Tag: wellock

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Finding Agnes Symson (1653 – 1702)

frontispiece of the Parish Registers of Linton-in-Craven, published by the Yorkshire Parish Register Society in two volumes in 1900 & 1903. Many of the earlier volumes, these included, are available online at www.archive.org.

There are so many reasons to be proud and grateful for being born a Yorkshire lass and whilst I suspect that there aren’t many people who would put the Yorkshire Parish Register Society on that list they have proved absolute gold dust in helping evidence the depth of our Yorkshire roots.

Founded in 1899 the aim of the Yorkshire Parish Register Society was to transcribe and publish at least one volume of an original parish register every year (complete with indices, an absolute godsend). It came as no surprise to discover that the first volume concerned St Michael-Le-Belfrey, possible the primary church in York (minster excluded). As the introduction explains:

“The City of York is rich in Churches, and consequently in Parish Registers also. These cannot fail to be interesting to a large number of Yorkshiremen, because many of our County families sprang from amongst its citizens, and many of the junior members of other families of distinction, in the country, were brought up and followed their professions or callings here. As the capital of the north, also, York was the resort of many persons in the highest stations of life, from all parts of the Kingdom, so there can be no town in the county, and perhaps in the Kingdom, London excepted, in which the Parish Registers can equal, in interest, those of York”. Yet these parish registers are the most egalitarian of history books recording rich & poor, men, women & infants alike (almost, as mothers are for more rarely referenced) allowing us to trace, recognise and amplify our ancestors whatever their station and gender. The single mention in a parish register of of “Wid Swinden, pauper”, my 7x great grandmother even inspired a poem. Given our ancestors were agricultural labourers, tenants of a few acres or a yeoman at best there is little evidence of their existence. We were rarely poor enough to require a record of relief and never wealthy enough to for others to write about. Yet the parish registers have enabled me to trace several lines deep into the 17th & even 16th centuries.

St Michaels & All Angels Church, Linton-in-Craven. Own photo. The church dates back to the twelfth century. It’s hard to explain the surety of place that those of us with deep roots in rural Yorkshire parishes can feel. I can be fairly certain my ancestors saw this church being built.

Volume V (published 1900) & XVIII (published 1903) concerned the parish of St Michael’s & All Angels Church, Linton in Craven, faithfully transcribed in two parts by the Rev. F. A. C. Share. M. A. then rector of Linton. Thanks to the Rev. Share (and at least one other Wellock descendent) I have long since been able to trace my Wellock line back 450 years to one Robert Wellock, father of William Wellock, who was baptised his son in this very church in 1574.

This is where Agnes Symson, our 8xg grandmother crops up, apparently apparating into the parish of Linton-in-Craven, just in time for her marriage to George Wellock (Wallocke) on 28 April 1674. Whilst the Wellocks are well documented, their wives haven’t been accorded the same attention. In reviewing the original record, I was struck by one simple phrase “both of this parish.”

The hunt was on.

the first appearance of Agnes Symson in the Yorkshire Parish Register Society transcripts of the Linton-in-Craven parish registers.

Reviewing the registers suggested two possible candidates for her father, James “of Garneshaw” and Robert “of Hebden Moor.” Fortunately Robert was quickly eliminated as “Agnes the Dau : of Robert Symson of Hebden Moor side baptized the same day, viz: 6to March [1663/1664]” would not have been old enough to marry in 1674 and ensured that Robert would not have had an older Agnes, at least not one who survived childhood. (As an aside, I am reasonably confident that Robert & James must have been brothers with a mother named Agnes as it was not that common a name.)

I also knew that Agnes & George were also described as “of Garneshaw” in their children’s baptisms. This was looking promising.

James appears numerous times in the register: in 1639 when he married Isabel Rathmell and in 1651 when Isabel is buried, in the baptisms of Margaret (1640), William (1645), Ann (1646), Thomas (1656) and Mary (1662), in the burials of William (1646), John & Mary (twins buried in 1651) and John (1661) (where he is named as father) and of his second wife Mary (1681) as well as his own burial on 18 November 1684. If James was such a regular attender of church (at least so far as baptisms, marriages and burials were concerned) why why was there no baptism for Agnes?

This is where I am again grateful to Rev. Share[1] for his commitment to the task at hand extracting every last detail he could where records were in poor condition. I was struck by the following two entries.

…ghter of James Symson……in ye townshippe….borne ye last day of December, baptized ye 80 of January following [1653/1654]

[here follow. fragments of about a dozen baptisms ; only these Christian names are left, viz. : Margret, Elizabeth, Thomas, Agnes, Henry, and Isabell.] Wm Perte of Griston Hall yeat b…..d ye..th day of March. A……of….Knight…..rneshaw was borne the ….day of March 55 [sic]………[follows on from 4 October] [1655/1656]

Despite the obvious connection between “Agnes” and “rneshaw” I felt confident in ruling out the second entry as James’s son Thomas was born on 4 June 1656. Which left me with “…ghter of James Symson.” This had to be Agnes.  

Here then, courtesy of Rev Share and the Yorkshire Parish Register Society, is Agnes’s story.

Agnes Symson was born on 31 December 1653, a non-momentous day for most in that age, as the calendar was not to change for another century. Momentous though for her mother, Mary, being the safe delivery of her first child. James, on the other hand, was doubtless hoping for a boy. Isabel, his first wife, had given birth to five children, Margaret (b. 1640), William (b. 1646), Ann (b. 1646) and then twins, John & Mary in 1651, but William & the twins had died as infants, the birth of the twins likely resulting in the death of their mother (Isabel was buried on 4 May, the twins were baptised on 11 May and buried on 17 December the same year).

Husbandry in these parts was not without challenges as these wonderful two entries illustrate: “Robert Holdgate of Garneshaw who was lost by a tempest of snow that fell the 3 day of January att night was found the 10th and buried the 11th day of the said January [1659/1660]” and “Septembr 17th 1673 happened a great fflood wch overflowing the Banke in the lower end of the Churchyard covered the most pt thereof below the Church. Burnesall bridge & Bolton Bridge & many more were driven downe by the violence of said fflood”. I’ve written before about Yorkshire snow, this can be a bleak and unforgiving landscape.  

By 1674, James was getting on in life, likely in his late fifties or early sixties. Thomas, the only son James had not seen buried as a child, was still only 18, too young to take over the land. Agnes, then 20, may have been anxious when she shared the news of her forthcoming pregnancy, but, in reality, this must have been seen as a blessing. George Wellock, 26, was the third son of a local farmer, trained from birth to run a similarly placed smallholding but without a tenancy to inherit.

So it was that Agnes & George started a Wellock connection with Garnshaw which, with some gaps, was to last over 200 years.

Agnes & George had four children: Robert (b. 1674) (Robert was baptised in August 1674, four months after the couple were married), Isabella (b. 1676) (named after James’s first wife?), Anne (b. 1683) and William (b. 1685) (our ancestor). The couple must have felt secure. Sadly, this was not to prove the case. George died in November 1694, leaving Agnes with four children aged between 9 & 20. It looks like Robert, then 20, may have been the one to take on the tenancy. Possible, not easy. Possible that is, until Robert, then aged 28, died in 1702, buried on 18 June in St Michael’s & All Angels churchyard. Agnes, then living nearby in Grassington, may well have come to tend her eldest son through illness, for she died and was buried just three days after Robert thus ending Agnes’s tale.

the last appearance of Agnes in the Yorkshire Parish Register Society transcripts of the Linton-in-Craven parish registers

[1] Harry Speight in his book Upper Wharfedale, describes the Rev Share thus “Of Mr Share’s labours in the parish little now need be said. He is a hard and zealous worker, and I believe has never missed preaching a single Sunday since his induction to the living in October 1891. The industrious rector appears quite content with the 13,000 and odd acres of ground within his parish, and has sought no holiday nor other means of recreation than what this large expanse of mountain, moor, and pasture afford. He has lately copied for publication by the Yorkshire Parish Register Society, the important but ill-kept and in places much tattered registers of his parish, a work requiring the closes scrutiny and painstaking transcription”.

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The naming of our grandparents

My siblings & I have never quite agreed how to spell Grandpy (my mum’s dad). Is it Grandpy, Grampy or Granpy?

It seems, from recent consumer research into the names we Brits call our grandparents, that Grampy is now the more popular. Whilst I may have to concede Grampy is, in fact, a legitimate spelling, he’ll always remain Grandpy to me! Reading the research further I discovered that Grampy is particularly popular in Wales and the South West and my curiosity was piqued for Grandpy’s own great grandparents, Elizabeth Prout and Thomas Barrett, were born in Pembrokeshire and Gloucestershire, respectively. Could the name have echoes of distant ancestors? And what other grandparent names have we used in our family?

My sister Anna’s christening in 1979 taken in the garden at Hill Top Cottage, Lindley. From right to left, back row: Grandpy & Grandad, middle row: Mum, Grandma & Nana, front row: me, Helen & Anna. Own collection.

I was the first grandchild on both sides, so Mum was able to decide what our grandparents would be called. She had a Nan & a Grandma herself so decided on Nana instead for her mum. Grandpy was not, sadly, a historic echo but rather chosen simply as a name which was different and more fun. (As an aside Nana’s sister, Hilda, became Gam, which I also love). Mum’s relationship with her in-laws was undoubtably more formal and she avoided calling her in-laws by any name until I was born when she could refer to them as Grandma and Grandad. My nieces and nephews know Mum as Gran (as Nana will always be Nana, and Nan felt far too old), Dad as Grandad Bob and Mum’s husband as Papa Joe (of Charlie and the Chocolate factory fame).

An extract from Mary Wellock’s date book showing use of “Granma Barrett” to describe Jane Brooks. Own collection.

Mum’s grandparents were Nan & Grandad Booth (Marion Moody & Arthur Booth) and Grandma & Grandad Barrett (Mary Wellock & George Thomas Barrett). Grandpy, in turn, called his own Barrett grandparents Granma & Grandad Barrett (Jane Brooks and Henry Barrett), demonstrating conclusively that the name Grandpy did not pass from our Welsh forebears.  

An extract from Grandma’s memoires “The Changing Years” referencing Grannie Houseman and Grandad Michael. Own collection.

Dad only really knew two of his grandparents. According to my uncle, my grandad’s mum (Mary Abigail Clapham) was Grandma and my grandma’s dad (Jesse Houseman) was Grandad. As there were only two grandparents, there was fortunately no need to add a surname. Fortunate as confusingly both would have been Houseman! Grandma always called her own parents Mother & Dad, perhaps reflecting their respective family status which is also seen in how she referred to her own grandparents. Her father’s parents were Grannie Houseman & Grandad Michael (Amelia Bradbury & Michael Houseman) and her maternal grandmother was simply Grandma (Maria Reynard) “a refined lady.” Strangely there is no note in Grandma’s memoires of her maternal grandfather, John Scott. He had died just before Grandma was born so she never knew him, yet her other grandfather, Michael, had died almost thirty years earlier and he was still warrented a mention.

With seven Grandads, a Grandpy and a Papa, four Grandmas, a Gran, a Granma, a Grannie, a Nan and a Nana in our family we seem to mirror the modern research. Whilst 68% of men are known as Grandad the women show more diversity with Nan coming in at 33%, Grandma 32% and Nana 24%. Once again, I am grateful to Mum for choosing a more unusual option as a name!

With much gratitude to my grandparents for all their love and to Amy Johnson Crow whose 52 ancestors in 52 weeks challenge encouraged me to publish this series of stories.

Infographic presenting the main research findings on what we call our grandparents, from the original press release.

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Mary Wellock’s life in a birthday book

Left behind. Mary Wellock & her brother Benjamin at Toft Gate in 1912. Own collection.

Mary Wellock’s birthday book is a treasure trove of genealogical information containing birthdays (plus some marriages, death & burial information) of more than sixty of Mary’s relatives. Yet what makes the book really special is what it tells us about Mary herself. A couple of weeks ago I wrote of what the book taught me about her friends and the impact of WW1 on this generation. Now I want to turn to Mary’s close relationship with her brothers in particular which oozes out of the pages.

Mary was my great grandmother, mother of my Grandpy. Born in 1886 she was the tenth child of eleven. Sadly, Mary’s younger brother Hornby had died when she was just six effectively making Mary the baby of the family from that point. There’s more background on the Wellock family in this blog.

Mary (Pollie) Wellock’s birthday book. Own photo.

The book itself is small (11cm by 8cm) and falling to pieces. There are indications that it was purchased second hand, owned first by a Nellie Hood. It was January 1907 and two of Mary’s closest brothers by age, David & Major, were preparing to emigrate to Canada. Was it a goodbye gift or did the twenty-year-old Mary buy it for herself to keep a record of her family? Mary’s beautiful handwriting helps to identify the first entries which are for parents, siblings, nieces & nephews plus the odd uncle & aunt. The most poignant of these are those of her two brothers, Richard & Hornby, who had both died in childhood.

Figure 71: the page recording the birthday and death date of Hornby Wellock, Mary’s younger brother who had died a few years before the book was started, and of her brother-in-law William Henry (Willie) Barrett who sadly also died young. Own collection.

At the front Mary records a few further red-letter dates, dates such as house moves and winning 1st prize for her butter making at the Yorkshire Show for her butter making. Topping and tailing these were her two brothers’ emigration “David & Major sailed for Canada March 15th 1907. Arrived at St Johns March 28 1907. Major sailed back for Canada Feb 17th 1911” and a final return holiday of one in 1949. “Major & Violet came on holiday July to Sept 1949.” It is these pages where her love for her brothers’ truly shines through and led to this final photo of Mary with her brother Major and their other surviving siblings back in Yorkshire. (In 2022 I was able to trace David & Major’s life in Estevan with some of their descendents).

the Wellock siblings back row, left to right, Benjamin, Major, “self” (not identified, but possibly Sarah, Benjamin’s wife), Violet (Major’s wife), Jeanette (unsure how relates). Front row Walker, Mary. Gargrave 1949 during Major & Violet’s last trip to Yorkshire. Own collection

I love this worn little book for it contains so much of my Great Grandmother making her so much more real to us. With much gratitude to Mary Wellock for recording that which was important to her about her life, her family & her friends.

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What a birthday date book taught me about WW1

Mary (Pollie) Wellock. Own collection.

I grew up thinking our family had escaped largely unscathed through both WW1 and WW2. Farming was a reserved occupation and none of our ancestors had fought in either of these two horrific wars. Slowly but surely my thinking has changed. First there was my great, great Uncle, William Henry Barrett who fought in WW1 and died of tuberculosis six years after the war ended, possibly a disease caught whilst serving. Then there were two cousins, Harry Clough & Frank White, relatives of my great grandmother, Hilda Mary Scott, both killed in battle. These are the ones I have so far written a story about, but there are others too, cousins & half cousins that I have come across in my research.

Still, it felt like these were isolated incidents. We are farmers & miners. We weren’t required to fight. That was until I started to transcribe my great grandmother (Mary Wellock)’s birthday date book a couple of weeks ago. Mary or Pollie as she liked to be known was my Grandpy’s mother, born in 1886. One of eleven children in a close family I was quickly able to identify the majority of the entries. Pollie had had eight brothers but by 1914, three were likely too old to serve, two had emigrated to Canada and two had died as children, so it was probably easy enough to protect Benjamin who, as he had no children, might just have come under pressure to volunteer, or even been conscripted had he not been a farmer.

I moved on to identifying Pollie’s friends and it was then I realised that one memorial in the remote Yorkshire village of Greenhow Hill, which Pollie called home, was the unlock for many of the people she had recorded as friends. Take a moment to study the names in this photo. (I make no apologies for this being the second time I have shared it on this blog).

Memorial plaque, Greenhow Hill https://greenhow-hill.org.uk/people/1914-1918/

Busfield, Newbould, Swales, Barrett, King & Moor all appear in Mary’s date book. The Whitehead family connects very closely to the Busfields. Mary was close enough to the Swales family to list the birthdays of three siblings Edith Ellen, Ethel & James. James fought and came back, their two brothers Herbert & Leonard were not so lucky, both dying in 1916. Over half the names listed on Greenhow Hill’s memorial can be easily and closely connected to Pollie’s friends identified through this one date book.

James Swales’ birthday as recorded in Pollie Wellock’s birthday date book. His sisters Edith Ellen & Ethel also appear. James fought in WW1 together with his brothers Herbert & Leonard who both died in 1916. Own photo.

Was there a sweetheart amongst the fallen? I tend to think not as Pollie was already 28 and unmarried when war started. If it was a local boy she loved she would have been wed by then. Instead, I’d like to speculate that William Henry’s connection to Greenhow Hill was how she came to meet his brother, George Thomas and that their shared experience of friends & brothers at war led them to connect.

This was a remote farming village where many households worked in protected occupations. No matter how insulated we thought our ancestors were from the war they were not.

With much gratitude to Mary (Pollie) Wellock, who had such a fascinating birthday date book, to her daughter-in-law, Mary Booth, my Nana, who kept it safe for me and above all to those who fought and those who remembered them.

There’s a later blog exploring the rest of the birthday book here

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An almost Yorkshire story – the podcast version

Writing this blog is principally about bringing our ancestors to life in an engaging and accessible way with the hope that their stories get shared and remembered now and in the future. That’s my primary goal, but it’s not my only one. It’s also about me learning to be a better writer, storyteller & communicator. So when Tina offered me the chance to record a podcast interview for waffle-free family stories, I took it.

“We talk about her grandmother’s role in getting her hooked on family trees, how she’s giving life to the women in her story, the horrible accident that led to one child shooting another, and right at the end, she gives you THE BEST conversation ice-breaker you’ll ever know.

In between all that chat, she talks about the tools and techniques she uses to get as close to the real story as possible, and how she plugs the gaps”

I’d say that our family history really is all about wonderful women and that I haven’t quite lost my Yorkshire accent! Avid readers of this blog may notice the odd mix-up I had with names but don’t let that distract from the storytelling.

Here are the links to where you can find out more about the women (and men) I talk about.

How I started

Mary Ann Gill

Elizabeth Furniss & George Downs

Elsie Moody including the photo I used to resemble

Elizabeth Dean and the Butterworth connection

Hannah Demaine, the woman who married twice

Widow paupers including “Wid Swinden”

The Wellocks

Walter Scott, the boy who was shot by his friend

With much gratitude to Tina Konstant, for giving me space on her podcast, and also to Natalie Pithers, who runs the Curious Descendents Club which is how I met Tina & is also where I am learning to write better stories.

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The Wellocks, Toft Gate and the Great Depression of British Agriculture

The family of Mary & Richard Wellock.
Back row L to R: Thomas, Margaret, Walker, Elizabeth. Middle row L to R: David, Major, Front row L to R: Benjamin, Richard (father), Mary, Mary (mother), Richard

This is a story of a family (the Wellocks), their home (Toft Gate on the edge of Greenhow Hill near Pateley Bridge in Yorkshire) and the impact of a little studied economic era on one family’s lives (The Great Depression of British Agriculture).

Before we journey to Yorkshire & study the economics lets meet the family.

Mary (nee Walker) and Richard Wellock were my great, great grandparents. Here they are in my Mum’s favourite ancestor photo taken c. 1893 surrounded by their nine surviving children. My great grandmother, Mary, is the young girl in the middle of the photo with her hands on the legs of her parents. My great, great grandparents, Mary & Richard, look particularly stern and careworn. Their children, clearly in their best clothing, show no hint of a smile.

To understand this photo and learn more about the family we first need to know more about Toft Gate and the Great Agricultural Depression.

Looking out from Toft Gate, Greenhow

Toft Gate is one of those solid old stone Yorkshire Dales farmhouses that is still farmed to this day. You might visit the barn café on a beautiful spring day and idly ponder how wonderful it might be to live there. Until winter kicks in. At 1,300 feet above sea level, Greenhow Hill is “probably” the highest village in Yorkshire. Winters are cold and long with wind rattling over the moor. Work was hard with a fairly straight choice between farming and lead mining. Rudyard Kipling describes it thus:

“Greenhow Hill stands up ower Pately Brig. I reckon you’ve never heeard tell o’ Green-how Hill, but yon bit o’ bare stuff if there was nobbut a white road windin’ is like ut; strangely like. Moors an’ moors an’ moors, wi’ never a tree for shelter, an’ gray houses wi’ flagstone rooves, and pewits cryin’, an’ a windhover goin’ to and fro just like these kites. And cold! A wind that cuts you like a knife. You could tell Green-how Hill folk by the red-apple colour o’ their cheeks an’ nose tips, and their blue eyes, driven into pin-points by the wind. Miners mostly, burrowin’ for lead i’ th’ hillsides, followin’ the trail of th’ ore vein same as a field-rat”.

Nonetheless, Richard’s father, Thomas (my great, great, great grandfather) appears to have been of hardy stock. He took over the lease of the 150 acre farm in the early 1860s, moving in with his second wife, Isabella (nee Preston) and their children, Richard (b. 1844), Agnes (b. 1847), Benjamin Preston (b. 1852) and David (b. 1853).

By then Greenhow Hill was in economic decline. In part this was area specific. The mines, which had been in operation since Roman times, were now deep below the water table, making them far more expensive than newer large open pit operations abroad. One by one between the 1850s and 1890s the mines closed. Some miners shifted to farming, many moved away.   

The Great Depression of British Agriculture was much more widespread. Generally dated from 1873 to 1896 it impacted farmers across Britain. The great prairies in the US & Canada were being opened up. The rise in steamships made transportation of grain, meat, butter and cheese far cheaper, resulting in significant falls in price back in Britain. By 1894 – 1895, prices had reached their lowest levels in 150 years. The arable farms serving Britain’s largest cities suffered the most but it can’t have been without impact on Toft Gate.

Now we can come back to our Wellock family in the photo.  

Richard Wellock was born on 7 April 1844 at Halton Gill. He married Mary Walker (b. 17 April 1845 at Capon Hall, Malham Moor) on 29 May 1866 at St Michaels Church, Linton in Craven. At the time he was working as a farm servant in Bordley. Halton Gill, Malham Moor, Linton-in-Craven and Bordley may all be within twenty miles of each other but they are long distances to walk. Richard & Mary probably only met because Toft Gate produced insufficient income for father and son forcing Richard to look elsewhere for work.

Eleven children rapidly followed: Thomas (b. 1866), Richard (b. 1867), Elizabeth (b. 1870), Margaret (b. 1872), Walker (b. 1874), Richard (b. 1877), David (b. 1879), Major Preston (b. 1882), Benjamin (b. 1884), Mary, my great grandmother (b. 1886) and Hornby (b. 1888).

The first three children were born in Bewerley, Ripon & Litton. By 1871 the family were back with Thomas & Isabella at Toft Gate but described as “staying for a few weeks.” It is likely that Richard had been a farm worker over this time, striving to find either a long term position or his own farm to lease. Then a period of stability. The family moved into Hole Bottom, and then Blazefield both on Hardcastle Moor just a couple of miles away from Toft Gate. Richard was farming at Toft Gate again with his father.

Thomas died on 28 January 1885 and his estate passed to his wife, Isabella. Probate was described as excluding leaseholds and I am curious as to whether this was deliberate. In my family experience, leases were passed from father to son. Yet this was an age of agricultural depression where landlords were desperate for tenants. Whatever the circumstances, Richard, Mary and their family once again moved back into Toft Gate. At the age of 41 Richard finally held the lease of a farm.

Life wasn’t easy – we can see that from the photo in the clothing and the faces of a couple who weren’t yet 50. This is also, more importantly, a photo of a family in mourning. Hornby, the youngest child, succumbed to scarlatina/ scarlet fever in June 1893. Richard & Mary must have gathered the children together seeking a permanent record in case others, too, were lost.

I prefer, however, to see this photo as reflecting the closeness of a family and the start of a dynasty. Each of the remaining nine children lived long lives, reaching an average age of 74. All nine married and seven have surviving descendants, with a surprising frequency of Hornbys amongst them. The continued agricultural depression encouraged David & Major to emigrate to Canada where they rapidly settled in Saskatchewan. The family remained close, with both letters and people crossing the Atlantic for many years. (You can read more on the relationship between the siblings through Mary’s birthday book & a road trip to Estevan)

Mary (my great grandmother and the youngest child in the original photo) married George Thomas Barrett in 1917. They had two children, Henry Wellock Barrett (b. 1918) & Richard Walker Barrett, my Grandpy, (b. 1921) playing tribute to both of Mary’s parents. And later, in 1927, with Richard’s health failing and Mary (mother) having died, Mary & George moved back to Toft Gate. Richard died in 1931 and the family connection with Toft Gate ended when Mary, George & family moved out in 1934 bringing us to the end of this story.

Mary (nee Wellock) and George Thomas Barrett with their two children Henry Wellock (right) and Richard Walker, my Grandpy (left) likely taken shortly after they left Toft Gate.

With much gratitude to Mary & Richard Wellock who, in grief, brought their family together for this photo, to the Greenhow Hill local history group who’s book “Life on the Hill” added a lot of colour to this blog and also to Amy Johnson Crow whose 52 ancestors in 52 weeks encouraged me to publish this story.

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