You Go Girl!

  I have the coolest family tree!  Full of rebels!  Mercy Jones, born in Massachusetts in Sept. 1654 was arrested at age 19.  Court records show the following:

The colonial laws regulated the subject of extravagant dressing.  In September 1673 the court recorded:“Diverse women at Springfeild presentd at ye Courte in March last for that being of meane estate they did weare Silkes contrary to Law vixt Goodwife Labden , Goody Colton , Goody Morgan , Goody Barnard , Mercy & Hephzibod Jones , Hunters wife ; Daughter ;Abell Wrights wife, & warned to this Courte the six former app’ring in Courte they were admonisht of their extyravagancyes & dismist.


Her sister was arrested as well, and with her name I can imagine she needed to do some fancy dressing to get beyond that moniker. What a cool family!  Besides Mercy Jones, my ancesters include the following:

• King Edward I, aka Longshanks, my 21st Great Grandfather
• Patrick Henry is my cousin, 8 generations ago
• Charles Martel (born in 676 AD) 39th Great Grandfather "Were it not for Charles Martel perhaps the interpretation of the Koran would now be taught in the schools of Oxford, and her pulpits might demonstrate the sanctity and truth of the revelation of Mahomet. . . . From such calamities was Christendom delivered by the genius and fortune of one man." Edward Gibbon: History Of The Decline And Fall Of The Roman Empire, Volume 5, page 156 - 157
• Hugh de Courtenay IV, Pirate of the high seas in the 1460s, my 16th great grandfather
• My 37th great grandfather, Charlemagne the Great
• Princess Diana, 21st cousin by marriage
• Prince William and Princess Kate, 22nd cousins by marriage
• Vladimir "The Great", Grand Prince of Kiev is my paternal grandfather of wife of grand nephew of the wife of my 30th great grandfather.
    (note to self: you might need to take a break now...time to step away from the computer...)

After King Edward I, my family tree follows a line through his daughter, Princess Elizabeth, who married Humphrey De Bohun, Earl of Essex.  The royal blood line thins as it reaches the 1700s and then I find I'm related to commoners after that.  When it gets that far away from Royal blood, at some point, does it turn into a rumor? Anyway, I think I'll send an invitation to Will and Kate for the next family BBQ.  They must have, what... a mere 540,000 22nd cousins?

45 years ago today

  45 years ago today a huge event occurred in my life. June 13, 1976.  I was 16 yrs old and it was early summer in Iowa.  I lived on a farm in Jordan, Iowa.  Our lane was a 1/4 mile long, our house on 5 acres with fields of corn on 3 sides, the town on the other.  My sisters and I had been picking strawberries for mom that afternoon and we had just sat down to put our sunburned noses in a bowl of strawberries and ice cream.  While mom was scooping she became angry when she glanced out the window.  Dad was recklessly driving at highway speed down our long lane.  Mom put the spoon down and headed outside to yell at dad.  Of course we followed to watch the fireworks!

By the time she made it out the door, he had skidded to a stop and was yelling for us to get outside.  He had been fishing on the Des Moines river and said he had been watching a tornado that dropped down.   We saw the tornado off in the distance and watched it.  (Well, that's what Iowans do.) Mom brought out blankets when it started to rain a few minutes later.  Dad's face looked worried after a little while because he could tell it was coming right at us.  He yelled at us to get in the car we needed to leave! He backed his truck out, a decision he would regret later, and 5 kids and 2 adults packed into the station wagon.

A neighbor friend of mine was visiting us that afternoon and my 3 siblings and I watched as we sped away from the farm.  We drove a half-mile away and parked on the highway.  It was starting to tear up the corn field next to our farm.  By then it was a massive wall of clouds, that later would be described as a mile wide tornado that Ted Fujita himself named an F-5.

The trees & house in this picture are not in the path, they are quite a ways away from the tornado.

After a few minutes, the car started spewing steam, having blown a hose.  Dad decided to go to the nearest gas station about 4 miles away.  When we arrived no one was there, the gas station was empty but still open.  He couldn't find a water spicket so he dumped a bucket of dirty windshield washer water into the radiator and we raced back toward our farm.

We arrived to see the tornado hovering over our town.  There was a grain elevator next to the end of our lane and the tornado had swallowed it up.  We could see our farm across the field though.  It had been erased from the land.  We had a large barn, chicken coop, corn crib, house and garage and all that we could see was what looked like a small shack on the horizon, what had been our kitchen.

My sisters, little brother, friend and I were all crying, wondering aloud what was happening to our friends and family that lived in our small town.  As soon as the tornado had moved away, we drove down the street and were in awe of the damage.

We couldn't drive very far into town because debris, dead animals and trees laid across the street, but we stopped and piled out of the car.  There wasn't a soul around but us.  We were yelling for people we knew lived in the houses that were now basement holes gaping at us.  There was so much debris laying around.  Slowly people started crawling up out of the holes.  Our town had 52 people that lived there. The grain elevator was the only business and it was a huge pile of twisted metal and wood.  

We began talking to the people that were beginning to join us on the street when the first deputy arrived to help us.  The adults began looking through debris while the kids milled about not knowing what to do.

In the end, no one was seriously hurt.  An amazing fact after finding out how many people had been in their basements.  The 9 year old son of a friend of ours had been in their basement and had been hit in the head by a brick.  His mom needed stitches on her knee and those were the only injuries that day.

The Jordan  school building had been on the edge of the tornado, it had been 3 stories tall.

Ted Fujita was a Japanese-American meteorologist whose research primarily focused on severe weather.  He created the Fujita scale of rating tornadoes.  The Jordan tornado was the first F-5 tornado he studied. As Dr. Fujita described the Jordan, Iowa tornado he said "it was the most intense and destructive tornado I have ever studied". If you'd like to read more information about the 1976 Jordan tornado you can google it to find some great reading on the subject.

We didn't rebuild on the land, and instead rented a farm house located across the field from where we used to live.  The house was on the highway where we had viewed the tornado.  Nearly everyone rebuilt their homes. 

Scrapbook pages 6-7

As you know, I'm making 6 Civil War scrapbooks to honor my GG grandfather, James Monroe.  Here are pages 6 and 7:

Civil War

The kids are in bed, dh is working and the house is quiet.  I love scrapbooking during this time.  A friend and I are visiting a new fabric store in the morning so I should get to bed but it's sooo nice and quiet right now.

I'm honoring my great, great grandfather James Monroe.  James fought in the Civil War from start to finish.  He enlisted on 6 Jul. 1861 in Company D, 4th Iowa Infantry. He fought in the battles of Chickasaw Bayou; Arkansas Post; First and Second battles of Jackson, Mississippi; Champion Hill; Siege of Vicksburg; Brandon, Mississippi; Chattanooga; Mission Ridge; In the Atlanta Campaign and in the battles of Jonesboro & Savannah. He was wounded in the head by a piece of shell at Chickasaw Bayou and was shot through the clothing at Vicksburg. Honorably Discharged at Davenport, Iowa 6 Aug. 1865.

I'm off to bed now... thanks for visiting!

Civil War Records

There are 50 pages of records for my great, great grandfather's service in the Civil War!    So far, this is what I know.... He was wounded in the battle of Vicksburg, Mississippi on December 29, 1863.  Shrapnel from a cannon ball hit him in the head, fortunately the wound was minor.  I have his signatures on several documents, and also his wife.

My great, great grandfather helped burn Atlanta.  Remember the scene from Gone with the Wind where Rhett and Scarlett barely escape with their lives as they pass a 5 story building full of flames? ... Yes, my grandpa was one of those dirty yankees in Georgia!

An 85 lb. soldier
from the Civil War

 He served as a private from beginning to the end of the Civil War.  His company "was reenrolled at Woodville Alibama on the 1^st day of January 1864 was with the Army of Gen Sherman on the March from Atlanta to Savannah in the State of Georgia – That the soldiers had no tents but Shelter Tents that on said March by reason of Exposure and hard marching the said James M. contracted the Chronic Disease – The same was in the line of his duty.  The Army left Atlanta Oct 3^rd 18yr and got to Savannah December 24^th 1864."


 The disease he contracted toward the end of the war disabled him for the rest of his life.  When he went to war he weighed 180 lbs, healthy for a man who was 5' 10" tall.  When he arrived back home at the end of the war he weighed 85 lbs.  


He fought in many battles, I'll have to make a list, watch for that in the near future.