Sepia Saturday: Clicquot Club

Sepia Saturday challenges bloggers to share family history through old photographs.

The bottles lined up on the tables in this week’s Sepia Saturday prompt reminded me how I misunderstood this photo of my mother and her friends:

High school sweethearts at the Palomar:  Tommy Watson and
Betsy Ward, Mary Eleanor Davis and Dickie Blanks
at the Spring Dance, Apr 23, 1945.

For years I thought the photo was taken during her college days and that she was drinking beer. However, when I took a closer look, I realized the bottles were nothing more than 7-Up.

I wish I could tell what THIS bottle is.

August 17-18, 1946  12:30 a.m. Ocean Club
George Savage, Margaret Wall, Mary Eleanor Davis,
Tuff Brown, Betsy Ward, Ralph Joynes

Maybe it is the same drink as these guys might have enjoyed during a camping trip with friends in 1919.

From Aunt Helen Killeen Parker
camping trip about 1919

Let me start by saying I have no idea what the joke was. The paper conversation bubble was glued on, probably by my grandaunt Helen Killeen Parker.

For this blog post, it is the case of bottles under the table that catches my eye. Clicquot Club? What is that?

Pronounced “Klee-Ko” (not “click kwat”), the company began in Massachusetts in the 1880s producing sparkling cider and ginger ale. Early producers of ginger ale sold solely to hotels, restaurants and clubs, but the Clicquot Beverage Company pioneered marketing ginger ale to families. Clicquot revolutionized the soda industry and soon became the largest manufacturer of ginger ale in the world.

The company was the first to put a metal cap on a bottle and the first to sell soft drinks in a can.

Part of the marketing plan besides advertising on billboards and in magazines was radio advertising. THIS IS FOR YOU, MR MIKE! The ginger ale company sponsored a banjo orchestra under the direction of Harry F. Reser called the Clicquot Club Eskimos, based on Clicquot’s most recognizable symbol: the Eskimo Boy.

The company itself went through several owners, eventually being absorbed by Canada Dry. Today the Clicquot Club wooden crate is a collectible. On Etsy and on Ebay the wooden boxes sell anywhere from $25 to $275.

image from Etsy

The various versions of bottles also have attracted collectors. Clicquot Club Eskimo dolls and figurines, sheet music and ads are also desirable finds.

Ebay has 2 vintage bottles of Clicquot Club ginger ale UNOPENED. I can’t offer you a taste of Cliquot Club, but here is a taste of the Clicquot Club Eskimos’ radio show.

Raise your glass or bottle to the many fine bloggers at Sepia Saturday.

Wendy

© 2020, Wendy Mathias. All rights reserved.

52 Ancestors - FAVORITE DISCOVERY: Marsh Mash

One of my favorite discoveries goes back to 2016 when I was participating in Amy Johnson Crow’s 31 Days to Better Genealogy Challenge. I was familiar with Linkpendium, but until she challenged us to try it out, I was skeptical that it would be of any use in my Jollett research. But I am nothing if not obedient.

Half-heartedly I entered a simple search: “Jollett” and “WORLDWIDE.” Most of the hits were census records and blogs that mentioned my blog. However, there was ONE hit that caught my eye: Kanawha County Family Tree Project. Kanawha? I didn’t know of any Jolletts in Kanawha, but there they were.

The family was that of Malinda Jollett and her husband Thomas Marsh. Malinda or Melindy was one of the sisters of my 3X great-grandfather Fielding Jollett. I had been unable to trace them after 1850 in Putnam County. The listing in Linkpendium made it clear why they had remained hidden from me for so long. The name Marsh had morphed into MASH, probably a reflection of the Southern soft-R. The family and other Virginians may have pronounced their name “Mahsh” rather than like something one does to a potato.

 

Buffalo Putnam Co WV
Home of many generations of the Mash and related families
photo courtesy West Virginia Culture Archives

The children in the listing on Linkpendium matched the names I had noted in the 1850 census. At last I knew for sure the family had not been wiped out by Indians as I had begun to think.

The other reason this discovery merits the label “favorite” is that I discovered I have never written about this family. Anymore it seems I have very little NEW information to share. Let me introduce the Marsh or er uh the Mash family:

Malinda/Melindy Jollett (c 1800 Orange Co VA - ) & Thomas Marsh (c 1796 VA - ) married 12 Mar 1822 Orange Co VA

1. James Marsh/Mash (1828 Orange Co VA – 11 Jul 1862 Baltimore MD) & Susan Johnson (c 1823 – 1901) married 7 Jan 1843 Mason Co VA

• Lucy Florence Johnson (22 Jan 1844 Mason Co WV – 11 Jul 1932 Kanawha Co WV) & Henry R. Perry (1838-1897) married 1863 Mason Co WV
• Cornelius Pleasant Johnson or Mash (14 May 1850 Putnam Co VA – a 1900 WV) & Caroline Hundley (c 1852 - ) married 1876 ; & Ella Luella Cook (1851-1913) married 1881 Kanawha Co WV

2. Julia Marsh/Mash (c 1830 VA - ) & John Steele (c 1830 - ) married 4 Jul 1852 Putnam Co VA

• Sarah F. Steel (15 Apr 1854 Putnam Co VA - )
• James T. Steel (15 Sep 1856 Putnam Co VA – 5 Jul 1860 Putnam Co VA)
• Mary Maglin Steel (25 Oct 1858 Putnam Co VA - )
• Abram Lewis Steel (23 May1862 Putnam Co VA – 27 Dec 1945 Putnam Co WV) & Virginia Bell Fowler (May 1867 Putnam Co WV – a 1910 ) married 12 Apr 1885 Putnam Co WV
• William H. Steel (1864 Putnam Co VA -16 Aug 1897 Putnam Co WV) & Miriam Oldaker (c 1868 Putnam Co WV - ) married 25 Dec 1889 Putnam Co WV
• Robert C. Steel (9 Sep 1866 Putnam Co WV – 18 Apr 1952 Putnam Co WV)
• Harry Steel (16 Jul 1871 Putnam Co WV - )

3. William Henry Mash (c 1831 VA –) & Minerva Steele (c 1832 - ) married 3 Jun 1851 Putnam Co VA

• Matilda Mash (8 Mar 1850 Putnam Co VA – 19 Sep 1931 Harrison Co WV) & James D. McMann (c 1832 England - ) married 31 May 1878 Mason Co WV ; married James Winters 14 Oct 1916 Harrison Co WV
• Ann Eliza Mash (c 1855 - )
• William H. Mash (10 Dec 1855 Putnam Co VA – 10 Apr 1927 Putnam Co WV) & Catherine E. Brofferd (Jun 1865 Putnam Co WV – 1906 Putnam Co WV) married 11 Oct 1885 Mason Co WV
• John G. Mash (c 1857 Putnam Co VA - ) & Elvira Hayes Legg (13 Mar 1851 – 13 May 1916 Putnam Co, WV) married 15 Feb 1897 Putnam Co WV
• Malinda E. Mash (c 1862 )
• Nettie E. Mash (c 1866 Putnam Co WV - ) & James A. LeMaster (c 1865 Mason Co WV - ) married 14 Jun 1886 Mason Co WV
• Victoria Jane Mash (20 Apr 1869 Putnam Co WV – 6 Sep 1938 Mason Co, WV) & George W. Holdren (c 1866 Kanawha Co, WV - ) married 25 Aug 1887 Mason Co, WV

4. Joseph Mash (c 1834 Rockingham Co VA - ) & Eliza Jane Steele (c 1829 Kanawha Co VA - ) married 20 Aug 1854 Putnam Co VA

• America Ann Mash (3 Jul 1855 Putnam Co VA – ) & James Madison Eads (c 1854 Greenbrier Co VA - ) married 23 Jun 1876 Putnam Co WV
• Minerva Jane Mash (18 Mar 1858 Putnam Co VA – 16 Sep 1936 Mason Co WV) & Jonathan Fielder (Aug 1852 Putnam Co VA – 9 Feb 1926 Mason Co WV) married 21 Jun 1874 Putnam Co WV
• James M. Mash (c 1865 Putnam Co VA – 19 Nov 1888 Mason Co, WV) & Harriet Emily Crump (1867 Mason Co WV - ) married 27 Jul 1884 Mason Co, WV
• Robert L Mash (29 Jul 1867 Putnam Co WV - )
• Elizabeth Ellen Mash (Feb 1870 Putnam Co WV – 7 Sep 1935 Mason Co WV) & William Franklin LeMaster (12 Sep 1865 Mason Co WV – 10 Sep 1948 Mason Co WV) married 19 Jun 1891 Mason Co WV

5. Mary J. Mash (c 1837 VA – )

6. John G. Mash (c 1839 Rockingham Co VA - a 1872) & Sarah Frances Dodson (c 1841 Mason Co VA - ) married 28 Sep 1859 Putnam Co VA

• Bennet Thomas Mash (26 Aug 1860 Mason Co VA - ) & Barbara Ellen Suttle (c 1859 Putnam Co VA - ) married 17 Mar 1881 Putnam Co WV ; & Margaret Ann Lark (c 1861 Putnam Co VA - ) married 24 Aug 1883

7. Benjamin F. Mash (c 1841 - )

8. Sarah Magdalene Mash (31 Dec 1844 VA – 5 Jul 1930 Putnam Co WV) & Marcellus Cash (c 1841 VA – 19 Dec 1932 Putnam Co WV) married 10 Nov 1861 Putnam Co WV

• Emily J. Cash (28 Jul 1861 Putnam Co VA - ) & Charles Oldaker (Mar 1876 Mason Co WV - ) married 29 Dec 1897 Putnam Co WV
• Sarah Ellen Cash (10 Aug 1866 Mason Co VA – 2 Feb 1938 Putnam Co WV) & Benjamin Thomas Oldaker (Jun 1867 WV – 9 Jan 1932 Putnam Co WV) married 1890 Putnam Co WV
• Virginia Cash (1867 Putnam Co WV – 13 Apr Mason Co WV)
• Lucy Ann Catherine Cash (1869 Mason Co WV - 13 Aug 1902 Mason Co WV) & William Alexander Craig (24 Aug 1864 WV – 6 May 1953 Putnam Co WV) married 18 Oct 1891 Putnam Co WV
• Mary Samantha Cash (Jan 1875 Mason Co WV – a 1910 Putnam Co WV) & Ulysses Grant Ray 7 (Mar 1869 Putnam Co WV – 21 Nov 1950 Kanawha Co WV) Married 5 Mar 1891 Putnam Co WV
• Charles W.  Cash (1876 Putnam Co WV – 15 Dec 1878 Mason Co WV)
• Henry T. Cash (June 1878 Mason Co WV – 31 Dec 1878 Mason Co WV)
• Theodore Cash (12 Apr 1878 Putnam Co WV - 1 Jul 1959 Putnam Co WV) & Miriam Steel OR Oldaker (14 Jul 1868 Putnam Co WV – 14 Sep 1943 Putnam Co WV) married 27 Dec 1898 Putnam Co WV
• Mariah Cash (Sep 1886 Putnam Co WV - ) & Henry Edward McGrew (c 1869 Putnam Co WV - ) married 11 Nov 1900 Putnam Co WV

In tracking just 3 generations, I have already found several things worth exploring and writing about: several Civil War soldiers and casualties, a murder (!), and some confusion about the intermarriages of Mash, Steel, and Oldaker.

Time to get my thinking cap on!

NOTE: Updated 4 May 2020 - removed Thomas Daniel Mash as a child of Thomas and Melinda

Amy Johnson Crow continues to challenge genealogy bloggers and non-bloggers alike to think about our ancestors and share a story or photo about them. The challenge is “52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks.”

Wendy

© 2020, Wendy Mathias. All rights reserved.

52 Ancestors - SAME NAME: Mary Mary Mary

I’m running out of time to meet this week’s challenge, so I present to you my longest continuous list of women named Mary:

My sister Mary Jollette (still kicking it)

My mother Mary Eleanor Davis Slade (1929-2005)

My grandmother Mary Lucille Rucker Davis (or maybe Lucille Mary) (1904-1990)

My great-grandmother Mary Susan Eppard Rucker (1875-1958)

Amy Johnson Crow continues to challenge genealogy bloggers and non-bloggers alike to think about our ancestors and share a story or photo about them. The challenge is “52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks.”

Wendy

© 2020, Wendy Mathias. All rights reserved.

Sepia Saturday: Photo Phakery?

Sepia Saturday challenges bloggers to share family history through old photographs.

The photo of people posing with a cardboard automobile in this week’s Sepia Saturday prompt afforded an opportunity to share this photo:

 

Mae and Clifton Holland in the backseat
Henry Holland in the front
photo courtesy Cliff Reeves

What can we glean from this photo? The steering wheel gives the illusion of a car, but there are no doors, no roof, no windows. The draping behind the couples looks much like a tent at a circus or fair suggesting this might have been a prop in a precursor to today’s photo booth. The baby in the backseat probably was not real. The black beady eyes and unnatural pose of the arms make it look more like a doll, maybe a prize for shooting plastic ducks or knocking down all the milk bottles.  

The photo was given to me by the grandson of the couple in the backseat: Mae and Clifton Holland. Mae (formally known as Mary Agnes) was sister to my paternal grandmother and sister to Helen Killeen Parker whose photos I have shared on this blog too many times to count.

The couple in the front seat was Clifton’s younger brother Henry Lee Holland and his unnamed wife, according to Mae’s grandson. She is wearing a wedding ring, so I must believe he is correct. However, there are some red flags that throw that conclusion into question.

A marriage record for Henry Holland dated 1942 claims he was SINGLE. The bride-to-be was divorcee Annie Sophie Wagner Whitley. However, the clothing in this photo seems to predate the styles of 1942, in particular the men’s stiff collars AND the lady’s wide-brimmed hat. Men’s collars of the 40s had become longer, more pointed. Ladies’ hats were much smaller.

Henry Holland and Annie divorced in 1946. He promptly married a widow, Mary Miller Mears. For the same observations about the clothing, it is doubtful the woman in the photo was wife #2 either.

I have no other photos of Henry, but thanks to my cousin, I have a photo of Clifton and Mae Holland with their children for comparison.

 

photo courtesy Cliff Reeves

Pictured are Clifton and Mae in the center, surrounded by their children John, Mary Evelyn "Ebbie," and Jean. John was born in 1917, Ebbie in 1920, and Jean in 1926. Without an exact date of the photo, I will guess that surely little Jean was no older than 6, dating this photo to about 1932. Mae does not look a bit older in the previous photo suggesting that picture was taken earlier than 1942.

At least two trees on Ancestry put Henry Lee Holland with a woman named Elizabeth Mae Bailey. Despite my hopes that there had been a wife previous to Annie Whitley, there is no record online. There is, however, a marriage record for Elizabeth Mae Bailey and one James Henry Holland. Eh – probably another case of sloppy genealogy linking similar names without verifying the facts first.

To be fair, there are not many facts available online for Henry Lee Holland. In the 1920 census, Henry was just a teenager working as a messenger boy for the telegraph company. After that, the only records are marriage, divorce, and death. Those indicate he served in the Navy and was a torpedoman when he died in 1950.

So is this Henry and Annie in the front seat? I cannot say for sure. But one thing is clear: those Holland men were good-looking.

Strike a pose with cars – real and fake – at Sepia Saturday.

Wendy

© 2020, Wendy Mathias. All rights reserved.

Sepia Saturday: Wherever You Tie Your Boat

Sepia Saturday challenges bloggers to share family history through old photographs.

This week’s Sepia Saturday prompt features a boat tied up along a canal wall. I am not a “boat person” per se because, unlike Goose and Maverick, I do not have a need for speed. However, my first ride on a gentle and slow-moving pontoon boat changed my life. In 2011 we bought a vacation home at Smith Mountain Lake in the southwestern part of Virginia. A pontoon came with it!

Sister and Moi on the pontoon 2016

When the lake opened in 1969, its main purpose was to generate electricity and to serve as a recreational facility for weekenders. For $1000 a family could buy a lot where they could set up a tent or bring a camper. Folks fished from the bank or from a canoe or john boat, maybe even from a small run-about.

Plans for neighborhoods and condo communities were years away. While today there are many million-dollar homes, there are just as many small cabins, A-frames, rag-tag mobile homes and trailer parks.

Tanglewood Trailer Park

Probably years of immersion in family history and studying old photos has drawn me to the original homes and docks of Smith Mountain Lake. I took photos of some of them to use as artwork in a guest room.

No longer can anyone build a home out over the water. Such homes are grandfathered, but if they fall in, that’s IT - bye bye.

Nobody builds boat garages anymore. I certainly wouldn’t want to. They look like havens for snakes and spiders.

Homeowners with deep water and deep pockets enjoy party docks like these.

 

From Charity Home Tour 2019

From Charity Home Tour 2019

No, that is not ours. Ours is modest.

Our girls and their guys 2013
Our dock in the background

See who is docked at Sepia Saturday.

Wendy

© 2020, Wendy Mathias. All rights reserved.

52 Ancestors - SO FAR AWAY: Velma's Great Korean Escape

When people ask if we are going to sell our home in Chesapeake and retire to our vacation home at Smith Mountain Lake permanently, I respond with an emphatic NO. My daughter’s family is here. My SISTER is here. I cannot imagine being far from either of them. My sister and I are not close in age, but we are every bit as emotionally close as our grandaunts Violetta and Velma. You can’t say one name without saying the other.

Violetta and Velma loved one another deeply and enjoyed being together. They especially loved traveling. In 1939 they traveled together to the New York World’s Fair.

 

New York World's Fair 1939
Postcard belonging to Violetta Davis Ryan

They were on a motor trip to New Orleans when they received word of their brother’s death in 1951.

Violetta traveled to Hawaii just a few short years after it became the 50^th state. 

Honolulu Passenger and Crew List 1953
from FamilySearch

In 1954, Velma arrived in New York aboard a ship from Rotterdam.

 

New York Passenger List 1954
from Ancestry

It is no surprise that Velma always imagined that the two of them would travel the world together. That is why it is so puzzling that in the late 1950s-ealry 1960s Velma took a job teaching in Korea for the Department of Defense Dependents Schools. DoDDS serves the children of military stationed overseas with the purpose of ensuring that American children get an American education.

Velma was widowed young, so there was nothing keeping her in Harrisonburg except the love for her sister. So why did she leave?

The only theory my cousin and I can devise is that Velma HATED Violetta’s business partner with a passion. We know Violetta rented a building to John for his piano and guitar business (I am withholding his full name to protect the privacy of his family who, frankly, do not deserve protection but so be it). Somehow Violetta became entwined with John’s wife and child as well. Wherever Violetta went, they were sure to follow. Violetta often arrived at my grandmother’s house with John’s wife and son in tow, much to everyone’s dismay.

Nobody liked them. NOBODY. NO. BO. DY. They were leaches. Violetta, a well-educated, well-respected woman, was somehow sucked into being a benefactor to this low-life family that always reminded me of the Snopes clan in William Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha trilogy. (“They were just Snopeses like colonies of rats and termites are just rats and termites.”)

What hold they had over Violetta is a mystery. She was too smart and too good for them. Why couldn’t she see them for the money-grubbing users they were? Had I been Velma, I might have gone to Korea too.

 Actually, she seemed to enjoy teaching and serving as principal for the DoDDS.

 

Velma with students of the DoDDS Korea

Some of these photos may have been taken when she was principal. The classroom looks typically American. The artwork displayed neatly on the bulletin boards and stapled artfully above the blackboard reminds me of every classroom I ever sat in during my own school days.

A unit on the Vikings would not be complete without drawings of ships.

Snowflake snowmen? The perfect activity for a lesson on um, er, uh, weather? Geometry? Whatever, you have to admire the kid who put the snowman in a hammock.

Playground equipment at the DoDD School looked exactly like what I enjoyed at recess in Virginia in the 1950s and 60s.

That is probably Velma cut off in the dark coat.

Velma’s job in Korea made traveling to Japan and India easy.

Velma is in the hat, 6th from the right

What an adventure!
Velma is sitting in the middle

Ill health eventually brought Velma home. She lived in one of Violetta’s apartments where Violetta took care of her in her final days.

Love wins.

Amy Johnson Crow continues to challenge genealogy bloggers and non-bloggers alike to think about our ancestors and share a story or photo about them. The challenge is “52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks.”

Wendy

© 2020, Wendy Mathias. All rights reserved. 

Sepia Saturday: Playing Around

Sepia Saturday challenges bloggers to share family history through old photographs.

This week’s Sepia Saturday photo challenge presents a most delightful scene: children at play. Long before everyone had a trampoline in the backyard and bounce houses and ball pits for birthday parties, there was the swing set.

 

Our backyard 1966
My sister Mary Jollette on the right with her friend Susan

A couple swings, maybe a glider or seesaw, a slide if your parents could afford it provided hours of fun in their simplicity. If you pumped hard enough you could force the supports out of the ground. Thrilling!

Sears ad 1960s

My children came along in the early 1980s when notions about good parenting seemed to be changing, or maybe I was just more aware being a new parent myself. Lamaze classes promoting “prepared childbirth” promised a more fulfilling birth experience and bonding with your baby. Breast-feeding was making a big comeback thanks to groups like La Leche League. Fathers were given greater emphasis as an equal partner in raising happy, healthy children.

Parents were challenged to prepare children emotionally, physically, and intellectually for a changing world. Playtime was to be learning time too. Conscientious parents made sure to provide educational toys, not anything silly or frivolous that failed to challenge the future leaders of the world. 

Given the attitudes of the day, it is no surprise that the common metal swing set was snubbed in favor of wood structures that inspired creativity. The message was clear: the ideal play equipment should help children develop their large motor skills AND their imagination.

I drank the Kool-Aid.

I even purchased a book about fatherhood written BY a DAD so that my husband would know exactly what to do and how to act. The dad-author shared wonderful stories of playtime. He even provided instructions for building a playset.

We can build that!

 

Photo taken in 1989, the year we sold our house
and left the playset behind. 

And we did. 

Barry 1983

Drilling holes for closet poles 1983

Poles for climbing. 

Two levels of platforms. 

A rope for climbing or swinging. 

A tire for a target or a lookout. 

Surely we were doing what it took for our girls to to become chemistry professors and business executives.

We were determined to be the best parents. But we still had to have REAL swings so we added this monstrosity.

Our play equipment seemed pretty big in the 1980s, but it does not compare to the set Santa brought my grand-baboo this past Christmas.

 

Hmm – she has a rock wall, rope ladder, AND a telescope. Why didn’t we think of that?

Please visit my friends at the Sepia Saturday playground.

Wendy

© 2020, Wendy Mathias. All rights reserved.