Saturday, October 10, 2009

More family found and still heading south...

When we last spoke we had just out-run the rain and had settled in for the evening when it caught up with us and gave us fits all night long. Getting up in the morning this is what we found, one big puddle.

We were off and running south again. This time to a small town in Nebraska called Hebron to visit the county courthouse located there for some more family research. We found some details about Jackie's great-grandfather and family. The ladies at the courthouse as well as the ladies at the two museums we visited were extremely helpful, as well as being friendly.

After this we headed to the town where the family purchased two lots in town. We found the property that had two run-down and empty houses on it. We stopped in to a neighbors house to see if they had any details about what was there over 100 years ago. As it turned out the neighbor had details about the local cemetery but this is not the cemetery where Jackie's ancestors were buried.

We did find the land that her great-grandfather homesteaded in the late 1800's. We searched the property but there was not any indication of anything that old still there.

A little out of order, but this is the extent of the town of Alexandria, where her family purchased property and which is listed as the birthplace of her grandmother. (The farm was out of town and Jackie's Grandmother, Sarah, was probably born there.)



We did find the Pleasant Plain cemetery where her Great-grandfather was buried, located about 2 miles from the homestead . Years ago a farmer had plowed and planted half of the cemetery so only about 10 headstones remained.


The last stone we looked at was her Great-grandfather's. She was pretty excited to find it. This shot is from the back of the cemetery showing how few headstones are left.




The next day we came back with some flowers and she was able to put them on his grave. Can you tell it was a little windy? We then headed about 25 miles east to another town where her Great-grandmother moved after she lost her husband. We went to the local museum and were able to get some more details on her and Jackie's grandmother and siblings.


Some of the research we did also located the headstone of three other relatives (Jackie's dad's uncle and two cousins, two of whom died in the diptheria epidemic.)


Not an exciting Blog posting but as we said before our intent now is to stay ahead of the snow and get to central Texas where we hope to find some warmth.
After saying goodbye to her lost, and now found, relatives we again hitched up and got back on the road again. This time we got out of Nebraska and started looking for Dorothy in Kansas. After we got on the road it started to rain again. This was a real heavy rain storm and it was hard to see going down the road. We ended up in Wichita and by the time we finished setting up Dick was soaked from head to foot.
The rain stopped some time during the night and stayed that way the next day so we could go out and visit the main store of Sheplers Western Wear where we could have spent a lot of money but got out of there with only some shoe polish. We did make up for the savings that night by going out to dinner at Olive Garden. Mmmmmm goooood.
Today we left Kansas are are now in Oklahoma for the week-end. The sun is out and it was over 50 degrees here today. We even got to sit outside for a while this afternoon.
Monday we should be in Texas where we will hope to post again.
To be continued...

3 comments:

Guy said...

Hey another neat post. Not can be exciting stuff but still good to hear of your travels. I was wondering about a map that we could get too that would have your route on it. I think it wouild be neat to see the spots you have gotten to on the map. I can't remember all the roads and stops when we did our trip thingy.
Love and will call on the phone for more information about the batteries....Hi to the kids too!!

Kathy said...

Hi Jackie, Dick & CC!
Very fascinating to find long lost relatives and the history they had!!

Glad you got away from the rain and hope you find warmth!

Thank you for your comments on our blog! But you haven't seen Zion yet! We have hundreds to edit for that, it changes every hour!

Definitely need to put Bryce and Zion on the "must see" list. I have been enchanted with this place since I was 13!

Happy Trails,
Kathy Webb

nancy said...

family history is very exciting,have been doing it for about five years,found live coz and it was only about 50 miles from were i grew up and none of us knew about the others hope to do this for four months a year in about three years. so enjoy