Same Name

Naming is such a huge responsibility. When you name a child that name will more than likely stick for the rest of their life. Are you giving them the right name? Is this a name that will cause other people especially children will taunt them? I think about students I taught and think what their parents was thinking when they named this child. Just like Johnny Cash singing about a boy named Sue I remember a young man named Lynn. How many times did this great kid have to fight about his name?

Then there’s the confusion of naming a child after a family member. Among my relatives three generations named Charles Shoemaker Moore. This caused some family squabbles when my aunt wanted my parent’s future son named Charles Shoemaker Moore. My mom put her foot down saying he would not have the name Shoemaker It was baseball season and my dad said if it was a boy he would name him Terry Moore after the manager of the Phillies baseball team. As luck would have it my brother was prematurely born shortly after this squabble and so Terry Charles Moore was the name he was given.

Other same name relatives had found ways to differentiate who you were talking to or referring about. So, we had Big John and Little John (shades of Robing Hood), Big Helen and Little Helen, Big Margaretta and Baby Margaretta (awkward when she was a teenager).

My husband’s family penchant for the name William causes so much trouble when referring to one of them. My husband William is named for his father William and named his first-born son William.  Both of his grandfathers are named William. Two of his three known great grandfathers are named William. His sister married a William and has a son William. His mother’s brother is named William and he has a son and grandson William. I suspect there are more Williams lurking in the family tree.

#52 Ancestors, #52 Ancestors 2020, #Same name, #Charles Moore, #William Baker

Close to Home

Traveling far from home is a relatively modern event for average people. My great grandmother, Sarah Corset Wiedrich was born in 1868 in Genesee County, NY. Like most people of her era she rarely would have traveled more that twenty or so miles from her home. She was in her 80s before she went any farther. We would visit her every August while I was growing up. I was not much more than a toddler when she went with us to Niagara Falls. It was just over 50 miles from her home, and this was her first visit. Later, when my grandparents had moved to Florida she traveled there to visit with them. For an average person born in 1868 who would have imaged traveling from western New York state to Florida. Today we go vast distances and think nothing of it. People fly a thousand miles just for the weekend.

#52 Ancestors, #52 Ancestors 2020, #52 Ancestors Close to Home, #Sarah Wiedrich, #Sarah Corset

Far Away

I was lucky enough to have some aunts, uncles and cousins within two hours of where we lived when I was growing up. We got together regularly. Aunt Margaretta and Uncle Roy lived in the Belle Meade area in North Jersey, about two hours away. Aunt Helen and Uncle John lived in Egg Harbor, New Jersey, about 40 minutes away. At least once a month we would visit, usually going up on Saturday and coming home on Sunday. The family interactions were great.

But I truly missed having a grandparent close by. My dad’s parents were dead. My mom’s parents, Hazel and Edward Wiedrich lived in Tampa Florida. We would only see them once every one or two years. There were some phone calls but that was the days of long-distance telephone charges. Letters would be sent. I wish they were saved to cherish later. When you did get together everyone was on their best behavior. I remember my mom telling me she asked my grandmother not to yell at the antics of my cousins and us as she didn’t want us to remember her as grouchy. Of course, she wasn’t grouchy, just with so many of us all together in one house it could be unnerving. You see, my grandparents lived in an eighteenth-century Florida house. Downstairs were my grandparents and Aunt Yvonne. Upstairs were my Aunt Connie and Uncle George with their children – three when we were young and three more later. Add to that other visitors were not unusual, sometimes adding up to a dozen or more people all under one roof.

I thought my dream came true when I went to live with my grandmother after high school in order to go to college in Tampa. We did many things together and those times were special, but some many other things interfered. First of course I was homesick. Also, my Aunt Yvonne had a drinking problem, which made living there difficult. She would wake me up in the middle of the night to tell me the astronauts were causing bad weather (I was studying astronautical engineering) and doing embarrassing things when someone came to visit. Eventually it was too much and my mom wouldn’t let me take out a loan to live on campus, so I came home. The worse part was the day I left my grandmother said, “What will I tell my friends? My granddaughter doesn’t love me.” I know she still loved me, but I disappointed her. The pain of that statement has never left me. Perhaps being far away would have been less hurtful.

#52 Ancestors, #52 Ancestors 2020, #Hazel Wiedrich, #First time away from home