Shaking the branches of my family tree
I'm not sure I entirely understand this strange fascination with people rooting around their family tree. Is it that they want to find out if they are FamousPerson's 10th cousin twice removed? Or if FamousDeadPerson was their great, great, great, etc., aunt or uncle?
Dot's late uncle Tom and a cousin whose name I can't remember both got completely into the geneology thing, each producing these massive documents of excruitatingly detailed relationships. Her cousin, who lives in New England, is one of those Mayflower wannabees, which is not to suggest that she's not a nice person. Her uncle: I can't explain. It all seems slightly weird, albeit in a harmlessly amusing sort of way. Family history is all well and good (I enjoy a good anecdote endlessly recounted over the dinner table as much as the next person), but this takes it a little beyond that point.
Now my father, in his old fart years, has taken up this slightly loopy and obsessive pastime. His side of the family has essentially been dirt farmers in the South since being booted out of debtor's prison. My mother's side of the family is where all the truly interesting (read: scandalous, weird and embarrassing) events have taken place. We are talking Tennessee Williams stuff.
My mother's grandfather and grandmother were known in family circles as Big Daddy and Mama Jessie (I told you it was Tennessee Williams stuff). Though I knew Mama Jessie, Big Daddy was long gone by the time I'd arrive on the scene. Through some event (slightly unclear) my father discovered a document being auctioned on eBay that was a letter or bill to Mama Jessie, re: BD's "business interests." These were suggestive of various endeavors left to her caretaking while her husband laid low. Further research revealed not all of these endeavors were strictly legit. Seems Big Daddy was making the big money selling whiskey in Georgia and Alabama. Which is why he legged it to Texas, where later he would settle the rest of his family.
Timing is everything. But for the efforts of Giraud, Alabama's law enforcers, the family fortune would have been intact.
Funny how things work out.
Dot's late uncle Tom and a cousin whose name I can't remember both got completely into the geneology thing, each producing these massive documents of excruitatingly detailed relationships. Her cousin, who lives in New England, is one of those Mayflower wannabees, which is not to suggest that she's not a nice person. Her uncle: I can't explain. It all seems slightly weird, albeit in a harmlessly amusing sort of way. Family history is all well and good (I enjoy a good anecdote endlessly recounted over the dinner table as much as the next person), but this takes it a little beyond that point.
Now my father, in his old fart years, has taken up this slightly loopy and obsessive pastime. His side of the family has essentially been dirt farmers in the South since being booted out of debtor's prison. My mother's side of the family is where all the truly interesting (read: scandalous, weird and embarrassing) events have taken place. We are talking Tennessee Williams stuff.
My mother's grandfather and grandmother were known in family circles as Big Daddy and Mama Jessie (I told you it was Tennessee Williams stuff). Though I knew Mama Jessie, Big Daddy was long gone by the time I'd arrive on the scene. Through some event (slightly unclear) my father discovered a document being auctioned on eBay that was a letter or bill to Mama Jessie, re: BD's "business interests." These were suggestive of various endeavors left to her caretaking while her husband laid low. Further research revealed not all of these endeavors were strictly legit. Seems Big Daddy was making the big money selling whiskey in Georgia and Alabama. Which is why he legged it to Texas, where later he would settle the rest of his family.
Timing is everything. But for the efforts of Giraud, Alabama's law enforcers, the family fortune would have been intact.
Funny how things work out.
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