about in that I don't think they should call it "easyshare" since I have yet to find anything easy at all about their darned software. (Normally, I tend to think KODAK is a great product, but with this particular thing, I think they need to make it a whole lot easier to work with if they want to label it as "Easyshare."

My plan here was to post the photo of my dad, his brothers and the older of his sisters but apparently blogger doesn't want to cooperate and allow me to upload the other photo I have which is just of my Dad's three sisters.

The title "Saying Goodbye?" is because all but one of my dad's siblings are gone now. The only remaining child of the ten children of George and Janet Nelson Hill is my youngest aunt - now 89 years old and in a nursing home.

So far, I have been unable to locate any old - very old - photographs of just my grandparents to try to post and share here.

My great-grandparents,George and Christina Hunter Hill, on this side of my family were both born in Scotland. My grandfather, the oldest child also named George, was a year old when his parents came to America and originally settled in eastern Pennsylvania where my grandfather worked as a coal miner - I believe this was up in Tioga County, around Arnot, PA. They moved from their to central Pennsylvania for a short time, then to Morris, Illinois where my great-grandmother was killed in 1884, having been run over by a train. At that time, they had I 6 children, the youngest - a daughter, was about 7 years old. My great-grandfather moved back east, apparently wrote to someone in Scotland about a lady who must have been a family friend or acquaintance, and she,Mary Todd, being a widow with two sons, came to this country and they were married shortly thereafter and had six children. I

George and Mary Todd Hill lived for a while in central Pennsylvania but for some reason, they moved out west and settled in Grand Coulee, Cascade County in the state of Montana. Somewhere, in the old boxes of pictures that had belonged to my Dad, there are snapshots taken back in the 30's sometime when he drove my grandmother and I think two of my aunts from the family homestead here in Morrisdale, PA out to Montana and at least a some of my aunts met some of the Hill Family from out west.

I got interested in family tree stuff a long time ago but really had very little means of trying to research the background on my Dad's family. But back in 1999, when I purchased a computer, one of the first things I did was to try to find geneology resources to track as much as possible, my family tree on both sides of my Dad's family as well as both sides of my Mom's family. I was posting query after query on numerous websites with what little information I had on my great-grandparents and one day, came across a query that looked like it had potential.

The surname listing was HILL - ok, that's a good start but Geez, Louise, there are only a kazillion Hill in this world, so why would I think this one might have possibilities? Because the poster had stated Scotland as their country of origin and then, states in the US, PA, ILL, Montana and Arizona. The Illinois entry there kind of threw me because I had never heard about them living there, but I did know that one of my great-uncles from Montana - later lived in Wyoming and the one for whom my Dad was named too - had daughters who lived in Arizona. I knew that from some correspondence I had taken upon myself to write to them back in the late 50's when I first started to get interested in learning about my roots. So, I queried back, said I thought maybe we might have a connection, might be related and the answer I received back from this lady was "You bet your bippy we are related, kid!"

And the best part of "meeting" this cousin online was that she had been working on family tree stuff at that time for over 13 years and had a complete workup of all my great-grandparents children, grandchidren almost all their great-grandchildren and further down that line now too! All, that is, with the exception being my Grandfather's family because he was the only one of 12 children who decided to make Pennsylvania his home! My grandparents did live in Montana for a short period of time though and my Dad was the only one of their 10 children who just happened to have made his entrance into the world in a little place called Carbonado, Montana, in February of 1901!

Through this cousin, Evelyn Hill Sturm, I received a copy of all the family tree work she had completed at that time and I gladly supplied her with what information I had on my Dad, his siblings and the descendants of my grandparents, George and Janet Nelson Hill. Cousin Evelyn and I still correspond from time to time although not much of what we send back and forth now has much to do with family tree informaton. I'm not sure but she may have slowed down a good bit in the data she had researched and was entering into her tree over the past couple of years.

But through her, I know I have relatives all throughout the western part of the country - Montana, Wyoming, Washington, Oregon, California, Arizona and even up into Canada, I believe in Calgary area. That data, I would have to pull up my tree and do a search and destroy type mission to figure out which of my grandfather's sisters moved up to Canada.

I'm still as fascinated today as I was back in 1999, when cousin Evelyn Sturm first sent me her data on our tree and there is nothing I would love more - save maybe a trip to Scotland and Sweden to trace the family's beginnings in those two countries - than to meet her, be able to someday visit in Cascade County Montana and maybe see some of the homes my ancestors lived in, meet other cousins and learn, through meetings like that, more about who I am by virtue of family traits shared by many of us with this Hill family connection.

By the way, prior to doing this research, I had no knowledge about any special naming traditions in Scottish families but I now know my grandparents followed that tradition very strictly. Their first child, a son, was named George - after his father, grandfather and great-grandfather too as near as we've been able to trace records. My next uncle, Alex - known as "Eck" -was named for my Grandma Hill's father, Alexander Nelson. Then my Dad, Jim, was named for his Dad's brother Jim; Robert or "Rab" was named after my Grammy's brother, Robert; Arch, for G-gradpa's brother Arch; my aunt, Elizabeth - or "Lizzie" - was named for my Grammy's older sister; the twin boys - John and William - were named after Grammy's half-brothers, my Aunt Jeanette or "Aunt Sis" was named for her mother (Janet NElson Hill) and my youngest aunt, Anna Mae, known to almost everyone though as "Mike" was named after two of Grammy's half-sisters! And amongst the grandchildren - my first cousins - many of us were named too after this or that ancestor. Even down to my oldest grandson whose name is Alexander and, at first blush, one could say he was named fully after my great-grandfather -his great-great-grandfather - but it just happened quite by accident (luck of the draw) that my daughter and her husband at the time, both liked the name Alexander. It wasn't until he was about 6 weeks old and we were up at my Aunt Mike's house - the family homestead - that she asked my daughter if she planned to call him Alex, Alexander or maybe "Eck." My daughter was totally confused by the question but it was then that the naming system hit me and although they hadn't thought of his name being the same as his great-great-grandfather's was, it's become a nice way to think of the family lineage and continuity there from that!

And for me, growing up as I did where I never knew my Dad, had no idea what he was like as a person, learning through family stories about him as well as many, many other relatives, it's been a way by which I have learned more about who I am, inside and the whys about me that until working on the family tree, I had no answers.

Not that I know completely to this day, who I am and why, where did this or that ALL come from, at least I have a little more of an inkling as to the origins now.

More family history to follow - hopefully with some other old photos too!

RE: News From Our High School

First and foremost - to any of you who read my post below here about the latest little flap at the local high school (West Branch Area High School in Morrisdale, PA for anyone interested), I apologize to you if you left comments and don't see them posted below the blog article.

I don't know WHY this happened because I never received the comment to allow me to approve it and have it published here.

The only thing I can think of is that there is apparently some glitch going on with Beta blogger and the regular blogger that is prohibiting regular blogger's comments from coming back to me for approval. I think that because the comments posted with that piece are all from folks who use the beta blogger.

So, if you are checking back here about that article, looking for your comments and can't see them, that's what I think happened. And, if you would like for me to receive your comments, please feel free to e-mail them to me at jenniferertmer@peoplepc.com. I would like to receive all comments on this topic as possible and especially so if there is anyone reading this who commented and is from this area, your opinion on this would be especially very much appreciated!

I would like to go through the comments received then and compose a letter to go to both the local newspaper as well as to the school administrators. How I personally feel about this issue is really not the important thing - it is how this all happened seemingly "out of the blue" as well as comments reported to have been made by certain school administrators that were totally out of line and uncalled for in this matter.

So please, if you tried to comment and I didn't receive it, send your opinion to me at my e-mail address as shown above.

Thanks to all who have already done that for me as I very much appreciate your help and support!

This One's For You!

Tonight, I'm going to do something a little different. I'm writing this blog in honor of a very dear, old friend of mine. We won't delve too deeply into the "how old" this friend is, but she is younger than me, that much I'll tell you.

I don't remember when I first met her, though I knew her brother throughout my entire 12 years of school here - until his very untimely death at about age 36, I think. A heart attack or heart problems - whatever, but let's face it, he was way too young, still plenty of things he could have/should have been doing.

I know I first met her though at the next-door-neighbor's home as Mrs. Little - the mother of the brood of 13 children who lived in the big house adjacent to ours was her aunt. Actually, since Mrs. Little had pretty much raised this girl's mother after their mother was killed in an automobile accident way, way back, she was more like a grandmother to her, than a great-aunt.

She was back then always a bit on the spunky side - a little daredevil at times I suppose could be used to describe her. Attitude all over the place was another thing she possessed then - and still does for that matter.

She lived down near Harrisburg, PA - Camp Hill - but usually came up here and would spend a few weeks next door and maybe a little time too with her paternal grandparents here in town - which is, by the way, where her older brother -my classmate - lived year-round.

Over the years, since I left home, married, moved back here so many things changed. She married too - had three children - we both divorced. But I rarely saw her as an adult.

At times, when around any of her first cousins from the Little family, her name would pop up and they would tell me what she was doing now, where she was living - little bits and pieces - snippets of her life but enough so that I had some idea what was going on from time to time with her.

I had, for years, referred to her one cousin and her husband, as "Aunt Helen Ann" and "Uncle Joe Benny" although we aren't related. And, as my kids came along, to help them learn who people were and keep the names straight from other folks, with respect to any of the children from the Little family, it became a habit, more like a tradition maybe, to attach the label of "aunt" or "uncle" when referring to any of them. To this day, my kids and I still do this so if I mention "Aunt Rose" or "Uncle Michael" we all know exactly who I am talking about - no confusion there whatsoever. And, we're teaching my grandchildren to call them all by those names too.

I mention this for two reasons - one being, as close as I felt to all of them growing up - they were like family to me then and today, they still are and two, so my readers will be able to better follow along with me in this piece now too.

The first time I saw her -this cousin of my former childhood neighbors - in many, many years was when I went to the viewing at the funeral home for "Aunt Lily" - one of the older girls of the Little family and the first of the thirteen who passed away too. I was surprised to see her there - not because I didn't think she would come up for either the viewing or the funeral, but rather because it just so happened she was there when I stopped by to pay my respects to the family.
I recognized her immediately as she did me and we hugged, grateful for the chance to meet again.

A while after that, I got my computer, began e-mailing and I don't recall now how it all came about but somehow we connected up again - via e-mail and the AIM instant messenger or MSN's messenger which we both used. I think I may have stumbled on her name and e-mail in a geneology query site online and recognized her from that but I'm not sure today how we managed to hook up our friendship again.

But, we did and for that, I am really pleased.

Any time we talk, or exchange e-mail notes, as I read them, not only do I picture her, but it brings up mental images in me of her brother, her aunt and uncle, cousins - all of them - and that always makes me feel really warm and fuzzy - so much better even than the old "fuzzy navel" can do to you, if you know what I mean there!

Tonight, I got an e-mail from her, telling me that she had begun to read my blog and really was enjoying following my day-to-day postings - keeping abreast a little with me and what's going on here - silly stuff like that, you know.

She's not a blogger herself - so no postings in the comments section from her will you be reading at this time - but it is so nice to know that someone out there in cyberspace is reading what I write and knows who or what place or event I am writing about because she's been here, maybe is related to someone I mention - or whatever! And I wanted to stop and take the time to thank her for letting me know this too!

So tonight - this particular post is dedicated to my good friend, Ki.

I'm so glad to have you visiting my blogsite kid. Just one other little way we can continue to keep in touch, isn't it?

Love ya kid - and hugs to you!

Family History Review?

I had a visitor this morning. Teresa, the editor/publisher of the West Branch Review, stopped by for coffee and a "short visit." And, like always happens with one of those "short visits," it was quite elongated and ended up being sort of a family history type review of the families who had a lot of control over the economics of Cooper Township way back when.

How our conversation went in that direction began with Teresa asking me about a place near here she thought I had mentioned to her way back when - a mansion-type house that sits back in, sort of in the woods -can't be viewed from the road - and had I been the one to have told her about this place.

Yep - I knew exactly what place she was referring to - The Sommerville Mansion - located out in Lanse and which is situated back in the woods behind the later-day Sommerville homestead - which is also somewhat of a mansion type home itself.

The Sommerville family - in my opinion - probably could qualify I suppose one could say, as being the elite or the "royal family" of the region back around the turn of the century and that type of label could probably have been used to describe them somewhat, even today.

"Old Mr Sommerville" - I never knew the man as this was before my time - had a finger in many pies within not just the township, but also within the county. Before they came to this country from Scotland, it is quite evident from various things I have learned about them, they apparently were quite "monied" in Scotland. I figure any family that transports a suit of armor with them when they immigrated here, had to have more than a couple of coins in their coffers then, don't ya think?

But Mr Sommervile was involved early on with the coal mines of the region, had a finger in virtually every other industry too here back then. When they first came here, the family settled in the adjacent county - Centre - before migrating over to Clearfield County where they settled in the little village of Winburne. Mr Sommerville served for many years on the Board of Directors of the bank that once existed in Winburne, of which I don't know as yet when it finally bit the dust. He also was affiliated with the Clearfield Progress - the local county daily newspaper - and off the top of my head right now, I can't remember if his position there was as publisher or editor. One or the other and that should give a little indication too of his status not just in the local area but county-wide.

He had four children - three daughters and a son. THe youngest daughter is still living, in the Chicago area and to my calculations, is probably about 88-90 years old now. I never knew anything about the son whatsoever growing up, but one daughter was the librarian at the county library for years and years and another, who graduated with my younger uncle - I think she was valedictorian and my uncle was salutatorian (or vice versa), went on to become a teacher and for many years, she taught English and French in the old school where my Mom, her brother and younger sister and I all attended high school. The family was of an economic status as such that the daughters all did a "tour" - meaning they spent a summer or several months abroad during their younger years - probably college age or just after completing college perhaps.

Talking about the Sommerville family led to discussions of other families in the region who held a good bit of power, in the economic sense, due to their holdings within the coal mining industry here. Frans Kristianson - a Swedish immigrant - whose coal company later became known as K&J Coal and was a bit of a power house employer for many years here. The Rydberg Family whose company became known as River Hill Coal and is no longer owned by members of the family but still operates under that name - it's no longer as large an operation to my knowledge as it once was either.

And then, there was Andrew Frendberg - who for many years was employed as the mine superintendent for the CBC - Clearfield Bituminous Coal Company - and this company back at the turn of the century and for many years thereafter, was the real powerhouse Coal operation in this region as well as in other counties surrounding here too!

As a child, I remember -vividly - my Grandfather and his older brother - my Great Uncle Erik - talking about their years of working for the CBC and under the command of "Old Frendberg," as they usually refered to the gentleman in not very loving terms or tone of voice when discussing him. The opinion I garnered of this man, as a child, was that he was some kind of a tyrant to work for but from what I have gathered from the research I've been doing for the past two years - via the Clearfield Progress' old copies database -is that he was quite well-known and apparently a very highly respected businessman throughout the community - county-wide - from his work for the CBC Company!

Once one gets into talking about these various early companies that prevailed in this region, it is too small a community for one not to know today who are descendants of the various individuals who once upon a time wielded much power and almost a stranglehold, at times, over the various immigrants who came here in the late 1800's and early 1900's looking for a better life.

It's learning things like this about the beginnings of this community and how it all translates down to people here today that I find absolutely fascinating.

My job now is to try to find out, if possible, when the heirs to the Sommerville estate will be back in town again - hopefully sometime soon - and see if perhaps Teresa and I can have a chance to make contact with THE current Mr Sommerville and get him to give us a tour of the mansion built by his grandfather that is hidden away in the woods atop the hill as you go from Lanse down into Winburne.

I really looking forward to a tour of that place very much and please, let it be something we can arrange soon too as Teresa wants to do a story about the Mansion as well as the Sommerville family for a future edition of the paper! And, so do I!

Wish us luck, will ya?