My Grandmother, Beatrice Viola Moody - 1899 - 1983
Sunday 30 September 2012
Nog’s Travels this weekend - 9-30-2012
We got up about 6:30 a.m. and worked on some family history before I went downstairs and made Grilled Almond Butter and sauteed Cinnamon Apple Sandwiches for breakfast. They were amazing!
Here is the link:
After breakfast I pulled out a big kettle and husked 3 dozen ears of corn. Put 6 ears in the kettle and started to cook corn. After pulling all the corn out and letting it cool (after a dunk in ice cold water) I also cooked up some green beans I had picked up at Dutton’s Farm stand this week.
I took the corn off the cob and put it into quart size ziploc bags. Filled up 6 of them. Cut up the green beans and put them into a quart ziploc bag as well. So another bag of beans for soups this winter and 6 of corn.
If it ever dries out, I need to dig potatoes and plant garlic for next spring.
*****
I was reading in a genealogy blog earlier this week about making goals in the history research. It is too easy to start with one person and suddenly find yourself out about 3 or 4 generations away from the person you were going to work on.
Decided to try to source my Great Uncle Charles R. Church whom I just found a week ago in the Oakland Cemetery in Brockville, Ontario. Great Uncle Charles is the youngest half brother to James Turner Church, my great grandfather. He was born 1 May 1873 in Kitley, Leeds, Ontario, Canada, his mother is Nancy Donahoe and his father is Joel V. Church.
The birth record gives his brother Uri’s name but has his birthdate which shows up in future census records in Canada.
In 1881 he is listed as being a Methodist, and is going to school.
In 1891 he is working on his father’s farm.
In 1901 his is listed as a Farmer’s Son, born in Canada.
24 Mar 1902 he married Mary Helena Coad in Brockville. Her parents were Joseph Coad and Margaret Connor and we found them last week buried in Toledo, Ontario in the Cemetery on the Hill.
in 1911 he is living in Kitley, Ontario as a Farmer. He has $2,000.00 in Insurance and has had insurance for 22 years.
1965 he died and is buried in Oakland Cemetery in Brockville, Ontario.
I think the 1921 Canadian census may be coming out next year, so I’m looking forward to updating some of the Canadian Aunts, Uncles, Cousins and Grandparents in my family tree.
After I finished sourcing Uncle Charles Church as far as I can at this point, I began working on Great Aunt Mary Helena Coad.
I’ve also been updating the Coad’s in the Cemetery on the Hill in Toledo, Ontario by adding photos for the stones. The person who entered them into the Find a Grave website has transferred the entire family to me.
Kirsten and I found memorial stones for Mary Helena Coad’s parents, grandparents, some of her aunts and uncles in the Toledo Cemetery to photograph a week and a half ago.
And finally, in an effort to learn a bit more about Loyalist/Tory history, I am reading “Shadow Soldiers of the American Revolution” Loyalist Tales from New York to Canada by Mark Jodoin.
http://books.google.com/books/about/Shadow_Soldiers_of_the_American_Revoluti.html?id=HWOQufUoDnYC
In
1778, New York state patriots forced colonists loyal to the British
government to flee north into what became Ontario and Quebec. Many of
the defiant young British Americans soon returned south as soldiers,
spies and scouts to fight for their multigenerational farms along the
Mohawk River, Lake Champlain and the Hudson River Valley. Eventually
defeated, they were banished from their ancestral homelands forever.
Mark Jodoin offers an enlightened look back at ten young men and women
who were forced north into what became Ontario and Quebec, sharing the
struggles that these Loyalists faced during our nation's founding.
I’m hoping to find a good Canadian History book to learn even more about my Canadian Grandparents on both sides of my family. If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know.
Thanks for reading.
Sunday 23 September 2012
Day 15 - Homeward Bound
We woke up about 7:30; it had been raining hard off and on during the night. Took showers, drank some coffee, Kirsten had granola and the last of the soy milk, I had a wrap with hummus, pesto, baby spinach and mushrooms.
We packed up our gear, tossed out all the fresh veggies and fruit since we were headed back across the border to the USA.
Left the motel about 10:20. As I went in to get our bill there was a cop in there talking about another person. Apparently something happened during the night (we heard nothing - well at 3:00 a.m. I woke up because a door slammed somewhere) and the desk clerk asked if the person was going to leave. “Oh Yes.” the policeman said. “We’ll be around and if you need anything, call the office we’ll be here in a flash.”
He left and the desk clerk and I finished our business. I told her about the funky sink drain and the faucet that if I was an old lady I’d never be able to turn on. The faucet required a muscular yank to open, and then it would be on full bore; the drain was slow, so inevitably you’d end up with a couple of inches of water in the sink... She assured me that she’d get maintenance on it, “They are going to be really busy today.” she said and thanked me for letting her know about the sink.
We headed up the 401 to Prescott. As we drove over the bridge to the USA there was a freighter from the Canada Steamship Line going under the bridge heading towards Montreal. Very cool to see. Forgot to check the mileage when we left the motel; on the bridge we were at 3506.
As we traveled on the bridge, we found ourselves kind of swishing all over our lane. Not sure if it is the Subaru all wheel drive on the metal mesh of the bridge floor; we’ve never had that kind of a problem on the bridge before. We might read up on that and what to do for the next time we cross one of the big bridges.
We came off the bridge and landed in the line with customs. Right in front of us was an AMX from Ontario. It was in beautiful shape.
We started checking how long it took some cars to get through Customs:
10:38 - car in gate
10:39 - next car
10:42 - next car - sent around to be checked over.
Then we noticed several flocks of geese flying over customs. Do they have to declare anything? Are they American Canada Geese or Canadian Canada Geese, hard to tell.
10:43 - next car
10:46 - next car - sent around to be checked over.
10:47 - next car
10:48 - next car
We went through at 10:55. Customs official asked us to put down the back window, then asked if we were US citizens? Was all the stuff in the back ours? Have a good day. He was going off duty so we had a quick time through.
We drove up Route 37 towards Waddington, NY and stopped there to get gas and use the bathroom in the grocery store/gas station. The next time we are in the area, I’m thinking about stopping at many of the little town halls and libraries in St. Lawrence County to look for any references to James Turner Church, Cora Pike, George Joel Church and see what I might find. More homework for me before we get up there in that area next year.
As we continued out Route 37, we found a ’57 Chevy being worked on and a great old sign on the front of the garage. The guy had just torn out the ceiling since it was infested with mice. Other than that, he said, it was in great shape. It had some huge engine designated by a big number, and a Hurst shifter.
In Massena they have several lovely water towers and as we waited at a stop light we noticed smoke pouring out of the top of the Burger King - must be burning off all that grease and fat from the burgers, as we left we found Bobs Motel. Not looking very healthy like many of the businesses in that area.
We continued driving through the St. Regis Indian Reservation, so much poverty there. Even the casinos looked run down but they are building a brand new one with fancy trees and a fancy driveway leading to it. Seems like their reservation is not placed quite as well as the Seneca Nation which has a casino in Nigara Falls, NY. Several other older casinos and about half the businesses looked abandoned.
We continued on to Fort Covington, NY. Little less poverty here, saw a lovely dark green church which turns out is the Senior Citizen Center.
We continued on and found many wind turbines in Chauteguay, NY. They are right on the Franklin and Clinton County line.
As we moved onto route 190 in Ellenburg, NY we found a lovely old shed that needed its photo taken. Turned around at the transit station and took photos. A fellow who wanted to leave the transit station kindly waited for us to finish taking the photo before pulling out.
We drove a couple hundred feet down the road and found the wires covered with starlings. Kind of reminded me of the old Alfred Hitchcock movie, "The Birds".
We drove down route 87 in the rain for about 30 miles, then got off to drive down route 22. This route travels along the shore of Lake Champlain giving us views of the Green Mountains of Vermont and the Adirondack Mountains of New York.
We traveled over the new bridge at Crown Point, NY and arrived in Vermont about 2:30 p.m. We changed drivers and found a great view of the new bridge with big signs that say no stopping - so of course we stopped for a bridge shot.
We pulled into a fishing access and met a green heron in the waterway.
We continued driving towards sunshine and trying to leave the gray clouds and rain behind us, we ended up going out Route 4 past Castleton to Rutland, my old college stomping grounds. Check out the lovely curves of the road ahead of us as well as the sunshine.
Saw some the Irene flooding aftermath coming through Vermont, including Jamaica where all of Water Street and several houses were swept away. The bridge replacement in South Newfane is progressing, and they have installed some curbing. Watch the curbin’, girls! That is what KT’s driver education teacher used to tell them.
We got home at 6:02 p.m. and unpacked the car. It has been a fun trip, and we both have learned more about our families.
Friday 21 September 2012
Day 14, our final day in Canada - or - Women with a mission!
We spent some time last night doing some homework to find the Lillies Baptist Cemetery in the Rear of Yonge and Landsdown township. It took a bit, but Kirsten nailed the directions down in her map.
We began the day knowing that we needed to find the Lillies Baptist Cemetery for 2 greats uncle William Church and his wife and several children. That was about 30 miles away to the west. I also needed to get to Blue Church Cemetery about 11 miles East of Brockville and St. James Anglican Cemetery in Maitland and finally Great Uncle Charles and his wife right here in Brockville.
So, we ate cold pizza for breakfast, drank some bad coffee and headed west to Lillies Baptist Cemetery. Weak coffee is such a disappointment. The route we took was exactly like yesterdays, but where we went right yesterday, today we went left and found it!
Sometimes I can zone right in on who I am looking for and that was the way of it at Lillies; walked right to them without any hunting.
It was starting to sprinkle, so on top of a garden bench for sitting, a bag full of brushes, rubber spatulas, powder, trowel, clippers, my notebook and a pen for writing the info and the Double Spotlight, we both had to carry umbrellas.
On of the stones was sunk down into the ground, so while I was writing up some of the other stones, Kirsten dug the dirt and grass away from the stone so I could get a copy of it with the dates.
As we were photographing the stones, the caretaker came over to see what we were doing and to stare at the hole Kirsten had dug. We told him we would fill it back in when I finished photographing my family members. I think he was a little stunned that we dug because his eyes kept sliding back to the hole. Frankly I don’t like to see my ancestors stones sliding under the grass, but we did fill it in.
He kept chatting at us and asking questions, told us about some other Church family members who were buried in the cemetery and finally Kirsten took off to photograph them while I finished taking photos of the stones I had come to see.
We left Lillies Baptist Cemetery and headed south to the 401. We needed to get up to Maitland, Ont for two cemeteries and they were about 65 km away.
Now the lovely thing about the 401 is that there are rest rooms (OnRoute they are called) about every 28-44 km down near Windsor and out past Toronto, but up here as we get closer to Quebec they are stretching out and so the Mallorytown OnRoute is the last one for 77 km. We stopped at the OnRoute for a couple minutes, then continued on up the 401. It is a subtle message from the Canadian goverment; rest all you want along the lake, but once you enter the seaway, you’ve gotta hold it. Why?
We got off at Maitland and it happens to be Church Street. Now amazingly enough, this was the street we needed to find Jerusha Skinner, her father and her sister-in-law. Jerusha Skinner is the 2nd wife to Dr. Basil Rorison Church. She died in 1833. He and his first and third wives are buried up in Merrickville and we found their grave stones a couple years ago.
We also found Jerusha Skinner Church’s sister-in-law next to her. I really liked the artwork of a chopped tree on top, hadn’t ever seen it before.
We left for the Blue Church Cemetery to look for Knapp and Guernsey family members.
Here is the view from the Blue Church Cemetery across the St. Lawrence to New York.
One of the things we’ve noticed is the marble stones up here are melting away fast and the granite stones are getting covered quickly with thick orange lichen.
After we found everyone we wanted, we called the Oakland Cemetery in Brockville to see if they could tell me where Great Uncle Charlie and Aunt Mary were buried. Dale offered to show us as soon as we got to the cemetery. So we drove down Route 2 through Brockville and past it to Oakland. Thank goodness we called. There are over 20,000 people in the cemetery with room for another 20 or 30,000 plots especially with cremations now. The cemetery is over 100 acres in size.
Dale jumped into his bright red Dodge Hemi truck with one of those rear air foil things, to keep the truck on the ground, that Hemi is so powerful. He tore off through the cemetery and it was all we could do to keep up in our little Subaru. He led us right to Uncle Charlie, and told us a little about managing a cemetery.
Uncle Charles is James Turner Church’s youngest half brother. He married Mary Helena Coad.
We stopped back at the office to get the section and plot number, then headed back into Brockville to find the Brockville Museum.
The Leeds and Grenville branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society is in the basement of the museum. They have lots of genealogical research books as well as some books to sell. There were some cemetery books I’ve been wanting. They also had a copy of the Kitley 1795 - 1975 book that I had wanted to peruse. I’ll get a copy of it through interlibrary loan, then scan the pages I want with my flip scanner and source the book.
We left the museum and headed back to Boston Pizza for an early supper. Ordered a caesar salad and penne with alfredo sauce and baked cheese. Kirsten got nachos with guacamole on the side.
We were back in the room by 5:30 and have accomplished everything on the list for today. Tomorrow we head back to the USA. It has been a lovely trip and I have lots of homework to add to my family history and more stones into Find A grave. Only in Canada; we see curling, twice, on the TV.
This blog has been fun to write, again thanks Sandra Leigh for inspiring me.
Thursday 20 September 2012
Day 13 - Athens, Delta, Route 42 and Cemeteries
We woke up at 8:00 a.m. and had hemp granola and soy milk for breakfast and some coffee from the Complimentary Breakfast that was truly weak. Guess we like pirate coffee, the kind that makes cousins say, “ARG!” when they take a sip. Okay not an Erin breakfast, but it was tasty.
We left the room and headed up route 29 then out route 42 towards Glen Elbe. We stopped first at the Glen Elbe Cemetery. I am looking for Hannah Jane Church and her husband Samuel Brown, (she is a 1st cousin 3 times removed - daughter of Levi Selah Church). We found her, her husband, her in-laws, and several children all on one stone.
I also wanted to find Phoebe C. Brown wife of A. Howard Church and her parents. Alpheus Howard Church is also a 1st cousin 3 times removed, also a child of Levi Selah Church. I found his wife and her parents on the same stone.
Next was Frederick Wyatt Scovil and his wife Fannie Wood Layng. He is a 1st cousin 4 times removed. We found him, her and about 6 other Layng family members.
We left Glen Elbe which is a relatively flat cemetery and headed into Athens, Ontario. Behind the Baptist church is the Athens-Hillside Cemetery. Here we were looking for Caroline Amelia Monroe Church’s parents Chittenden Taplin Monroe and Prudence Wiltse. Caroline is my 2 greats Aunt married to Uri Nelson Church.
This Cemetery is on quite a hill and goes almost the full length of the hill.
If you look at the middle of the picture there is a sign. Here is what it says:
So apparently someone thought this was a decent hill for tobogganing on at some point.
******
So while we were searching for the Monroe stone, we found several Knapp family stones that I photographed. Also found, Brock DeWolfe who is a first cousin 4 times removed and several wives of Brock’s whom I didn’t know about.
Sometimes, if the monument is sturdy and the search light holder is agile, a person needs to do wild things to light up the stone. My helper is very dedicated to getting just the right light to read a stone that is very faint.
We finally found the Monroe’s at the top of the hill, took their photos and wrote the information down and headed back to the car.
When we were here several years ago, we had found Dorman DeWolf and his wife Clarra Hoggaboom, so I stopped to say hello to my 3greats uncle Dorman and Clarra. Next time through we’ll stop and dig the grass away from the both of them as they lay flat on the ground.
We then headed out route 42 headed to Halladay Burial Grounds in Elgin, Ontario. As we drove by a house and field we realized that the fence had an line of old rusting bicycles along it. We had to turn back and take some photos.
We kept driving out route 42 and saw a lovely hay field with round bales, so of course we had to turn around and get some shots of it as well.
We turned back around to continue to head to Elgin and happened upon a Huge solar array of panels on the roofs of different buildings at this one farm. We stopped to take the photo as well.
We got to Halladay Burial Ground and found it was a large cemetery. We began searching for Eliza Church Hill and her son Albert. She is my 2 greats Aunt. She is the daughter of Jonathan Mills Church and his first wife Laura Brown. (He married Claramanda DeWolfe 2nd whom I am descended from).
Kudos to Kirsten for being able to read the stone. It was extremely difficult to read even with the Spot Light.
I am concerned that her stone looks like it is getting ready to either crack and fall over or just plain fall over.
We started to head for Lilies Baptist Cemetery to find another Church relative, but couldn’t find the name of the town in the atlas. My map on my iPhone wasn’t working either. We were tired and decided to head back to Brockville.
On the way back we decided to treat ourselves to a supper out. Boston Pizza is a favorite place for us in Brockville.
So we stopped, got a HUGE caesar salad which Kirsten and I shared, then we each got pizza. Kirsten ordered a mediterranean pizza and I ordered a “special” onion, mushroom, with roasted corn, tomato and peppers on top. Delicious and now we have some to bring back to the motel for either eightsies or ninesies tonight or cold for breakfast tomorrow. The crust of these pizzas is a multigraine which tastes wonderful.
So, I found a lot of the people I wanted to find, trudged a lot of cemeteries and I am tired. Have a little more homework to do tonight for the Lillies Baptist Cemetery and trying to figure out where it is as well as getting my thoughts together for visiting the Ontario Genealogical Society tomorrow afternoon.
So, as they would say in Italy if we were there,
Buona notte a tutti - translated means, good night everyone.
Wednesday 19 September 2012
Day 12 - A new sunny day but cold.
We got up about 7:00 a.m. and took showers. Erin brought us a lovely breakfast of Hot Croissant, a lemon poppyseed muffin, yogurt, juice, a hardboiled egg, coffee and the fruit plate of the day was a half a grapefruit each with strawberries and grapes. We are so spoiled. It will be so different to get up tomorrow morning and have to make our own breakfast. LOL!
We packed up our stuff, cleaned up the cabin and left about 10:30. We stopped at the office to pay the bill and chatted with Erin for about a half an hour. It’s very quiet and peaceful and she asked if we felt balanced again and ready for getting on with the world. We told her we were.
We headed out Route 60 towards Ottawa. In Barry’s Bay I stopped to fill the tank with gas. After that we started noticing that we were getting 40+ miles per gallon. The most I think we saw was 41.9 mpg. Hooray for a Subaru!
We got into Arnprior and took 15 down to Smith Falls, then on 29 down to Toledo. We stopped at the Cemetery on the Hill in Toledo looking for any more Brennan’s, Coad, or DeWolfe. Found a bunch of the Coad family, not sure if they are related to Mary Helena Coad yet.
Also found an Isaac DeWolfe that I need to look up plus his wife. His stone leans forward and I am afraid at some point it will fall over on its face.
I was concerned to find many stones in this cemetery are simply falling off their pedestals and laying on the ground. Saw a really large red granite top that was about 6 feet long and about a foot wide laying on the ground off of the 3 foot pedestal it was sitting on.
Here is a Tallman stone I wanted to photograph, luckily the info I was looking for is on the front of this stone and readable.
There are no more Brennan’s in that cemetery other than William S Brennan, his wife and baby daughter.
As Kirsten was digging the grass away from a small Coad stone that had sunk down into the grass and dirt, a car stopped out near ours.
A man walked over to us and started asking us a few questions. His name is Tom Freeman and he has an interest in the history of Toledo and wondered who we were looking for.
I told him about the Brennan, Coad and DeWolfe family members.
He said that John Brennan Esq. and the Marshall family in Toledo were having a fight trying to draw more business to both Toledo and Brennanville (now known as Frankville). He told me where the Coad homestead used to be in Toledo and gave me the title of a book to read. "Kitley 1795 - 1975"
by Glenn J Lockwood.
I've been checking on line and it looks like I’m going to have to see if my little hometown library in Newfane can get me a copy through interlibrary loan as this book is no longer available in print.
There is also a book about the building of Brockville by the same author that I may try to get through interlibrary loan as well.
Hopefully some of the cemeteries we visit tomorrow will not have quite the abandoned look that Cemetery on the Hill in Toledo has.
We are staying in Brockville for the next three nights at the Travelodge. I’m hoping to get to the Leeds and Grenville branch of the Ontario Genealogical Society this trip and splurge on a bunch of books I’ve been wanting.
See you all tomorrow.....
Tuesday 18 September 2012
Day 11 - Heavy Rain, Wind and Fog -
We woke up at 7:15 a.m. and got dressed, washed dishes and waited for Erin to bring our lovely breakfast at 8:00.
Today’s menu was a hard boiled egg, a hot croissant, a pumpkin raisin homemade muffin, tomato juice, a yogurt, coffee. Delicious as usual.
We chose to stay in the cabin today. The skies opened up and it poured. At times the wind drove the rain a little sideways.
I checked the weather for the Whitney area and it was supposed to rain all day (which it did) and tonight it is supposed to get down to 39 degrees.
The island in the front of this picture never mind the hill behind it were not visible most of the day due to the rain we had.
(I just had a little hot flash and stepped out on the porch, yep it is going to be darned cold tomorrow morning.)
I finished my book I had picked out of the bookcase in the cabin, “People of the River” by Michael Gear and Kathleen O’Neal Gear. It seemed like it was written similar to the way Jean Auel wrote her Mammoth Hunters books. Lots more characters to keep track of. I spent time as I read it trying to figure out who was who and what clan did they come from. Even the next to the last page had me trying to figure out who a character was.
After putting the book back into the bookcase I decided that perhaps I could work on the Brennan family a bit. I pulled up both my Ancestry info and the Find A Grave website and put in the stone for James M Brennan, his wife Jane Morris, his daughter Mary M A (Annie) Brennan and started working on his sons James Edgerton Brennan and Samuel Wesley Clark Brennan.
Most of the Brennan’s I met in Orillia or talked to or called are descended from Samuel Wesley Clark Brennan.
It feels good to have this connection to more of my ancestors. There is just something comforting to realize we have history, we made history and we (you and I) will become someone’s history. Yeesh I’m waxing poetic here or something.
My lineage to James M Brennan is as follows:
Me
My Dad Lloyd Church
My Grandfather George Joel Church
My Great Grandfather James Turner Church
My Great, Great Grandfather Joel Vaughn Church who married Betsy Brennan.
James M. Brennan is one of her brothers.
Our internet connection up here in the wilds of Ontario is a little slow, so I didn’t get many photos uploaded.
However, I did spend some time perusing the census records and finding out that James Brennan was a Farmer in the Kitley, Leeds, Ontario area (where I am heading tomorrow) and after marrying his first wife Jane Morris, moved to Orillia and was a farmer for two more census years, then he became an Agricultural Implements Dealer.
When he married his 2nd wife he continued to be an Implements Dealer and the last census I see him in is 1911 he is still an Implement Dealer.
I’m hoping the 1921 census for Canada will come out some time next year or the following one so I can find out more information about the relatives.
Tomorrow morning we’ll pack up the cabin and leave the Algonquin Park area and head down to Brockville, Ontario.
Before we leave we want to chat with Erin about making a reservation for next September for close to two weeks.
I’m looking forward to finding James Turner Church’s youngest half brother Charles Church’s grave along with his wife Mary Helena Coad. There is also an opportunity to find Joel V Church’s half sister Elizabeth Church. There are other Church family members I will be looking for in different cemeteries as well as any Brennans, Knapps, Guernsey, DeWolfe family names. You just never know when that gravestone picture you took on the fly because it was a family name was really your two greats grand uncle and you didn’t know it at the time you took the shot.
Lets see what tomorrow brings... have a good night all.
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