My Trails into the Past

          Today would have been the 83rd birthday of my father, William Joseph Hork, born in 1930 on April 23. [1] According to his birth certificate, he was born in Ontario, San Bernardino County.  He had always said he was born in Cucamonga, California.  Maybe they were living in Cucamonga, or maybe he just like saying the  town's  name.       Bill’s parents were William Cyril Hork and Anna Marie Sullivan. [2]   Bill was the fifth and last child born to Cyril and Anna.  He had four older sisters, one who died just days after birth.       His childhood was tough.  He was born in the early stages of the great depression.  His father was a drinker and couldn’t keep a steady job.  He was but a young fella when his mother took the courage to leave Cyril and raise her four children on her own.       He did have fond memories...

Nils Arthur Nathaniel Nilsen    Nils Arthur Nathaniel Nilsen was born 118 years ago today on 15 March 1894.  His parents were Rev. Nils Malkom Nilsen and Hulda Charlotta Anderson-Carlson.  Arthur was born in Youngstown, Mahoning Co., Ohio, where his father was the pastor of the Swedish Church on Poland Avenue.  He was their first child and would be the oldest of six (four brothers and one sister) children.    Arthur was an avid reader and was self-taught in many subjects. He worked many different jobs, as a clerk at the post office, farmer, truck driver, electrician, and chicken rancher. Arthur c. late 1940s    Arthur was my husband's grandfather.  He died 19 September 1954 in Sacramento, California, when my husband was nearly two years old.  He never got the chance to know him. Copyright © 2013 by Lisa Suzanne Gorrell, My Trails into the Past

 I was researching in NewspaperArchive.com, searching for newspapers in Jeffersonville, Clark county, Indiana for any article about the Davey and Wollenweber families.  I found some gems and this is one of the best.    In the 24 May 1882 issue of the  Jeffersonville Daily Evening News, on page 2, was a very nice article about the 50th wedding anniversary celebration of Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Davey. The story starts out with some facts about their nuptials in Cornwall and then some very nice things about Mr & Mrs Davey: "Golden Nuptials," A Pleasant Celebration by Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Davy.     Mrs.[sic] Thomas Davy and Miss Mary Nicholos were married May 23d, 1882 at St. Agnes Church, St. Ann's Parish, Cornwall, England, by Rev W. V. Snowe.  This venerable and highly respected couple have been living in Jeffersonville for twenty-three years.  They are greatly respected by their many friends in this city for their many virtues as good...

Randy Seaver, a blogger at Genea-Musing, has created a wonderful blog theme called Saturday Night Genealogy Fun.  Here is today’s mission: Your mission, should you decide to accept it (cue the Mission Impossible! music) is to: 1) Determine where your ancestral families were on 1 January 1913 - 100 years ago. 2) List them, their family members, their birth years, and their residence location (as close as possible). Do you have a photograph of their residence from about that time, and does the residence still exist? 3) Tell us all about it in your own blog post, in a comment to this post, or in a Facebook Status or Google+ Stream post. Here is the location of my father's family in 1913: 601 South 5th Street, Hamilton, Montana My grandfather, William Cyril Hork, and my great-grandmother, Julia Ann Sievert (William’s mother) lived at 601 South 5 th Street in Hamilton, Ravalli Co, Montana. [1] I have a recent photo of the house. My grandmother, Anna Marie Sullivan w...

   My father's sister, Lorene, passed away this week on 26 Nov 2012.  She died peacefully in her sleep.  She was my father's oldest of three sisters.  Here is a short bio I wrote in 2004. Lorene High School       Ethel Lorene Hork was born Aug 3, 1923 in Santa Monica, California.  She attended St. George's Catholic Grammar School and Chaffey Union High School in Ontario. In grammar school, Lorene remembers "skipping second grade to the third grade and crowning the Blessed Virgin in Our May Church procession." She also won the American Legion School award.       Her first job was as an usherette in a movie theater in Napa. She was paid $12.00 a week. She worked for the Army as a civilian for 18 months and lived in Japan not far from the Imperial Palace. After working there, she traveled around the world with friends visiting Asia, the Middle East and Europe. She returned to the United States on the Queen Mary. Lore...

This post was originally posted on  October 17, 2011 but thought it was appropriate to repost today on Veteran's Day. Seaman Cyril W. Hork My grandfather, William Cyril Hork (1899-1967) served in the United States Navy.   His active service in the Navy was between January 5, 1918, where he enlisted at Salt Lake City, Utah, and June 14, 1919 where he was discharged, again at Salt Lake City.[1] I have his Service Record and learned he used another variation of his name: Cyril Willis Hork.  You can see his signature here: I also learned where he trained and served.  His training took place in San Diego and at Mare Island, California.  He then was stationed at the U.S. Sub Base in San Pedro, California.  From March 31, 1919 to Jun 12, 1919 he served on the U.S.S. Alert. So what was this  USS Alert ?  I found information on the website  California Center for Military History  and there was a photo of the  USS Alert . ...

Randy Seaver of Genea-Musings has a fun Saturday blog activity and today I decided to play.  What the Name Roulette is: Find the name of one of your great-grandmothers. Divide her birth date by 90 and round to the nearest whole number.  Use that number to find the ancestor in your tree with the same Ahnetafel number. Write 3 facts about that ancestor. To find the roulette number I took the birthdates of all four of my great-grandmothers and found that by dividing by 90, I came up with the same rounded number of 21.  The ancestor with 21 is my great-great-grandmother, Mary Sheehan. Mary Sheehan was born probably in Cahirkeem, Co Cork, Ireland. (1)  I do not know her exact birthdate.  The two census entries (1870 & 1880) in the United States have her birth year as 1827 and 1832. Her tombstone listed her age as 70 making her birth in 1832. She married Jeremiah Sullivan sometime around 1841-1842, as their first child was born in Nov 1843. (2) ...