by Sharon Hall | Mar 21, 2015 | Surname Saturday
A couple of weeks ago the Cakebread surname was featured with an interesting story – this week it’s Whitebread. These two surnames appear to share similar origins dating back to pre-seventh century Olde English. The Old English word “hwit” meant white, “hwaete”...
by Sharon Hall | Mar 20, 2015 | Feisty Females
A group of well-to-do young ladies, anxious to do their part for the Southern cause, formed and all-female cavalry unit in 1862, calling themselves the Rhea County Spartans. These “sidesaddle soldiers” were like many women on both sides of the war who wished with all...
by Sharon Hall | Mar 17, 2015 | Wild West Wednesday
Her story was sensationalized in 1857 by a Methodist minister named Royal B. Stratton, who used what the Arizona Republic called “purple prose” to exaggerate and fabricate the experiences of young Olive Oatman. As the Republic pointed out, there was no need for such...
by Sharon Hall | Mar 17, 2015 | Tombstone Tuesday
I came across this fellow named Green Rash while I was doing research for some of my ancestors, the Stogsdills — his name appeared in some Pulaski County, Kentucky will records. Unusual names just intrigue me – and what could be more appropriate for St....
by Sharon Hall | Mar 14, 2015 | Surname Saturday
The Whale surname was derived from a nickname for (no surprise) a person of large girth who “rolled” as they walked, according to the Internet Surname Database. Charles Bardsley, author of A Dictionary of English and Welsh Surnames, wrote a bit more poetically: ...
by Sharon Hall | Mar 13, 2015 | Far-Out Friday
Do you suffer from friggatriskaidekaphobia (and you say, I don’t even know how to pronounce it, so how could I be afflicted with it!?!). Maybe not, but it may affect between seventeen and twenty million Americans. According to the Mayo Clinic, in clinical terms a...
by Sharon Hall | Mar 11, 2015 | Ghost Town Wednesday
Lewis Hawkins Davis left Indiana in 1851 and joined a wagon train in Independence, Missouri, heading west to Oregon Territory’s Willamette Valley. Two years after arriving he headed north to Saunders Bottom in Lewis County, Washington where he built a double log...
by Sharon Hall | Mar 10, 2015 | Tombstone Tuesday
Ambrose Hill and Callie Donia Fickling Bradshaw were married on March 6, 1918. For both it was a second marriage – Ambrose was a widower and Callie Donia divorced with five children. A few things intrigued me about this couple: their names, their large blended...
by Sharon Hall | Mar 7, 2015 | Surname Saturday
This unusual name is among the oldest known surnames, possibly of Norse-Viking and Olde English pre-ninth century origins, according to The Internet Surname Database. The name may have been derived from a combination of a Norse word, “kaka” (meaning cake) and the...
by Sharon Hall | Mar 4, 2015 | Ghost Town Wednesday
This “ghost town” in East Texas is known as the Burning Bush Colony. It was an “intentional community” founded as an offshoot of the Methodist Church. Headquartered in Waukesha, Wisconsin, this splinter group of “Free Methodists” called themselves the “Society of...
