SNGF --Your (or Your Ancestor's) Personal History Timeline

Calling all Genea-Musings Fans: 

It's Saturday Night again - 

Time for some more Genealogy Fun!!

Our mission from Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings is to:

1)  Taneya Koonce wrote a Happy Birthday post about her own life in Quick Tip: Create Your Personal History Timeline - The Birthday Edition 🥳.  What a great birthday idea!

2)  This week, write your own Personal History Timeline - every 5 or 10 years, or the most important events.  If you don't want to do yours, write a History Timeline for one of your ancestors.

Here’s mine:
I decided to do myself in the same fashion as Randy. I found the early years easier to write than the later years.

1954 (age 0). I was born at Concord Community Hospital, and the doctor said I was the most beautiful baby. I am my parents’ firstborn.

1959 (age 5). We lived in Pittsburg on East 9th Street. I began Kindergarten. I came down with scarlet fever, and we were quarantined. Now I had two younger brothers, Steve and Jonathan.

1964 (age 10). We moved to Walnut Creek the previous year, and I transferred from St. Peter Martyr School to Parkmead Elementary, a public school. It was a big adjustment. My 4th-grade teacher, Mrs. Eckhardt, was my favorite. She taught us some German, showed us cool Native American artifacts found at the site of Rossmoor, and was generally very nice. I also have a sister, Danna.

1969 (age 15). Now I have two more sisters, Sabrina and Renee. I attended Las Lomas High School as a Freshman. My friend, Beth, whom I met at Parkmead Intermediate, was now my best friend. This year I took my first airplane ride with my Nana to Southern California, where I visited Disneyland, Hollywood, San Juan Capistrano, and San Diego, and met many second cousins.

1974 (age 20). I attended Cal State University, Hayward, studying biological sciences. I worked part-time at the library on campus and for Mr. Gigas at Rossmoor. The fees were low enough that I paid my own way while living at home. I drove a Rambler Ambassador wagon until BART began running out on the C-Line. It cost a dollar each way to Hayward from Walnut Creek and twenty-five cents to ride the bus down to BART (the ride up was free). I got lots of homework done on the train. I was also a member of the Walnut Creek Model Railroad Society and helped build the layout.

1979 (age 25). After graduating from CSUH in 1977, I worked a year at Alameda Sporting Goods. In October 1978, I started the train operator class at BART. I was also a member of the Bay Area Electric Railway Association and volunteered at the trolley museum. That’s where I met Norman.

1984 (age 30). I married Norman in 1980, and we bought a house in Martinez. I worked as a train operator with weekdays off. I took classes at the community college, preparing to transfer for a civil engineering degree, but couldn’t get into UC Berkeley because of already having a degree. My hobbies at this time were going to glass shows and watching foreign movies in the City with my friend, Hugh.

1989 (age 35). Big changes occurred the previous year. Our first child, Elizabeth, was born. I still worked as a train operator and still had weekdays off, not having enough seniority to get weekends off. I occasionally worked with new train operator classes. I took a leave and enrolled at CSUH’s teacher credential program at their Pleasant Hill campus. I did this in parts, going back to work during quarter breaks. I was home with my daughter watching the World Series game when the 1989 earthquake happened. It was the big talk the next day at the elementary school where I was student teaching.

1994 (age 40). I did not like turning 40 and developed a bad case of Rosacea. My second daughter was born in 1991, and I became a full-time instructor at BART two years later. My teaching credential was a major factor in getting the job. Good news, I had weekends off. Bad news, I had to commute to Hayward, and occasionally, when teaching a new class, work nights. Luckily, we had a great babysitter, Susan, who watched the girls until they were in middle school.

1999 (age 45). I bought a new car, a Ford Explorer (which we still have), replacing the 1991 Ford Tempo. This car was better for taking the Girl Scout Troops camping. I was a leader of both girls’ troops over the years, as well as a day camp director at Diablo Day Camp for one week a summer. The girls and I took a multi-state trip with the new car, visiting Nevada, Idaho, Wyoming, and Montana. We did some genealogy in Anaconda, Butte, and Hamilton, Montana, where my grandparents lived. We also visited Yellowstone National Park and Twin Falls in Idaho. This was also the Giants' last year at Candlestick Park, and we had a season ticket package and were at the final game.

2004 (age 50). Still at BART, now with my office in Concord, so my commute was shorter. I was mostly teaching new operators and writing curriculum. Elizabeth was into soccer with a club team and on the high school team. Our weekends involved traveling to away games. Margaret still went to gymnastics and piano lessons. I was more active in genealogy, taking trips to the Family History Library in Salt Lake City.

2009 (age 55). This year, our last child graduated from high school. The oldest was attending Cal Poly, SLO, studying graphic design, and the youngest was going to go to Notre Dame de Namur in Belmont, studying theater. I started thinking about retirement, as with PERS, I could get 2% at 55; however, I didn’t retire this year. In the past five years, I started scrapbooking using Creative Memories materials and would work on it at Nancy’s house. Digital photography wasn’t a big thing yet.

2014 (age 60). I retired at the end of 2010. Norman and I had taken a two-week vacation to Oregon and learned we could live fine together (ie, both in the same house all day). It didn’t take long to get more involved in genealogy. I became secretary for the California Genealogical Society and was on the board of the Contra Costa County Genealogical Society. I became more serious about genealogy and signed up for the ProGen study group and attended genealogy institutes in Salt Lake City, Birmingham, and Pittsburgh. Following two trips to Pittsburgh with Beth, we drove around Pennsylvania and Ohio. Both girls graduated from college.

2019 (age 65). I became a Certified Genealogist in December 2018. I went on the clock in 2017 after attending a SLIG class about certification and joined an accountability group that met weekly. Most of my time at home was spent doing some kind of genealogy. Outside activities included three trips to England to visit Margaret, who was attending a graduate school in acting. On the first trip, we added a trip to Holland and Germany. We also took a trip to Guatemala with Norman’s brother and wife. Margaret moved to New York City, and we visited her, too.

2024 (70). These years will forever be known as the COVID years. Even though many in-person activities were curtailed, I thrived online, attending study groups, classes, and meetings. I started a weekly meeting with my local society. I thank DearMyrtle and her study groups, as well as the certification accountability group I was in, for making me feel comfortable on Zoom. We did travel, our first trip on a Special Interest Tour riding in a private railcar behind an Amtrak train. When traveling to NYC to visit Margaret, we were careful on the airplane, but mostly we traveled by Amtrak in a sleeping car. However, I did get COVID twice on a trip, the first in New Hampshire on a Special Interest Tour and the second time last summer in NYC. Although vaccinated, I still caught it, but Norman never did, even though he was in the same hotel room with me. My certification was renewed in 2023. Also, two friends, Jill and Mary, and I started a business, Applied Genealogy Institute, and taught classes on Zoom to our students.

That’s my life in a nutshell. I left out model railroad conventions I attended and those I worked on. I need to create a full timeline of my life and fill in more details. I have those scrapbooks to help, but I was never one to write a journal, so I will have to look at the souvenirs and photos I have to help with it.

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