Family stories, artifacts and connections
Lowell Sedgwick Brown was born 29 October 1896 in Morris County, New Jersey. His sister, Mazie Tremaine Brown Bryan, was my husband’s great-grandmother. I have not heard any family stories about Lowell, so what is pieced together here is only from government and personal documents. He died in the Second Battle of the Marne in France on 18 July 1918. He lived a short 21 ½ years.
Is this not the scariest picture of relatives you have ever seen? The mean woman who looks like she would eat you for lunch, the old woman whose hand is turned up in a secret “save me” signal. The man kidnapping the baby! And the mustachioed man calmly ignoring the madness around him. Continue reading “Awkward Family Photo”
There are a number of meta items that may be of interest to those taking a deep dive on this site, such as my effort to determine the proper tense when describing ancestors (“she was my great-grandmother” or “she is my great-grandmother”) and the conundrum of where to draw the line on private information (is anything game once someone is dead?). There’s the Slave Name Roll Project, which is fascinating. I’ve been thinking about “to tag, or not to tag” those posts which are generate strong emotion. And how best to ensure this content lives on after me. And so on.
I’ll be writing posts on all these topics and more, and you’ll be able to find them linked here, so stay tuned.
I actually know nothing about the history this recipe, but I can tell you that it is fabulous. My mother-in-law, Geraldine Parker Jones Bryan, has been making this soup forever. She’ll make it in batches, and freeze it in old sherbet containers. Even the slightest case of sniffles is almost welcome as it can result in one or two of those beloved containers (that have a strip of masking tape on top with the words “Pot Soup”) dispensed with lots of love. Continue reading “Potato Soup”
Although this recipe originates with Mazie Tremaine Brown Bryan (and her grandmother, Eliza Toy Prisque, who was born in England in 1827 and emigrated to the U. S. around 1865), it’s famous in the Bryan clan because of Mazie’s daughter-in-law, Geraldine Parker Jones. The story below was written by one of Geraldine’s grandchildren for a school project several years back and does a nice job to set the stage for this fabulous meal. Continue reading “Pasty”