For 2023, I’m writing responses to the 52 Ancestors in 52 Days prompts provided by Amy Johnson Crow on her ”Generations Café” website and Facebook page.
As many of you have acknowledged, it’s hard to select just one favorite photo. I have a lot of photos that I like for various reasons. But I chose to write about this photo today because it provided a window into a large family that I don’t have many photos of.
I found this photo among my parents’ things after my mother died in 2012. It wasn’t labeled, so I had to do some detective work to figure out who was who. I recognized my grandfather (on the right in the second row) and extrapolated from that to identify everyone else. I’m not 100% sure about some of these folks, but I think I have most of them right.
This photo was taken sometime between 1912 and 1915. My grandfather John (the youngest sibling) was born in 1995, and he looks like he’s in his late teens in this photo. My great-grandmother, Angelina, died in 1915. John married Orpha Ellefritz in 1916.
I like several things about this photo.
First, the fact that the family decided to take a family photo at a time when that was not a casual undertaking means that they valued their family and wanted other people to know about them.
Second, I realize that my father more closely resembled his grandfather than anyone else in the family. My father’s face was long and thin, like his grandfather’s in this photo. My father would have known his grandfather (my father was born in 1918 and Warner lived until 1938 and they all lived in Hancock County, Illinois) and I wish I had asked my father about this photo. All but one of my grandfather’s siblings in this photo lived into the 1950s or 1960s; I don’t think I ever met any of them, because my parents had moved to Virginia after World War II and all of these family members remained in either Illinois/Iowa or Arizona.
Third, I like this photo because it connects me to my second great-grandfather Miles Arnold (Warner’s father). Miles served in the Civil War and lived until 1899; all of the people in this photo would have known him and would likely have heard his stories. That includes my grandfather John, although he would have been only four years old when his grandfather died and might not have remembered him.
Fourth, I realized that my grandfather was a handsome young man. Here’s a closer look at him.
I didn’t know him until the 1950s, when (to my mind) he was an old man who just looked like an old man to me. The picture below shows what he looked like in the early 1950s. I realize now how young he actually was at this point – probably only in his late 50s. He died in 1957 at the age of 62.
Thanks! It’s all just very interesting.
I was struck by the young man, second from top right. Although this was obviously well staged and a unique photo undertaking, only this young man had a very starched collar and perfectly tied tie. Other men had no ties or loosely fit ones as if not usually worn. So there must be something unique about my guy. Any ideas??