Inspiration

Do you remember George Bailey?  He was that everyday man in the classic Christmas movie;  It’s A Wonderful Life.  Poor George was so busy living and giving, working and helping, that he never stopped to take credit for or even realize all the good he had done.  We have all know a few George Baileys, who touched our lives and the lives of countless others.  I would say that they go about their work quietly, but of course to them it isn’t work.  It is simply how they live their lives and they can’t really imagine doing less than what they do to help others.  They are productive and positive.  The type of person I’m talking about also refrains from making us feel guilty for our own lack of giving.  You see, for these types, giving is not a competition.  They aren’t boastful, doing most of their good backstage.

I believe that God does his work through us and especially relies on the George Baileys of the world for the bulk of this labor. Often we just aren’t up to the task or feel we don’t have much to offer.  Many of us just frankly aren’t as energetic or excited about things, especially as we get older.  I suspect that we have all experienced a bitter, negative, elderly relative or neighbor.  And, we might have wondered if that was what it was like to be old.  So, today my story is about a couple that, despite advanced age and all the difficulties that brings, continue to contribute to the world.  They model for me a positive vision of old age, showing me that there is no retirement from service to others.

My great uncle, Kenneth Riley, is 96 years old.  He doesn’t drive anymore and suffers from the pain of arthritis.  But, despite these obstacles, each Friday Uncle Kenny delivers Meals on Wheels to the housebound and elderly in his community.  He’s been doing this for years and because he can’t drive, now accomplishes this task with the help of his daughter, Sandi, who drives him on these weekly rounds.  There seems to be no feeling of “I’m too old for this and I’ve done my part.” in Uncle Kenny’s picture of himself.  Even at age 48, I must confess, that I’ve occasionally had the feeling that I’d already done my part volunteering.  But, now I can’t get that vision of Uncle Kenny, at age 96, delivering those meals, out of my head.  Uncle Kenny’s actions help me to realize that for giving, there is no work order, which, once filled, satisfies our lifetime requirement.

Kenny’s wife, my great aunt Grace is 94 and she also does volunteer work and sings with the Louisville Silver Notes.  This choir is 50 members strong and has about 40 performances a year in the Louisville area.  Aunt Grace has kept me in her circle of care and concern since my parents died when I was a young adult, despite the fact that our families didn’t see a lot of each other when I was growing up.  It took love and effort for her to keep that thread of connection with me, a great niece that she hadn’t seen in years, but she persevered, and for that I am most grateful. 

This year Uncle Kenny and Aunt Grace celebrated their 70th wedding anniversary.  Their lives and service illustrate to me that there are no limitations on our potential for giving and contributing.   They inspire me to be better and do more.  When I visited their home a couple of years ago I was awed by the love and affection that emanated from them both.  I imagine that many have felt the power of their love and concern.  I would also venture to guess that, Kenny and Grace are completely unaware of the many lives, like mine, that they have touched and altered.  I suspect that their angel wings have already been earned and are waiting for them in heaven, but right now God needs them here on earth to do his work.

Merry Christmas 

-Mary

2011 Update-- Uncle Kenny turned 99 last September.  He's had some health set backs and surgery to replace a broken hip, but after several months of recovery in a convalescent home he's now back home with Grace who turned 97 in August.

2015 Update- Uncle Kenny died at age 102 last year.  Aunt Grace died this week at age 102.  May these sweet souls rest in peace.

Uncle Ham and Christmas

Here in California suburbia, people spend the weekend after Thanksgiving putting up their Christmas holiday decorations.  The lights on the houses and yard decorations seem to follow trends and vary from year to year.  The tendrils of white “icicle” lights were popular for a while, but seem to have lost favor this year.  Those trying to be “green” are buying the new LED lights, but the white ones end up looking a depressing light blue.  And, the blow up globes and Santas that were around on lawns last year are not seen so much this year because, like beach balls, they simply didn’t last. There are also fewer of the lighted deer figures bobbing their heads on yards this year.  Once, I proposed that we fill our yard with a whole herd of them but I was just kidding of course.  The most unique display in our neighborhood this year is a Golden Gate bridge, constructed of ladders, that is lighted up in red, with ocean waves in blue lights underneath.

I like to wait on the decorating until at least the start of Advent.  I’m a traditionalist I suppose.  We just put up our Christmas tree yesterday, and the lights went up on the house last weekend.  I like the season of Advent and its message of preparation, even if I don’t always take the time to prepare in the spiritual manner that is really intended.  Yearly, my father in law is confused by my advent candles and wonders why I’m only lighting some of them for Sunday dinner.  I guess Advent is an Episcopalian thing.

In our family, we know that the holiday has truly arrived when the mailman delivers a heavy box to our door a few days before Christmas.  The box, containing a whole country ham, is sent to me from my brother, who lives in Kentucky.  Although he has been sending us this treat for years, there is no guarantee that it will continue to be his gift to us.  There is always the nagging notion that perhaps it won’t arrive in time or that he will decide to send something else instead.  This uncertainty is akin to the Santa experience, hoping that Santa will visit but not quite knowing for sure.   It makes it all the more exciting when the package does arrive!  

Now, inside the package is something that might not look too pretty to the eye of the unknowing.  A true country ham, packaged in a net bag, looks dried out and is often covered in mold.  There are stories that many expensive hams have been thrown in the trash when sent from Kentucky to those in other regions.  The mold was taken as an indication that the ham was spoiled.  But that mold is a beautiful sight to me, as I know that inside is a true delicacy.

For the unaware, I must tell you that the process of creating a good country ham is not unlike the process of crafting a fine wine.  Dry curing with a mixture of salt and other spices preserves the ham.  The ham is then smoked and aged.  Each step of this process involves creative combinations chosen by the craftsman.  The diet of the hog, spices used in the curing, type of wood used in the smoking process, and the amount of time the ham is aged, all influence the taste of the final product.

When the ham arrives we hang it up on a nail in the garage until the night before Christmas when it is brought inside to soak overnight in our kitchen sink.  If you are wondering about the mold, well, I scrub it off with a stiff brush and a bit of dish soap before the ham is soaked.  Soaking the ham overnight re-hydrates it and draws out some of the excess salt.  There are various methods of cooking a country ham but I always bake mine, per my brother’s instructions, in a roaster with some water in the bottom until the bones sticking out can be wiggled.  The cooked ham is very salty and somewhat similar in taste to Italian prosciutto.  

We don’t see my brother often, so to my children he is known as the uncle who sends the ham, or more fondly he is “Uncle Ham”, a title he is proud to have.  Uncle Ham is the oldest of my three brothers and nine years older than myself.  He played a fatherly protective role for me when I was small.  He made sure I got on the right school bus, gave me his lunch money when I lost mine, and fixed my toys and hurts.  And now, thanks to my brother, on Christmas afternoon, each year, we sit down to a delicious “Kentucky” meal and savor those fabulous salty slices of country ham.  It’s part of our family tradition and Christmas just wouldn’t be the same without it.  I suppose that even if the Grinch came and stole the “roast beast” (country ham) that there would still be a Christmas for the Davys here in California.  But, I doubt we’d be as jolly as those Whos down in Whoville.

-Mary

Amazing Grace

The stories of many of our ancestors,  and perhaps even our own, are constructed of a mixture of life experiences, good and bad.  Life is more often than not, a journey of pain and loss mixed with joy and fulfillment.  My parents used to say that life was just one problem after another and that the trick was in learning how to deal with these problems that always arrive unexpected at our door.  Challenges confront us and we must find a way of moving through and eventually past them.  For many of us, it’s faith in a compassionate God, which allows us to keep moving forward despite what life throw at us.  Of course there are also many who can no longer believe in a God that has allowed too much tragedy to come our way.  Tragedy is certainly always been a test of one’s faith.

James Gray Whitford was born in Crown Point, New York in 1810.  When he was almost 6 years old his father was in the process of moving the family “west.”  We don’t know their intended destination, but we do know that James’ father, Greene Whitford, died during some part of this journey.  This was the first tragedy.   Greene was 57 years old and we might presume that the family had not gone too far west as his widow returned east with her young children, of which James appears to have been the eldest.  Now a widow, Hannah Whitford, chose to live near her brother in Bridport, Vermont.  She was destitute at this point, so young James, now age 6, was taken into the family of Thomas Jewett of Weybridge, Vermont, where he lived until he turned 20.  James’ educational opportunities were slim and he attended school only in the winters.  But, at the age of 18, he was inspired by the ministry of Rev. John C. Green of the Methodist Episcopal church and became a convert.  By the age of 20, James was licensed to exhort, which allowed him to read the scripture lessons in church.  

In 1832, when James was 21, he married 17-year-old Betsy Amanda Hindes in Addison Vermont.  The following year he was licensed to preach by the Methodist Episcopal Church and began to work as a circuit preacher in Vermont.  These circuit preachers traveled over a wide territory.  They visited communities that, either from lack of money or available preachers, had no local minister.   They preached the Word and performed marriage ceremonies and generally got paid minimally for their tasks.

In October, a year after their marriage, Betsy and James were blessed with the birth of their first child, Amanda.  Three years later, another child was born, Mary Elizabeth.  Soon after the birth of Mary Elizabeth, about 1836,  James and Betsy moved west to join the Illinois Conference of the Methodist Church and at some point he was eventually assigned to the church’s mission to the Chippewa Indians in Wisconsin.  At that time, these areas were for the most part wilderness and the dangers were many.  It is not clear if Betsy and the girls joined him at the mission or remained at some type of home base in Illinois or a more settled part of Wisconsin than where the mission was located.  My guess is that Betsy did not accompany him to the remote mission, as there seems to be no mention of her in the descriptions of this small Methodist mission near Ft. Snelling.  There are descriptions of this group of missionaries that included James and several other Methodist ministers.  They tried to teach Methodist hymns, translated into the Chippewa language, and to preach the gospel, but basically their efforts proved to be unsuccessful.    

Another daughter, Sara Jane,  was born in 1837.  It was after this joyful event that tragedy struck the Whitford household.  On June 7, 1837, Betsy died.  We don’t know the details of her death, but only know that her husband James had shot her accidentally.  Was he cleaning his gun or hunting too near the house?  We simply do not know.  The little girls were all under the age of 3 and certainly this must have shaken James’s strongly built faith to the core.  There were so many threats and dangers in this wilderness but to have her die because of his own carelessness must have been unbearable.  Others seemed to have stepped in to care for the girls.  James was unable to continue with the ministry.  How does one recover from something so tragic?  How could he live with himself or ever face his children again, much less preach the Word of God?   He had killed his own wife!  

We don’t know what he did over the next few years but we do know that in 1841 he was ordained as a local deacon in the Rock River conference of Illinois and Wisconsin.  Somehow his faith had brought him through the darkness.  His travels in the region often brought him to the Sauk Prairie community in Wisconsin.  It was there that he met Betsy Teel, a childless 22-year-old widow whose husband had died after less than a year of marriage.  Betsy Teel’s father was quite active in the Methodist Church community of Sauk Prairie.  In August of 1840, Betsy Teel and James G. Whitford were married.  It appears as if at least two of James’ daughters came to live with the newlyweds while the youngest continued to be raised by a Mrs. Jones in Evansville, Wisconsin.  Then in 1841 a son, James, was born to the couple and a new family had begun.  Perhaps the past could be overcome.  Perhaps now, after the darkest of darkness, life would be filled with joy and happiness!  The following year James was appointed to be the minister in Burlington, Iowa, where he would serve two years.

Things seemed to have gone smoothly for the family after this latest tragedy but I suspect that again James’ faith had been put to the test.  He spent the next several years doing one year stints at the following locations: Plattville, Dodgeville, Hamilton Grove, Mineral Point and South Grove Circuit.  By 1850 three more sons had been born, Charles, Wilber, and Samuel.

In 1851, at the age of 40, James Gray Whitford officially retired from the church and settled down in Clayton County, Iowa, pursuing farming.  Another son, Allen, was born the following year, but died soon after birth.  Then, the next year, a daughter Martha was born.  Son Warner was born in 1855 and a daughter Emma in 1858.   James continued to farm and, even though he was officially retired from the church, he still preached, visited the sick and dying and performed marriages.  In an obituary he was described as the “spiritual father” of the Volga City, Iowa community.  

Tragedy raised its ugly head for the family again in 1862 when the eldest son, James, was killed in a Civil War skirmish in Montevallo, Missouri.  He was only 20 years old.  But in life’s bittersweet mix of tragedy and joy, another son, Henry, was born to James and Betsy Whitford a month after their eldest son’s death.

James G. Whitford and his wife Betsy were blessed with long lives.  In their later years they lived with their daughter, Martha.  James died in September of 1900, just short of his 90th birthday.  Betsy died the following year at the age of 82.

I am reminded of the third verse of John Newton’s “Amazing Grace”

Through many dangers, toils and snares

I have already come;

'Tis Grace that brought me safe thus far

and Grace will lead me home

Reverend James Gray Whitford is my husband Doug's GG Grandfather

-Mary

In Context

Last week I was in San Diego to see the Dead Sea Scroll exhibit. It was a wonderful treat for this former archaeologist. I’ve seen, touched and excavated older things, but these scrolls are iconic. They are the earliest surviving written scriptures from the Bible. There were about 15 scroll fragments on display. The age of the fragments ranged from about 2nd century B.C. to the 1st century A.D. Most were written on parchment, which is really just stretched and scrapped animal skin. But, the exhibit was much more than just a display of these ancient fragments. There were beautifully done galleries, with large vivid photographs showing the flora, fauna and geography of the desert region near the Dead Sea. A separate section detailed the discovery, preservation, and interpretation of the scrolls. For instance, in the 1950’s, fragments of the scroll were often put together with scotch tape, which ended up causing a great amount of damage. Nowadays- DNA testing of the parchment (skin) is being used to match up the most difficult pieces. The entire exhibit was well designed, enabling the visitor to see these ancient documents, but also illustrating the setting in which they were found, the community to which they belonged, the challenges of their preservation and a sense of their importance.

After seeing the scroll exhibit we decided to explore Old Town San Diego, a state historic park. Old Town is the original location of the San Diego settlement and is just down the hill from the site of California’s first mission and presidio. In the pouring down rain we ran from building to building in old town. Most of the structures were well done reconstructions and designed to recreate the look of this little settlement back in those early days of California. The problem was that the interpretative materials told only small parts of the story of old San Diego. I kept hoping that there would be something that would tie all these bits of information together and explain the history of this important early site. Why was the settlement located inland from San Diego Bay? Why was the town later moved to the site of the current downtown on the bay? Where was the location of the original presidio and mission and when were they built? One nicely labeled map could have explained the basics, but instead we were presented with a hodgepodge of facts and stories. 

There was a barn there with a fabulous collection of old wagons and stagecoaches and some interpretive displays that detailed the role of this type of transportation in the far Western states. But, on the upper floor of the barn, display cases housed a random collection of items, the variety of which was reminiscent of an episode of the “Antiques Road Show.” It reminded me of those small town history museums run by local historical societies, with members contributing miscellaneous objects from their basements. But, this wasn’t a local museum; it was a California State Historic Park! Most of the items on display in this barn museum had no relationship to the settlement of San Diego. I stopped when I got to the cases of Hopi Kachina dolls from Arizona. What about the local Native Americans? Perhaps the Barona Band of Mission Indians should buy up Old Town and turn it into a more polished and complete history exhibit. Interesting that the Barona Band, along with Hilton and B of A, was a major corporate sponsor of the Dead Sea Scroll exhibit. Indian casinos do well out here in California, allowing tribes to bring their members out of poverty and also to give back to the community at large. 

Luckily for us it was a low visitor day, because of the rain, so the guide at the museum was able to answer all our questions about the history of the settlement of San Diego. His overview provided a framework, or context, for the bits of information scattered throughout the park’s displays.

My point in relating these recent travels and observations to you is to remind you and myself that objects, and people, need context to be understood. Many wonder why archaeologists discourage the pocketing of found artifacts. Why not just pick up that beautiful arrowhead? It’s because we value context. Artifacts, removed from their setting, simply reveal less. This concept applies to people also. As a teenager, when I was quick to criticize a stranger, like a gruff shopkeeper, my dad would say, “You never know what that person’s been through today.” It was his way of reminding me that in the context of that person’s day, their actions were perhaps understandable. He was reminding me that, although I didn’t always know the context of a person’s life, it was an important concept to remember and respect.

My current focus in genealogy is not just the collection and discovery of the names of my ancestors. I want to know the details of their lives. How big was their family? Did they have cousins that lived nearby? Were they saddened by tragic life experiences? What was going on locally where they happened to live and work? Context makes the story more complete, and instead of just a beautiful poster of a family tree with names and dates, it allows us to see and perhaps understand the kinds of lives our ancestors lived. I call it the “Ken Burns Effect” as it is similar to that director’s approach of documenting historical events by relating those events in the context of the lives of ordinary people. What I often do is somewhat the reverse of that, as I try to document the lives of our ordinary ancestors by explaining the historic, social, and familial context of their lives.


=Mary