Together for the Gospel Conference. Simply amazing!
Took this video (about 160mb so may be slow to load). Sounds okay, but nothing like being there.
T4G2018
2018 Road Trip #1
Short road trip with Mary Martini over to visit her sister and family in Holton, Michigan. First we visited the Frederick Meijer sculpture gardens and butterfly exhibit in Grand Rapids. We were greeted by the Michigan marching band (see pic below). Of course later that evening we also had to endure Michigan getting smoked by Villanova.
Go Blue!
Butterfly
Butterflies
Sculpture1
Sculpture2
Sculpture?
My personal favorite
On Tuesday we visited the White River Light House and museum (not open yet unfortunately) before heading back home through a beautiful cold, rainy and snowy day in April.
White River Light House 1
White River Light House 2
George Thomas “Mickey” Davenport
Uncle Mickey is my only living Aunt or Uncle. And the one that I know the least about. But I have learned a bit through my research and chat with his daughter Kristine. So here you go:
Uncle Mickey was born George Thomas Davenport on 10 February 1933 in White Bear Lake, Ramsey County, Minnesota. He was the youngest of 6 six children and born 4 years after my father Frank. He had four older sisters Olive, Lois, Barb and Marian. His dad, our grandpa, died in 1945 when he was 12 years old so he would have probably lived with his mom Muriel, our grandma, in Minnesota. There are some stories of him being in Bay City for a bit but at some point he moved to California, because:
He married Loretta Mae Stone in Butte County, California on 9 July 1952. They have a son Robert Allen Davenport born 3 November, 1953 and a daughter Teresa “Terry” Lynn Davenport born 8 May 1957 in Salt Lake City, Utah. Teresa passed away on 8 August 2003. Kristine has confirmed this to me as good information, so lo and behold we have two more first cousins that we never knew about (or at least I never knew about). Here are a couple of pictures I found of Uncle Mickey, one of which is a picture of him with Loretta. And also a yearbook picture (top row, 4th from the right) with Loretta in it:
I am not sure how long he lived in Salt Lake City, and I did not find a divorce record from Loretta, but I know that he married Juanita Lois Urbano about 1963 and she is the mother of Kristine. Here is a yearbook picture of Juanita:
I have some somewhat conflicting information regarding his divorce from Juanita, but I have a marriage record between Uncle Mickey and Mary Lou Limon on 6 October 1979 (this is also confirmed by Kristine). I do not believe they are together anymore and I am unclear on any other information.
It would be fun some day to actually meet my first cousin Robert Allen. And I do know that Teresa did marry a Paul Evans and they appear to have had two children born in the 1980’s.
I guess I need a road trip to California!
Genealogy 101
Olive Anne Davenport
My Aunt Olive was the oldest sister of my father. She was born 9 May 1920 to Frank (36) and Muriel (24) in Russell, Manitoba, Canada. She would move with her family to North Dakota around 1922 and then to White Bear Lake, Minnesota around 1928, where our Grandpa Frank would minister at an Episcopal church called St. John in the Wilderness. Our grandfather Frank passed away in 1945. I have attached a PDF copy of portions of a history of that church with pages pertinent to our grandfather.
St Johns History with Frank only
From that history I discovered that Olive was first married to James Bernard Baine. James had enlisted in 1941 and served in the U.S. Army Air Force during WWII. Olive and James married 21 May 1943 in Jacksonville, Florida. Staff Sgt. James was killed in action on 24 January 1944 (only 8 months after they were married) and was buried at the Cambridge American Cemetery (plot F, row 3, grave 77) in England. He received the Air Medal and Purple Heart awards. Olive was working as a defense worker according to the marriage certificate and still listed her residence as White Bear Lake, so I am not sure how the Florida thing figures in.
Olive married Donald John McArdell 17 March 1945 and they had four children; John, Susan, William and Thomas all living and a part of my first cousin clan. That first cousin clan is larger than I thought but more about Uncle Mickey and that subject on another post. Olive passed away on 4 August 2002 and Don passed away 29 June 2003.
One last interesting fact about Olive and Don: Olive and Don are sixth cousins two times removed, according to a formula I found and the following information linking them both to a common ancestor:
| 8 | Thomas Davenport 1681-1745 m. Catherine Woodworth 1673-1729 |
≡ | Thomas Davenport 1681-1745 m Mary Pitman 1684-1740 |
6 |
| 7 | Oliver Davenport 1714-???? | Gideon Davenport 1738-1810 | 5 | |
| 6 | John Davenport 1735-1809 | John Davenport 1766-1822 | 4 | |
| 5 | Humphrey Davenport 1773-1859 | Gideon Davenport 1803-1850 | 3 | |
| 4 | Oliver Davenport 1799-1870 | Joseph Davenport 1831-1907 | 2 | |
| 3 | Paul Dudley Davenport 1823-1888 | William E Davenport 1860-1938 | 1 | |
| 2 | Irene A Davenport 1845-1899 | Frank H Davenport I 1884-1945 | ||
| 1 | Minnie Emma Wilkins 1869-1913 | Olive A Davenport 1920-2002 | ||
| Raymond J McArdel 1896-1965 | ||||
| Donald J McArdel 1923-2003 |
For ref. here is the formula:
“There is a mathematical way to identify the degree of cousinship shared by two
individuals. In the description of each individual’s relationship to the most recent
common ancestor, each “great” or “grand” has a numerical value of 1. The
following examples demonstrate how this is applied.
Example: If person one’s great-great-great-grandfather is person two’s grandfather, then
person one’s “number” is 4 (great + great + great + grand = 4) and person two’s “number”
is 1 (grand = 1). The smaller of the two numbers is the degree of cousinship. The two
people in this example are first cousins. The difference between the two people’s
“numbers” is the degree of removal. In this case, the two people are thrice (4 — 1 = 3)
removed, making them first cousins three times removed. “
Highbanks Hike in February
Who knew in February that I could get a walk in 75 degree weather! We went to a park called the Highbanks which is on the north side of Columbus, Ohio and had a great walk with myself, Lia and my granddaughter Emma leading the way. There were many trails to explore and we took the overlook trail. Will have to hit some of the longer trails on another day. Here are a few pics of our walk, which I am sure will be much prettier once the leaves and foliage turn green.
Wikitree Widget of Family Tree
Below is a widget from Wikitree. A little bit of an experiment for right now to see how it all works with WordPress. My programming skills were in basic (from many decades ago) and not HTML. I did click on the “Stick to front page” option, so let’s see what that does.
https://www.WikiTree.com/treewidget/Davenport-3854/30
embeddable family tree updated live from WikiTree
Hike with Brian & Sam – Dec 2017
Final hike of the year with Brian and Sam to see their deer hunting location north of Lebanon, Pennsylvania.
Off we go on our hike after parking the truck. Beautiful chilly day with a hike that was about 3.5 miles long.
Sign with information about the land we took the hike on.
The view looking south from their hunting spot. I see at least one wild animal.
The view looking west with Sam keeping watch for the all elusive squirrels.
Lester Burton Davenport
I have run many times into “brick walls” in my genealogical research of my family, and this man, Lester Burton Davenport is what I finally found behind one of my walls. I had heard through my cousin Tom McArdell in Minnesota that our great grandfather William Edgar Davenport may have fathered a child early in life before marrying our great grandmother Mary Anne Hyde and fathering our grandfather Frank Howard Davenport and many other aunts and uncles. As noted in an earlier post William also divorced Mary Anne and ended up marrying again (Jennie May Richards) across the country in California, where he passed away in 1938.
In my search I found a reference to a Lester B Davenport listed as a grandson in a 1900 census of Pawtucket, Rhode Island (14 Browne Street). Joseph (Darling Davenport) and Amanda M (Burton) are the parents of William and John Graham Davenport is a brother of Joseph. This had to be the break in the brick wall!
I know it says Daneport on the data but this has to be Davenport. William married Mary Hyde in April of 1883 about a year after Lester was born, so I am guessing that Lester was raised by his grandparents. I have found other sources of information for Lester which confirm his middle name was Burton (which makes sense because William’s grandmother was a Burton). Here is the other information I have been able to find:
Born: March 20, 1882 in Pawtucket, Rhode Island
Father: William E. Davenport (b. 22 Aug. 1860 in Pawtucket, d. 13 Jul 1938 Glendale, CA)
Mother: Clara Jencks (Have not found any more information other than her name)
Married: Ella May Horton Oct 1, 1900 (who passed away in 1918 at 38 years old)
One child with Ella: Estelle Burton Davenport, born 13 Nov 1900, (date of death?)
In 1910 census only Ella is listed with Estelle and her status is single so it appears their marriage did not last long. Still searching for more information on her.
One child: William E Davenport born Dec 17, 1917 (Date of death??) It is unclear who the mother is (so far in my research), but he is listed as a son of Lester and Catherine in a 1930 census in Lincoln, Rhode Island.
Married: Catherine Meehan Aug 22, 1921 (date of death?). Marriage occurred in Manhattan, New York..
Died: 4 Sep, 1932 in Pawtucket, Rhode Island.
For-Mar Nature Preserve
Made a short visit to For-Mar Nature Preserve in Genesee County. Had a nice walk of about 4 miles, even though a third of the trails were not accessible due to construction. And I was able to visit the barriers free tree house that was featured on the “Treehouse Masters” TV show back in January of this year. Not to mention a sighting of a wolverine and some OSU fans.
All Trails track
Walkway
Stream
Trail
Inside tree house
Tree house
Wolverine
OSU fans!
