I am currently three sheets to the wind this evening, so there’s no guarantee that anything I write will make any sense.
This past week, I saw an official government document that caused me to burst into tears. No, it was not my tax return. Make the jump to find out more.
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This story is personal and a bit maudlin. If that’s not your thing you might want to skip directly to the comments.
I have already written a few diaries about research my family history on-line, with the long term effort to solve a recently discovered family mystery. Ancestry.com allows one to build a family tree, and then to link the people on your tree to official documents that substantiate the fact that they existed. Among these official documents are the results of the 10-year census surveys. They are only made public 60 years after they were recorded, so currently, the most recent census available to public access is the 1940 census. However, even the old ones contain valuable information. It was through this information I was able to reconstruct my Bohemian grandmother’s large family. While you have the option of looking at the original handwritten forms, Ancestry has digitized the information to make it easier to read. I never would have thought I would have a strong emotional response to the information contained in one of these surveys, but it happened. Some backstory is required.
My father’s parents married in about 1913. Both of them were 20 years old. Their families did not approve of this union, as he was a German Lutheran and she was a Bohemian Catholic, but they persevered on their own. In the next five years they had 3 children; my father was the oldest, born in 1914. They were a striving family making their way until 1918.
That was the year the influenza pandemic hit. Millions died from this worldwide disaster. Almost everyone (including you, dear reader) lost someone in their family to this pandemic. Both of my grandparents became ill. My grandfather recovered; my grandmother did not. With 3 small children, she was dead at the age of 25. I don’t think my grandfather ever recovered from this blow. In later life he was a mean old man, and I have to wonder if he might have been less angry and ill-tempered if the love of his life had survived.
It was impossible for my grandfather to provide the care his three children needed while still being a wage-earner. I don’t understand why, but neither of the families were willing or able to take the children in. In this situation, he placed his three children into a Catholic orphanage and moved back with his parents until he could remarry and provide better care for his children. This eventually happened sometime in 1920.
I have known all of this since I was a child. I heard my father tell his stories about living in the orphanage, how the children were forced to sit still for long periods of time, how gifts from family didn’t always go to the children for whom they were intended. But it didn’t become real to me until I opened the census record for my father from 1920. I wasn’t thinking about the orphanage at all when I opened it. Under normal circumstances, one sees the various members of the household listed and their relationship with the head of the household. When I opened the census report for my father, I saw a long list of names—and I knew immediately that these were the names of all the children at the orphanage. I felt as though I had been struck. Just the thought of my 5-year-old father lost among these dozens of children, away from the loving arms of family, filled me with sadness. I wanted to travel back 96 years to be able to hug my father as a child and assure him everything would be alright in the end.
I have to wonder how the census-taker reacted to this particular assignment. Did he react to the children’s situation, or was it just another job of collecting information? Could he have known what effect his work might have nearly a century later?
Well, I’m getting old and stupid.
Enough of this. On to the comments!
Top Comments (December 2, 2016):
From siab:
A beautifully crafted retort by IamGumby in a troll diary..
From BeninSC:
I am nominating this comment from first-time Daily Kos commenter, TallOak, as much as anything because I am curious about whether the proposal is viable. Can Democrats filibuster NOW? Can you initiate a filibuster when an issue isn’t before the Senate?
Next is this comment from yet another first-time Daily Kos commenter, mac11b20, about a previously unaffiliated ‘Democrat’ who has ‘come home’ because of all the recent developments. A nice read.
Then, one of my favorite comments in recent memory is this comment by, yes, ANOTHER first-time Daily Kos commenter, tattoomom2, whose optimism, sense of reality and focus of intention lifted me in an unusual way. Please read and help welcome this person to Daily Kos.
Finally, I loved this comment by ArcticStones (member since 2012!) with some thoughtful proposals about the overhaul of elections in this country. Good stuff.
Top Mojo (December 1, 2016):
Top Mojo is courtesy of mik! Click here for more on how Top Mojo works.
Top Photos (December 1, 2016):
Tonight’s picture quilt is courtesy of jotter!