Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?

Subject: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 16 Feb 02 - 08:25 PM

In the thread that Art Thieme started, "Is It Me?" Katlaughing asked me how I came to write Handful of Songs. The song is really about what each of us has kept to remind us of loved ones who've passed on. For us, we will all leave a "handful of songs" that will be carried on and remembered in our family. The one common quality that people seem to cherish when keeping something that belonged to a family member is that it meant a lot to the person. I kept my Grandfather's hammer, and his old railroad watch. Neither of them worth a plugged nickle on the open market. But, they were a part of who he was.. a modest working man who was always on time. When I've sung the song, people always come up afterward to tell me what they've kept to remember someone they loved. For many of the men remembering their Fathers, it's a tool, a knife or a watch. I have my Mother's bible that her Mother gave to her just before she died on the operating table. A friend of mine keeps a hockey puck on his dresser that his Father caught at a hockey game and gave to him as a little boy. As the song says,

"Some may leave money from a lifetime of savings
Some just their name on a marble stone
It's not what you leave, it's the joy of remembering
And all I can leave you is a handful of songs

Spaw asked me to start this thread. So tell us, Spaw, what have you kept that brings back loving memories of someone? I know that there are many beautiful stories out there. I'd like to hear every one.

And what about you, Rick? And Kendall? and all the rest?

Jerry

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: bill\sables
Date: 16 Feb 02 - 08:41 PM

I have kept my fathers old miners safety lamp and his watch and my mothers pasport. The lamp is on the fireplace but the watch and pasport are stored away now. Cheers Bill

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Jeri
Date: 16 Feb 02 - 09:01 PM

I'm a pack rat at the end of a long line of pack rats. I have trays and a rocking chair my grandmother, whom I never met, stencilled. I have a basement full of books, and all sorts of things my grandfather (whom I never met) made by turning wood. I have my father's belt buckle somewhere. I have a bunch of beautiful quilt covers my great aunt made, and you can tell when she got a sewing machine, because the stitching goes from the meticulous but somewhat quirky hand stitches to those perfect machine ones. One of the hand-stitched ones is all red and white, with hand-embroidered blocks - flowers, figures, faces and such.

Before my mom died - LONG before - she told me there was only one thing I should never part with, and I haven't. She had one of those ceramic "nodders." It's an owl. The head is a separate piece, and fits into the body so if you push it a bit, it nods back and forth. It's been broken and repaired several times. Anyway, she told me that when my dad asked her to mary him, she came home and asked the wise old owl if she should.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Mary in Kentucky
Date: 16 Feb 02 - 09:30 PM

When we divided my grandmother's things, I had my heart set on a needlepoint flower picture that was always by her front door. My brother wanted a different picture, and my sister wanted still a different one. Because of our age differences, we realized that each of us remembered a different picture that had a prominent place in her house at different times. Then there were all the little gifts I had given her as a child...Then there are the special dark blue vases that hold yellow buttercups (jonquils) every spring. Then there are all the wildflowers every spring that she taught me the names to...

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Janie
Date: 16 Feb 02 - 10:31 PM

I have several things of my grandparents that are very special, but the most special to me are my grandmother's silver and an old, cheap cut glass bowl in which she always served the cranberry relish.. The silver is plated and not expensive, but to a poor Kentucky farm girl it was precious indeed. She only used them for special and family holiday dinners, and now I do the same. When I lay the table for Thanksgiving or another special meal, I always feel like Papaw and Nannie are sitting there with us around the table. I have watermelon seeds that my grandfather got from some farmer on a trip through Arkansas that he had carefully labeled and dated but never got around to planting. Finally, when Nannie died, my aunt took the last remaining quilt she had done entirely by hand and had teddy bears made from it for all of the grandchildren and great grandchildren. It was the quilt that had been on their bed for so many years, that had kept them warm, that they had snuggled under. This bear is priceless to me.

Thanks for starting this thread.

Janie

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Sorcha
Date: 16 Feb 02 - 10:41 PM

Well, I didn't keep it all but......let's just say I am not among the un-stuffed. My dad has been gone 11 years, my mom only 3, so I still have a LOT of their stuff. I don't really want to get rid of any of it in case the kids want it someday. I'd be sure to get rid of the one thing they wanted.

I have a serving dish that was my Great Grandmothers, a crystal/etched "violet bowl" that was another ggmothers, a workable spinning wheel from another. As for the ggrandfathers, I have a pocket watch, a jack knife, photos, sheesh, lots of stuff.

From Mr. Sorcha's side we have a quilt made by his ggrandmother in 1889. It's the last photo on this page.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 16 Feb 02 - 10:54 PM

Thanks for sharing that with me, Sorcha. I worked for 37 years at a Museum, and we had a group of women who came in dutifully every Monday and made hand-stiched quilts. None of this machine made stuff. Each year, they'd auction off a quilt as a benefit for the Museum. When I re-married, three years ago, they made a beautiful quilt for my wife and me. It's something that we'll always treasure that will be handed down to one of our children someday.
Jerry

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Sorcha
Date: 16 Feb 02 - 10:55 PM

Sounds like the beginnings of a song, there Jerry. Quilts and spinning wheels........run with it if you like--I can't write songs.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Gypsy
Date: 16 Feb 02 - 11:02 PM

I have moved so many times, and pared down an equal amount, that anything that has survived is precious. The item that reallly comes to mind, is my grandmother's journel of when she lived in Ethiopia in the 1950's. (she is a native of Louisiana, USA) She was there for two years, and reading it at the same age as when she wrote it......was a powerful story.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: 53
Date: 16 Feb 02 - 11:06 PM

My dad's old Morgan silver dollar, and some of my mother's furniture.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: katlaughing
Date: 16 Feb 02 - 11:59 PM

Like Jeri, I'm a packrat. Like Sorcha, I have kept a lot. Mom would've been so proud of us when she died 3 years ago. We had one afternoon when we were all five together and went through her stuff to decide who would keep what. We did a good and fair job and were able to sit down to supper together after.

I have my maternal grandma's silver beads choker which she gave me when I was 8, as that was the age she received it.

I also have my mom's Bible which she won in a singing contest at church when she was just a girl.

I have a pillow my aunt made for all of her sisters, including my mom, which she used grandma's tulip quilt pattern for. Each pillow was a one square replica of the original.

I have my other grandma's Bavarian china and some really old silver, plus an oil lamp which they used on the ranch in Colorado.

Most precious to me are the old family photographs showing the original log cabin homestead of my dad's family; my maternal "schoolmarm" grandma riding her horse to school; my other grandma as a young lady; plus other papers.

Ah, the other precious thing I have is a cassette tape my dad made of his memories of growing up with extraordinary people; and one I have of my mom talking a little bit about growing up and singing a little. If anyone still has parents, grandparents living, please try to get them to put stuff down on a tape. It is priceless, not only to those of us who are their children, but also to our children and their children.

Thanks for this thread, Jerry. I had to cry a bit before I could post. I love reading what other's have posted.

kat

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Chip2447
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 12:05 AM

Someplace in time, eons ago, The first real Dakota Souix blacksmith made a metal hatchet. It has been passed from father to eldest son since it's birth. We dont know how old it is actually, but can safely say that goes back to the mid 1800's, or beyond. My Grandfather could remember his father telling him that it had belonged to his dad, my double great grandfather. So it probably goes back even further than 1850.
Chip2447

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: mmm1a
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 12:10 AM

There are some antiques that I have that have been passed down from several generations , but the one thing that stands out at this time is a set of 8 crystal wine glasses.I know that they were my great-Grandmothers and I recieved them on the day I married my 2 oldest sons Father. The wedding toast was made with them. And now in 1 week I will carry on part of the tradition at my second oldest son's wedding. They will be using 2 of the glasses for their toast. But I will keep the glasses as I have 4 more children that will be married someday. Thanks for this thread. mmm

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Amergin
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 12:25 AM

unfortunately...many of the older generations in my family...had/have a nasty habit not to make wills....and so many of the things they treasured are scattered....the kids of their current spouses usually ended up with them...

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: DonMeixner
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 12:40 AM

My Dad's jewler's tools which I continue to use almost daily. I have my Grandfathers Architect's scale that I have used for 16 years as a drafter on designer.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: mouldy
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 02:40 AM

I have all sorts of things as I come (on my mother's side) from a long line of hoarders. The oldest thing I have is a silk printed paisley shawl which was given to one of my great-great grandmothers (I was told) as a wedding present in the mid 19th century. She had been a nursemaid for one branch of the Byron family and they gave it to her. It is huge: meant to be draped over and around a crinoline. But it is also a printed pattern, and not woven - as befits a servant!

I also have (amonst many, many things) my grandfather's notebook from the trenches in the 1914-18 war. It makes fascinating reading when it comes to what they actually were given to eat!

I won't add any more because I'd never end!

Andrea

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Liz the Squeak
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 05:01 AM

I have the last embroidery my grandmother ever made. She was going blind and died of breast cancer shortly afterwards, so it's special. It's a large square Jacobean 'tree of life' pattern in blues and browns, the patterns she loved best. Some of the stitching is a little off (it's one of those iron on transfers) and the colour changes are a little sudden compared with her earlier work (she loved the random dyed and variegated silks)but it is all meticulous stitching and so typical of her... I can see it now, from my computer here, and it reminds me of my childhood. Everything that could be embroidered was... chair backs, cushion covers, armchair covers, pillow cases, eiderdowns, chair seats, you name it, she'd put embroidery on it!

From my other grandmother, I have a stone jug, a pine dresser and a poorly plant. Nothing else. She had 4 children, the oldest, my father was born out of wedlock. Before she was even cold in her bed, the eldest daughter was labelling furniture and things to be parcelled out to her three children. When the middle daughter, the woman who had spent the last 6 years looking after her complained, she said 'he's a bastard and doesn't get anything'. In the end, we got the leftovers, everything that they didn't want, mostly odd bits of china, glass, plants and a big pine dresser that wouldn't fit in any of their houses. I only got the dresser and the plant when my mother emigrated and couldn't take it with her!

One thing I do have though, is a lot of family photos. My mother's family kept a photo of practially everyone who ever passed through their front door! Of my father's family, again, nothing. We weren't even allowed a picture of his parents.

My dad left a fair amount of photos, and I have a lot of his tools - he left 27 screwdrivers alone, in various states of repair! I hope that Phoebe will want to keep some of the things, maybe not the War Department issue adjustable tank spanner that I'm so fond of, but hopefully something.

LTS

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Deckman
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 05:22 AM

I have many treasures that belonged to my Father in his working days. My Father was a master carpenter, and became a successful custom home builder. One of the treasures is a very old handsaw, with the number 65 carved on the handle. It first belonged to my Mother's Father, my Grandfather. He then gave it my Father and he used it for years. The number 65 is interesting. In WW1, GrandFather worked in the shipyards and 65 was his tool chit number. In WW2, my Father worked in the same shipyard, and 65 was assigned to him as his tool chit!. CHEERS, Bob (by the way, my Father will be 94 in 6 weeks).

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 05:43 AM

What great memories! Looking back on when I wrote the song, I hesitated on the line, "It's the JOY of remembering." It seems like this world has become so cynical that people don't use the word "joy" as freely as they used to. Maybe it's just my perception. But, I feel the joy in these postings. Why settle for happy, when you can shoot for joy?

You've touched on something else that is joyful... family photographs. There are a couple of lines in the song that talk about that, too..

"Some may leave lessons, hard in the learning
And some just a smile in an old photograph.

And tapes! What a blessing. My Father died four years ago at the age of 92. When he was in his 80's, I got him to do a long tape of his memories. My Father didn't like to talk much about growing up, because he was very bitter about his family. He wasn't one to open up about himself. The way that I got him to do a tape was to send a list of questions for my Mother to ask him, with the tape recorded running. Talking to her made it a lot easier than talking to the tape recorder and as he went along, he relaxed and was pretty effusive, for him. I also asked my Mother to write about her childhood, and got a many-paged letter that I really cherish. Her Father had a dairy farm and when she talks about beds with rope mattresses, heating stones in the fireplace to warm their feet in the wagon in the winter when they went into town to ice cream socials, it transports me into a time that has become a part of me.

"Throw all the kids in the old hay wagon, And point the horse to town
The stones are loaded on the wagon floor, and the blankets all turned down
The night is cold and the moon is full, and the horse he knows the way
And it won't be long 'till we get to town, and we all can hardly wait.

And over in the corner, there's a fiddler
And the kids will all want to dance
And though Mom says "No", you know she'll go
If you give her just half a chance.

My Mother was driving a milk truck and making deliveries when she was 13 years old. She finally stopped driving a couple of months ago. She misses taking her older sisters out for rides. She'll be 95 in June.

Jerry

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Mr Red
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 06:18 AM

Call me Mr Functional.
I have a Swiss Army Knife given to me by my ex-wife
It has a charmed life, whenever I loose it, it manages to turn-up, time and time again. Lodged in the crevice of a seat of a person I will only see for one day, found by accident etc etc etc. Given the circumstances I would not grieve but be quite happy if it divorced me. BUT it is a very, very useful, carpentry tool, tree pruner, spectacle repairer, and a knife! etc etc and if I threw it away it would be unkind, in pique, cynical. If I gave it away I would have to not like the person, & why would I be giving them presents? If I bought another, I would be unfaithful. So here I am in limbo land with the constant reminder. Why are these gizmos sooooooo practical.
I also have a Pentel Pencil which has the same connotations, much repaired much lost & returned, and it was there when I wrote most of my early songs (AD ie After Divorce). It has magic. & that wasn't put there by her!!! No way.
Infuriating isn' it?

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: JEM-Wales
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 06:38 AM

My father passed away last year and what I treasure from his side of the family is the photo of his great grandfather, taken after saving lives in a mining disater, the photo of his grandfather and grandmother when they went on the Ykon gold rush, the photo of his father standing on the ship of which he was a captain, which was sunk in the war and the photo's of my father - one when he is playing rugby for his country, the other taken during the second world war when he is looking so young and handsome in his uniform.

On my mother's side I have the jet beads that her grandmother always, in every photo of her you can see them, wore, I have my grandmothers bakestone. 20 kilos of blackened steel, that still mkae the most majical Welsh akes, but for my mother, thank goodness I have as yet no keepsake, I have her.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: mack/misophist
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 10:00 AM

In my own family we were too poor, too migratory, and too divided for there to be any keepsakes. Any extra baggage was discarded. My wife's family, which is old, established, and thoroughly middle-class, no longer bothers with keepsakes. I hang on to all the old family things I can get my hands on, hoping that some day one of the younger members will want them. So far, there's been a total lake of interest. This seems to be the rule with younger people today. Too bad.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: artbrooks
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 10:21 AM

We have my grandfather's sea chest, a couple of embroidered shirts Jenn's grandmother brought over from Russia, and a picture of her Greatuncle Arthur (the one who was supposed to be in the band on the Titanic but missed the boat).

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Rolfyboy6
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 10:38 AM

Daddy's bowl-backed mandolin (Luigi Uriani, Napoli). Every once in while he'd whip it out and play 1920s novelty pop tunes like "Ain't she sweet" and "Washington at Valley Forge." When Kweskin came out in the 60s I was like "Yeah, OK, why're people excited about that? That's just like Daddy." Thanks Dad.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: GUEST,tupence
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 11:01 AM

I've got my Grans cross & chain and some pictures of my grandparents before WWII having fun with their friends (wonder how many of them survived the war?). Generally though my family tend to keep things that mean nothing to anyone else, like small stones from a favourite mountain walk and train tickets. I've still got my 1st pet dog's identity tags & my mums got his licence -he's not been around for nearly 30 years. My granparents used to buy us silly cheap ornaments for birthdays - mine are all still on display in my frontroom, I would part with them for anything.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: DMcG
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 11:47 AM

One of the family traditions/keepsakes is a lace Christening gown made by wife's great grandmother. It was used for all her children, her grand children and all her great grandchildren. Hopefully, it will serve the next generation as well.

We also have a table made by her grandfather that has been our main dining table for nearly twenty-five years now, even in the houses that were really too small for it.

From my father's side I have kept a set of technical drawing instruments that he got when he started work. He was largely self-taught and they are a symbol of both his ability and determination. As a child I found his careful planning and preparation infuriating - when we will actually start on this??? - but I never knew him to make anything that was not to the highest of standards.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: kendall
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 12:34 PM

My grandmother died in 1956, and, I got her lap robe. It is mohair, has pictures of horses on it, and it is as heavy as a bucket of hog livers. I believe it predates automobiles. I also have a Waltham railroad watch (gold). I used to carry it, but, they quit making watch pockets in mens jeans, and, it is a pain to set. You have to unscrew the front, pull a little lever, then set the hands. Why they made them that way, I have no clue.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Clinton Hammond
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 12:37 PM

About the only thing my family hands down is its dysfunctionalism...

Hell of a neat thread to read this...

;-)

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 12:59 PM

Wonderful thread Jerry. The kind of Mudcat chat that I dearly love.

Sadly, I have very few keepsakes from my parents. My dad died when I was 18, and I'm afraid neither of us really understood each other very well. I had entered my own little world a few years earlier (absolutely necessary for my emotional survival at the time) and it was years later that I went through the contents of the one article of his that didn't get lost or misplaced over the years.

It was his leather briefcase, and inside I found several fascinating things. A magazine where he was named "Pharmaceutical executive of the year", complete with testimonials from folks all over Canada and the U.S. as to how much he was liked and respected by his fellow pharmacists, from the ones who had stayed as small town store owners, to the ones who ended up CEOs of big companies.

A couple of cartoons that I'd drawn when I was about 10.

Also a half-written book called "Dear Doctor", crammed with humourous anecdotes about the relationship between those who manufactured the "miracle drugs" and those who dispensed them. Very funny writing. I had no idea he wanted to be a writer. Wish he'd finished and published it.

Also, a Mason's apron and some documents and pins. Don't remember him ever going to a meeting, so I guess it was one of those hereditary memberships passed on to him by HIS dad.

Some WW11 medals and patches from his time in the Army from 39 to 45, mostly spent in France. I still have difficulty knowing how those marriages stayed together with so much separation....but the vast majority did. I suspect my Mum put these things in the old briefcase after he died.

And yes...I thought about these things when I first heard Sandy sing your song.

Cheers

Rick

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Lyrical Lady
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 01:37 PM

I have my great-grandmother's post card collection, my grandfather and my father's stamp collection as well as a several boxes of 78's that my dad spent years collecting. My most treasured keep sake is the set of keys that were hanging in the front door lock on the day that my dad died. I figure those keys are the last things he touched before he died and I keep them in with my silverware so that when I set the table, I look at them and remember my dad.

LL

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Tinker
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 01:41 PM

As a third generation pack rat, I've surrounded myself with bits and pieces of the past from both sides. I've an afgan from each grandmother. And I'm still lugging the upolstered rocker that Pepere rocked all 33 grandchildren to sleep on. It needs major repair work, but the budget will cover it someday. An oil lamp Memere used in her childhood, and transcripts (the tape long ago broke) of her days in the mills as a young girl in New England.

When we moved to our present house the 92 year old woman we bought from couldn't place all her treasures and I agreed to finish the job. Slowly many things have come off the porch and back into the house because they just "belong". That includes two unusual Madonna/Goddess statues that were in this good Baptist woman's foyer. My pagan friends can't identify them either but we all agree they belong, so they now live amongst the plants and try to protect them from my haphazard care.

Love the song may even learn to play it in Bb like Fielding some day...

Tinker

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 02:11 PM

Several people have mentioned letters. Another great treasure. One of the ways that I kept my sanity through many hard years was by writing endless letters to my buddy Art Thieme. I kept carbons (remember carbons) of the letters that I wrote to Art that had descriptions of family adventures (and kept many of Art's too.) A couple of years ago, I went through my boxes of letters and pulled out all the references to my two sons as they were growing up, going back to when my 26 year old was a todler. I combined them into one running collection of great, funny, hard, painful remembrances and ended up with 36 pages. I think that they appreciate them. I sure get a kick out of reading them.. Now, with everyone on the computer, will anyone print out hard copies of e-mail and save them? Something else lost to progress.
Jerry

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: katlaughing
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 02:39 PM

Jerry, email makes it easier, if one wants to preserve, imo. I copy and paste the important bits that I want to save, put them in a spcific file, then have it to print out anytime. However, I also have a lined blank book in which I still handwrite short sayings, poems, etc. which I've come across and don't want to forget.

My paternal grandfather clipped out poetry from magazines and newspapers, then pasted them into an old agriculture book which he obviously didn't need to read anymore. My niece has that and it is a precious reminder of him and his love of good literature.

This has prompted me to ask my brother what happened to the reel-to-reel tape he made in the 1950's of my grandma reading us stories and my little 4 or 5 yr old voice helping her to tell Goldilocks. I'd love to hear her, again!

Wonderful thread...

kat

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Grab
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 02:43 PM

Got my great-grandad's violin, bought in 1921 for £21 (we've still got the receipt!). Sounds lovely, and the back is beautiful, but it's needed some major repair recently and may need more too. When I learnt violin as a kid, I needed to trade up from a 1/2-size to a full-size, and my gran said "I think I've got one in the loft". So that's what I got, and that's what I learnt on.

My mum got it valued at Sotheby's, and they didn't want to know - they told her it was worthless. I just got it repaired, and the repairer had a fit when I said it wasn't insured! Anyway, I got it valued, and it _is_ worth insuring (not Strad territory, but nevertheless the price of a small car). There were some jokes from my wife and friends about getting someone to sit on it, but I don't find that too funny really - as far as I'm concerned, it's my violin and my gran's before me (and maybe my great-gran or great-grandad or some other family member - we don't know) and I couldn't bear to lose it.

I don't get too emotional about most possessions - they're all just stuff. But instruments are one thing I really do get attached to. I'd rather have my house and car burned out than have an instrument stolen or broken beyond repair.

Graham.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Bill D
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 03:32 PM

well, I have a bunch of 'stuff' from both my Mother's side, and my Father's side...and my wife (Ferrara) has lots of things from HER familie(s)...we are almost inundated with things that just 'sit there'.

I suppose the most meaningful are the things my paretnts had carefully saved, including a tonic bottle my maternal grandfather used when he was a barber in Missouri in the early part of the century. My mother considered that her prized posession...various other glassware & letters and quilts also.

I also have a kitchen cupboard from my paternal grandmother...the kind with the flour & sugar bins and bread drawer and plate racksetc..(it actually had the original zinc top when I first got it, but is now just a dining room piece.

I do have my grandfathers watch and his shooting medal from his military service post-Civil war (1880s)

My fathers family lived in Pennsylvania..(near Pittsburg) but traveled a lot, and I have a large album of postcards sent by various members in the 1903-1913 era...such reading!

Now that I have a digital camera, I need to record some of those things with notes so my son will have records and know where everything came from.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: CarolC
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 03:52 PM

I'm not particularly sentimental, and I don't usually keep things to remember people by. Although I feel incredibly blessed to have a little over a year's worth of PMs from LR Mole to remember him by.

However, re: family memorabilia... I don't really keep any of that sort of thing myself. But for a little while when I was in my twenties, I was part of a family with some very interesting memorabilia.

My first husband's mother was one of the original Radio City Music Hall Rockettes. She lived with my husband and me for about a year. She had a trunk full of old newspaper clippings and photographs from her days as a dancer in the early part of the 1900s. There were picures of her dancing with the rockettes, and some of her dancing in a show with Ginger Rogers, and some of her dancing in a Zigfield production of some sort or another. And newspaper and magazine advertisements in which she modeled cosmetics and things. And press releases and newspaper articles about the Rockettes' tours to Europe and other places. It was an amazing thing, that trunk.

She was a very modest and quiet woman and didn't like to draw very much attention to herself when I knew her. It was almost like pulling teeth to get her to bring out the trunk and let my husband and me look through it. We had one fascinating afternoon going through that trunk, and then I never saw it again.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: GUEST,BigDaddy
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 08:39 PM

Where to begin? With the oldest, I guess...an ambrotype (photographic image on glass) of great-great grandmother Eleanor made around 1858 and a teapot she owned. A dauguerreotype of her husband Sylvester in his civil war uniform holding his 1851 Colt Navy revolver. He died at Andersonville prison not long after. Photos of most of my other great-great grandparents as well. My great grandfather George's pocketwatch and jeweler's loupe and great grandmother Mary Jane's ring and brooch. My grandfather's pocketwatch, Colt pistol, UMWA pin, a rolling pin he carved, an arrowhead he carved from a mussel shell and nine poems he wrote. And his blacksmithing tools. Also a window he handmade for his mother-in-law's (Addy's)log cabin. My grandmother Lula's rings and things. And that's just a start...

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: kendall
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 09:01 PM

I'm somewhat a pack rat, but my grandmother never threw anything away except her first husband. When she died, we cleaned out her house, and in the attic was many balls of plain string. There was also a shoe box labeled "Pieces too short to save."

Carol C,I wish I were more like you; I'm too sentimental I guess. I even have a pair of Edsel hubcaps in the original wrappers! Coins from different countries I've been in, the watch my mother gave at high school graduation, my National Defense service medal (from the Korean mis-understanding) old high school year books, ancient photos, commendations from my service in the National Marine Fisheries, and a photo of the patrol boat I captained 40 years ago. I like to break them all out and remember those times because the recent past has been anything but happy.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Steve in Idaho
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 09:13 PM

I guess the oldest would be the matched sets of family Bibles. On from my Dad's family and in German. Has a listing of all my family from about 1800 on hand written pages in the center part for births and deaths. The other from my Mother's family and in English and from the early 1800s - same info and in the same manner. Both are huge books - and have heavy wooden covers on them.

The rest are tools - tools are my weakness. If I had to choose between tools and Ol Mose I'd choose the tools as I could build another guitar with them.

And my Grandma's old Oak hutch - she used to keep pictures of all her children and grandchildren on it - we do the same with it. The 22 rifle my Dad bought from the J.C. Penny's catalogue for $13 when he was a kid - my son has it now. And his old Harmony guitar - my son now has that also and is beginning to play again.

But what is more important than any of the material things is the ethics I carry with me from them. "What do you think of this post hole Grandpa - nice and straight and deep." "I'm still earning my own honest way Dad." "I love my country very much Great great great Grandfather Tawney." "I don't lie to gain things Mom." "I believe in God Grandma." "I obey the law when the law is right and good." "I believe in helping others but not at the expense of myself - for if I am gone who can I help?"

Just a few of the things I hold dear to me.

I had to think about this before I posted Jerry - great thread

Steve

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: The Pooka
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 09:43 PM

"Pack rat" doesn't make it. The kind that keeps EVVVERYthing, such that the keepSAKES are in there somewheres but ya usually can't find 'em so what good are they. There's a clinical term for this. NO STOP CEASE don't tell me; I've blocked it. Have software to filter it out; just can't seem to put muh hands on the CD-ROM. It's not Denial. It's Refusal. There's a Difference. Annyway the wife's case is a milder one so we're fine y'see. Haw.

Old family photos & studio portait pictures, some to like the nineteen-teens I think. Great-Grampa Dan in his glory days of the 4th Ward Dimmycrathic Club of Danbury. Mom's story was they elected him Chandelier 'cause somebody said they needed one and Flynn thought it was an office & made a motion which carried. Dunno. Old family Bibles, the huge giant kind with the big clasps & gold leaf & so weighty they MUST be True & look like they have been stamped Nihil Obstat by His Holiness and Imprimatur by Almighty God Himself. Make ye think twice, believe you me. Some of Dad's writings, both his career & his avocation. Mom's typewriter; she wrote also. Political campaign literature & button etc.; she ran for satewide office in '62. Lost. Republican: durty linen, skeletons, black sheep. Naah. Social-climbing; lace curtain. Handed-down dinnerware & glassware & quilts & and all suchlike from wife's side, they're much better at preserving those things. Her father's paintings. He became an excellent artist and art professor and university art department chairman, after fighting in the Pacific as a US Marine. Remarkable remarkable man. Funny as Hell, too. I have his bayonet. Also "Ma's Sword." Ma was my maternal grandmother. Widowed, she lived with us. Yeah. Her sword had been captured by some ancestor, never got straght exactly whom, from the Mexicans or the Spaniards in the War. Never get straight exactly which War. Remember the Maine. Santy Anna gained the day nowait. Curved blade, fancy carvings on wooden handle & scabbard. No crosspiece handguard at handle. Ceremonial, I think. The important thing is it was Ma's Sword. Symbol of Authority. Oh yeah. Ruled the Roost. Sword kept hidden away at bottom of forbidden window-seat storage compartment. Never wielded. That wasn't the point. So to speak. It was There. Talisman. That was enough. Have it over the mantle now. Doesn't work same way for me at all. Excalibur after le morte d'Arthur. Haw. A-waaay, Santy Anno.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Jerry Rasmussen
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 10:11 PM

Wow! What a collection we all have! I have a lot of great old photographs, too... some are tintypes, and some more recent. I have a great old photograph of my father standing in front of his brand new Model T, taken out in Montana. He's standing there with his hands in his pockets with a big, silly grin on his face. I had never seen the photograph growing up. My Uncle Harold from Eden Prairie, Minnesota (only a Midwestern could picture the Garden of Eden as being prairie land) sent it to me when I was in my fifties. The story behind the photograph was even better. My Father had been courting a young woman in his neighborhood, and she moved out to Sydney, Montana. He took off in his new Model T and drove out to try to win her heart back. But it wasn't to be. I realized that there was a song there and wrote it for my Dad. After that, the family started calling him Montana.

And what about songs? This thread ain't dead. I suspect that a lot of us are like me... came to folk music through recordings, more than singing around the table. My Father didn't sing much. Hardly ever heard him sing. But, he loved The Trail of the Lonesome Pine. It was probably his favorite song, and the only one I ever heard him sing. Many, many years after I left home, I was talking to my Father on the phone and told him that I was going to record the old hymn Softly and Tenderly for a gospel album, and he started singing it, over the phone. Choked me up. I couldn't believe that he knew all the words, or would sing it over the phone.

My Mother sang a lot more... mostly hymns, but popular songs from the turn of the century too ... Casey Would Waltz With The Strawberry Blonde, Bicycle Built For two.. the songs she heard as a kid. I have two older sisters who liked to sing around the house, but my love of folk music came from the occasional songs by Burl Ives, Harry Belafonte, the Weavers, or quasi-folk like Frankie Lane. Did you parents leave YOU a handful of songs?

Jerry

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: leprechaun
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 10:36 PM

I think it was 1983 when my brother announced we were walking in the St. Patrick's Day Parade with our dad. He bought a cane with flask at the Hilton Hotel pre-parade celebration, so I got to carry his blackthorn walking stick. We started out at the front of the parade. Since I was just starting my police career, I was just a little worried whenever dad would open his cane flask and take a nip right in the middle of the street. Part way through, dad had to go into a bar to see if they would refill his flask. They wouldn't, so we had a drink. When we came out, we were in the middle of the parade. A few blocks later, dad went into another bar, unaware it was a gay bar. Dad didn't pay much attention to that sort of thing. He asked the bartender if Ma'am, could you fill my flask. The bartender said no, and besides I'm not Ma'am. Dad said Well you could have fooled me. When we came out of that bar, we were closer to the end of the parade, and dad sat down on the curb to rest, with his shillelegh and his cane/flask in his lap. I stood beside him in my green top hat, holding his blackthorn walking stick.

It had to have been five years later when I was walking through the photography exhibit in the County Fair. I saw a photo with a third place ribbon on it. I looked at the central figure, an old guy with a bulbous nose, seated on a curb. I thought, That looks like my dad. That guy standing next to him looks kinda like me. Pan back. By God that is me! That's my dad!

I told my other brother about it and he had the good sense to go down to the fair and buy that photo. It hung in my folks house until dad died.

It's the most valuable thing I own.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Jeri
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 11:19 PM

There were always songs on car trips, Jerry, and my Mom sang constantly when working around the house. My Dad sang, but he was completely tone deaf. He knew up. He knew down. Actual notes weren't important to him. It didn't stop him, and he loved to sing. He also sang "Trail of the Lonesome Pine," but he did the parody - the one about the cow on the railroad tracks.

We also sang the other songs you mentioned - Casey and Bicycle, also Daisy, Daisy, the Daring Young Man On The Flying Trapeze, There's a Long, Long Trail. When I was a kid, I thought that last one was a metaphor for death, although I don't think I knew what "metaphor" meant when I was 8 or 9. I must have been a strange child.

...and the band played on.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Mudlark
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 11:35 PM

Great thread.

The most important thing I got from my grandfather....his jounals...from 1914 to 1969 when he died. In pencil, in miniscule writing, but decipherable in strong light...a lifetime, bridging tremendous cultural change.

Like Clinton, other than that, mostly disfunctional. But most importantly, from my parents I got a love of music, whatever else bad they passed on, and a voice to sing it with. I know more 30's and 40's tunes than I can remember learning, just from hearing them singing. The fact that they were drunk, and lousy parents, becomes less and less important, as I learn to play and sing those same songs myself.

I've basked in the memories written here...a good thread! Thank you, all....

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Rick Fielding
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 11:42 PM

Ahhhh, now music. Both my parents were (at one time) professional musicians.

My Dad even got HIJACKED into the American Army. The way he told the story was that shortly after leaving the College of Pharmacy, he and his trumpet playing buddy (this would have been around 1927) were playing a jazz date in Buffalo New York. A guy in the club LOVED their playing and brought a soldier in the next night to see them. The soldier in question was the leader of the U.S. Army Jazz Band! Apparently he talked my Dad (don't know about the other fellow) into doing some creative lying (about things like "Nationality"!) and the next day my dad was a U.S. Army soldier (and clarinetist)! I think it only lasted for a few weeks before they booted him out...but it must have been fun, 'cause he told the story with a big smile.

Guess that IS a keepsake.

Rick

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: katlaughing
Date: 17 Feb 02 - 11:59 PM

Speaking of photographs, last spring we went down to see my dad's cousins, both in their 80's, near the old family homestead in Colorado. I took all of the ancient photos and albums I have. Their mother, my dad's mom's sister, was committed to the state mental institution when they were quite young and lived there until her death in the 60's. It was something that was not talked about, from what I've gleaned.

I didn't know it, but the pictures I took down were the first ones they'd ever seen of her. They had no idea there were any. For the first time in their lives they saw pictures of her; as a young woman and of her and their dad, on horses, getting ready to go on their honeymoon on a pack trip in the Rockies.

It's pretty hard to describe the feelings I had when I watched those two very precious people in my life look with amazement and gratitude at pix of their mom. My only regret is that I didn't know who she was in the pix or I would've shared them years ago. Sure made my heart happy to see their faces and hear them talk about her, though. Of course, they now have copies of all of them.

Jerry, we always were singing in my family, with my parents and had lots of records, too. I have always been so grateful to my parents for making music such an important part of our lives. we all took music lessons, too.

One other thing dear to my heart is one of my dad's violins; I think it is the second one he had. It is a little over one hundred years old. I came home from school one day when I was about 8 and told my folks I had signed up to join orchestra and play the violin. From that day, I've had that fiddle. Had it repaired and the bow rehaired by an old fellow, now passed on, whose dad taught my dad how to fiddle and who made the fiddle my dad still plays.

kat

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Mickey191
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 12:15 AM

Wonderful thread-love it. I too am a saver, thank Heavens. I've some of my Dad"s tools including his shoe last (I think that's the name). In the 40's you could buy squares of leather and repair the families shoes. My favorite is the license plate from his 1929 Ford, which he bought the day WWII ended. From my Mom,letters,letters,and more letters. She wrote about every important event in the world and in the family. Most interesting is how the great depression affected our family and what a struggle it was to put food on the table. Many are filled with great Irish wit, but the most touching was the description of my brother's death from cancer. When she came from Ireland she was a cook for rich family,upon her leaving the job she was given a beautiful vase with hand painted roses and gold trim. The Mistress of the house said she was a "good girl" ugh! I still have that.I often wonder what will be done with those letters when I depart.Maybe my coffin. One great photo of my Dad with Countess Markevitz. (SP.)

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Justa Picker
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 12:21 AM

Well there is a 1914 Heinzman upright piano which was reconditioned and given to me when I was 4 to learn to play as I'd expressed an interest. It's one of the really old Heinzmans with the ornately carved, curved front legs. It resides at my parents house because they have the space for it, but my grandparents got it for me. And my mother has told me its mine and I can have it anytime I want. I also have a ring given to me by my grandfather when I was 13, and a Stratego game he bought me when I was 11. On occasion, I have my grandmother's wisdom.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Kaleea
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 01:04 AM

I have in my posession a chest of drawers & vanity with mirror which were in my grandparents bedroom. I also have a desk which Granny used everyday, for letters, etc., & keeping the books for Grandads' Auto Salvage business. Tucked under the kneehole of the desk is a little footstool my Daddy made in shop class in the 8th grade, last grade he attended before running away to join the marines. I have a piece of "costume" jewlery, and an apron from Granny. From the other grandparents, I have Grandads' old harmonica which is so permeated with tobacco I can't stand the taste of it to play it. & I have a feather fan made of the entire wing of a large bird. The fan is for "ceremonial" use of Cherokee people. Grandad was Cherokee & Irish. The most important thing I have from ancestors is the book of stories which I proposed at a family reunion a couple of years back. All the living aunts & uncles wrote down their favorite family stories, as did some of the cousins. The story I wrote was the story Granny told me when I was 17, of the 2 years when she met Grandad, and saw him at church functions, and finally married him when she was 17. None of my aunts or uncles had ever heard Granny tell this. These stories are what I treasure above all the other things.

Subject: RE: Family Keepsakes: What have YOU kept?
From: Sorcha
Date: 18 Feb 02 - 01:27 AM

What about what you wish you had? My paternal grandmother and I used to play a card game called Authors......I've never seen it since. I wish I had her deck of cards. She taught me to embroider and I still remember the smell, sights and feel of her bedroom before she moved in with my aunt. She used to call me her "bed heater"......now I'm the cold one who needs a bed heater.