by Sharon Hall | May 19, 2015 | Tombstone Tuesday
A strong thread of American patriotism is evident in both the ancestors and descendants of Robert Christian Humber. He was born on June 2, 1783 in Goochland County, Virginia to parents John and Elizabeth (Christian) Humber, the tenth of thirteen children. The...
by Sharon Hall | May 12, 2015 | Tombstone Tuesday
Baron DeKalb Stansell was born in Decatur, DeKalb County, Georgia on November 25, 1833 to parents David and Priscilla (Chastain) Stansell. DeKalb County was established in 1822 from parts of Henry, Gwinett and Fayette counties and named after Baron Johann de Kalb, a...
by Sharon Hall | May 8, 2015 | Feisty Females
Today’s feisty female, Theodate Pope Riddle, dared to be different. She was born at the stroke of midnight on February 2 (or 3), 1867 in Salem, Ohio to well-to-do parents Alfred Atmore and Ada Lunette (Brooks) Pope. Her birth name was Effie Brooks, but despising it...
by Sharon Hall | Apr 29, 2015 | Tombstone Tuesday
I could just as well tell her story under the “Feisty Female” category of this blog, but I’m choosing to write about the woman known to the country throughout the 1930’s until her death in 1946 as “Aunt Lizzie Devers”. To research her entire life, however,...
by Sharon Hall | Apr 22, 2015 | Ghost Town Wednesday
This ghost town in Motley County, Texas was once a Comanche village near where Tee Pee Creek merges with the middle fork of the Pease River. In 1875 it was established as one of the first Texas Panhandle settlements as a buffalo hunting and surveyor camp by Charles...
by Sharon Hall | Apr 21, 2015 | Tombstone Tuesday
In case you missed last week’s Tombstone Tuesday article, you might want to read it first since I promised to clear up the mystery of what really happened to the son of Ezekiel and Ella Pettit. The story posted by a family friend at Find-A-Grave left me with more...
by Sharon Hall | Apr 20, 2015 | Military History Monday
The Upper East Side is one of the most affluent neighborhoods in New York City and once referred to as the “Silk Stocking District”. Within its boundaries lies some of the most expensive real estate in the country, home to some of the wealthiest people in the world. ...
by Sharon Hall | Apr 17, 2015 | Feisty Females
When Amelia Earhart wanted to learn how to fly an airplane, the deal she struck with her parents required she be taught by a woman pilot. That pilot, Neta Snook, was a woman of many “firsts” – one of the first female aviators, she was the first woman accepted into a...
by Sharon Hall | Apr 14, 2015 | Tombstone Tuesday
Ezekiel William Pettit was born in 1837 to parents Samuel and Polly Pettit in the province of Ontario, Canada, not far from the United States border in the township of Townsend. One source indicates that his parents were actually United States citizens, but there are...
by Sharon Hall | Apr 10, 2015 | Far-Out Friday
A friend forwarded a story to me recently from Retro Indy (Indianapolis) about a device invented in the late eighteenth century, which led me to explore a bizarre series of patents granted from the 1840’s through the early twentieth century. The September 20,...
