This Family History Thing…
Posted by Jim Pedley on August 2, 2009
It’s been a while since I wrote anything. It’s this family history thing. You start off nonchalantly with a shrug of the shoulders and a “So what?” and before you know it you’re immersed in dates and times and statistics so magnetic that you find yourself wallowing in a quagmire of history you were never quite aware existed – and you are having a helluva time trying to extricate yourself…
A “second cousin” ( is that the same as being “twice removed”?) started it all off – although I had been quite attracted to the TV programme “Who Do You Think You Are?”, wherein various celebrities trawl back through their ancestries, sometimes coming up with something worth noting, both by themselves and by the viewer.
But when this second cousin of mine sent me a pile of her research , which showed me that my paternal grandfather had enjoyed a few more brothers and sisters than I had ever been aware of, it made me curious. It made me even more curious when I discovered that even my Aunt Florrie – Grandad’s youngest of eight children, and the only one left living that I could consult – didn’t know that she’d had so many aunts and uncles..!
I couldn’t leave it there so I started digging. And before long I found myself digging deeper and deeper. Suddenly, I was hooked. I began to understand why chasing up your ancestors becomes an addiction. So now I’m addicted…
My wife complains that she has become a “computer widow”. I appear to be spending far more time on the computer than I used to spend in front of the goggle-box.
Excuse me. There’s a slight alteration I have to make to my family tree on the “Ancestry” website…
james pedley said
my name is james k. pedley. i am a trial lawyer in fort lauderdale florida. i grew up in cleveland ohio. my father was harold k. pedley and my mother was elizabeth. i have 5 brothers and sisters. margaret–george–rosemary–william–and harold.
james k. pedley
James Pedley said
Hi, James,
I’m not surprised that I receive a response from across the pond…!
Since I took up this Genealogy thing I have discovered the Pedley name all over the planet. However, I cannot, with any certainty, grasp at your family details and embrace you as a long-lost cousin! I have discovered it is not as easy as all that.
I can only offer you – in return – a few details of my own, which are: I am James Pedley, a retired newspaper printer aged 80. My branch of the family has nothing so solubrious to compare with your occupation as a trial lawyer – my father, another James, having been a truck-driver for most of his life.
My mother, Doris, does have claim to relatives in The States, though. Her cousin, May Rushton, married Phil Banner after WW1 ended and he was demobilised from the British Army. They emigrated to America in 1920 and settled in Laramie, Wyoming.
Their daughter, Rose, was born in Laramie in 1921. She grew up to become Deputy County Assessor, and to marry Harold (Bud) Rasmussen – a private contractor.
I did, in fact, pay Rose a visit some years ago – so she, at least, was one blood relation in the USA I was able to say “Hello” to…
I have one sister – Jean – who is aged 77 and a widow. My 50-year-old son, Mark, is a market research manager working for Agilent, an offshoot of American International: Hewlett-Packard – with whom he began his career in Germany 24 years ago. He spends his time looking after four areas of Agilent’s planet that require his supervision – in Europe, America, Taiwan, and Singapore. (I should have spent a bit more time with my own education, I think…!)
Anyway, James, I guess that’s about all I can say in reponse to your own. It was nice to hear from you and – who knows? – you may run into may son, Mark, sometime when he is on a business trip to America…!!!
Thanks for coming back to me,
Jim Pedley
Mark is actually expected home for a week or two tomorrow, and my wife, Joan, and I are, obviously, lookingt forward to the visit…!