There is something amazing about coming across the photo of an ancestor, especially one you've never seen a picture of before. I've had this happen a number of times. Here are some examples:
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| Eliza (Fowlke) and Elias Aston See below for details. |
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| Alonzo Havington Ennis A wonderful relative found my father's website and realized that she had more information on the Ennises that we did. She sent a package with an Ennis genealogy by Alonzo's grandson, a page from a county history, and this and the next photo. |
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| Olive (Bird) Ennis, Alonzo's wife |
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| Harriet Ann (Aston) and Charles Edward Green and baby Curtis I had seen a photo of Harriet as an older woman but not of her in her younger year or of Charles. |
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| Hester (Middleton) Salisbury I was attending a graduate program at BYU when I stumbled onto this sketch of Hester's grave effigy. The bookstore was having a book clearance sale out in the quad one day. I found a book on British historical costume and opened it up to find a drawing of one of my ancestors inside. |
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| George Southam Isn't my great-great-great-grandpa adorable? |
As I noted above, I'll share the story of Elias and Eliza (Fowlke) Aston, both about the finding of their photo and about them.
When I was an undergrad at BYU, I took a family history course. For my term paper, I had to research and report on an ancestral family and their children and at least some of them needed to be born post-1850. Well, choosing a family with post-1850 children that hadn't already been researched was not so easy. After conferring with my Mom, I chose the Aston as she had only some bare facts on them.
I didn't expect to find anything new...but I did. There was contact info for a submitter on Familysearch and they had the photo of Elias and Eliza above, a copy of which they graciously sent.
They also sent a copy of remembrances of family members, including their granddaughter, Irene Aston Shumway: "Elias had quite a hard time raising all those children. I have heard Grandmother (Eliza Fowlke Aston) tell about pinning some of the little ones to her apron when she sat down to sew. I remember Elias as a little man with a long beard, walking with his hands clasped behind his back. Grandfather (Elias Aston) studied the Bible and could recite the scriptures by heart. He was very religious.”
We learned a great deal about the family. I wrote up my paper and Mom eventually wrote a webpage with the information we learned, including this: "Above the family home was a large ditch, and in the summer all the boys would go to the ditch for their morning washing. The family worked and played hard together. They all enjoyed square dances. The family also had tragedies. Orson was killed at age 20, as they sat on a hillside eating their lunch. A large rock rolled down, striking him in the back, killing him instantly.Mary Maria was sickly all her life and never married. All the boys and Harriet suffered from asthma, and eventually died from its effects."
In addition, Mom returned to some records she had gathered previously so she could send them to me. As she did, she noticed that she had misread a place on a record--it read "Wollaton," not "Nottingham." That discovery allowed her to locate Elias' ancestors.
To learn more about the Astons, go to Mom's website on Harriet, Elias, Eliza, and their ancestors: http://www.boydhouse.com/alice/Aston/aston01contents.htm
The Aston project was one of my first family history projects. The next was the Ennises with more photos and more biographical details and more door opened to find even earlier ancestors. For this reason, these pictures are among my favorites. Who knows what wonderful pictures are out there still? Perhaps there are more pictures of the ancestors I've seen before. Or perhaps of those I've never seen.
I mentioned last week that of my great-great-grandparents, I'm only missing photos for Maurice Hickey and Squire Richardson. There are some unidentified Carey photos, including one of an older gentleman, maybe even Maurice. As for Squire, perhaps there's a mugshot.
And On Another Note...
While we're speaking of Squire, last week I wrote about him and his son William Henry. Then, on Saturday, the brilliant Studio C released a video that really, really reminds me of researching the Boyd-Richardsons:Enjoy!
Next week's challenge from No Story Too Small: "Week 15 (April 9-16) – How Do You Spell That? What ancestor do you imagine was frequently asked that? Which ancestor did you have a hard time finding because of an unusual name?" Well, the ancestor I'm thinking of probably didn't get asked how to spell her name, just judging from the time and place. But I did have to ask for help knowing how a name spelled like that is pronounced.
