Today is Thursday, and we started the day with sunshine! I'm a desert rat, I like the sun. The rain is lovely, but after 3 weeks, I love seeing the sun! OK, OK, it was raining by evening, but we had some great hours this morning, Julie even took a snooze on the lawn at the Ohio Historical Society. It was warm, the grass was dry, and she was out. Mom and I went through the Museum, it was very interesting. Ohio was the first state into the Union after the Revolutionary war, so it's an old state with a lot of history, both Native American and new American.
I've spent days in libraries and courthouses, and I'm worn out. Julie helped me today, and we found more Cramblit's and Dunkle's. We were at the Ohio Historical Society Library, in Columbus, for several hours. In some ways I wish I had several days there, but I'm ready for a break. We left about 4:30 and started driving west, right into the rain. Actually we even saw snow! It didn't last very long, but it was definitely snow. We are in a KOA just east of Indianapolis tonight. Julie is deep into her new Mac laptop, working on her website and answering email. I'm doing the same thing, and Mom is asleep. We even have TV tonight! The Office is on, the wifi is working, life is good.
I'm like a genealogy junky, I know that. I try to say that I could quit anytime I wanted to, but we all know differently. When I'm in genealogy mode, I don't sleep, it's all I can think about, where did they come from, how did they get into this town, this state? How many times did they move before they stopped here? And-- Who's Your Daddy?? Really, that is so hard to find out sometimes! I've found so many names for these 2 families, and I don't know where they fit, it will take me months to sort them out, and figure out if they are in my direct line or not.
I talked to David this evening, and there is now a Best By Farr Plumbing business. They've been working on that for months, and the paperwork is finally done. Now there are 2 businesses to manage, but he is very good at that!
Thursday, May 15, 2008
Sunday, May 11, 2008
More Rain!
I have to make a note about all the Fredonia pictures in my slideshow. David was raised in Fredonia, AZ. Mom and I drove through Fredonia, NY, so I took a bunch of pictures. My favorite is the truck- St George, from Fredonia. St. George, UT, is the nearest 'city' to Fredonia, AZ. It just seemed so improbable to see a truck with a St. George and Fredonia sign on it 2000 miles away!
I know, I shouldn't complain about the rain, it's heaven sent and all. Still this morning there was a tornado warning along with the storm that swept through here. We were fortunate, nothing bad happened to us, but the radio said there were terrible storms and tornadoes just south of us. Our prayers are with those people.
We are in the hills of Ohio. We haven't found many RV parks, but lots of forrest campgrounds with electrical hookups, so we've been camping. It's unbelievably beautiful and green, I'm a little frustrated that it's been raining so much I can't go out exploring. I've spent the last 3 days in libraries and Court houses, and I've found more information about our family. We are driving to Logan, OH tomorrow, to visit the Hocking County Courthouse. Hopefully I'll find more birth, marriage and death records.
We finally stopped to eat lunch yesterday about 2:00, we walked to a restaurant down the block. Well, we thought it was a restaurant, turned out to be more of a biker bar. It's in an historic hotel in downtown McArthur, OH. Mom walked in, looking at all the momentos, but I stopped short at the doorway when I saw a line of bikers at the bar. How do you get Mom's attention without everyone else noticing? No frantic "Mom- stop!", or anything I could think of. They did have a couple tables set out...
Anyway, While we sat down, 'Pappy's Lady' knocking back a shot of whiskey, while 'Pappy' talked to the bartender. We know them because her leather jacket was emblazoned with "Pappy's Lady", so I assume the guy next to her was Pappy. He had a leather jacket on with all kinds of patches on it. They all were eating lunch too, though, not just talking and drinking. Here we are, 2 old ladies just out of the library, primly sitting at the table ordering tea, with a half-dozen bikers and their chicks sprawled across the bar, talking tough to the rough looking bartender. She was a blonde that had spent way too many years working nights and smoking cigarettes. We got more than a couple side-long looks, and I imagine they weren't much more impressed with us than we were with them. Lunch wasn't too bad, for bar food, and we out-lasted the bikers, so the end of our meal was peaceful. We found Lake Hope campground north of McArthur. The only lake we saw looked more like a marsh, I could almost see the mosquitoes breeding there among the cattails and sedge. Luckily the camping is quite a bit higher, and not many bugs. The birds are singing right now, and it's very peaceful and calm. Happy Mother's Day!
I know, I shouldn't complain about the rain, it's heaven sent and all. Still this morning there was a tornado warning along with the storm that swept through here. We were fortunate, nothing bad happened to us, but the radio said there were terrible storms and tornadoes just south of us. Our prayers are with those people.
We are in the hills of Ohio. We haven't found many RV parks, but lots of forrest campgrounds with electrical hookups, so we've been camping. It's unbelievably beautiful and green, I'm a little frustrated that it's been raining so much I can't go out exploring. I've spent the last 3 days in libraries and Court houses, and I've found more information about our family. We are driving to Logan, OH tomorrow, to visit the Hocking County Courthouse. Hopefully I'll find more birth, marriage and death records.
We finally stopped to eat lunch yesterday about 2:00, we walked to a restaurant down the block. Well, we thought it was a restaurant, turned out to be more of a biker bar. It's in an historic hotel in downtown McArthur, OH. Mom walked in, looking at all the momentos, but I stopped short at the doorway when I saw a line of bikers at the bar. How do you get Mom's attention without everyone else noticing? No frantic "Mom- stop!", or anything I could think of. They did have a couple tables set out...
Anyway, While we sat down, 'Pappy's Lady' knocking back a shot of whiskey, while 'Pappy' talked to the bartender. We know them because her leather jacket was emblazoned with "Pappy's Lady", so I assume the guy next to her was Pappy. He had a leather jacket on with all kinds of patches on it. They all were eating lunch too, though, not just talking and drinking. Here we are, 2 old ladies just out of the library, primly sitting at the table ordering tea, with a half-dozen bikers and their chicks sprawled across the bar, talking tough to the rough looking bartender. She was a blonde that had spent way too many years working nights and smoking cigarettes. We got more than a couple side-long looks, and I imagine they weren't much more impressed with us than we were with them. Lunch wasn't too bad, for bar food, and we out-lasted the bikers, so the end of our meal was peaceful. We found Lake Hope campground north of McArthur. The only lake we saw looked more like a marsh, I could almost see the mosquitoes breeding there among the cattails and sedge. Luckily the camping is quite a bit higher, and not many bugs. The birds are singing right now, and it's very peaceful and calm. Happy Mother's Day!
Friday, May 9, 2008
Rain and Brain Drain
Yesterday was Jared’s 25th birthday! I can’t believe he’s 25 already, I can still remember the day he was born, which was Mother’s day that year. He was also born on his due date, how often does that happen??
Yesterday we spent the day in the John McIntire Library in Zanesville, OH. We found a lot of books with records of Cramblits and Dunkles, I don’t know how many are direct relatives, but I took pictures of all the records I could, and typed in the rest in my genealogy research packets. Zanesville is a really pretty town, with several large stone or brick churches, built in the late 1800’s. It is at the confluence of the Licking and Muskingam Rivers, and has a really cool Y-shaped bridge across both rivers that is quite unique. We stayed at Wolfie’s Campground, it’s a great RV park just out of town.
As we were driving in to the library, we saw a livestock auction, and I had a really hard time pulling Mom away from there. I said “No, we can’t buy chickens or a calf here, and drag them all the way across the country!” She said she just wanted to look, she wouldn’t buy anything. She smiled, “I just like the smells!” However, I’ve been the recipient of several dogs, chickens and sundry critters that came home with her from the livestock auction in Colorado, so I wasn’t taking any chances! I’m not sharing space with one of her finds!
I tease Mom a lot, but I’ll tell you, she is amazing. She’s 75 and can park this rig anywhere. She handles all the plumbing, water, gas, everything necessary to keep it running. This morning I was unhooking the sewer pipe when the end split-it’s a flexible tubing. Mom pulled out her tool kit and went to work. I jumped in and we took the working ends off the tubing and attached it to new tubing, now we have a good-as-new set up.
Today we drove from Zanesville down through Ohio hill country. It is all backroads, little two lane affairs with only local traffic. We’ve seen lots of farmland, with big beautiful barns. Many of them have cattle, with newborn calves scampering near their mommas. I was driving today, and as we lumbered down the road, with our bed on board, I imagined us as a Conestoga wagon, pioneers in a new land. Every field in this area had to be cleared of trees and brush, and most of them were done by hand in the 1800’s. The Amish still use horses and plows, but the original farmers used them too, with wagons to bring in the wood, and the harvest. Anyhow, we drive slow, lumber along, and feel like pioneers exploring new ground. We are lucky enough to have paved roads, and don’t have to ferry across the myriad of rivers, creeks, streams and marshes that we’ve seen everywhere we go.
Tonight we are spending the night in Hocking Hills country, a state park. We are looking for Locust Grove Cemetery, where several Cramblit and Dunkle family members are buried. Luckily one of the men working here at the campground knows where it is, because it’s an old, out of the way church and cemetery. It’s been raining for the past two days, but hopefully it will be more clear tomorrow, and we can look around the cemetery. I’d like to visit some of the caves here in the park, too.
Speaking of rain, I’m working on a unique corral that we can attach to the roof of the motorhome. I figure that when we leave this area, if I use that energy vortex from Niagara Falls that seems to be following me, (I keep getting turned around!) I can draw some of the clouds into the corral and since we drive so slow, we can trick them into following us home. So, expect some rain in AZ along the end of May. If you see a motorhome with a big black cloud above it, heading west, you’ll know it’s us!
We found the cemetery, and even though it wasn't raining while we were there, the grass was soaked, and within a few minutes so were we. We found the headstones for the Cramblits!! That was pretty neat to see, 2 couples, each with a large headstone or pillar to mark their last resting place. I went to the courthouse, and found more records there too. I'm pretty happy with the results of our research already, and we have another week in Ohio. Mom is being very patient with my obsession- at least we are looking for her family too, that helps peak her interest. I'm exhausted at the end of each day, but happy about the results. Oh, it's raining yet again, for the past couple hours. No wonder it's so green here, it rarely has pure, unadulterated sunshine. We're getting homesick for the great southwest!
Yesterday we spent the day in the John McIntire Library in Zanesville, OH. We found a lot of books with records of Cramblits and Dunkles, I don’t know how many are direct relatives, but I took pictures of all the records I could, and typed in the rest in my genealogy research packets. Zanesville is a really pretty town, with several large stone or brick churches, built in the late 1800’s. It is at the confluence of the Licking and Muskingam Rivers, and has a really cool Y-shaped bridge across both rivers that is quite unique. We stayed at Wolfie’s Campground, it’s a great RV park just out of town.
As we were driving in to the library, we saw a livestock auction, and I had a really hard time pulling Mom away from there. I said “No, we can’t buy chickens or a calf here, and drag them all the way across the country!” She said she just wanted to look, she wouldn’t buy anything. She smiled, “I just like the smells!” However, I’ve been the recipient of several dogs, chickens and sundry critters that came home with her from the livestock auction in Colorado, so I wasn’t taking any chances! I’m not sharing space with one of her finds!
I tease Mom a lot, but I’ll tell you, she is amazing. She’s 75 and can park this rig anywhere. She handles all the plumbing, water, gas, everything necessary to keep it running. This morning I was unhooking the sewer pipe when the end split-it’s a flexible tubing. Mom pulled out her tool kit and went to work. I jumped in and we took the working ends off the tubing and attached it to new tubing, now we have a good-as-new set up.
Today we drove from Zanesville down through Ohio hill country. It is all backroads, little two lane affairs with only local traffic. We’ve seen lots of farmland, with big beautiful barns. Many of them have cattle, with newborn calves scampering near their mommas. I was driving today, and as we lumbered down the road, with our bed on board, I imagined us as a Conestoga wagon, pioneers in a new land. Every field in this area had to be cleared of trees and brush, and most of them were done by hand in the 1800’s. The Amish still use horses and plows, but the original farmers used them too, with wagons to bring in the wood, and the harvest. Anyhow, we drive slow, lumber along, and feel like pioneers exploring new ground. We are lucky enough to have paved roads, and don’t have to ferry across the myriad of rivers, creeks, streams and marshes that we’ve seen everywhere we go.
Tonight we are spending the night in Hocking Hills country, a state park. We are looking for Locust Grove Cemetery, where several Cramblit and Dunkle family members are buried. Luckily one of the men working here at the campground knows where it is, because it’s an old, out of the way church and cemetery. It’s been raining for the past two days, but hopefully it will be more clear tomorrow, and we can look around the cemetery. I’d like to visit some of the caves here in the park, too.
Speaking of rain, I’m working on a unique corral that we can attach to the roof of the motorhome. I figure that when we leave this area, if I use that energy vortex from Niagara Falls that seems to be following me, (I keep getting turned around!) I can draw some of the clouds into the corral and since we drive so slow, we can trick them into following us home. So, expect some rain in AZ along the end of May. If you see a motorhome with a big black cloud above it, heading west, you’ll know it’s us!
We found the cemetery, and even though it wasn't raining while we were there, the grass was soaked, and within a few minutes so were we. We found the headstones for the Cramblits!! That was pretty neat to see, 2 couples, each with a large headstone or pillar to mark their last resting place. I went to the courthouse, and found more records there too. I'm pretty happy with the results of our research already, and we have another week in Ohio. Mom is being very patient with my obsession- at least we are looking for her family too, that helps peak her interest. I'm exhausted at the end of each day, but happy about the results. Oh, it's raining yet again, for the past couple hours. No wonder it's so green here, it rarely has pure, unadulterated sunshine. We're getting homesick for the great southwest!
Tuesday, May 6, 2008
Pennsylvania, Ohio OHMY
Yesterday we cruised down the highway along Lake Erie for many miles. We left Niagara Falls, of course we got turned around one more time before we could get away, but it was relatively painless. I tell ya, there's an energy vortex there, sucks you back in...
We dropped into western PA, after we stopped on the beach of Lake Erie. It was a nature preserve, and had a nice boardwalk out to the beach. It was a nice sandy beach, but it had a big pile of debris about 10 foot tall. It was hard to overlook, and as I walked by, I thought there was a lot of crud that had washed on shore. Then I looked closer, and realized there was snow under the dirt crust. 10 feet of snow on the beach! It had been scooped up into a big pile, dirt, leaves and all. That really brought home to me how cold it had been, and I had a flash of what the shore had looked like just a few weeks before. As I walked down to the water, I could see the far shoreline, and realized I was again looking at Canada across the water. It was pretty cool.
We spent the night somewhere in PA. I found a State Park on a lake, and we stopped there for a couple hours. The Canadian geese were flying north just overhead. A few landed on the lake, and we enjoyed watching them skimming the surface, honking at their friends. It was like they were calling for the rest to join them. I realized again how much I missed the geese and other birds flying over us in Colorado. It was a regular event, spring and fall, the geese would fly in formation as they moved back and forth across the continent. We lived a couple miles north of the Colorado river, and the geese would stop there as they traveled. When they started honking, often our geese would honk back, and look like they wanted to take off with the wild bunch.
Today we drove through Ohio Amish country. We drove into Walnut Creek, looking for a good restaurant and a place to park. We found a parking lot, adjacent to 3 horse-and-carriages, parked in their own spot. The grocery store had a place on the side of it that said "Carriage parking only", with horse poo splatted on the pavement as proof! An Amish couple climbed out of their carriage and walked down the street. I had my camera, but suddenly felt it would be invasive to take their picture without permission. I got a few shots of the horses, and once the couple were at the end of the driveway, facing away from me, I took a picture of the horses with them in the background. I bet it gets old to be the focus of all the tourists every day, but the people I met didn't seem to mind much.
We had lunch at an Amish restaurant, and pie; I had chocolate cream, Mom had strawberry, before we drove on down the road. We also found a cheese factory, where they use locally produced milk. It was all Amish-run, wonderfully organic cheese and other items. There were horse-drawn carriages running up and down the roads, squeezed against the side by all the cars and trucks whizzing by. I saw teens driving most of the time, seemingly unfazed by the masses of cars on the road. The farms are immaculate, with great big barns. We saw a man plowing a field with a draft horse, it was pretty cool.
Tonight we are in Zanesville, OH. Mom's getting an oil change at the local Ford dealer tomorrow, and I'm dragging her to the local library and maybe to the courthouse to check for records. My Grandma was a Cramblit, and her great-grandfather lived in this county for years, from 1830-1850's, so I want to see what kind of genealogy records I can find. I'm in full genealogy mode now, and hope to find some interesting things while we're here.
We dropped into western PA, after we stopped on the beach of Lake Erie. It was a nature preserve, and had a nice boardwalk out to the beach. It was a nice sandy beach, but it had a big pile of debris about 10 foot tall. It was hard to overlook, and as I walked by, I thought there was a lot of crud that had washed on shore. Then I looked closer, and realized there was snow under the dirt crust. 10 feet of snow on the beach! It had been scooped up into a big pile, dirt, leaves and all. That really brought home to me how cold it had been, and I had a flash of what the shore had looked like just a few weeks before. As I walked down to the water, I could see the far shoreline, and realized I was again looking at Canada across the water. It was pretty cool.
We spent the night somewhere in PA. I found a State Park on a lake, and we stopped there for a couple hours. The Canadian geese were flying north just overhead. A few landed on the lake, and we enjoyed watching them skimming the surface, honking at their friends. It was like they were calling for the rest to join them. I realized again how much I missed the geese and other birds flying over us in Colorado. It was a regular event, spring and fall, the geese would fly in formation as they moved back and forth across the continent. We lived a couple miles north of the Colorado river, and the geese would stop there as they traveled. When they started honking, often our geese would honk back, and look like they wanted to take off with the wild bunch.
Today we drove through Ohio Amish country. We drove into Walnut Creek, looking for a good restaurant and a place to park. We found a parking lot, adjacent to 3 horse-and-carriages, parked in their own spot. The grocery store had a place on the side of it that said "Carriage parking only", with horse poo splatted on the pavement as proof! An Amish couple climbed out of their carriage and walked down the street. I had my camera, but suddenly felt it would be invasive to take their picture without permission. I got a few shots of the horses, and once the couple were at the end of the driveway, facing away from me, I took a picture of the horses with them in the background. I bet it gets old to be the focus of all the tourists every day, but the people I met didn't seem to mind much.
We had lunch at an Amish restaurant, and pie; I had chocolate cream, Mom had strawberry, before we drove on down the road. We also found a cheese factory, where they use locally produced milk. It was all Amish-run, wonderfully organic cheese and other items. There were horse-drawn carriages running up and down the roads, squeezed against the side by all the cars and trucks whizzing by. I saw teens driving most of the time, seemingly unfazed by the masses of cars on the road. The farms are immaculate, with great big barns. We saw a man plowing a field with a draft horse, it was pretty cool.
Tonight we are in Zanesville, OH. Mom's getting an oil change at the local Ford dealer tomorrow, and I'm dragging her to the local library and maybe to the courthouse to check for records. My Grandma was a Cramblit, and her great-grandfather lived in this county for years, from 1830-1850's, so I want to see what kind of genealogy records I can find. I'm in full genealogy mode now, and hope to find some interesting things while we're here.
Sunday, May 4, 2008
FYI
Just a note to everyone- I've tried responding to emails, but sometimes my emails will not go out, so please don't think I'm being rude. I will keep trying to reply to emails, but if you don't hear from me, at least you know why. Elaine
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