One of the things I’ve discovered working on the family tree is that 1890-1925 is a critical time piece.  If there’s going to be a problem with the family, that’s where it begins to unravel.  I’ve seen it in multiple places in my tree and it’s vexing.  The tear your hair out and wail type of vexing that makes you want to ball up your family tree notes and pitch it all in the trash.  I have a piece of paper tucked into the cover of the book that holds my family tree notes that says in 120 point font DON’T DO IT.

When I started working on Gus’ family tree, I wrote down what I knew as gospel.  Gus’ full name (which is not Gus, btw), his birthday and where he was born, the day he got married and where that happened.   I wrote down what I knew about my grandparents and that was harder.   I knew the basics for Papa; name (William John Richards), birthdate (January 28, 1914), marriage date (unknown), death date (May 1996).  I knew his anniversary date but that didn’t count for me as that was to my step-grandmother (June 19) and what I knew about my real paternal grandmother fit in a thimble.   I call her Marce; name (Marcelline Boucher), birthday (March 9, 1909), I know she died when my dad was young (in 1954) and that she died of Hodgkin’s Disease (Hodgkin lymphoma).   What I’ve discovered since is the archives are my friend and they can fill in the gaps.   Thanks to records in the Archives and online, I now know that my grandparents were officially married on October 6, 1936 (banns were posted three times).  I have access to her baptismal record, his baptismal record, their marriage record and that makes me a happy girl.  It also gave me a jumping off point for other searches.