Most of us have skeletons somewhere in our genealogical closet. Not that I am saying the kin mentioned in this post are skeletons in
my closet. One or two of them might have been skeletons in my
ancestors' closets, however.
Many years ago, I was told by a psychiatrist he had found an "aunt" on my mother's side of the family who had been institutionalized for schizophrenia. Naturally, I assumed he meant one of my mother's aunts and, for some reason, I assumed the "aunt" was one of my maternal grandmother's sisters. Perhaps because my mother is always talking about how "insane" my grandmother was?
Well, I did find a relative in my family tree who was institutionalized, but she was not an aunt... more like a great aunt of my mother's. I do not know why she was institutionalized. I only know that she was institutionalized until the day she died. The woman was my great grandmother's sister, Alice Edna Butterfield, my maternal grandfather's aunt.
I believe I have written about Alice Edna Butterfield before. I am writing again because I found more information on this branch of the tree. Alice married a man named Peter John Thue on 31 December 1900 and, so far as I know, her first children were a set of male twins named Curtis and Deward. Peter John Thue was Norwegian, so we have a Norwegian line even on the German/English side of the family. They are, of course, not directly related, but are cousins nonetheless and having experience researching my own direct Norwegian lines throughout
Norway, I researched a bit of the Thue lines as well. (No, I have not found any insanity.)
Curtis Thue married twice, both times to women of foreign birth. His first marriage was to Dolores Medina, who was born in San Juan de Lagos,
Jalisco, Mexico in 1912, came
legally to the U.S. in the 1920's, became a
U.S. citizen in the 1930's and died 19 December 1942 in
Los Angeles, California. Dolores had at least one child with Curtis Thue, so we have cousins with
Mexican and, I am guessing,
Spanish, heritage. The fun part is that I get to learn how to do research in Mexico. Fortunately, I already read Mexican Spanish and I speak Spanish, although not fluently, as well. I do not expect to have an easy time of it, however, as I have seen old Spanish documents dating back to the time of the Missions and they are not the easiest things in the world to read, but I know I'll get through it because I also read German gothic script and if you can read that, you can learn to read just about anything!
Curtis Thue married a second time to a Lebanese woman, whose name I will not mention because she may still be alive. I suspect they may have married in
Lebanon, but in any case, if they had issue, we have cousins from the
Middle East as well.
Before anyone sends me nasty grams, let me note that I do not consider having Mexican or Middle Eastern branches in the family tree a "skeleton in the closet." In fact, I was delighted to find these branches of the tree because it illustrates how diverse one individual's heritage can be and if the knowledge that you might not be who you think you are doesn't deter racism, hatred, fear and prejudice, you are a lost soul indeed. It should at least make you think twice before succumbing to knee-jerk reactions.
Image via CrunchBaseI just received the email yesterday - Footnote is changing its name to fold3. Its new focus will be "offering the finest and most comprehensive collection of U.S. Military records available on the internet." I about had a heart attack while simultaneously leaping for joy when I read those words. What would happen to the records that were not related to the U.S. military? I was relieved to read those records would remain on the new site.
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