Gene Notes

Some random and some not-so-random thoughts on family history.

Tuesday, February 19, 2013

A Breakthrough - But Not for Me!

My cousins from Knoxville drove over yesterday for lunch, chatting, and for J's wife E to pick my brain on her genealogical brick wall. In E's convoluted family history (her father was married at least 4 times and her mother probably had a child out of wedlock at age 16 or 17 and her adopted father is not to be found on the 1940 census,) are a pair of twins, Judy and Jerry Hemming. The twins along with older brothers Julius Creighton Hemming and Ritchie Hemming were taken away from their parents and put in a children's home. Julius Creighton Hemming, Sr., however, was able to get the older boys back, without taking the two younger (both less than 2 years old in 1940,) claiming they were not his. So, E would like to find her possible half siblings.

In searching for her family, she found a daughter of Julius Creighton Hemming's first wife, Marjorie, who was also looking for them. She had a note that they were adopted by a couple in Kansas City, Missouri. This is where I came in.

First, we were looking for Lannie or Lennie Duncan, a doctor.  He married Reba -- and here is where the problem came in, we weren't all that sure what her maiden name was. After going through the notes this daughter of Marjorie's sent, and cousin J's transcription of them, we were able to narrow it to Gloves or Glaves. I simply did a search on Ancestry.com using Reba Gl?ves. We found her in 1930 living with her brother in Illinois. On the 1920 census (Reba was born in 1910 in Missouri) we found another family living down the street from the Glaves in Lewiston, Missouri, that Marjorie's daughter named.  The daughter also stated that Reba and Lennie/Lannie were in California.

Another search of Ancestry.com brought up the California Find-a-Grave index and there was Reba, buried next to Frank L. Duncan. Both were found on the California death index and they were from Missouri and Illinois. Ok. Unfortunately we were not able to scare up an obit for either, and E will work on that. But now she has something further to go on.



Copyright 2010-2013, ACK for Gene Notes

1 comment:

  1. That is an exciting mystery! I hope that she finds them, and they're both alive and well after all these years.

    ReplyDelete