Another Jane ...

I have written about the two "Janes," but there is third Jane, who entered my life many years ago and has had a significant impact on me and my family, both here and those that have gone. Jane came to Salt Lake City from her home in Michigan to search her roots. We are related through our Gray families. While researching she came across my name in the card files in the old genealogy library. Before computers we found information in card files. My address was a previous one and at first she decided that she would write to me when she got home, but then she told me she said, "Heck, she lives here," so she found a number and called. "Yes, my grandmother was Helen Gray and her parents were William Gray and Jane Reid." I made an appointment to pick her up. She came and we have been dear friends ever since. Her letters to me always included "extras," including pictures and recipes and snippets of fabric and wallpaper. She loves family history and quilting and "hooking and flowers." I love those things too. She loves birds. I am not too excited about birds, but her enthusiasm is contagious. Two summers ago she even gave me a short "hooking" lesson when I visited her. We joke because Jane is a "hooker," but of wool. Her basement looks like one of the fabric stores that I have visited in Manhattan, or maybe even Scotland. She lives in a home built by her parents near the shores of Lake Michigan. Her grandparents,Edwin Manley and Elizabeth Jane Gray, whose father David Gray was a brother to my grandmother Helen Gray Lillie, moved from Kincardine, Ontario to Grand Rapids, Michigan,where he was the head of upholstery for the Truscott Boat Company. When the company moved to St. Joseph the family moved also. He loved to farm and in 1907 he bought ten acres, including a yellow clapboard house that was owned by Captain Langley, a Great Lakes captain. There they build their resort where the people from Chicago would come to escape the summer heat. A Truscott boat is in the Maritime Museum in St. Joseph. I saw it when I went a few years ago. I love her home. It is also a museum, but of things close to her heart, and my heart also. I have a stitchery above the door in my kitchen that she did for me that says, "Happiness, a little fire, a little food, an immense quiet." Again, things I love! Her cat, Daisy, enthralled my children, because he played the miniature piano. Oh yes, she loves cats ... I do not! Well, we are also cousins. We have been to Scotland together and walked the lands of our family; Aberdeen, Belhelvie,Old Machar,New Machar, Foveran. The Belhelvie/Old Foveran church remains are above and to the right. We discovered gravestones in the New Machar churchyard for our third great grandparents, David Gray and Christian Thomson (picture top left). My maternal grandmother's, Isabella Broomfield's family is from Devonshire, England. That is not the connection I have with Jane. We are related through my father's line. For many years the Bromfield's lived in little town called Hemyock, in fact my great great grandparents, William Bromfield and Sarah Wood were married in the church in Hemyock. One day, before my first trip to England, I told Jane that my family was from Hemyock ... astonishment, almost silence. Jane's family was from Hemyock also.The Manleys were gentleman farmers and one a brewer in Hemyock. The buildings that housed the brewery were on the little river that ran through the town. No way ... that is almost WIERD! Remember we are not related through this line. After a little research I found my family on witnesses of births and marriages of her family. We were destined to be friends ... our ancestors were friends. Neal A. Maxwell, now deceased, an apostle of the L.D.S. church, and a missionary who served with my mother-in-law Barbara in Canada, says there are no coincidences in the underpinnings of our lives. " None of us ever fully utilizes the people-opportunities allocated to us within our circles of friendship. You and I may call these intersectings "coincidence." This word is understandable for mortals to use, but coincidence is not an appropriate word to describe the workings of an omniscient God. He does not do things by "coincidence" but instead by "divine design." Well, Jane introduced me to many things, including Hemyock, and clotted cream. She continues to be on my mind and in my heart a great deal. Still, with projects that we have worked on together not finished, she haunts me. Last time I was with her she mentioned that she didn't think anyone would care about her family history work when she was gone. I care and so many others who have and will benefit from her hours and hours of "family" will care. Our friendship and kinship, by Divine Design!

My cousin, my sister, my friend!

I have a cousin I have never met. We have written to each other and researched our Lillie family for over 25
years. We are similar ages and I think share similar interests. Our grandparents, William Rayburn Lillie (on the left with an "X") and Annie Lillie Robinson (at the bottom on the right, Annie Lillie, Ruby Lillie (married name Angell), children of Thomas Lillie and Hannah Groat and Roy Lillie, their nephew, son of William Rayburn Lillie and Helen Gray) were brothers and sisters and lived in Guelph Township, Wellington County, Ontario and later in nearby Salem, Nichol Township, Wellington County. When Arlene's grandmother, Annie, died at a young age her daughter, Arlene's mother, Geraldine Robinson, was raised by our great-grandmother Hannah Groat Lillie, in Salem in a home vacated by my grandparents William Rayburn and Helen Gray Lillie, when they moved west to Manitoba in 1908. Hannah and Geraldine are pictured on the right. Her first letter to me dated January 2, 1985 starts;

Dear Sharon, (my own middle name is Arlene ...)
My name is Arlene .... and I am a member of the Church in North Bay, Ontario. I have been doing genealogy on my mother's family and it appears we have something in common ... Would you be interested in corresponding and sharing whatever details we have on these ancestors. I hope to hear from you soon ... she did and we have shared and shared and shared. Her valediction then was, Sincerely, Arlene ...

My response to her dated 11 January, 1985 begins;

Dear Arlene,
I was so excited to get your letter, in fact tears came to my eyes as I read it. I have spent so many years researching the Lillie line and up until now have never run into anyone, in my (extended) family who (shares my religious background.) ... Two summers ago I spent two weeks in Ontario doing genealogy and I have had such an urge to go back every summer since. I felt so much at home there." Sincerely, Sharon ...

... when we write it is no longer sincerely, but definitely "love." I love this cousin, sister, friend. Again, we still have never met, which leaves a little hole in my heart, but as the years have passed and we have grown as mothers and wives we have shared stories and support. I feel like I know her family somewhat. She is a much better researcher than I, and I am sure a much better person. Letters have changed to email and occasionally a call. There is still excitement in our finds and I still shed tears (I am right now). This past summer she lost her sister and I know I don't feel her sadness, but I feel sad for her. That is what happens when you love someone. So the Spirit of Elijah draws families together here and beyond this earthly existence. She will be richly rewarded for all she has done for her family and many others on both sides. She has been a wonderful example to me ... my cousin, my sister, my friend! (for you and Shirl)

Two Janes

My great-grandfather, William Gray, was married twice. His first wife died shortly have childbirth. He and she had one child, Catherine Jane Gray, and apparently an official or unofficial, adopted son, Robert Ferguson. They all lived in the Bon Accord settlement, in the country surrounding Elora, Nichol Township, Wellington County, Ontario. His second wife, was my great-grandmother Jane Reid Gray. Her picture is to the right. She was born in the Puslinch (Holstein), Wellington County, Ontario, where she was also raised. Her parents were William Reid and Hellen (Helen/Ellen) Gillespie residents of Holstein, Ontario, and her brother Hugh Reid married William's sister Catharine. Where was and who was William's first wife? It seemed a huge puzzle. In the spring I had found an old marriage register (remember this was before internet research) showing the marriage of Thomas Gray (I think his name was Thomas William), to Jane Allan, but that was all the information I had. So, off I was, in July of 1983, on another adventure. I had made arrangements with my father's elderly cousin, Amy Young, since deceased, to pick her up in London, Ontario and have her take me on a little tour of the Elora are. The Elora Cemetary is a beautiful, quaint, country cemetary, near the town of Elora, Ontario. The Elora Gorge waterfalls over the Grand River and a wonderful old mill that has been turned into an inn and great restaurant, make Elora a great day destination. I walked the rows and rows of the cemetary finding many deceased family members, Lillies, Grays, Downings and towards the back, BINGO, William Gray, with not one but two headstones, finally solving the question, who was William's first wife. In my letter the next month to Bertha Vickers Beug, Jane Allan's granddaughter, I wrote;

"Visiting the Elora Cemetary I found four headstone in the early Gray area. One in the ground for William Gray. One to the immediate left for Jane Reid and William Gray , it is much newer and was probably placed there at the time of Jane Reid Gray's death. One to the left of that one for the three small children of William Gray and Jane Reid, Godfrey McDonalld Gray, Helen Gillespie Gray and an infant daughter, who they named Margaret, but the one I think you would be most interested in is an upright old white stone just to the right of Williams's Gray's flat marker in the ground. It is almost impossible to read and I tried to get a rubbing with black wax, but it was very hard and the words carved into the stone are not raised above the stone, but I did get some information. I can't tell you all the wording, but it did say, "Jane, wife of William Gray, and lists her death date as September 1st, 1866, aged 28 years 11 months" ...

Jane Allan, TWO "JANES." She died a little more than a week after her daughter Catharine Jane Gray (pictured at left with her husband, George Vickers, Detroit Lakes, Minnesota), half sister to my grandmother Helen Gray Lillie, was born, August 22, 1866. Solved, just in time to let Catharine Jane's daughter Bertha, who then lived in Minnesota, know who her grandmother was. Civil registration in Canada did not begin until 1869, so there would be no other official record of her death, and the local church does not have that particular record anymore. I am often alone in rather remote cemetaries and often wonder, especially before cell phones, if any would ever find me if something happened. On a day to day basis I rarely tell people where I am or where I am going. But, wonderful discoveries and really peaceful and exciting days amongst the stones and trees of beautiful cemetaries.

... and now you know the rest of the story ... GOODNIGHT

Hello Americans . . . stand by for news!" This was Paul Harvey's tag-line. A radio host for over 50 years he began a feature in 1976 called, "The Rest of the Story." I loved listening to it. I couldn't wait to hear the "rest". I now have my own "rest of the story." A number of years ago, when we were attending Expo 86 in Vancouver, my aunt gave me a couple of "Rahier" family documents. One was a short letter to my grandfather, Servais Joseph Rahier, from his teacher, Professor Silvestre, in the area of Heusy,Verviers, Belgium, two or three were postcards, one of a church and one of a home in the city of Verviers. The postcard of the home was signed Rosa Rahier. As a genealogist I am always looking for clues, so I had the letters translated. There were no clues .... nothing new, but they are treasured keepsakes. His teacher tells of changes in the city since Servais and his family had left. The letters are in French and from a man who obviously cared for this young student, my grandfather ... Fast forward almost 25 years and I received an email last year from Leonard in Santa Rosa, California, with whom I have researched my Rahier family. He asked me if I knew who Servais Joseph Rahier was. Off course ... he was my grandfather! Leonard, in turn, had received an email from a gentleman who operates a small historical museum in Belgium.

"Hello I am historian of the area of Verviers (Belgium) I have just discovered a dated letter 1901, with 6 photographs of Rosthern and Servias Joseph Rahier who writes to his former professor in Heusy (Verviers) The photograph represents Servais with the harvest of 1912. 2 and 3. Beating. 4 Express train leaving the station of Rosthen for Duck Lake. 5 the Rahier house in the North of Rosthern to 2 miles and half. 6 a group of Four men who draw with the rifle in front of a lake In the letter Served known as qu' it have 2à Hectares of ground He says qu' he had on December 28, 1897 a little sister who bears the name of Guillemine and on April 11, 1901 a brother of the name of Georges -- Could you tell me if there exists the downward one of this family."

My grandfather left Belgium in 1895,with his parents and his sister Anne Marie, who was actually born on a previous seven year emigration to Buenos Aires, Argentina. He was nine years old when they left Belgium for the second time. "They arrived in the spring ... with little more than the clothes they wore and some hand-baggage and $100 in his (father, Gilles's) pocket." He told me that he remembered the Sunlight Soap billboards when they arrived in Canada (probably Quebec). The letter, dated 14 June 1901, was written to his teacher in Heusy. It tells of their farm, their crops, and even the birth of his sister Guillamine (Minnie) and a little brother, George. Even then, Grandpa, and possibly his father, were amazing photographers. Now years later they have come full circle, not to Canada, through a historian in Belgium, to a man in California to me, his granddaughter, in Utah. WOW ... I was and still am amazed and speechless. Miracle! Technology has given us so many opportunities , especially in family history. Another emotional moment ... for me they all are ... and now you know ... the rest of the story .... GOOD NIGHT! (the letter and pictures can be viewed in this movie clip.