Precious photos, precious lives.

This is my grandmother, Ivy Johnson when she was in her late teens or early twenties. I had thought no photos of her survived after my aunt lost all the family photos on a train during the 2nd world war.. The only ones I had were of her as an old lady. I contacted a great Aunt (wonderful lady! Story for another day) and she gave me several photos of my grandmother, including this one.. I can't begin to tell you how excited I was to see her like this! It has energised me into re-visiting her life story that I put together many years ago. I'm now going to use Serif Craft Artist to make a digital version of it and to include lots of photos this time. I will put some of them on here. I was just appreciating the wonders of modern technology and how it can impact our family history. A blessing indeed!

Family History Miracles

On monday Kevin and I went to visit the Lincolnshire villages where my grandmother lived as a child. I was always very close to her, She was a wonderful woman who never had a negative thing to say about anyone or anything. When she was 5 her mother passed away, and she went to live in a little village called Coleby with her older sister. She told me of many adventures she had whilst living there. One sad event was that her nephew George Henry Hobson died when just 7 years old after having his tonsils out. I remember visiting his grave with her in the 70's, and I promised her then that one day I would go back and put flowers there. Well, it took me a while, but I did it on monday. It felt good to do that, and I felt quite emotional, knowing how much it would have meant to her. We called in to the church and my eyes were immediately drawn to a notice that offered help to anyone doing family history in the village. Normally I would have gone home and written a letter, but Kevin felt that we should call to the address on the poster. A very kind woman invited us in. After telling her about my grandmother Ivy Johnson, she went into her garage for 5 minutes and came out with an armful of books. She opened a book and passed it to me. Written on the inside cover was this "To Ivy Johnson, a present from the Wesleyan Sunday School, 1908". My mouth must have dropped open! Exactly 100 years after my Grandmother received this book as a gift, it was given to me as a gift! There was another- which had Ivy Johnson written in her own hand, and that was given to me also. We went home with 2 other books which had belonged to George Henry Hobson. I felt overwhelmed and so grateful for this experience. When I try to think about the chances of this happening I really can't believe it. The woman who gave us the books said she found them in an antiques shop in the village 16 years ago, and felt to buy them and store them. They have been in her garage ever since that time. Someone once said to me that when you do your family history it seems like not only are we seeking our ancestors, but they are seeking us. I believe there is a great deal of truth to that.