Wordless Wednesday - 30 March 2010

Edward Everett Wilcox with grandmother, Mary Youker Wilcox (ca. 1862), Van Buren County, Michigan.

Tombstone Tuesday - 30 March 2010 - Gorsline/Freeman

Gorsline monument, Mohawk Village Cemetery, German Flats, Herkimer, New York

William D. Gorsline (b: 9 April 1832, d: 30 March 1915, 95 years ago today)

Peter Freeman - my 3rd great-granduncle (b: 9 May 1812, Stark, Herkimer, New York; d: 19 November 1896, Boston, Suffolk, Massachusetts)

Helen Mesick , wife of Peter Freeman (b: 7 March 1816, d: 26 March 1888 - 122 years ago last week)


Mesick Thomas Freeman, son of Peter & Helen (Mesick) Freeman (b: 26 September 1842, d: 4 Dec 1855, 13 years of age)

Elizabeth Freeman, 1st wife of William D. Gorsline (b: 28 April 1838, d: 19 Jan 1881).

Florence/Flora Mills, 2nd wife of William D. Gorsline (b: abt 1860, d: 26 October 1884)

Did your Ancestor play a saw?

The Glendale Folk Heritage Festival, held on March 20-21, was a great experience. It was free to the public and the public came! Butch held 2 workshops, but only one where I took photos: learning to play the saw. He helped budding sawyers of all ages learn to hold and bend the farm implement. By the end of the hour, they were actually playing "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" (well, that's what they said it was!). If you think that this sounds like something you would like to do, after you get your head examined, check out Uncle Butch's web page to download instructions on saw playing (note: there is also a handout download on that page that covers spoon-playing).

Here are some photos of the master teacher at work.


This "instrument" has been around as long as it's been a tool, so if your family had one of these, perhaps one of your ancestors was a saw-player. Just a thought!



"What does it sound like?" you ask. Ah, that can be discovered on his CD: "Playing on the Edge" (you can listen to some of the cuts from the CD, if you so desire).