Sunday, March 13, 2011

"What A Friend We Have In Jesus" & St. Patrick's Day on Sentimental Sunday, Katie Morris

Howdee,

Happy
St. Patrick's Day
March 17 - 2011


I just finished reading a lovely little book, as the author travels the circuit around old Ireland & writes his impressions. He remarks that in almost every little hamlet & wayside stop, he could always see in windows of the shops, dwellings & homes he was invited into, postcards like these . Written from family & friends overseas ... or ... for sale to send. You know whole towns & hamlets in Ireland were saved during the Potato Famine by cities here in the United States of America. The Irish here sending over money to see them thru hard times. Then and later sending money and presents of goods from here in America, back to their loved ones.

I was curious about my Great Grandfather, EWM ~ Mervyn Evans. I wish I could have known him and listened to him talk. I asked my older cousin Alyne, about him one day. She remarked, "Oh no, he didn't sound Irish at all, no accent". Well, of course, when the family came over from Ireland in 1869, he was only about 9 years old, so growing up here he lost the Irish voice. I was disappointed hearing that.

I'm sure his parents, Jane & Edward, would have kept the Irish in their voices all their lives.

I was thinking that Janes older brother, Joseph Medlicott Scriven, would probably have kept the Irish in his voice all his life too. What a treasure it would be with all the technology we have today, . . . . . if we could have "What A Friend We Have In Jesus", in his own Irish'r voice.

When I was growing up, we were always told, "Oh yes, your Irish & German & English ....."
I sort of knew the old people came from those countries. Only living life here in this current life of days passing, those other places were like a wisp from an almost forgotten dream. Unreal to me.
Doing the genealogy is a wonderful course in geography, history, biographies & more. For me it makes these unmet ancestors come alive and be real persons. I can see them all as in a Masterpiece Theater story.


Now that we'll be celebrating St.Patricks' Day for Ireland this Thursday, I wish we had a day to celebrate for Germany & England & all the other countries as the calendar year goes by. I think that would be great fun!

~ ~ ~REMEMBER ~ ~

Everyone is IRISH on
St. Patrick's Day
so be sure to wear some Green somewhere ~ somehow ~ someway . . . . so you don't get pinched!


Happy Trails, Katie Morris

Monday, March 7, 2011

Pilgrim Memorial, Provincetown ... Mayflower Monday Madness



Howdeee All,

Attended my 1st Mayflower Society luncheon on
February 26th. A birthday treat to myself. What a lovely group of happy people.

We met at the Cattlemens' Restaurant in Petaluma, CA..
Started off with the Pledge of Allegiance, which I found very refreshing to stand up and say. There was a roll-call, for which Pilgrim we came from. Fun to see there were 5 others from Governor William Bradford like me.

Surprising to find I sat across the table from 2 sweet ladies, Barbara Millet Webster & her sister, Myrna. Barbara was the best friend of Blanch Evans when they were growing up !!! Blanch - my mother's cousin. Of all the people in the room ~ they are the ones I chatted with right off and shared the dishes with.

Barbara told me her Mayflower ancestor actually had gone overboard during the crossing in a storm. But that he was able to grab some ropes and get back aboard. God! How scary is that and almost unbelievable. That the ship was swaying so much, it leaned so far to the water he could grab ahold and get back aboard. How fantastical
The world isn't just small ~ it's a Mobius strip!

These photos from the website for the
Pilgrim Memorial Monument at Provincetown.
I had never heard of this before and it's on the cover
of The Mayflower Quarterly booklet for this last December 2010. So naturally curious I looked it up online. A great website with loads to look at.
Anyone taking a trip to see Mayflower or Pilgrim stuff, this is 1 place I'd definitely go see. I'm sure it's on the hit list with schools and groups to visit. They are probably mobbed all school year.

Pilgrim Monument and Provincetown Museum

http://www.pilgrim-monument.org/

Sorry to say I have lost my Youtube video link to the story about Joseph Scriven :(
It's not on Youtube anylonger. If I find it again, I'll post it. It was a nice video about his life and the photography in it was great.

I thought it was something I did when I changed my background for the Blog. I wasn't looking forward to working on the nuts & bolts to fix it.

ANyway I poked around for awhile trying to find what happened to it, and found it's gone. PHEW! A relief to know it wasn't something I'd done.

Happy Trails, Katiebird