This morning my much loved Nan, Ruby May PEARSON (nee SIMMONS) passed away peacefully in her sleep. She was 93 years old. I am incredibly thankful that I have had her in my life up until now.
Taken on Christmas Day 2012.
I love you Nan and will miss you.
A little while ago, it may have been around this time last year, Trove popped a digitised newspaper up that I had been waiting for, The Northern Star. It covers the area in which most of my father’s great grandparents established themselves, near Lismore in Northern NSW. Coincidentally I now live smack bang in the middle of where they all lived and drive past their old farms on my way to work. Almost as if I always lived here.
Anyway, where was I? Two days ago Trove loaded further articles from The Northern Star and I was very excited because I have been looking for a death or obituary notice for my 2xgreat grandfather George PEARSON. I have been very lucky to have access to the microfilm to the Northern Star where I work and have been successful in finding many notices and articles for my ancestors, but for some reason I have never found George as I scrolled through the microfilm – thank goodness for digitisation!! (I really don’t know how I missed it and am going to pull out the microfilm to see exactly where it is so I know what I did wrong – sometimes things just aren’t where you expect them to be).
Until 2 days ago I knew quite a lot about George as far as where he was born, married, died, how many children he had, where he lived, and that he was one of the first directors on the board of NORCO, however, I knew nothing of the type of man he is. His obituary has helped me gain a clearer picture of who he was.
OBITUARY. (1918, April 26). Northern Star (Lismore, NSW : 1876 – 1954), p. 3. Retrieved November 26, 2012, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article92917594
OBITUARY. (1918, April 26). Northern Star (Lismore, NSW : 1876 – 1954), p. 3. Retrieved November 26, 2012, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article92917594
Many thanks Trove.
I grew up in Grafton and have some wonderful memories of Jacarandas and the Jacaranda Festival from my childhood.
My sister and I were talking about it last week and she reminded me of how we used to watch the parade on Jacaranda Saturday that wound its way through the streets of Grafton with the Jacaranda Queen and Princess gliding past…and this huge bizarre green turtle that used to spray water out his nose at the people watching the parade. I can’t remember what it was doing there, but presumably it had nothing to do with saving water!
My other clear memories are those of numerous Jacaranda Thursdays when we used to have the day off school, it was an official holiday for us in Grafton, and once we were old enough, we used to run around having all sorts of fun with water pistols, coloured hair spray and shaving cream – sounds very civilised doesn’t it? We lived in a country town, we had to have something to amuse us.
As young children we used to spend countless hours rehearsing in the heat and dust for the school spectacular when we would perform in front of (many?) people, usually wearing crepe paper outfits and hoping it would rain and transform our clothes into multicoloured disasters.
Last weekend was the big weekend in Grafton for the Jacaranda Festival, and whilst it has been many years since I have been to one I still think fondly of them and thought it would be interesting to see what was in Trove regarding it.
This was an article about the first Jacaranda Festival held in Grafton in 1935.
JACARANDA FESTIVAL. (1935, October 30). The Sydney Morning Herald (NSW : 1842 – 1954), p. 17. Retrieved November 6, 2012, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article17237605
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article17237605
So, it would appear that from the very beginning school children were very involved in the festival. There is no mention, however, of crepe paper or shaving cream. That must have come much later.
Trove Tuesday is an initiative of Amy Houston of Branches, Leaves and Pollen.
I’m a little late this week for my Trove Tuesday post, seeing as it is now Wednesday, but here goes anyway.
I came across a story in some information my mother gave me recently about her GOODHEW ancestors. The story goes that my 3xgreat grandfather Henry GOODHEW (1830-1916) was a passenger on the Goulburn mail coach on the night of Tuesday, 25 May 1869 when it was held up by two bushrangers. It was such an exciting story I had to do a search and quickly found an article about the holdup on Trove.
STICKING UP OF THE GOULBURN MAIL—A PASSENGER AND A BUSHRANGER SHOT. (1869, May 31). Empire (Sydney, NSW : 1850 – 1875), p. 3. Retrieved October 24, 2012, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article60835098
Unfortunately, although details in the article, such as date and where it was going, match with the personal account I have a copy of, the article does not mention Henry specifically, so I still do not know if he was actually on that mail coach or not. Seems I have a little more digging to do.
John SMEDES, my ggg grandfather, is my current brick wall obsession. I have tried over a number of years to find out where and when he was born, and where and when he died, but just keep coming up blank.
John SMEDES, or (Frederick John SMEDES depending on which record you are looking at), first appears in English records as marrying Amelia Lydia Ann NEIDERMANN in the Parish of Christ Church, Middlesex on 3 July 1836.
His next appearance is in September 1837 on the baptism record of the first born of John and Amelia, Amelia Gagena, (or Gazenia), SMEDES. On this record John is listed as a labourer and resident of Brick Lane.
I should note here that I have not obtained every single certificate of birth, marriage and death records of John and Amelia’s known children, but have managed to acquire a few of them. To my knowledge they had five: Amelia Gagena, John Frederick born in 1839, George Henry born in 1843, Ann Rosetta born in 1845 and David John (my gg grandfather) born in 1847.
The 1841 Census John SMEDES is recorded as being 30 years of age, a sugar baker by occupation, and as being from foreign parts. John lives in Thrawl Street with his wife Emilia (sic), daughter Emilia (sic) and son John.
After this, I can find no trace of him. The 1851 lists his wife Amelia as a ‘widow’, still living in Thrawl St and with the occupation of ‘shop keeper’. So what happened to John??
I have searched in many places including Ancestry and Find My Past and was very excited when London Parish Registers were added to Ancestry, but cannot find his death recorded anywhere. My searches have been both narrow and broad, taking into account the many variations in spellings I have come across for SMEDES, including SMEEDES, SMEDIS and SMEDE.
I *think* he died sometime between 1846 and 1851, primarily because his last child was born in May 1847, so 1846 allows for conception (assuming of course he was even the father, but is listed as such on David John’s birth certificate), and 1851 because he does not appear on the 1851 Census and Amelia is listed as a widow, (I am still assuming at this stage that this was the case, but it also may not be). Amelia also remarries in June 1851 to Diederich LUTJEN, so unless he ran away which he could have done, I have assumed him to have died before this date.
My next step was to browse page by page through the GRO index for those years under S to see if I could locate him, particularly as some of those records were hand written and so may not have been correctly indexed for searching. I found ZIP. Then I looked right through the Christ Church Spitalfields Burial Register from 1846 to 1851. ZIP again. Interestingly I also did not find a record for the burial of Ann Rosetta who died very young in 1846, so I was not over hopeful of finding the father. Maybe they were both simply buried elsewhere. I can find Ann Rosetta in the GRO Index though, so why not John??
Where did he come from??? I have heard a few family stories that he was from Germany, but lacking any details on that other than the 1841 Census stating he was from ‘foreign parts’, I really don’t know where to start looking for his place of origin. I had hoped that David John’s birth certificate would list his father’s place of birth but it did not, it was too early to record that information.
I have also done some searching in newspapers, thinking that if he was a sugar baker he may have met with an accident and untimely death – again there was nothing, nothing with his name anyway. There are plenty of stories about deaths associated with the sugar mills of the area.
Time to take another break from him I think. If anyone has any suggestions for me please I would love to hear from you. I am still relatively new to this and would welcome any hints. The answer is probably staring me in the face.
Trove Tuesday is an initiative of Amy Houston of Branches, Leaves and Pollen.
My post this Tuesday is about a very small item I found that mentions my Nan’s family in Brooklet in Northern NSW, just prior to Christmas in 1900.
Brooklet School Picnic. (1900, December 22). Northern Star (Lismore, NSW : 1876 – 1954), p. 4. Retrieved October 9, 2012, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article72075180 http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article72075180
It is such a very small mention ‘Simmonds’ but has resulted in me being able to narrow down when the family moved from Milton on the South Coast, up to the North Coast of NSW. My great grandfather, Victor Rex SIMMONS was born in Milton in 1898 so I knew they were still living down South then. Until I came across this article, the earliest I could place them on the North Coast was from the 1901 electoral role.
Although it narrows down the time frame of when they arrived, I still do not know exactly when they came up this way, or why – although I suspect it had to do with selling the family farm and moving to where there was more land.
I should also point out that the name in the article is not spelt exactly the same way as my Nan’s maiden name of Simmons, however, due to the very small population in the area at the time and after not discovering any other Simmons or Simmonds family in the area at that time in my research, I am quite confident it is ‘my’ Simmons family.
I also like this article because of the spirit it represents in people building a new community and how important a school was in that process. Something we take somewhat for granted these days.
I missed last week’s so am going to pop a quick one up now. I missed Trove whilst it was down these past couple of days. Good to see you again.
I’ve recently been doing a heritage conservation assignment (that is another story) and for my topic I choose the Cape Byron Lighthouse. Apart from being an extremely scenic place it also has a fascinating history that involves Indigenous people, shipwrecks, pioneers settlers, whaling and stories of the families of the lighthouse keepers.
I found a huge amount of useful information on Trove to complement what I discovered at my local historical society in Lismore. One of my favourite articles about the lighthouse tells the story of its opening. The town was eagerly anticipating this huge event, and when the official guests were unable to make it on the night due to wild weather, (they had to stay on their ship in the bay instead), the townsfolk got stuck into the food and beverages and had a wonderful time nonetheless – probably more so!
http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article72080223
The Cape Byron Lighthouse. (1901, December 4). Northern Star (Lismore, NSW : 1876 – 1954), p. 4. Retrieved September 18, 2012, from http://nla.gov.au/nla.news-article72080223
