Family history has always intrigued me, perhaps because there's some of it that is known but never spoken about. One branch of my family has been in North America since the 1600's, and a line of it has been verifiably traced back to that time.
That line of the family was 'seen to' by the girls: it's history was passed on from Mother to Daughter, Grandmother to Granddaughter, sometimes across the stretch of decades. Some of the lore is absolutely mind-blowing, and one has to wonder just how much of it has been 'embroidered' by the retelling.
With my 45th birthday drawing near, my parents found reason to drop by over the weekend. My Mother handed me a plastic bag, inside of which appeared to be a very faded linen tea towel... and a hand-written note on yellow-aged paper affront it. That hand-writing was oddly familiar to me, and I took off my glasses to get a better read of it.
The hand-writing was that of my one great grandmother, the only one that I had known any well, my Dad's grandmother on his Mom's side.
Lora Mulvihill was born in 1900, in Oklahoma, and married to the son of Irish immigrants; they'd found themselves in Western Canada by the time WW1 started. She'd been alive when I was growing up, passing away in 1977. My birth had been something of an occasion for the woman, I have a hand-written note from her in my baby book: she'd sent a $20 bill with the note, and that was a LOT of money in those days.
Her hand-writing was in front of me again, decades after her death. She makes reference to “Jimmie”, which is how my Dad is called by his family (no one else would dare): he's the oldest of her 8 grandchildren.
The note reads as follows:
Great Great Grandma Smith was born July 31 – 1841.
This belonged to Jimmies Great Great Grandma Smith.
I have had it since 1927
See how many generations it will still be in use
Grandma Mulvihill
It is a linen tea towel, that appears to have once been pink and white striped. Each “stripe” was hand-tatted in, the lace trim is hand-tatted linen thread. My great-grandmother had sent it to my Mother when I was born, and without a word, my Mother had kept it, through 15 moves that included different provinces.
I have a small piece of the family history, a legacy, sitting on my desk today. It's more than a birthday gift, it's something of a wonder: Grandma Smith and family lived through the Civil War. The family lore claims she lived til the age of 99, and a picture of her exists from the 30's: records indicate that to be a truth. It's likely that the lady made it with her own hands, with purchased material: it indicates a certain degree of financial comfort in her world. That it's been handed on as it has been also speaks to it's quality.
My birthday present was a gift of legacy, from a woman I have never met, and only vaguely knew by name as being a long-living relative; she missed my fathers' birth by a matter of months.
Why such a thing would bring about such sentimentality in me is also a wonder. I'm humbled, and admit that my Mother keeping mum about it for 45 years is a little disconcerting, too: I wonder how many other such 'secrets' she's keeping.
As a birthday gift, it's more than oddly important to me, it's priceless. I am now the fifth generation to be in possession of it, and that's really neat.
Mich's Mumbles © 2011
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