Seahawks to the 2014 Super Bowl!

Go Seahawks!

My hometown of Winlock, Washington is famous for it World's Largest Egg by the railroad tracks. These tracks are the main north-south route for Burlington Northern Sante  Fe Railroad and Amtrak. Some townspeople recently got together and repainted the egg - at one time it also had a US flag on the side.

As my friend, Barbara Nichols Lewis posted on January 25th:

"Today was an amazing day in Winlock. Ron and Mason Gaul and Melody Reilley put so much time and effort into painting the Winlock egg with the Seahawk logo, and it looks fantastic! So many people came forward to help and at times there were so many cars going by and people getting out to take pictures, that it seemed like a parade! The sun came out to thaw the frozen egg ( helped along with hair dryers and a heater mounted on the scaffolding) and it all came together! Just a fun and wonderful day in Winlock!"

Photo by Trish Zee 

From June Bolden:

"For those of you who aren't familiar with Winlock's location, we are about 100 miles south of Seattle and about 70 miles north of Portland. Our Egg sits right next to the RR Tracks. Amtrak travels both North and Southbound 3 times per day so it will get a lot of exposure. We have people who live hours away who are driving here just to have their picture taken next to it!!! GOOOOOO HAWKS!! #PROUD"

And from Jeff and Cheryl Millman:

"12th Man in Winlock! What Fun!!

 

And from the Winlock Historical Society:

"Here's a look at the final product after volunteers spent the entire day painting. The rooster was finished about sunset ... and what an improvement!"

52 Ancestors - #4 Isaac Harry - A Union Soldier

Isaac Harry is my paternal great great grandfather. His daughter Effie Harry married Hubbard Philander Mitchell. One of their eight children was my grandfather Roscoe Arthur Mitchell. My information on the Mitchell’s and the Harry’s come from Roscoe’s sisters Veron Mitchell Holden and Gwendolyn Mitchell Wiggins and his niece Bonnie Wiggins Baron.

Isaac’s father Charles Andrew Harry (born November 17, 1800) was part of the second generation of the Harry family to be born in this country. His mother was Elizabeth West born July 27, 1810 in Williamsburg, Ohio. It is believed that the Harry’s (originally Harre’s) migrated from France to Germany and then to this country sometime after 1738. They were known to be hat makers.

Isaac was born May 3, 1843 in Williamsburg, Ohio and was the seventh of eleven children. Isaac from the age of 10 through age 17 lived with and worked for his maternal grandparents, George and Nancy West. He earned 10 cents a day and gave all his earning to his Mother, except what he needed for his clothing. When he was 17 or 18, he went to Charleston, Illinois to work in a blacksmith shop for his brother, William E. Harry. After six months in Charleston he enlisted in the Union Army, Company A 123^rd Illinois Regiment.

Isaac Harry, at the age of 96 was interviewed by the Charleston Illinois Daily Courier and gave the following account of his service in the Civil War. Possessing all of his faculties, this 96 year old veteran can recall with all of the vividness of youth, incidents occurring in his three years of army life.

“We came into actual army life at Louisville, Kentucky, in August of 1862,” he said “I was in the infantry for the first six months of the campaign and then became a member of the mounted infantry under Colonel Wilder in his brigade.”  The horse he rode was called Dolly, a little black mare. The mare was acquired by the customary wartime tactics – “taken from a pleading southern widow woman,” according to the General’s command. He was in the service for three years from 1862 to 1865.

In the three years, the army worked its way from Louisville to Atlanta, Georgia arriving there in 1865. All in all the regiment, which was composed entirely of Coles County young men, fought 111 engagements of which the three major battles, Perryville, Chickamauga, and Atlanta, are a major part of the history of that bitter struggle.

“At Perryville, Kentucky, our first major battle, over 170 from our number were either killed or wounded. At Chickamauga our loss was light and we were able to penetrate the enemy lines with little difficulty.”

“Colonel James Monroe of Charleston was in command of the 123^rd Regiment and he was a fine leader and soldier, and had the respect of his men. He was killed at Farmington, Tennessee when Joe Wheeler led a band of confederates in a raid against our brigade.”

“We usually had enough rations although one time we went three days without food. That time, however, the mess sergeant had confiscated many of our supplies and sold them. On our raiding parties we took only food and things that we needed. We destroyed no property only that which had been devastated in battle.”

One incident that Isaac Harry tells is of the time that his brigade was camping near Pulaski, Tennessee. “It was the coldest weather that had ever been experienced in that part of the country. That night it froze ice in the streams deep enough to support the weight of a horse. Frank Waters of Ashmore and I pitched our pup tent alongside a huge log which protected us from the wind. The leaves alongside the log kept us warm through the night. Many of the party, however, could not sleep it was so cold that they kept dragging logs onto huge fires.”

“I served under three generals, Buell, Rosecrans and Sherman. I was under Sherman’s command at Atlanta but when he started his march to the sea I was assigned to a contingent that was after the rebel commander, Nathan Bedford Forrest. We finally caught him at Selma, Alabama, where after a bitter battle we were able to take 2000 prisoners from the Confederate ranks but we lost over one third of our brigade in winning. Forrest and about 200 of his men were able to escape.”

“Following this skirmish we were returned to Macon, Georgia at the end of the war and from there we were brought back to Springfield, Illinois where I received my discharge. I was given the horse “Dolly” and rode it to Charleston where I remained for a while before returning to my old home at Williamsburg, Ohio.”

In all Isaac Harry fought in 111 engagements and never received a scratch. His company of 1000 was reduced to 22 upon returning after the war. He lived to be 101 years old.

The Evans Sisters @ Hood Canal

I spent last weekend with the Evans sisters which is like spending time with the Tucker Cousins - we laughed and laughed and had a great time! I used to work with Ann seven plus years ago at the city where she still toils. Sue has been retired for 4 years and both Ann and I would like to be! We already scheduled our next get together at Ann's in Clatskanie, Oregon for the first weekend in April.

Here is my view as I sew:

Here is my new Singer Featherweight 221 in action - does a much better 1/4 inch seam than my Pfaff.

We all worked on old projects that we had been dreading working on again. If we had been working by ourselves, we probably would have given up.

My project was from two years ago. I started the center medallion at Ann's house January 21, 2011. I then finished a set of borders and corner stars the following weekend.

Off to a great start until I started working on the twenty outer blocks - problems, problems, tedious, tedious. So I just put them away and started two other quilts one of which I finished in August.

I managed to finish eight side pinwheel blocks - then I discovered that I have four more to do - the only difference being they are called center pinwheel blocks.

Sue finished three bags - from last April - and has a fourth almost done.

Ann's project was probably the most mind boggling to figure out but she did it! She hadn't worked on it since last April either.

She got everything pieced together and since she had an extra day there - started to sew the strips together. I offered to take it off her hands when she finishes it.

What a Beautiful Baby!

After saving money since last April when I first tried my friend Sue's Singer Featherweight at Hood Canal, I was able to get one after Christmas from Super Sew and Vac on Kent's East Hill (they had been recommended as a trustworthy place to have my sewing machine serviced by Paula at A-1 Vacuum in Kelso.) I went in there to have my tired and cranky Pfaff 6270 serviced (it has a lot of road miles on it traveling up and down the freeways of Washington with me) and noticed they had Featherweights for $300 (they can sell for as much as $600.)

The case is a little beat up but in works great still - and it has its original manual. The machine had been serviced and the foot pedal and the cord replaced. It was made sometime between 1939 and 1941 which when I was collecting Lionel trains - was a good thing.

It sews like a dream!

52 Ancestors - #3 Mary Graves Hardesty - An Unconventional Woman

Mary Graves Hardesty was born in Kentucky on February 28, 1840. Her father was Kinzea W. Hardesty of Henry County, Kentucky (1806-1851) and her mother was Mary Sallee (Polly) Dingle (1810-1883). There were thirteen children (eight boys and five girls) in her family. On a journey to Missouri in 1852 her father Kinzea became ill and died. During the early Civil War years the Hardesty brothers decided to move the entire family West rather than fight against the States. They had a long journey by covered wagon and arrived in Honey Lake, California in 1861. Soon after they arrived Mary met John Tucker and they were married on January 21, 1862. The marriage certificate is the only time she is known as Mary Jane instead of Mary Graves.

 Mary Graves Hardesty Tucker

February 28, 1840 to December 10, 1918

In the early days at Silver Creek in Washington Territory, they had only a few neighbors - two white settlers at Mossyrock and one at Salkum. The Indians, the Ike's and the Castama's who lived near the mouth of the Tilton River also became very good friends. The Indian women delivered three of the six children Mary had at Silver Creek and she in turn went to the Indian camp to deliver their children. Mary also was a mid-wife for the white settlers as they moved into the valley. 

Mary was tall, about 5'8", and she commanded the respect of everyone when she spoke. She was kind, practical and abruptly direct. She was also unconventional in that she insisted that Indian Louie, John's hired hand, sit at the table with the rest of the family for meals. The white settlers criticized her for treating the Indians as equals, but she didn't care. If someone was good enough to work along with the Tuckers in the fields than they were good enough to eat at their table.

In addition to the store the family ran out of their home, Mary would also travel to Tumwater (100 mile round trip - two weeks) and Tacoma (160 mile round trip - almost a month) by horse and wagon to sell butter she churned and salt pork that she made. In addition to the 160 acres they homesteaded, John purchased 450 acres from the railroad for $900. He had over one hundred head of cattle and a number of pigs and chickens. They always had wild animals after the cattle so John carried an old "Yager" gun and Mary always took an axe with her. Mary was out looking for some cattle with the dogs one day and found the cattle circled around a newborn calf trying to protect it from a cougar in a tree. Mary picked up the calf and carried it on her back while the cougar followed her. Even though cougars often killed dogs they managed to keep the cougar away from Mary and the calf until they reached the safety of the barn.

Mary and John had eight children who were healthy until their daughter Sarah Ellen died at age 19 of a ruptured appendix in 1886. Her husband John died in 1904. Mary's son Albert Henry (born 1876) died in 1911 of a strangulated hernia leaving a widow and a 4 year old son. Mary died in 1918 after being an invalid for four years. Her sons and daughters took turns taking care of her until her death.

Mary and six of her children on her 74th birthday in 1914 - my great grandfather William John Tucker (1862-1933) is in the back row on the right. The others are Alfred James (1879-1951), Mary Elizabeth (1865-1921), Frederick Rollyn (1882-1958), George Henry (1872-1937), and Agnes J. (1874-1951).

Fort Magic

For Christmas I got my grandsons Fort Magic - it is an amazing building kit that you can use to make all kinds of neat forts. We decided to start with the yellow submarine (must be my son-in-law's influence since he is a Beatles fan.)

You can cover them with fabric, sheets, or as one woman suggested online - plastic tablecloths from the dollar store. The problem with the plastic tablecloth is that they tear very easy and with the clips that come with the kit you can use them only one time. I think I will wait for closeouts on material at JoAnn's.

Jackson and Dylan

I did purchase material to make the race car fort and the airplane fort. I think material will be much easier.

52 Ancestors - #2 John Tucker born January 29, 1828 - Hampshire, England

John (son of Isaac and Sarah Agnes Tucker) sailed to the East coast of America in November 1851 from London, England. He traveled across the country to try his luck in the California gold fields. He mined for 10 years but never earned more than $1.50 per day. John met Mary Hardesty (a descendant of Edward Carter Dingle) shortly after she arrived in Honey Lake, California in 1861. They married on January 21, 1862. He then purchased a farm in Susanville, Lassen County, California but irrigation was necessary and he disagreed with his neighbors on the terms for the distribution of water. John and Mary's first child (my great grandfather William John Tucker) was born nine months and nine days after their marriage while they lived in Susanville. John had two dreams, to go north to Canada to get back under British Rule and to buy a farm where God did the irrigating. He succeeded with the second dream in 1866 when he hewed his log home out of the wilderness of the Silver Creek area after two years of renting a farm on the Cowlitz Prairie in Washington Territory. At that time Silver Creek was a 2000 acre valley of fertile soil with no roads and very few clearings because the land was covered with a hardy growth of timber. For the first two years at the Silver Creek cabin it had no door - just a large and heavy canvas and then with the birth of each of the next six children he would add a room to the cabin. He never made it back to British territory as he was unable to convince his wife Mary to ford any more treacherous rivers after they had lost a team of horses and a wagon crossing the Cowlitz River near Toledo after their arrival in Washington Territory. The Silver Creek Post Office was established in his cabin on March 15, 1875 and he was postmaster for 22 years. The Post Office stayed in the Tucker family for 41 years. John was very enterprising and also kept a store in his home for over 25 years. During his life John also sent money to his family left in England.

Before the Silver Creek school was built in 1888, John hired a live-in tutor as was English custom to teach his children. John's son George Henry Tucker became a teacher, superintendent of schools and a state senator.  Three of his son James' daughters became teachers who taught a total of 93 years between them. Several other family members also became teachers. 

One of the Tucker cousins had the original letters from John's family in England from 1854 to 1910 and Hardesty letters from Nevada and California from 1869, and 1906-1914. There were also letters from 1855 to 1859 from John Tucker's brother Henry who followed him to America in 1855 but settled in New Bern, Craven County, North Carolina because he could not afford the trip across the plains to the West coast. Between 1999 and 2001 three of us (my first cousin Chris and my second cousin once removed Carole) transcribed the letters and followed up on the genealogy leads that they contained. I then made copies of the originals and transcriptions and had them bound into books about 2 inches thick for about 40 Tucker cousins interested in a copy. My cousin Carole compiled the genealogy information we had at the time on the Tucker, Hardesty and Dingle families and printed copies of that for the cousins.
  

John Tucker

January 29, 1828 to August 14, 1904

One Year Anniversary

Today is the first anniversary of my blog. I managed to do 82 posts - and that was with skipping October entirely. I didn't get as much sewing and quilting done as I had hoped but I have gotten a lot of things organized! I now know what I have as far as sewing, quilting, scrapbooking, and genealogy materials - and I know what I have to do. Unfortunately, my biggest challenge to getting things done is having to work 40 plus hours per week.

Friday was my Aunt Dorothy Irene's 79th birthday and Saturday would have my father Lionell's 94th had he lived (he died in 1982 at age 62.)  His mother Ruby had been in labor for a week and the doctor could not hear the baby's heartbeat any longer so he decided since it no longer mattered and because Ruby needed some sleep that he knocked her out morphine. Ruby later complained that during her long week of labor the doctor partied and drank with men folk while they waited. When Ruby came to, Dorothy was kicking and Ruby was back in labor. When Dorothy was born on January 10, 1935, she had a long, narrow head from being in the birth canal for so long. After three boys the girl was unexpected, Ruby was exhausted and out of it, so the men were trying to figure out what to name the baby. Lionell asked if he could name her since his 15th birthday was the next day. He named her Dorothy after a girl he was either dating or fond of. The Irene was after her father's sister. Lionell and Dorothy were very close in spite of the difference in their ages. On September 14, 2013, she and her husband Dick celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary - with five children and many grand and great grandchildren.

52 Ancestors - #1 Calla Tucker's 1917 Botany Note Book

My Great Aunt Calla Lily Tucker died in 1981 when she was 82 1/2 years old. I inherited a few of her things - one of which was her Botany note book which she did between Fall 1916 and June of 1917. Calla turned 18 on March 11th that year. It contains Botany exercises, drawings and plant samples from Silver Creek, Lewis County, Washington. Amazingly almost all of the plant samples are still in one piece after 97 years (only the strawberry plant had totally disintegrated by 2014.) I finished scanning it the first week of January 2014, in case someone else wanted a copy of it (since there are dozens of Tucker cousins) and to "preserve it" forever. I also created an index to it which includes current day pictures of the samples. The note book sits on my antique desk, and I put Calla's grandmother's (my great great grandmother Mary Hardesty Tucker's) reading glasses on top of the book as if she was reading it. I am sure Calla showed it to her as Mary did not die until 1918. 

1916/1917 Botany Note Book

Samples from the Book:

 

My Great Aunt Calla Lily Tucker was born March 11, 1899. She was William John Tucker's (eldest son of John and Mary Tucker) fifth and youngest child and his only daughter. Calla's mother was Will's second wife May Mabel Wight. 

Calla left Silver Creek 1 April 1922 to attend the Seattle School of Nursing with Eva Henderson. In December she came home for a few days visit on December 23^rd. The Kalama River in neighboring Cowlitz County had frozen over due to the severe cold snap and two barns had collapsed from the weight of the snow in the Winlock area. The following year Calla and Eva had the month of July off from nurses training and spent it in Silver Creek.

After graduation, Calla stayed in Seattle to work as a nurse, but returned home often for visits. Calla was my maternal grandfather Alva Ashbury Tucker's youngest sibling of four and only sister.  Alva had forgotten to mail his life insurance check for his premium in May 1927 and he asked her to mail it for him before he went to work (he was an engineer on a tugboat) and to look after his family if anything happened to him. The tugboat went down in stormy seas a few days later and the life insurance money helped keep his widow and four children (ages 10, 7, 4 and 2 months) going during the depression. Calla did what she could for his children in the years that followed.
 

She worked in Seattle until sometime in 1929 when she started working as one of two nurses for a 38 year old physician, Dr. James R Barton, who also employed a cook for the household at Port Gamble, Washington. Calla was still there on April 5, 1930. Later in 1930 Calla moved back to Seattle to work as a nurse at the Florence Crittenton Home for unwed mothers for six years.

 

Cally Lily Tucker July 28, 1932

 

Calla must have needed a birth certificate for something because on 29 August 1934 her maternal grandmother swore in an affidavit in lieu of a birth certificate that Calla Lilly Tucker had been born on 11 March 1899 at Silver Creek, Lewis County, Washington. Calla’s father William had died the year before and her mother May had died in 1920 at the age of forty-nine.

During the spring of 1936, Calla had a couple of Seattle doctors that she had worked with write her letters of recommendation. This is what they had to say about her:

 

“This is to certify that I recommend Miss Calla Tucker, a registered nurse, to the fullest degree. I have been closely associated with her in a professional status for the past seven years and have found her to be most capable and competent. Her character is beyond reproach and it is with great pleasure that I recommend her for whatever position in the field of nursing she may desire. Carl M. Helwig, M.D.”

 

“During my service a pediatrician on the staff of the Florence Crittenton Home, I have worked with Miss Calla L. Tucker.

 

I know her to be an exceptionally well prepared and efficient obstetric and pediatric nurse. I can most whole-heartedly recommend her to any position requiring institution pediatric type nursing.

 

She possesses an unusual acumen for detecting when things are not going well with babies. She is dependable, trustworthy and energetic. Arthur E. Wade, M.D.”

 

Calla returned to Lewis County sometime after 1940 to work at St. Helen's Hospital where in 1948 she was a head nurse. At some point Calla bought a home in Chehalis at 1434 Second Street which was across the street from the block that R.E. Bennett School occupied. R.E. Bennett faced Market Boulevard which was the main street through Chehalis. 

 

 

Calla belonged to a number of community and fraternal organizations. On 2 October 1950, Calla and her fellow members of the Pythian Sisters Drill Team journeyed to Seattle to compete at the Grand Temple Convention. Their team took first place and was now the best team in Washington. The Pythian Sisters is a fraternal order with members in both the United States and Canada. It was founded in October 1888 in Indiana, and it is associated with the Order of the Knights of Pythias which was established in 1864 in Washington, D.C. (The organization is much smaller now with one temple in Italy, twenty in Canada, and one hundred fifty-one in the United States in twenty-eight states. Oregon has five and Washington has four temples – Tacoma, Longview, Black Diamond, and Port Orchard.) 

In the fall of 1950, Calla was also a member of the World Hobby Guild No. 1. It was a fairly large group with twenty-four members attending even during icy weather when most could not make it. Members had a variety of hobbies from writing to rock collecting to jewelry making to painting. At the meetings members would show examples of their hobbies and various clubs would exchange items to review at guild meetings. For example, a World Hobby Guild in California sent the Lewis County guild samples of a rock collection from an old mine. A man in New York sent samples of his jewelry to be sold or exchanged. Various competitions were held around the country and you could enter something from your hobby.

Calla had a busy active life with a number of friends. In June of 1951 she had a birthday dinner party at her house for two friends, Mrs. Marie Jubb and Mrs. Elmira Filan, with birthdays that week. She had a pink and white decorated birthday cake and the assistance of Donna Filan, the small daughter of Mrs. Elmira Filan. In April of 1952 Calla was elected to the Executive Board of the Hobby Guild. She held offices in every organization in which she was a member. She also was active in the Southside Garden Circle.

Calla spent the weekend before Thanksgiving 1953 having dinner with her first cousin Adeline Larson Swanson, her husband Arthur, and daughter Marjorie who had come down from Port Angeles to celebrate with some of Arthur’s family. Also attending from Tacoma was Hilda Usher, the widow of Adeline’s older half-brother Walter who had died in 1952. Since they were living on neighboring farms, the first cousins - Calla born March of 1899, Walter born February 1896, and Adeline born in 1901 would have all grown up together.

Calla worked as a nurse at St. Helen’s Hospital until she retired. She was also a member of the Chehalis Seventh-Day Adventist Church. Calla died at St. Helen’s Hospital on Monday, November 30, 1981. Her funeral was held on Thursday, December 3^rd at Fissel Chapel of the Brown Mortuary Service in Chehalis. She was buried at Alpha Cemetery (noted in one cemetery index as Callie Lilly Tucker instead of Calla Lily.)

Calla left her estate to her church. The church members were very kind to me at her service and said that I could go into her house and take whatever personal belongings I might want because I was Calla's closest living relative. She had a few snapshots of herself and her half-brother Edwin Monroe Tucker, Sr. and his wife Marie. Under the glass on her bedroom dresser, she had something that made me cry. Calla had the obituary for her grandfather John Tucker, her grandmother Mary G. Tucker, her father William John Tucker, and an article "5 Men and Boat Believed Lost in Straits - Missing Tug and her Scow Thought to Have Been Run Down and Sunk" about the death of her older brother Alva to whom she had been very close. Alva did not have an obituary.

 

 

Great grandparents: Isaac Tucker/ Agnes Tucker

Grandparents: John Tucker/Mary Graves Hardesty

Parents: William John Tucker/May Mabel Wight

 

Updated May 25, 2023

Copyright ©2023 Maevè Mitchell