Genealogy Project Wins Christmas!

That's my niece there, reading one of the books about our ancestry. (See stories below.) There were two books, one with the charts and tables, and the other contained stories of all the major lines on my Dad's side going back as far as we can now trace.

She's interested and that's what I'd hoped for. Maybe, some day down the line, she'll have the time and want to pick up the search. Time will tell. If that time does come, and even if I'm gone, she'll have a head start.

My sister got the printed version and my niece and nephew both received thumb drives with all of the documents.

Finally, I feel that the work will not disappear.

Here's wishing you the happiest of holidays and the merriest of Christmases!

 

Ho-ho-ho!

 

It must have been about 1954 because my brother was born a bit later and he's no where to be seen in this group of photos from Mom. That's me with Santa. You probably have a similar photo too, and recognize it as the typical department store Santa image.

I'll bet anything that this one was taken in Cleveland at Sterling-Linder-Davis. The big tree was in the center on the ground floor and as I remember it, and granted that memory might be foggy, Santa was set up somewhere at the base of the tree. Maybe.

Downtown Cleveland, decorated for the holidays.

1954.

"BIGGEST EVER Sterling-Lindner-Davis' Christmas tree now is on display. The giant spruce is decorated with 1200 ponds of tinsel and 2400 ornaments, store officials report. The tree, 54 feet tall when it was moved in Saturday night, will grow six inches before it is removed after the holidays."

(Thank you, Cleveland Memory Project for these and other photos!)

We lived in the suburbs in a small Cape Cod style house in Maple Heights. Going downtown was a big deal, and going downtown to meet Santa was the very best a girl could home for, except for the presents later on Christmas day, obviously. We'd take the bus to the trolley and arrive at Higbee's in the Terminal Tower, then walk the few blocks to Sterling-Linder-Davis, and gaze in each department store window to see what wonders were on display. I can still smell the smell of arriving at the Terminal Tower underground and then entering Higbee's.

 

Mid-1950s store holiday windows were a wonder of mechanical ingenuity. I gaze on the electronic and digital splendor of today's store displays and long for the old 1950s train making its way around a tree and over a village and through a stack of presents. Does anyone even use tinsel anymore on their trees?

Higbee's window. The label on the Cleveland Memory Project says it's Christmas and I see a tree but is that Easter Bunny too? The back of the photo says: "Danny, 5, and Collee, 9, Majeske, son and daughter of Mr. & Mrs. Robert Majeski, Lakewood look at Christmas displays in Higbee's window."

Good old Santa! What a good listener! Maybe he was the last male in my life who really listened to me spout off a list of hopes and dreams;) Here's hoping that your Santas of past listened to you too. Enjoy the holiday!

Higbee's Christmas window 1958.

The URL for this post is: http://nutsfromthefamilytree.blogspot.com/2013/12/heres-wishing-you-happiest-of-holidays.html

Olde Timey Stories

I never get tired of listening to Mom tell about how things were when she was a young girl! Here's a random sampling of some of the stuff she's told me recently. There are lots more - and some I simply can't tell you to protect the guilty - but these seem appropriate for the blog.

Christmas during the Great Depression was meager by our overblown standards but as Mom says, they never knew they were poor because so was everyone else. What they did get was a fresh orange every Christmas as a special treat, so when Mom smells oranges it still reminds her of Christmas.

When I was growing up, Mom always put a fresh orange in our Christmas stocking so even today, around holiday time, when I smell a fresh orange I think of my childhood Christmases and Mom telling us about her Christmas oranges. She also mentioned scurvy and how important vitamin C from the oranges was because scurvy was still more common when she was a kid.

Mom points out that they had what seemed like enough of everything, and plenty of food on the table. Everyone had a big garden in the yard with veggies and chickens in a coop at the back of the property and sometimes pigeons. The men hunted (this is Western Maryland and the hunting is still good in the region) and that put more meat on the table. The women "put food by", or as we say, canned. I can still remember my maternal grandmother's pantry with its shelves lined with all manner of food stuffs. I loved staring at those simple jars with melted wax on top to seal the goods.

Mom has a rather nasty memory about the killing of a chicken and feathers flying. She must have been three or four years of age and didn't understand what was going on so it kinda freaked her out. Still does when she tells the story.

Very early, there was an outhouse in the back of the yard too. Everyone had them. I don't know what year indoor plumbing and sewer lines came to Frostburg, but Mom was still in elementary school when it did. It was very difficult to get your sleepy self to go out to the outhouse in the cold of winter! One spring, a bird decided to build a nest in the outhouse, giving all reason to spend a little extra time seated there.

During the Depression, the front or "best" room wasn't heated during the winter. A tree was set up there and the room heat turned on only for the Christmas celebration. Mom would sneak in (as all kids did and still do) to check out the inventory of presents and the name tags. And of course presents were more likely to be hidden in closet recesses or on top shelves! Mom, undaunted, loved to go on little expeditions looking for hidden treasurers. One year she found a polka-dot dress meant for her! Oh, joy!

My sister took after Mom and always loved knowing what she was getting for Christmas before the day. I never saw the fun in that scheme, but to each his own. I love a surprise:)

Mom, at a year old, with her father

Cambria Williams and her mother,

Emma Susan Whetstone Williams, 1919.

Men who hunt... food on the table.
Grandpa Williams seated with pipe.