Left to right: Grandpa Wilson (Achus), Francis Wilson, Achus Wilson, Jr. and Grandma Wilson in front of the boat they owned and used for carrying wheat up and down the Erie Canal.
By Susan James
"Nobody could ever agree on my birthdate, so I just picked one," my grandmother always told us. In turn-of-the-century Seattle, fires were frequent and all records of her birth were destroyed. She chose June 14, Flag Day, as a tribute to the adopted country of her parents, who had fled Soviet persecution a few short years before.
As I listened to some of the stories this gentle man was telling, I decided to ask him if he would mind giving me a private audience, so I could write down some of his stories and pass them along to others. This is the story of that mild mannered gentleman named Cliff W. Olson.
Could we get into mischief? Of course, what cute little girls did not get into mischief? I remember a time when we were playing hid and seek and Louise and I decided to hide under our grandmother's front porch. It had a lattice type structure under the porch, which you could open or close. Louise and I would hide there and we could see through the lattice those who were trying to find us.
One particular day around Christmastime the other students were particularly disruptive. Mrs. Beckwith had left the room to get the principal to restore order and Lucy stepped onto a table in the front of the room and dropped a stack of books onto the floor. The children immediately stopped their misbehavior and turned their attention to Lucy. The sense of control and command was a feeling Lucy realized she truly enjoyed.
Grandpa was quite a character and always had plenty of amusing tales to keep me entertained for hours. Grandma didn't talk very much but shared her assortment of memories with me through a tattered box of black and white photographs she had collected over the years.
I would ask, "Who is this, Grandma?" She always answered and then Grandpa would contribute a tidbit of information. Uncle Noah was five feet tall; Aunt Lizzie had ten children; Great-grandfather Allen fought in the Civil War; and so on.
My beloved grandparents both passed away in the late 1970s and somehow I was fortunate enough to be given the frayed container of photographs sitting in the top of Grandma's closet.
Mum lived with John, her eldest brother in Peebles, Scotland after her mother died, and when she was in her teens she went to work in the woolen mills in Galashiels.
It was hard being a weaver. There were huge looms and only gaslight to work by. She had to watch the shuttles flying to and fro, and pity on you if one broke or you got a knot. You had to watch them all the time. No wonder my mum's eyes were bad later in life!
Josephine Elizabeth (Betty) Wagaman in picture.
Submitted by Betty's brother Merle's daughter, Pauline (Polly) Wagaman Mazariegos.
Let me begin to tell you a story —— about a lady named Betty. This lady is my aunt and she has a story to tell.
Growing up as the youngest of four, life on the railroad was an endless adventure for Marjorie. Most mornings, the family was up and working by sunrise. Unser was already guiding the train to its next destination and Marie and the children were doing their part to help get breakfast ready for the other passengers and workers on the train.
Eva Hamlet's story of survival spans several generations. Even though her beloved husband, Eddie, could never talk of his being taken to a concentration camp at the age of 13. Eva has chronicled her story of survival against the Nazis and The Third Reich in the hopes that this horrible tragedy will never be repeated.
The holocaust left her with only a few distant relatives as the remainder perished in the "Iron Furnace" of Hitler's concentration camps. All of their personal belongings were destroyed.