FAMILY TREE
Relatives can live in the same town and not even know each other.
Friends first, they didn’t know they were cousins.
Several years ago, my Uncle Ken informed me that a man in Tennessee had compiled a volume on the Hartsell family. My great-grandmother’s maiden name was Hartsell.
So I wrote the man, Larry Fox, and he sent me a copy of the Hartsell volume. He also asked additional questions about my immediate family that he wanted to include in a subsequent genealogy report.
As I looked through the names in Larry’s volume, I focused on those descended from my immediate ancestors. I found one name I instantly recognized: Fran Dumas.
Fran was the secretary at my church, and I knew her well.
As it turned out, she and I were first cousins once removed. Her mother was my grandmother’s first cousin.
I told her of my discovery, and we marveled that we were cousins. We would never have known any of this if I hadn’t read Larry’s publication.
Later, my husband, James, daughter Amy and I visited Larry and his wife, Maggie, when we passed through Tennessee on vacation. Maggie was the Hartsell descendant, and Larry the genealogy sleuth.
I also got to know Maude, Fran’s mother, who lived in Kyle, a little town a few miles south of us. She remembered my grandmother and greatgrandmother and thrilled me with family stories, one about a table that was brought in a wagon from Oklahoma to Austin. Two leaves of the table cracked when the wagon got stuck in the mud. Maude is now deceased and I have moved away, but Fran and I stay in touch through Christmas cards.