My Brother and Me

Here are some pictures of my brother and I when we were just little tikes. The photos seemed to have been on paper that came off in a roll and then my mother cut each picture. Mom must have ordered enough to send for Christmas gifts, as on the back of one of the pictures, it says he was 2 and I was 1. So these were taken right after my first birthday, in 1952. Which pose do you like best?

 Looking right at the camera.

How did they get us to look up like that at the same time??











This is the one they sent off to the relatives!

 

And here is one of just me! I am sure that my brother has the one of himself.

Wish I knew how to photoshop the cracks made from the paper.
Thanks for stopping by!

Forgotten Foto Friday #1

I have decided that I will try and put on a unknown picture(s) on Fridays. I have a lot of them, so who knows how many weeks it will take to get them all on. When someone lets me know the name of the person, I will share that will all of you.
My first picture is of a lovely lady. I would say this is a picture from the early 1930's, because of the hair style and the bow on the dress. It could be the late 20's, but because it has been colored in I am thinking the 30's. I took this picture and made a copy of it in black and white, just to see the difference. Any suggestions or comments would be appreciated. Thanks! Isn't it a beautiful picture?

On top of photograph it says: Eastman-Nitrate-Kodak 114. Pic #1

I am thinking that Eastman-Nitrate-Kodak 114, means the type of paper is it on. Just did a google search and found out the Glass Plate photographic Negatives  were done around 1929-1937 with the Kodak #114 on them. Interesting reading if you want to know about it.
Here is the picture in black and white and reversed:

Found another picture like this and it says this is Eunice 'Roberta' Stufflebean'!

In Remembrance

William Everett Utterback

1895-1959

I was looking for a  picture to post and came across some papers, that I decided to read. A booklet of my grandfather's was in the pile. I have read and looked at these booklets and papers before but noticed something new this time. When my grandfather passed on I was turning 8 years old. He was buried on the day of my birthday. I went with my mother to watch her make all the arrangements for the funeral. For me that was the first time I knew of someone who died and let alone look at all the scary things that you need to do when someone passes on. Of course now, it doesn't bother me, as death is part of this life. Grandpa died in 1959 and that is when Boris Karloff was doing all the scrary movies and grandpa did have his scary eyes, so it was a little spooky for a kid of 8 to go through. If this is the only picture you had to remind your grandfather wouldn't you kinda think he looked like Boris???
 Now I have some good pictures of grandpa and my memories of him always holding my hand and going for walks.

Grandpa and Uncle Bill.

Uncle Bill came to visit at least once a year when we lived in Santa Fe Springs, back in the early 50's. He and dad always were laughing and having a good time.

Great-Aunt Iza, Glenn and Emma Utterback (my parents), Great-Aunt Iola and Grandpa (William Everett Utterback).

    
In the above picture, grandpa had a visit from two of his four sisters.They lived in Spokane. A distant cousin had this picture and was wondering who the younger couple were. This cousin and I met through ancestry.com and started sharing relatives names. He said he had some pictures and I had some, so we emailed each other and this was my treasure. The young couple is my parents at the house where I started my first 8 years, of course my brothers and sister lived there too!
Back to what I noticed in the booklet. You will need to click on the pictures to make them bigger, so that you can read what the page says.

On this page it does say he died in Santa Fe Springs, but he fell over of a heart attack in the front of his apartment in Los Angeles. My parents lived in Santa Fe Springs, so maybe the funeral director thought it was that city.

He had lots of flowers.

 From these pages is where I noticed that my great-mother was still alive! The line that says: Mrs. E. L Utterback-mother, wow, so I had to go and look up when she passed on. She was 88 years old and not able to come.  She died the next year in June. Don Mitchell (cousin) drove down the two aunts from Spokane. I also noticed the pall-bearers were my mothers', uncles and brother.
This experience has suggested to me to read more thoroughly the information from booklets or papers, so that I can get closer to my ancestors and their lives.

A Trip to Donner Pass in 1941

A vacation trip for my mom and some of her Armstrong relatives! My mother (Emma Armstrong), her father (Harry Armstrong), Aunt Raynell, cousin Kenneth Ramsey,Great-granny Armstrong and cousin Patsy Armstrong, were able to go visit Donner Pass, California. I did a little research on Donner Pass through googlesearch.com, so that I could get a feel of what it might of been like. In the winter of 1941 there was a blizzard. The picture of it from: http://myoldadz.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=301, was too blurry. Some very interesting reading from here:
http://donnersummithistoricalsociety.org/PDFs/newsletters/news11/march11.pdf
Enjoy!

My mom, Emma and her cousin, Kenneth Ramsey.

Mattie Armstrong (my great grandmother), Aunt Raynell Armstrong, Harry Armstrong (my grandfather), and Emma June (my mother).

Mom with cousin Patsy Armstrong

Grandpa Armstrong with his mother, Mattie Armstrong.

Aunt Raynell with mom.

Cousin Patsy with mom.

El Centro 1937 First Grade Class of Miss Linere

This is a picture of my mother's first grade class. We never went to El Centro to visit family there. I don't know why, maybe my father thought it would be too hot in the summer time to go. The young boy OJ Stone and his family also moved up to East LA area around the same time as my mom's family did. In fact they went to high school together. Uncle Bob and OJ were friends for years. I have met OJ his wife, Marie and their daughter. The others names of children in the picture I haven't met. Maybe you know of someone from El Centro, California during this time period and could fill in the names of the other children.
 Here is another picture of mom and her friend, Beverly, 1939:

Thanks for stopping by!

Missions and Vacations

Santa Barbara Mission

As a family we went on vacations every summer. Mostly up and down the coastline of California. Along the way we would camp, visit family members and visit the California missions. My father always had a route and made sure it included the California Missions. We have been through quite a few of them.  I remember being bored and wanted to go to something more fun than just walking through dirt, musky smelling old buildings. Now that I am older, I enjoy more of the history of California and am glad that we have these pictures for our memories.

There are 21 missions from San Diego up to San Francisco. There are many sites one can look up to see the information about each mission and where there are located from google search engine. I know that I have been to at least 10 of the missions’ maybe more. The one I am most familiar with is La Purisuma Concepcion as I have lived in Lompoc and visited there more than once.

Here are some pictures that my father took while we were young. Kent, Karen or anyone who has been to some missions please add comments at the end. (Thanks!)

Santa Barbara Mission

A good link to learn about this mission is: http://www.athanasius.com/camission/san_jose.htm

Aunt Shirley and her children came to San Jose with us. Left to right: Shirley (dad's sister), Randy (cousin), Glenda (me) ,Kent (brother), Emma (mom) holding Kevin (brother). It looks like I am the only one happy? Summer of 1957.

San Jose Mission

Part of the cemetery at San Jose.

Inside San Jose Mission

 

 Even though time has faded some of the details in these pictures, I think my father did a good job of deciding what pictures he wanted developed. As back in the late 1950's film and developing was costly.

Riggs Homestead

It has been awhile since I have added more pictures. I am not a fast person on blogs and just couldn't think of what to put on next. This will probably  happened often.

In this picture my grandmother (Leona Riggs), is sitting in the hair chair. Next to her, I think is Clara Mae, then Denver, Anne, Ted, Nuel, then Granny (Emma Elizabeth) and Grandpa (William Emerson) Riggs.

 

Here are the Riggs family posing in their garden. Leona is holding the cat. I will let you guess on the other children, until I find someone who knows correctly who they are. The parents are Emma and William Riggs.

Again the only one I know is Leona, in front in the middle. I think this might be Dilbeck and Riggs children.
If you know the names of each child from the last two pictures, please let me know.