I have just done an unofficial review of the newest version of Family Tree Maker (2008) if you would like to take a look at it on iPentimento.
Family Tree Maker 2008 Review: Newer Isn’t Always Better
Also there is a new way to monitor the internet for your ancestors. Read about it in the article below. It's not free, but then, not much is these days, eh?
At the beginning of this year I got quite a shock when I found that Ancestry had renewed my full access to their site to the tune of around $300! Luckily, I had the money available at the time, but it was still a very large sum to shell out for just a hobby. I won't be doing the same thing next year, but I am always on the lookout for other ways to get genealogical information at an affordable (or free) price.
My newest issue of Family Tree magazine arrived a few days ago, and one of the article that caught my eye was 10 Great Little Subscription Web Sites.
Here is what FT magazine has to say on this topic:
Ancestry.com may be genealogy's biggest subscription Web site, but it's not the only game in town. We tried out the "little guys" and found 10 small commercial sites worth your money.
By Rick Crume
Also, you might want to download this very helpful file of weblinks mentioned in the current issue of Family Tree Magazine. I did.
Wouldn't it be great if you could tap into some of Ancestry's databases? Did you know that you can, and that some of them are free. Actually, there are over 200 free databases you can access. So, if you have some free time and want to check them out, go through GenealogyBuff's website and see the lists of free DB's. I intend to do just that today, and to bookmark the site! Thanks GenealogyBuff!
The main purpose for my new blog iPentimento was to have a central location where people researching Oregon state history, the Holmes surname, or Oregon City history, could find a well-sourced biography of my 1st cousin William Livingston Holmes. William was one of the first sheriff's of Clackamas County when it was still Oregon Territory. Just this last weekend I uploaded the files for his biography to a page on iPentimento. I have also included some pictures I took at Rose Farm, the house William Holmes built; also included on the page is a two generation family tree for the Holmes family.
William and his wife Louisa, along with there three children were members of the 1843 Oregon Trail wagon train that left Missouri in late spring and traveled many months to get to the end of the Oregon Trail at Oregon City in November of that year.
It was a long and arduous trip for them, and it is likely they walked most of the way. One thing that many people may not think about is that when the wagon trains left Missouri the land was somewhat flat and the travelers were fresh, as were the oxen teams pulling the wagons. It is a sad fact that as the trip wore on, the terrain was more difficult to traverse, and their energies were flagging by the time they got to the Columbia River. They would have to either try to make it overland to Oregon City, or lower their wagons and livestock into the treacherous river and hope that they didn't drown in the process. A good book to read about this wagon train is Blazing a Wagon Trail to Oregon: A Weekly Chronicle of the Great Migration of 1843 (Paperback) 
This family was just one of 1000 souls who were on this particular wagon train, the first organized one to make it to Oregon City. There are some great Oregon Trail web pages online. One of them is Stephenie Flora's Oregon Pioneers page. She has been kind enough to link to the William Holmes page from her site.
I don't know if any of you have discovered this site yet, but it is called Family Link and might be a good place to start if you plan on sharing any of your family trees and/or photos. I have just signed up, and I will add new information as time permits. My direct link to my profile will keep you updated, so be sure and bookmark it please. Just a caution here. I am not totally sure this is going to be a free site forever, so please check the site before signing up. I do see that they encourage you to sign up for World Vital Records. Hey, just don't blame the messenger, ok? Thanks!
History Ignored
I had an interesting email exchange with a mannamed Robert who was representing Find A Grave. I had posted some new information to their site about my cousin William Livingston Holmes under the section of "famous" persons. My posting included a photo of William's headstone, and also a photo of the man. The reply I got was 'canned', but it tells me that our national history is certainly not important to a site like Find A Grave. Here is what he said:
Greetings...
Thank you very much for submitting a memorial to Find A Grave. You indicated that William Holmes
should be considered for inclusion on the 'famous' pages. Unfortunately, William Holmes does not
appear to fit our criteria for a 'famous' listing. You can learn about Find A Grave's famous
listings, including what we look for in a 'famous' entry, by reading our 'Famous FAQ'. You can jump
directly to our FAQ by following the link below:
http://www.findagrave.com/cgi-bin/faq.cgi?faqMode=famous#32
So, what's my gripe? Here is my reply to "Robert":
Hi Robert,
I am not writing to "argue" or anything. I listed William Livingston Holmes as 'famous' because he was the first sheriff of Clackamas county in Oregon. That probably sounds mundane, but at the time he was elected in 1845 the size of the county extended from the Rocky Mountain divide to San Francisco*, up into British Columbia and west taking in parts of Puget Sound. He was the first and only law man for the area before Oregon even became a state.
He might have been famous in his time, and not ours. Thanks anyway, and for the email.
* I was incorrect about how far south it went. 
As an interesting side note to this, on the same Find A Grave site, it lists two 'real' famous people in the same cemetery as William L. Holmes. One is Howerton, Clarence Chesterfield 'Major Mite' who was a dwarf and one of the Munchkins in the Wizard of Oz. The other is Ogden, Peter Skene, a trapper and a fur trader who first sighted The Great Salt Lake and who they named Ogden, UT after.
Granted, Clackamas county, Oregon was sparsely populated at the time, but in the wild and untamed 'far west' that it was, there were still murders and other acts of mayhem committed on a regular basis. William Holmes may have had deputies to help him, but at age 38 he was the only man who was sheriff of the county that took in a very large expanse of real estate while he was in office.
William Livingston Holmes is my first cousin, five times removed. I just think that he should be given his due acknowledgement as an Oregon Trail Pioneer, as well as one of the first to settle in Oregon and become one of its contributing citizens (see Rose Farm). I am currently writing a biography about Wm. Holmes.
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Have you visited Dead Fred lately? This is a very handy site where you can upload your family photos and let the world know just where your ancestors are buried. The younger generation might go "ewww" about this, but for those of us who do genealogy and want to share the wealth of our records and photos, this site is a good place to start. Besides, it is free to register, and they only ask that you donate now and then. The usual amount is $1. Not too hard on the wallet, eh? 
One of the things I like about the site is that you can also leave a sentiment and flowers on a virtual grave. With my ancestors spread all over the country, that is a nice way to show you are thinking of them.
There are five ways to search on the site: by surname; location, check the mystery photos to see if you can identify anyone; or just do a keyword search. You might want to look through the section on school annuals too.
You might also like to visit Find a Grave also. Another good site for genealogy research. On this site you can even search for famous person's gravesites too. A friend of mine is the step-granddaughter of Henry Travers (Clarence in "It's a Wonderful Life") and I found where he was buried, and even who was buried nearby and sent that information to her.
Happy hunting!
Like a pack rat whose attic can't hold one more bowling trophy, photo album or dog-eared copy of National Geographic, the city of Portland is running out of space to store its history.
I heard this story on Northwest Cable News at noon today, and could barely contain myself. Who knows what genealogical riches might await the Oregon researcher!? I would love to see what is in this collection, mainly because of my connection to early Oregon though my Holmes cousins who lived in Oregon City. I will be writing a story about William L. Holmes soon, and I hope to interest some genealogical web sites in purchasing the rights to reprint it. Stay tuned...
Link: Medal of Honor could be back in family soon | IndyStar.com. This is a great story. I do hope that it turns out that there really is a concrete connection that they can use and the Medal of Honor will go to the descendants of Joseph F. Carter.
Our own Medal of Honor recipient in the family was John Whitmore. His medal was lost in one of the two house fires his family suffered. So sad to have these family artifacts lost to fire or just misplaced. It breaks my heart to see the lack of family pride and honor some people show too.
I know of many family photos just tossed in the garbage because the descendants didn't want to deal with them. My husband's grandfather burned his wife's family photos because he was "mad' that she up and died!
Make sure you visit Megan Smolenyak Smolenyak's new website at Roots Television.
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| Iowa. Proud birthplace of Johnny Carson. John Wayne. And John Fremont Krizer.  |
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| Legendary funnymen. American film icons. Proud fathers. All heroes. All part of Iowa history - and more importantly, family history. Ready to learn more about yours? |
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Search the new Iowa State Census collection. What could you discover in this collection? |
If you don't hear from me today, it is because I am wallowing in these records! Whoohoo! -- Webduck
Whenever people are just beginning their own genealogy, they always hope to find they are connected to someone famous. When I began my own genealogy quest, I just hoped to find out more about my most recent lineage, and I never even gave it a thought that I would find myself connected to royalty. Still, it is pretty neat to find that you are connected. In my case, one of the people I am connected to is Robert Bruce. The one I speak of is the Robert Bruce born in 1210 in Scotland. By my Family Tree Maker program's calculations, I am his 24th great granddaughter.
Much of Robert Bruce's line has already been proven, so it only remained to see just how I am connected. Here are the first 16 generations, ending with John Crawford. Download descendants_of_robert_bruce.pdf The Crawford family Download descendants_of_john_crawford.pdf connects to me Poindexter family , which of course, being more broadly researched and documented, gets a bit more involved. Download desc. of Archibald P. Poindexter.pdf My decendancy is through Miriam Poindexter who married Charles Smith in North Carolina, is my 3rd Great Grandmother.
Charles and Miriam had 10 daughters, one of which was Elizabeth Jane Smith, my GG-Grandmother who married Eli B. Pentecost in Kentucky in 1850.
Elizabeth and Eli Pentecost had 7 children. I descend from their daughter Mary Elizabeth Pentecost, who married Harvey Lawson Smith in TN in 1874.
Mary E. and Harvey also had 7 children. I descend from their youngest daughter, Minnie Caroline Smith who married Will K. Yates in Missouri in 1917. Will and Minnie's oldest child was my father, William G. Yates who was born in 1920 in Missouri.
I stumbled upon a very interesting blog the other day. It is called "tn type" (quotes mine) and it is a blog about Roane County, TN genealogy. Roane county is where my Yates and associated families are traced back to. I suspect that I have a lot of good information that I could share with anyone who might be researching these surnames: YATES, MORRISON, KELSEY, BALL, HOLMES, REGISTER, ABSTAN/ABSTON, EDGEMON, HENDRIX, BREEDLOVE;
Download john_holmes_family_roane_co., TN.pdf
My Great Grandfather, Jim Yates migrated to Howell County, MO with his half-uncle Gideon P. Morrison's family in 1884. Jim's sister Myra also migrated with them. Jim Yates married Cerilda Breedlove in 1885. This photo is of Cerilda, Jim and in the back, Jim's sister Myra Yates. Myra died in 1888 at the age of 22, probably from tuberculosis.
There is no possible way I can post the migration patterns of all these families, but if you email me I would be happy to answer questions, share information and photos.
If you have an interest in Roane County, TN, please do take a look at TN Type's webpage.
In honor of Women's History Month 2007, I would like to tell you a little bit about my aunt Joyce Moline Huntley. She was born in Seattle, Washington in October of 1921 to parents Elvin and Hulda (Nordgren) Moline. She was the middle daughter of three girls, Jeane, Joyce and my mother, Joan Moline.
When Joyce was a month shy of her eighth birthday, her mother Hulda was killed in downtown Seattle by a hit and run driver. That was in 1929, and in 1932 Joyce's father Elvin remarried to Lillian V. Epstein, a registered nurse who would prove to be a profound influence in Joyce's life.
Joyce and her two sisters, moved to a small lumber town in Thurston county, WA in 1933 when their father took a job as a lumber salesman for Mumby Lumber Company in Bordeaux. Growing up in a small lumber town meant that your horizons were somewhat limited. Unless, you were a young woman with a mind of your own.
After ending her academic career at Rochester High School, Joyce went on to nursing school, and as a registered nurse to Alaska to work in a clinic there until WWII began. Joyce enlisted in the US Army Nurse Corps at the beginning of the war and was discharged after serving in the European theater and being awarded for her service in Belgium.
Joyce married Frank Huntley in the early 1950's and their only child Casey was born while they were living in (then) Formosa. Joyce passed away in 1990, and I presume that her husband Frank is now deceased as well. We have lost track of her daughter Casey, and if she reads this, please know that we think about you often and would love to hear from you.
We are honored to say that Joyce is a part of our family history. Thank you Joyce for your service to our country.
The 2007 Theme, "Generations of Women Moving History Forward”. If you would like to link to this article , or if you write one about how a woman helped move history forward, please let me know. (c) CJW 2007
If you haven't visited this page yet, you might be missing a genealogical breakthrough. It is called Genealogy Blog Finder and I have been using it quite often lately. I just did a locality search for Roane County, TN, where my Yates family is traced back to, and came up with TN Type. The first listing that comes up is about the Deatherage family in that county. My GGG-Grandmother Deborah Holmes was married a second time to William Deatherage Morrison. I am not connected to the Deatherage's by blood, but I do research that name to find connections to my family.
Would you donate to me? I don't mean for no particular reason, but if I found a genealogical record for you, and it saved you time, and probably *money, wouldn't it be worth it to pay for it? If I find a record or records for you, you could donate what you feel it is worth ($1, $5, $10 or more?). If I don't find anything, then obviously you pay nothing. I have included a PayPal link on the top of my main page that can be used to make a donation. (You will have to sign up for a PayPal account).
I have been thinking of how I can pay for my Ancestry subscription and do the things I really like to do, like genealogical research. I have a full subscription to Ancestry which includes the UK , Canada and some German records, and many, many more.
Who is in your family tree? Do you have names, dates and locations, but you don't know where to start? Let's give this idea a try and see if I can keep up with the requests!
One thing though. Please don't contact me and ask for all the Smiths in the United States or anything. If I am going to be able to find your ancestor, I need specific information to begin my search. And, it might take me a while to find records and email them to you. By records, I am referring to anything from actual census images to citation text in a database.
*If you didn't have to pay for a full subscription to Ancestry.
I am not a certified genealogist, just a family historian who loves genealogy. I make no guarantees to find your family history. I will not be able to provide refunds. Your donations will be gratefully accepted and received. If you email me about this offer, please put " Genealogy Lookup Request" in the title of your email. Thanks!
Icon Generator: Get one for your page!
Link: Cyndi's List - U.S. - Vital Records. On this list you will find vital records by state, as well as associated records. Hope this helps with someone's genealogy research. If you haven't visited Cyndi's list before, bookmark it and use it as one of your starting points.
Link: SOS, Missouri - State Archives: Birth and Death Records. If you are a family genealogist with research that needs to be done in Missouri, this is a "must see" site. I have used it several times to check for death reacords, and in one case, I uncovered a family mystery.
One of my Great aunts had migrated to Missouri from Tennessee using the name Myra Yates. I knew the date that she died, and so I did a search for her death record. What came back was two names, with the same death dates. BUT the names were not Myra Yates, but rather Deborah Yates. That was her grandmother's name. So who had given the information, and was her real name Deborah and not Myra. In earlier census records I had found Myra's name in TN and she was called other names too, such as what I knew was to be her middle name. Genealogy can be very confusing without the documentation.
Could you spare 15 minutes to add to your family tree? Try some of these methods today!
(1) Go through your family file and fill in those empty death dates. There are 77.7 million records in the Social Security Death Index. The SSDI is available here at Rootsweb. It is free. Or, you can look here at Ancestry.
(2) Find your immigrant ancestors by going to Steve Morse's site One Step Web Pages There, you can decide quickly what search forms are right for you. Or, if you have more time, you can also go to the Ellis Island site.
(3) Get on a mailing list. If you haven't had a chance to visit before, now is the time to check out Rootsweb. You can do a search for a list about your surname, or a location. Rootsweb is much more than mailing lists though, so you might want to bookmark it and come back for a more detailed search.
(4) Do you think you have a Revolutionary War Patriot in your family? The volunteers with the DAR would be happy to do a lookup for your ancestor. Go to their site, and fill in the form. Also, if you are already a member of the DAR, you can login and search the database for free too.
(5) Go back through your notes from the last time you went to the library. Check your downloaded emails for new clues too. Sort through your piles of papers and get them into family groups. After staring at names and dates for hours the last time you did some research, it may have boggled your mind and clouded your thinking. Taking a fresh new look might make the information more obvious.
(6) Search with your genealogy program. If you are using Family Tree Maker it's as easy as highlighting your family member's name and clicking on the Web Search Results button. The program knows your female ancestor's maiden name, and will do a search for that, as well as her married name.
(7) Use those lookup volunteers! If you use the USGenWeb to research family in locations you already know, don't forget to click on the link labeled "lookup volunteers". These kind-hearted souls have their own books or resources and are willing to help you out. Please though, do be polite and ask for one name at a time, and remember to thank them.
(8) Order military records. You can order the records online, or download a PDF file and mail it in. Either way, you will have to show a signed signature to get the records. If the veteran is deceased you have to sign. I have done it using both methods and it is very easy to do.
(9) If you do not already have a genealogy program, and you have a limited budget, you can download Personal Ancestral File (PAF) for free from Family Search (LDS). Registration is free, and does not generate spam.
(10) Privatize and then upload your family tree. This can be done at WorldConnect, Ancestry, or GenCircles.
(11) Scan some of your old family photos. Think that might take more than 15 minutes? Most flatbed scanners can accomodate multiple photos (depending on size, of course) so instead of doing them one at a time, do 4 or 6. Save that file and then go back later, when you have more time, and using your photo editing software, select each photo from the batch, and copy and paste it into its own file.
(12) Search the database at Heritage Quest. Not a member? You might be. If you have a library card you might be able to search HQ's database through a link on your library's webpage. Scroll down and look to see the list of states and the libraries that have links.
You might also check your online state library to see if they have a link too. Or, call the reference desk at the library and ask about access to Heritage Quest.
(13) Are you looking for family information in The United Kingdom or Ireland? Try looking at GenUKI. If you do not live in the UK, before you get started on their page, make sure you check out Researching from Abroad
(14) Do a simple search in Google (or your favorite search engine) for 'surname' family tree. Change surname to the surname you are looking for, and you will probably come up with many, many hits. I have a very obscure family name: Osgathorpe. I just did a search in Google and found (to my surprise) while writing this article, that there is a website devoted to that family name.
(15) Are you looking for an ancestor who might have served in the American Civil War? You can do a search at the CW Soldiers and Sailors System. You will not only be able to search soldiers and sailors, but also look up regiments, prisoners, cemeteries, battles, medals and parks.
Link: Geni.com Launches to Create the World's Family Tree. This is not to be confused with The World Family Tree by Rootsweb.
New Website founded by former PayPal COO / Golden Globe-Nominated producer.
Los Angeles (PRWeb) January 16, 2007 -- Internet and entertainment entrepreneur David O. Sacks today announced the launch of a new website, Geni.com, whose mission is to create a family tree of the entire world. The site applies "Web 2.0" principles of social media to genealogy and family networking.
Link: The Local - Swede could be heir to English throne. Now this is an interesting development, is it not? As you read the article, it is not meant to be a serious threat to the current queen of England, but rather a fishing expedition to find a link to history.
If you are at all interested in your family history, gazing at the image of a census record showing the family of your ancestor, it can be very exciting. I know, genealogy sounds like a very dry hobby, but now that so many records are online it has become a million dollar industry.
Our government began keeping census records in 1790 and they have done so every decade since then. The 1930 census just became available a few years ago because there is a 72 year time restriction that must be observed for privacy.
These are some of the things you will find in the census:
Family member’s names and their age on their last birthday.
How many times they have been married, and how many live births a woman has had.
The value of the land and other assets owned by the head of the household.
The birthplace of the person, and their parents; also, whether or not they speak English
The year of immigration.
What street they lived on can be found sometimes too, if the census taker writes it in the margin of the record.
You can also find maiden names for women if at some time one or both of their parents come to live with them. I have found many maiden names this way.
Sometimes too, you can find one of the family living with a neighbor, cousin, grandparent, etc., working under the title of farm labor.
Not all of this kind of information is available in every census. Before the 1850 Census, few of these details were recorded. From 1790-1840, only the head of household is listed and the number of household members in selected age groups.
For specifics on what information was collected in each census year, see Availability of Census Records About Individuals (I highly recommend you look at this much more detailed information. Especially page 3, that tells what was specifically asked on the census for that year.)
© webduck/CJW, all rights reserved 2007
It is a common malady that strikes almost every genealogist: You love to visit cemeteries. When I was younger, I wouldn't set foot in a cemetery (well, maybe on a dare) because it was "too creepy". I can't put my finger on when all that changed, but I visit cemeteries now with reverence and curiosity instead of dread.
If you have always wondered where Grandpa might be buried, you might want to check Cemeteries on the Internet, a gateway to many sites that have cemetery records. The sites are listed by the population size they represent.
The sad part of going to cemeteries isn't that it is scary for genealogists. It is that some are in such disrepair, or have been vandalized. I found a wonderful site today called Saving Graves that is dedicated to the protection, restoration and preservation of endangered cemeteries worldwide. So many times I have talked to cousins who have found a headstone of a family member, but it has been turned upside down and used as a sidewalk, or worse yet, the farmer who owns the land has removed the headstone in his field and just plowed over the gravesite.
When you are planning on going to a cemetery, have a plan.
1. Before you begin walking, do it in a pattern so that you can make sure you have searched each headstone.
2. Have a pen (waterproof, in case of rain) and paper with you and make sure you write down the information on the headstones you find just as you see them. It is easy to get excited and read too much into what you are finding.
3. Take a camera! That sounds easy, doesn't it? Well, I can tell you from experience, you might not always get the results you were hoping for with a film type camera because you won't know what the picture will look like until you get it developed and you might be 1200 miles away at home. If you have one, take a digital camera so that you can see the results right away. I won't go into the details of how to take pictures in a cemetery here, but you can find out more by going to Tips for Taking Great Cemetery Pictures by Kimberly Powell.
4. Have a list of the names you are looking for, including married names of women if you have them. (the word "nee" means it is a maiden name)
5. What if you find out there is no stone for your ancestor, but you know they are buried there? My husband and I visited a cemetery in Iowa and found that very dilemma. After consulting with the cemetery sexton who kept the burial records, we determined that we would ask my husband's family if they would be willing to contribute to the new headstone and many were happy to honor that request. We collected the money, made the arrangements with the local monument company, and got it in place within a few months.
6. What if the writing on the stone is hard to read? Some people advise using shaving cream. I haven't tried that, but I did hear a story of someone using flour on a headstone out in a pasture with horrible results. The cows in the field were attracted to the flour and wanted to lick it off, causing some damage along the way when the headstone was knocked over! Don't use flour!!
7. If you know you are going to a cemetery and where your ancestor's graves are located, you might want to have a scrub brush, bucket, and even take a few gallons of your own water (not all cemeteries have water available) in jugs to spruce up a headstone that is covered in moss or mud. Be careful with the very old headstones though, as they may crumble with age and your good intentions will be for not.
8. If it is possible, and the stone isn't too old, you might want to consider doing a rubbing of the headstone. You can find more information on How to do Tombstone Rubbings here.
9. This may seem strange to say, but take the kids. Teach them that it is an act of respect and honor to go to the cemetery to find where the ancestors were buried. If you make it an annual pilgrimage and you clean the stones and leave flowers, it instills in them that cemeteries are places of honor, not to trash. You can talk about the family members as you knew them (I find myself mentally talking to the interred!) and relate some family history as you walk along.
10. Make sure that when you get home that you enter any new information in your family files. You might also want to check the Geographic Names Information site to see if you can get a map of just where that cemetery is located. What a nice thing to have in your files for future generations so they too can find where their ancestors are buried!
September 9, 1970: A date that will live in infamy….
OK, it won’t really live in infamy. We just joke around about it that way. Thirty-six years ago tomorrow will be the anniversary of our wedding day. That’s us in the picture, standing on the steps of the Thurston County courthouse. We were married about 7:30 in the evening by a judge in a courtroom.
A couple days before the wedding we were at my parent’s house and who should roll in the driveway but Jim’s parents and one of their friends, Ron Rutherford! I couldn’t believe my eyes, and immediately I was thankful that my parents were sober and the house was somewhat clean! Mom made fresh coffee and my dad and Loren stood around and yakked about Navy days and whatever else that came to mind. My dad wasn’t much of a talker, but he held his own. To be honest, I have no recollection of anything after they came in the house.
After we left my parent’s place that evening (Mom was not prepared for dinner guests) Jim’s parents wanted me to find them a motel room close to the courthouse, and Toots wanted me to find a place where she could get her hair done. By some miracle there was a beauty school just up the street from the motel so Toots was able to walk there since she did not drive. I am not sure if she liked the outcome of her hair since it was radically different than her usual “do”, but she never said anything to me. I think they stayed at the Golden Gavel motel on Capitol Way.
The most humorous part of Jim’s parents arriving without warning was when they offered to take him back to base to get his clothes for the wedding. He had to come clean and tell them that he had his clothes there in Olympia, which let the cat out of the bag that we were ::::gasp!:::living together! His parents never missed a beat though, they just accepted that I had deflowered their son and dropped us off at our house on Puget.
I had made all the arrangements for the judge to marry us, and my mom had bought corsages for all the women and men in the wedding party, as well as for my grandparents who attended also. My dad had given me money for a wedding dress, but he stipulated it not be white. I should have just bought a white one anyway, but he still was a force to be reckoned with in my life at that time, so I complied. Actually, it was the perfect dress for my body shape. I was very thin and had a long neck, so the empire waist and high neckline were just my cup of tea. Other than the reasoning behind why it had to be yellow, I really did like the dress and wore it for many years afterward.
Our friends Starla and Reggie Dixon were suppose to show up the night of the 9th to be our witnesses, but they never did. I was hurt and mad about that at the time, but Jim’s mom was already griping about the judge being late, and I was getting nervous standing around in the hallway of the courthouse listening to her complain. I felt like she was saying it was my fault, when there was nothing I could do about it. Judge Thorpe finally showed up and made apologies to us all and we proceeded into the courtroom.
My friend Rose Atchinson came for the wedding, and when Reggie and Starla didn’t show, we had to ask that Rose be a witness as well as Ron Rutherford. If I had been thinking, I would have just asked my brother and his wife. I felt bad that I did that to Rose, making it seem like she was second best to Starla, but she was gracious and didn’t say a word about it. Ron was just as gracious too and was more than happy to fill in for the no-shows.
To be honest, I just wanted to get the ceremony over with! It did seem to go very fast and since it was just a single ring ceremony, I didn’t have to do that part of it. I was just so shy and quiet that I didn’t want to talk in front of everyone. The next thing we knew we were shaking hands with the judge and hugging everyone else. The judge ushered us out of the courtroom and we all mingled around out on the steps smoking cigarettes (all but Jim) and visiting. My parents were dead broke at the time, so they went home and Jim and I, along with Ron and Jim’s parents all went to a restaurant in town for supper.
It seems like the restaurant was the Golden Corral which is kind of coincidental considering the name of Loren and Toots’ motel being “golden” something too. We went in to eat and had a nice meal as I remember, but then afterwards Jim’s mom wanted us to all go in the bar and have some drinks. There was just one problem: I was only twenty years old and the legal drinking age in Washington state then was twenty-one. Jim’s mom even went so far as to ask if I could just sit with them and not drink. That got a resounding “no”. I was so embarrassed that she did that, partly because I just wanted to go to our motel room at the Tyee Motor Inn in Tumwater and not have Jim drink any more. Ok, truth be told, I just wanted to get away from his parents because they made me nervous.
We eventually left the restaurant, and on the way to drop us off and get Jim’s ’57 Chevy at our place, Jim’s mom whipped out a $50 bill and handed it to him. I guess to pay for the motel, food or something. Heck, we could have spent a week at the Tyee with that much money in those days! Ever the practical man though, we only spent one night there and then went back to our apartment in Olympia. You didn’t really think I was going to tell all the details of our wedding night did you?
And so began our lives together in wedded bliss. If you know us well, that line will give you a laugh!
© Carol W. 2006-
Link: : Genealogical Publishing Company.
Extended by Popular Demand: A Penny for Shipping!
(Labor Day sale extended until midnight September 7, 2006).
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