Investigating Family Ties~Part 1

My Take

DiVoran Lites

In the days before email and the Internet, my mother did a lot of letter writing to learn about our ancestors, and then she made a big round chart of what she had learned. I love that she added bits of information that interested her. She also gave me the materials she collected or knew from her own relatives. Perhaps someone will become a family historian like Mother and all this will pass on to them to get them started.

The outer edge of the chart edge represents the fifth generation before Mother and Dad. I started with Mother. The fifth generation of her line is empty. That could be a challenge to anyone who would like to know more and who now has the digital age and thousands of genealogists available to help.

In the fourth generation segment, Mother wrote, “Dora Bell Dice Morgan’s father fell from a horse and broke his neck. In those days even the best doctors had little knowledge of how to treat people. If you broke your neck, you died. We don’t have any other information about him. Dora Bell’s mother died from a burst artery in her leg when she was out tending the garden. The ways in which people died were a big topic of conversation in the old days and would be included in any family history. Poor Dora Bell. How old was she when she lost her parents?

Dora Bell herself was born on a farm in Warsaw, Missouri, June 4, 1888, She was of Scottish, Welsh, and Irish descent. She had twelve brothers and sisters. The only names we have are Joe, Dave, and Julia. Big families were common back then due to the lack of birth control and the need for lots of workers for the farm. A lot of children died, however of disease and accidents. They had home remedies, but they were ineffective against contagious disease and infection from wounds. In old cemetaries, you’ll see a lot of little graves. I’m sure parents grieved deeply for each child, and never got used to losing them.

Dora Bell apparently loved children and animals very much. She married Frank Samuel Morgan and had three children of her own, Charles, Vera, and Mabel.  I knew Auntie Vera into her old age. Mabel was my own grandmother.

When the children were small, Dora Bell and Frank lived in Breckenridge in the high mountains of Colorado. Frank was a miner and they must have lived in a drafty cabin and been quite poor. According to the customs of the time a poor woman with a family to rear did everything she could to feed them including taking in laundry and boarders. Dora probably did everything she could think of. She might have cooked for miners, maybe she had a summer vegetable garden and canned her tomatoes. Dora Bell was also an accomplished seamstress, so perhaps she made or repaired clothing. At any rate, I have heard a lot about Dora Bell. My mother was named for her and I know they were close. I liked the feeling of connection with family Mother has given me. After all, I’ll probably see them in Heaven. I hope so, anyhow.