How many ancestors have you met?

Thanks to Randy Seaver for this Saturday night's blog idea.
How many ancestors have I met? Well, let's see...

1) Arlene Guinee Wozniak Turnbull, my beloved mother whom I have written about many times on this blog, lived most of her life here in the Chicago land area until she retired. She then traveled the country and spent her winters as a "snowbird" in Arizona!
2) Norbert Wozniak, father, lived in the Chicago land area until he retired then he moved to Shelbyville, IL. He died shortly after he retired.
3) Lucille Hanaway Guinee, my grandmother, born in Indiana, lived in the Chicago land area after her marriage to Bert Guinee, and later lived in Arkansas until her death in 1998.
4) Bert Guinee, grandfather. Unfortunately, I only knew who my grandfather was, I did not have any kind of relationship with him. I have heard many wonderful stories from my cousins!
5) Stephen Wozniak, grandfather. Lived in the Chicago land area. Died in 1959 in Oak Lawn, IL. I have one precious picture of my grandfather that I cherish!
6) Cecelia Sawicki Wozniak, grandmother. Lived in the Chicago land area for many years.
7) John Guinee, great grandfather, died in 1972 when I was a teenager.
8) Alma Ball Guinee, great grandmother, died in 1963 when I was only eight years old.

My mother had one sister and two brothers, one of whom is still very much alive. I have a lot of first cousins and many of us still live close to each other and still get together. My other cousins and I still keep in touch.
I have been lucky to know all of my grandmother Lucy Guinee's siblings, and there were eight of them! My great Aunt Berniece is still alive and wonderful! I have tons of cousins from the Hanaway family tree!
I also knew my father's sister and brother. My aunt is still alive. I still occasionally hear from her and her family which is terrific!

So, I consider myself pretty lucky to have known these ancestors. Sure wish I had known more of my great grandparents but times were very hard in the mid 20th century. I have a couple of pictures and hope to discover more!

Wordless Wednesday....the Mother-In-Laws!

The Mother-in-Laws...

Alma Guinee & Eva Hanaway

8-31-1930

Digital Photo owned by P. Taylor

Wordless Wednesday (almost wordless)

Arlene Marie Guinee

Holy Communion picture

Taken about 1940

Photo owned by P. Taylor (address private)

Mother's Day, 2008

Lucille Hanaway Guinee

1912-1998

Yesterday would have been my grandmother Lucy's 96th birthday! I am very fortunate to have MANY wonderful memories of my grandmother. My mother, sisters and I grew up less than five miles away from her home. After church on some Sunday's we went to her home where we enjoyed a fried chicken dinner, homemade mashed potatos, sweet corn, salad-with her own homemade oil and vinegar dressing and of course dessert--homemade chocolate cake and chocolate frosting. I can still see the blue metal cake saver sitting on top of the cart in her small breezeway kitchen. My mother and grandmother would chat with each other while my sisters and I went to the park or played outside.

On most Sundays though, we went out to visit our relatives in Indiana. My grandmother Lucy was born and raised in Indiana and that is where even to this day, most of my relatives live. We would travel to Gary, Crown Point, and Hebron visiting my Aunt Mabel, Aunt Toots, Aunt Berniece, Uncle Homer, Uncle Jim, and my grandmothers other siblings and all their families. There are a lot of relatives in Indiana! Many of my relatives were farmers so this "city girl" loved the "country". I loved playing in the barn, swinging on the truck tire swing, running in the crops, getting close (but not too close!) to the farm animals. Little did I know how much those visits would mean to me someday!

So, to my grandmother, my beloved mother, my many aunts, my sister, thank you for the memories! Thank you for being terrific role models of mothers! Happy Mother's Day!

Here's the story, of a lovely lady......

In order to be "fair", I will share another story about a different ancestor. This time the story will be about my great grandmother Alma Guinee. I have no recollection of Great Grandmother Alma, she died when I was about eight years old. However, my grandmother Lucy shared the following story with my family when we asked questions about her. Here's how I remember the story....
Sometime after the turn of the 20th century, most likely between 1900-1906, Alma joined a circus, or a vaudeville show, or even perhaps Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show! (This story is very sketchy). She was only a teenager at the time. She may have traveled around the Midwest area with whatever show she was involved with. My grandmother Lucy told me Alma used the stage name of "Beatrice Arnold", which other relatives have also indicated to be true. In fact, people referred to her as "Bea". The story goes on to say that she performed song/dance routines and may have ridden a horse in whatever show she was in. According to my grandmother Lucy, Alma was actually a very good bareback rider. Apparently Alma very much enjoyed working as a performer and may have even had her picture on the cover of a playbill! (In the late 1930's or early 1940's, one of my cousins recalls her performing a song/dance routine for him to the song of "Shuffle off to Buffalo")
That's it. That's all I have of the story passed down to me. What parts are fact and fiction I do not know. How exciting as a child to think you might actually be related to someone in the circus or who may have really known Buffalo Bill! There are rumors that one of my cousins may actually have a copy of that playbill that Alma was privileged to be on the cover. I have yet to discover who may have it. As time goes by, my chances of getting a copy of that "playbill" may get smaller and smaller. My hope doesn't die though and my itch to find out more continues to grow.
I have been in contact with the Circus Museum in Baraboo, Wisconsin, unfortunately they have no record of a "Beatrice Arnold" working for the circus. Recently I have written to the Buffalo Bill Historical Society in the hope that perhaps they have copies of the shows' playbills. I do not have any personal pictures of Alma and I together. The few pictures I have however, do show a very lovely lady!

Out in the internet world

Yesterday I used my Rollyo search engine and typed in the name "Guinee". I was looking through my "hits" and ran across a new entry posted on Rootsweb.com. Upon reading it, I discovered what I hoped would be a connection and contacted the author of the post. I was wondering if she could give me some additional information about Charles Guinee's wife-Carol. She responded and provided me with Carol's parents' names and some of their family history! Lucky me. Although the author Laura and I are not related it was interesting to see our connection through my great uncle and his wife Carol. Little tidbits of information may not seem like much, but you must keep looking for them, gathering them, and putting them all on your tree. You never know when you will contact someone who is a distant cousin!

Great Grandparents Alma and John Guinee

For the last year now I have been seriously working on obtaining some accurate information on my Great Grandparents Alma and John Guinee. Alma had been married since 1906 to Philip Hirschberg and they had four children. In May, 1918, she married John Guinee. An interesting fact came to my attention when I requested the divorce records for Philip and Alma. The County Clerk could only provide me with annullment papers, dated 1920! Apparently the annullment became legal the end of 1921. How was Alma able to marry John if she was still legally married to Philip? I would like to know the answer to that question.
According to the annullment papers, Philip had been previously married and recently divorced when he married Alma. In those divorce papers he was unable to marry for one year, unless he remarried his first wife. Imagine that? Perhaps that was the legal loophole which allowed Alma to marry John. I am attempting to obtain Philip's divorce papers from his first wife.
Vital records are important documents to request if they are available. They give concrete evidence to relationships and important facts and dates. Sometimes they can be costly, but they are worth the time and effort in obtaining them.