Month: June 2008
Reflections
I’ve taken pictures of this birdbath before, but never from above. It’s got a nice patina of minerals and algae on the inside of the basin.
Dew Drops
I think this is a cabbage rose, but on the other hand, I’m not entirely sure it’s not a peony. I was so distracted by the poison ivy that I forgot to look at the foliage. I know there were other roses growing in the same bed, and I don’t recall there being peonies in that bed. There are peonies in the bed next to it, though, so I just don’t know.
Anyway, the flower–whatever it is–is a little past its prime. I like the photo, though. I didn’t notice the dew drops at the time (again, distracted by the poison ivy!), so they were a nice surprise.
White Yarrow
This is growing in a bed at the house where I’m cat sitting. Unfortunately, there’s also poison ivy growing there, too. As far as I can tell, it’s not anywhere else on the property aside from that one flower bed. Yikes!
Inverted Lens Macro
Wild Columbine Seed Pod
This was my first try, and it’s a little breezy outside, so it’s not as sharp as it could be. All you do is invert the lens. The only hard part is manually holding it in place. Because it’s an older lens, it’s heavy, and my hands got a little tired and unsteady after awhile.
This was a few shots later, and I think it turned out better. Both were taken with a Tamron SP 28-80mm 1:3.5-4.2 lens.
Ivy Roots on Brick Wall
Thomas Hamilton
My aunt Dottie asked if there were any Revolutionary War soldiers in the Lord line of our family tree. Possibly (they were certainly in the right place at the right time). So I did some digging and found that my 7th great grandfather, Thomas Hamilton, was indeed a Revolutionary War soldier.
I only stumbled across that last night, which is odd, because I only just found Dottie’s email in my spam folder this afternoon. I haven’t a clue why it ended up there, as there’s not anything remotely spammy about it.
Anyway!
The Thomas Hamilton in question is buried in the White Settlement Cemetery in Tomkins County, New York. His (modern) headstone identifies him as a private in the 10th Pennsylvania Regiment. That seems to be incorrect, though. There was an interesting a discussion on one of the Hamilton surname listserves that details why the Thomas Hamilton who was a private in the 10th PA can’t be “our” Thomas. And, as well, a good reason to think that our Thomas was actually in the Northampton County Militia.
What we do know about our Thomas is that he was a surveyor. He married a woman named Sarah Westfall. They had five children. In 1875 the family, along with Joseph Brearley and his wife, Lydia Colborn, moved to Muncy, Pennsylvania. While crossing Sweet Arrow Creek, their wagon was overcome with water and Sarah and Joseph both drowned. Thomas later married Joseph’s wife, Lydia. (Since it ends in a wedding, I guess that makes it a comedy, right?)
Day Lily
I didn’t think I’d get any flowers this year from the plants I got from Ms. Lea, since they were moved so late in the season. This one has a few bud clusters on it, though.
Margaret vs. Pauline
I’ve been cat sitting for folks who live out in the country, so I’ve been doing more driving than normal. I grabbed some random CDs, because I wanted new car music. One of them was unlabeled. It had a couple of Neko Case songs on it. I love this one, but every once in awhile it sneaks up on me and makes me teary.
Margaret is the fragments of a name
Her love pours like a fountain
Her love steams like rage
Her jaw aches from wanting
And she’s sick from chlorine
But she’ll never be as clean
As the cool-side-of-satin Pauline
Grief
Somewhere near the top of the list of Bad Advice for Condoling the Bereaved is the expression, “It’s for the best.” Why on earth would anyone say that, even if they believed in their heart of hearts that it was 100% true?
It’s like having to learn the world again. Every day the new world is more familiar, of course. But I still wake up feeling as if my outer shell has disappeared, feeling as if I have to defend myself against my own grief.
[..]
It’s all about those intricate webs of memory, love and dependency, and the webs have been cut through by that dark sickle of death. They must be mended, rewoven, repaired, and while that process happens one grieves.
She also talks about how grief keeps sneaking up on you. She likens it to rotten floorboards, where everything seems fine until you take one random step and it swallows you up again. I think that’s a pretty good analogy.
Little Things
It’s nice to have crazillions of databases searchable from one interface (Ancestry.com). It’s easy to forget that not everything tha\’s available online is accessible through Ancestry, though, even when the state/county in question has opened their databases to Ancestry. Things slip through the cracks.
I looked and looked and looked and could find no marriage records for Henry Meineke and Mary Shoemaker. I found birth records for their children, which listed Mary’s maiden name, but no marriage record. It occurred to me, though, to see if Illinois had their vital records online. And they do. And look at what I found!
MEINECKE, HEINRICH–SHUMAKER, MARIA ANNA–1894-08-23 00K/0070 00010815 MC LEAN
I don’t know why they were married in McLean County[1], but that’s definitely my grandfather’s paternal grandparents. And interestingly, though the Minnesota birth index lists her as Mary Shoemaker, grandpa spelled her name Shumaker, which seems to be the way she spelled it at the time of her marriage. Also, I now have a middle name and a known variant spelling of her first name. Since I have not been able to trace her parentage, this could be helpful. Or not, as it’s a common name. But it’s a new clue, and those are always exciting.
It also narrows down her possible emigration date, as she supposedly came over not long before marrying. Another clue.
And, because I have nothing topical to illustrate this post with, I shall include some random Harriet cuteness.
She is of German extraction, at least!
_______________________________________
1. Actually, this is clue number 3. There’s a gap between the 1870 census (the first one that Henry shows up in, as his family arrived in the US in 1869), which puts them in Tazewell County IL, and the 1900 census, which puts them in Wright County IA. The 1890 census is useless, as most of it was destroyed in a fire. But what about 1880? I can’t find Henry, his parents, or any of his siblings in the 1880 census.
Now I can at least look for him in McLean County IL. And, I’ve got reason to believe that not all of them stayed in Tazewell County. Maybe even none of them. There are several possible candidates in the Illinois Death Index. I also need to take anther look at the Illinois voter records, because I may have enough information to start weeding down those “possibles,” too.
Unfortunately, it’s possible that the whole family was somehow missed during 1880 census. It happens.
red paper boat 
