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BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2.
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BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. |
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Subject: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Jim Dixon Date: 20 Feb 02 - 01:50 PM Click for Part 1. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Jim Dixon Date: 20 Feb 02 - 01:53 PM Two sets of my great-grandparents lived in log cabins, and I have pictures of both families standing in front of their respective cabins. I think they were taken about the same time by an itinerant photographer. There's an interesting story that goes with one of them: In those days, the family used to get their firewood by going into the woods, finding a downed tree or maybe a standing dead one, chopping it down, chopping off the limbs, and using a mule to drag the log back home. They had a little rough-hewn wooden sled (or sledge?) that they put under the forward end of the log to make it easier to pull. This sled was left on the ground between the road and the split-rail fence, and it ended up in the foreground of the picture. The family was standing behind the fence, in the front yard and on the porch, and they weren't aware it was there. When the picture was developed, they said, "Oh, no! Why did we leave that old piece of junk out there?" To them, it was a piece of meaningless clutter that spoiled the picture. To me, it adds interest and atmosphere. I also have: Both my grandfathers' pocket watches. I don't know why I was the favored grandchild to receive these. I have lots of cousins on both sides. But my parents said that both grandfathers wanted their watches to go to me. I was very young when they died. My father's pocket watch. He worked for a railroad. He didn't work on the trains, though; he was a janitor in the office building, and didn't need an expensive watch. But he wanted to have the same type of watch that the conductors used, so that's what he bought. My father's straight razor and his leather strop. A rather plain glass "coal-oil" (kerosene) lamp from my grandparents' farmhouse. They never had electricity. About 15 quilts made by my mother. More than I can use, actually. Some are so old and tattered that my mother was using them as mattress pads, underneath the fitted sheet! I acquired most of these recently when my mother moved to a nursing home. I suppose I'll give some to relatives. Several crocheted doilies, runners, etc. that my mother made. I'd love to put them on display, but we have cats, and I'm afraid the cats would shred them. Maybe I'll put them under glass somewhere. Some ancient relative of mine—I haven't yet figured out how he's related to me—was a Confederate soldier, and I have his discharge certificate from when he was released from a Union prisoner-of-war camp. A couple of sad irons. (Why did they call them that?) A hickory cane which my father made for my grandfather. He made it by finding a hickory stump that had some sprouts growing from it, bending one of the sprouts, tying it down, and leaving it growing that way for a year to give the handle the proper curve. A pencil holder made from a block of cedar wood, which I made in Cub Scouts and gave to my Dad. It has some pictures and an inscription, "To Dad from Jimmy," made with a wood-burning pen. A couple of very sturdy wooden "waiting room" chairs that came from the office building where my father worked. My father probably acquired them when the railroad discarded them, or sold them cheap, when they switched to upholstered chairs. It's the only furniture from my parents' house that I bothered to save. (Do you think I should have saved the "blonde" bedroom set from the 1950's?) Three sets of sugar bowls and creamers made of glass. One of these is, I think, "depression glass" and one is "carnival glass," and one is sturdier and (I think) older. I'll have to ask my mother about the history of these items before it's too late. Also, a pair of depression-glass salt and pepper shakers. And a fancy silver-plated "sugar shell" (spoon for the sugar bowl). |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 20 Feb 02 - 03:41 PM Well thank you brother Jim! I was just about to take the plunge and see if I could do what you've already kindly done for me! I spent most of the afternoon downstairs assembling a pantry cupboard. You can bet that my kids won't beg me to leave it to them. Jerry |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 20 Feb 02 - 03:58 PM O.k., now I see how it's set up.
For those who don't want to go back and read all of Part I (which I HIGHLY recommend,) this whole thread started rather innocently when Cat Who Laughs asked me to tell her how Art Thieme and I became friends (which I responded to in the Is It Just Me? thread, and also asked me to tell her how I came to write Handful of Songs. I responded to that question too, in the same thread, and then Spaw suggested that I start a seperate thread about family keepsakes. It was a wonderful suggestion: Thank you again, Spaw! I have thoroughly enjoyed this thread, and expect that there will be much more yet to come.
So, this thread is really a request from me to everyone. What have you kept to remember family by? Why did you keep them? What kind of memories do they recall? Those who responded in the first thread have shared their reasons for keeping tools, watches, pocket knives, quilts, furniture, even two belly button rubies. I built the first lines of the song I wrote on things I've kepot from my Grandparents:
"All that I have is my Grandfather's hammer
As this thread has evolved, many of us have been reminded of more things, letters, writings, values that have been passed on to us and came back to share them. I've been moved by the writings of others, and keep thinking of more things I've kept. My Father had a square block of iron about two inches thick that pre-dates my earliest memories. I don't know where he got it, or what it was originally used for. But, he used it to crack hickory nuts. Every fall, he'd go out in the country and collect gunny sacks full of hickory nuts. I think that he knew every hickory tree within a fifty mile radius (as well as where all the wild plums and asparagus grew.) He'd sit down in the basement, cracking hickory nuts on that block of iron, and you'd hear him down there by the hour. He took great pride in producing many gallons of hickory nut meat, which he'd share with family members, once my Mother had her share for baking. When my Father died, that was one of the oddities that I lugged home on the plane.
So, tell me what you treasure from your family. I'm having a wonderful time reading everyone else's memories. We've also had a few songs posted, which are always welcome. I've kept a lot of memories of my family in songs, and often it's a way for me to talk about the things that I value.
If we need a part III, maybe I'd better learn how to do it. Thanks again, Jim! Jerry |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Rick Fielding Date: 20 Feb 02 - 05:57 PM I kept my Mother's piano...just a low-rise apartment size Heintzman, and a BUGGER to move from place to place (as i did through the seventies and eighties. Often wished I'd REALLY learned how to play (I play piano like many guitarists...chord oriented and BADLY) but I didn't really appreciate the stuff she played so beautifully on it...Gershwin, Hoagy, Berlin, the classics, etc. when I was a kid. NOW, I appreciate it! I finally sold it about ten years ago (got an electic piano) and as the new owners were moving it, they dropped the sucker down a flight of stairs!! I practically ran out the back door to cash the check, before they found a way of blaming me for the accident! Rick |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Deckman Date: 20 Feb 02 - 07:11 PM Jerry ... after following this wonderful post for all 104 postings, something suddenly dawned on me! As you and I are somewhat the same vintage (I think I'm a bit older) I suspect that we both have lost several friends over the years ... I know I have. For some reason, when I started losing friends, at a very early age, I had the good sense to ask for some belonging of theirs. I still have these treasures, as we all do. I have saved a favorite tie, several capos, a few guitars, fishing poles, fishing lures, an orchestra baton, a violin rosin, a pocket knife etc. A few years ago, when I lost two best friends in the same year, I found a new word in my vocabulary. I started asking for "TOUCHSTONES." And "Touchstones" is what you are talking about. Does that sound like a song title? CHEERS and THANX, Bob(deckman)Nelson |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Jeri Date: 20 Feb 02 - 07:48 PM One thing I'm very glad I did... My Mom went in for bypass surgery - I think around 1985. I started seriously thinking I'd lose her. I bought her one of those books with blank pages. You see, whenever I went home to visit, she'd occasionally start telling me stories about her childhood or some other time in her past. She never seemed to talk about that sort of thing when I was growing up, so the stories were new to me. I asked her to write down her memories in the book when she though of something. Well, she wrote a couple of things about her childhood. There are a few poems in there as well. The bulk of the stories are about me when I was little. There's one main reason I can never seem to finally unpack things. It takes me forever to get through one box of old stuff because I have to take handle each thing and remember it. I have to look at each photo and look through every book. Rick, we had a non-heirloom piano when I was growing up. We sold it, and my father helped move it. He came back nearly apopleptic with laughter. Seems the truck went up a hill and the piano didn't. I was very upset about it, and REALLY mad my Dad was laughing about it while describing the incident in detail, with hand gestures and sound effects. My Mom thought it was hilarious too. I got my sense of humor from them, and it was a darned fine gift. |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Janie Date: 20 Feb 02 - 08:41 PM I have a very old tintype of my great, great grandparents. The eyes of my grandmother, aunt and father look out at me from the face of that ancestral grandmother. When my grandfather died I found myself reflecting on how his ways had shaped my father, who in turn shaped my values and attitudes. I, in turn, influence others. In this way, if in no other, we are all immortal. I have an onyx ring of my sister Kaye's. I was with her when she bought it and knew what it symbolized to her, it holds cherished thoughts of her. The Christmas before she died she had given me a framed calligraphy cut-out that said "Chance made us sisters. Hearts made us friends." In my kitchen now hangs a black-and-white portrait of the 3 of us girls when we were ages 6, 7 and 10, with that cut-out above it. Although my son never knew her, she is a real person to him, with a history. Growing up, our closest family friends took lots of 16mm movies of all of us kids. After Kaye died, they took them and had them edited and put on video to give to us. These living, moving memories that spanned decades are more precious than words could ever describe. Tears are rolling down my face now, soft tears of love and gratitude for the memories that the keepsakes of all my loved ones represent.
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 20 Feb 02 - 09:02 PM Bob: Touchstone is a fine term. And, even though I asked what family keepsakes people have, there are certainly things we keep that belonged to friends or neighbors that bring back good memories. My little fake-bronze bison from the World's Fair brings back memories of the little old lady who lived in the gray house across the street with the shutters permanently nailed down (I suspect) who gave it to me. Jennie Buck. Jennie looked like she was ninety when she was probably still in her 40's. She had a husband, who was a fine cabinet and furniture maker. Funny, even though I love woodworking, I never got to know him. He was just Jennie's husband to me. I liked the old geezer down the street who showed me how to make a ladder out of peach crate ends better. Jerry |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: JennieG Date: 20 Feb 02 - 10:45 PM I am enjoying this thread so much - I have pieces of jewellery from both my grandmothers, and some of my childhood dolls, one of which was my mother's. But I only have sons!!! no daughters to pass them on to. (might have a granddaughter one day) I have a 3/4 size violin that my father used to play (but I can't). And I have a wonderful big photo of my grandparents with their first child, my mother at about 5-6 months, which hangs in my house above the Singer treadle sewing machine that my Nanna bought new to make my mother's baby clothes. My mother could not sew to save her life but I do - make my own clothes and quilts and things like that. Incidentally my mother had a really great maiden name - Mavis Davis. Cheers JennieG |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Art Thieme Date: 20 Feb 02 - 10:56 PM Jerry & folks, This is a lovely thread. And would you believe I missed the first one. Gonna have to go find it. Most of what Jerry says is true about our long correspondence over the years. Then E-mail came in and we rarely correspond. So what's that all about, huh? I suspect it's just me and Carol being preoccupied helpin' each other make it through to the next day one day at a time. I must tell you that Carol is doing better than anybody ever hoped she would. I always hoped these tratments would work for her---but they are doing the job so good that I simply can't believe it quite yet!!! Sorry for the thread creep --- but I do have my uncle's pocket watch and his pliers also. We've always had small places to live but the dwelling has never been as small as our present location. But that's cool. It gave us a chance to get rid of everything (potlatch) and only keep those books we'll actually read again. The records (LPs) are mostly gone. So is the turntable. But musical friends have filled the place with CDs and cassettes to the extent that HUD thinks we are stressing the floor we live on but I doubt they'll toss us out for that. Those are the main things I've got---my uncle's watch and pliers. All the rest of the stuff has been passed on. My 9-string Martin D-76 guitar went to our son, Chris, when after 5 years of denial it finally sank in that I'd never be able to play the thing again. If there is a huge turn-around in my situation, and I CAN pick once again, I'll know right where the big guitar is hanging out.-----------But I've digressed again. If I think of any other stuff I kept as keepsakes I'll sneak back into Jerry's good thread here. (If anyone starts a thread about how folks might've saved your life, I can tall ya 'bout the time Jerry pulled me off a water tank out in the badlands ----- or the time I was stuck in New York City a captive of Bob Rodr...... who was telling me a 2 year long story about how to survive at folk festivals with no money. He was threatening to make it a 5 year story. That was truly a harrowing time. Again, thank you, Jerry, for getting me out of that one ! Art Thieme |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 20 Feb 02 - 11:30 PM Any time, Art! What better thread creep than good news about Carol?
And speaking of keeping things from people you love, I've got a volkswagen full of letters from Art. Hey, if Kendall can take poetic license, I'm applying for mine. Jerry |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: katlaughing Date: 21 Feb 02 - 01:10 AM Art! I wanna hear those stories, too!! Have to see about starting THAT thread, then! Other treasures: my maternal grandmother broke her writing arm when she was in her 70's. During convalesence, she taught herself to write with the other and wrote out the equivalent of about 120 typewritten pages of her memories of coming to Colorado in a covered wagon, early, early days in Boulder, then moving to the Western Slope with her new husband and having children. She was a schoolteacher and natural storyteller, so she includes all manner of interesting signs of the times; the first telephone, first automobile, etc. Lots of fun things, but also she wrote of the tragedies of the hard life, including the TB which took her two older sisters, Ida and Myrta, in their teens, one of them engaged to be married. My sister has the oil portraits of them, in ornate gilded Victorian frames with the oval glass. Grandma used to have them above the bed in the room my mom and I slept in when we went to visit and I've always loved looking into the eyes of those beautiful great-aunts. I also have my sister's 50's Girl Scout knife, which she gave me when I was little. No wonder I've always looked up to her, huh?! Besides all of the other neat stuff she's done for me over the years. One time I went to visit my dad's cousin, the one who is like an aunt to me. She told me to come out into the garage with her, where she opened an old round-topped trunk. She pulled a roll of paper out, about 2 feet wide. When she unrolled it to about 3.5 feet, she told me it was an old photograph of my great-grandparent's ranch, taken by an itinerant photographer, sometime in the 20's or 30's. It is kind of in faded blues, greys and browns, with some white here and there. You can clearly see the three brands which my granddad owned by then, painted on the barn. The very old original log cabin homestead is also shown. She gave me that photo. It is one of the most precious things I own. I also found a postcard of it which was never sent, made from the same photo. When I told my dad about it, he said he remembered his dad was gone the day they took the picture and when saw the final outcome he was really mad that there were no cattle in the picture of what really was a cattle ranch! In more recent times, we've added to our treasures. One kind of funny thing now is a medal that Rog received from Marcos in the Philipines. He was stationed there during Viet Nam and during one of their worst hurricanes in history. He received the medal and a certificate for service above and beyond etc. When his mom died, his sister sent us some wonderful old pictures of them as children and his parents, plus a lovely silver filigree butterfly pin he'd sent to her when in the Philipines, as well as one letter she'd kept in which he written her about the hurricane. Not having known him until much later, I cherish these glimpses of the young man he was. Jerry, these are just remarkable threads, Thanks so much. kat |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Deckman Date: 21 Feb 02 - 05:14 AM Hi Art ... Nice to read your posting! As I mentioned before, my Father will soon be 94. He, and Mother, live in a nursing home four blocks from me. I spend a lot of time there. In his working years (sounds like another song title) my Father was a master carpenter. A couple of months ago, on a whim, I brought over some nails, a small chunk of log, and his favorite hammer. He really enjoyed pounding some nails again! It put a smile on his face and started another ten thousand stories. CHEERS, Bob |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 21 Feb 02 - 06:44 AM Back when I was in "Grade School" classes were divided into two reading groups. One group read the Skip and Judy series, made famous by their "run, dog run" simplicity. The other group read Alice and Jerry. I was in the Alice and Jerry group. I'm beginning to wonder if most of us weren't in the Alice and Jerry group, because my favorite part of those books was when they went to visit their grandparents and went up in the attic. They'd look through old trunks of clothes and keepsakes, or marvel at all the old stuff littered around the attic. Maybe we were all programmed... us Alice and Jerry types. When we became adults, we walked around glaze-eyed and said under our breath, "I want to go to Grandmother's attic..."
Anybody old enough to remember those days? O hadn't thought of those readers is many, many years. This thread is pulling up many old memories. Jerry |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: VoxFox Date: 21 Feb 02 - 09:41 AM My father passed away when I was still in my teens and back then I was always in a world of my own to really get to know him, I am ashamed to say. So any little snippets I get from Mom and her sisters(when I get to see them,One still in England and the other lives 4000 miles across country), I write down on whatever is handy at the time. This I then squirrel away in a large shoebox until I get the chance to write it all down in my journal. Surprising the things you learn just listening. Like his nickname (Chick), although I never heard anyone call him that. I have started my own version of a family tree and so far Ihave collected all the names the elders can remember but sometimes a name or a story arises and there I go with my scraps of paper. *BG* I guess I'm the "historian" in the family. :o) .As I said in the first thread I never met any of the family on Dads side as they were in England and I've only known Mums two sisters so whatever news I gather is precious to me. They are all in their 80's so my news gathering time is limited, (Ihope not but...) Enough from this peanut gallery. Love to all. VF |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 21 Feb 02 - 10:34 AM I'd encourage anyone who still has family members or old friends they love to try to get them to talk about their lives, on tape. I have a wonderful tape of my Father, made when he was in his eighties. It's not just the stories. It's the timber of his voice, and his laugh.. a real "Aw shucks!" laugh. I also have tapes of my kids singing when they were four or five years old. What a treat to dig them out every once in a while. My youngest son didn't talk until he was almost two, but he sang along with me in perfect pitch, long before he ever said "Mommy" or "Daddy." Just sang baby gibberish. I put the nursery rhymes to music, and left a part where he would answer me... which he'd do with full gusto. Which reminds me, I have to recopy the cassettes, or burn them to CD. Cassettes do deteriorate..
Thanks for all of the wonderful memories Jerry |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Art Thieme Date: 21 Feb 02 - 06:44 PM Then there was the day my aunt ran her huge old Buick into the air conditioning system of the local Holiday Inn in Evansville, Indiana at 3:30 AM and jumped out, naked, yelling that she wanted a hairdresser. Ah, fond memories. Art |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Amergin Date: 22 Feb 02 - 02:43 AM Hey, Jerry....your last comment reminded me of another thread and song...from about a year ago.... AmerginwhoistakingpluglessonsfromLorcanOtwayBG |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Amergin Date: 22 Feb 02 - 04:21 PM you know I have been thinking....that these posts all have a song or two in them....this whole thing sounds like it would make a good song challenge... |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Art Thieme Date: 23 Feb 02 - 06:02 PM Folks, that was exactly what my aunt (my mother's twin) did that cold night in Southern Indiana. It was only then we learned that emphysema (spelling?) from smoking all the years had deprived her brain of oxygen and pretty much killed it off. We were able to get her into a proper care facility where she died 5 years later. Art Thieme |
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Subject: RE: BS: Family Keepsakes: Part 2. From: Jerry Rasmussen Date: 23 Feb 02 - 09:37 PM You talk songs, you talk memories. You talk memories, you talk songs. That's why so many of these postings have reminded me of songs. The Silent Voices one is really fine.
How about: "All lined up in lawn chairs under the trees Jerry |