The Marcella Armstrong Memorial Collection

Library of Congress Civil War Photographs

2010-12-09T05:29:00.000-08:00

The Library of Congress posted a series of Civil War photographs on Flickr, many of them of unidentified soldiers. I skimmed through them wondering if I could identify any of them.

I came across this one:

and wondered if it might be possible that this was my Bagley ancestor; these are the pictures I've got:

This one:

also seemed like a possible match, although maybe less likely.

Have I identified an unknown soldier in the Library of Congress photo collection?

There must be people who are well-versed in -- what, forensic photograpy? -- who know what to look for as far as ruling out a possible match. But how would one ever know for sure?

Journal Facsimiles Update

2009-09-10T09:37:00.000-07:00

So, I sent a photocopy of the original to Joan and Don Joy in Conway, South Carolina, so Joan could finish reading it, while I work on the rebinding of the original and the production of the facsimiles.

Today I picked up a proof copy of the facsimiles on ordinary paper, done for Bessenberg by a service bureau in Saline. The result isn't very good -- the problem is, the original is fine-point blue ball-point pen on somewhat faded paper. Turn that into a straight one-bit-per-pixel image using thresholding, and you've got a gritty-looking image with dropouts; bring the threshold up too high to make it darker, and the background starts to get speckled.

Bessenberg sends out their scanning and printing to a service bureau, so the binding is now on hold while I work with the service bureau to come up with something that looks better. They're probably accustomed to scanning dissertations in crisp black print on a white background, which doesn't require a high bit depth. I think what I'll have to do is ask them to scan it again, in color at perhaps 600 dpi, and give me a disc with the images. I'll then have to spend some time playing around with the images in Photoshop, which may mean finding the best per-page settings, then bring it down to a dithered black and white image, and have them print that.

So, on the one hand it looks like I will have to put more time into it, where I was hoping to pay other people to do all that. But on the other hand, the results should be closer to what I want -- and if it works out right, I'll also have an archival digital version, which is actually more than I had originally hoped for.

Bessenberg Bindery

2009-08-12T09:21:00.000-07:00

With Grace's help, I've finally gotten my act together enough to take Marcella's journal to Bessenberg bindery, to have it bound in a new cover, along with a box. The original cover is disintegrating, but fortunately the paper in the book is holding up well, and it is sewn, and can thus be put in a new cover without too much difficulty.

I'm also having five bound archival-quality facsimile copies made, and an unbound facsimile to be kept in a box. This should make it easier to scan or make further copies in the future. I'm also hunting for someone to finish transcribing the whole thing, after realizing that I'm not going to have time to type it all; and even if I did, my wrists just aren't up to that much typing. I'm on the computer pretty much all day at work as it is, and don't want to give myself an attack of tendonitis or carpal tunnel syndrome.

And finally, I have a photocopy (on ordinary photocopy paper, made at a Staples), which I'm sending back to Joan and Don so that they can finish reading it.

When the original is done, I'll send that to Joan and Don as well. The facsimiles are for the grandchildren. They estimated they would be done in about three weeks.

I'm not making a lot of headway in my scanning and archiving -- it's a lot of work! And when Joshua arrived, our free time was squeezed just that little bit further, and a lot of our planned activities fell apart. But I will keep plugging away as best as I can.

Starting a New Album: Clarkes, 1902-1935

2009-05-17T12:53:00.000-07:00

I am starting to scan and restore images from an old album of my grandmother's, marked "Clarkes 1902-1935." To do this I had to take it apart, but fortunately this one has a tied binding. Some of the other albums are going to be trickier.

It is another black paper album, and is quite worn. The photos tend to have too much or too little contrast, and some silvering. There are a lot of hand-written comments in white ink, but many of them are difficult to read. I'll try to do restorations of some of the more promising images.

Here's a detail of one of the clearer photos, a scan prior to any cleanup. It shows Joe and H. Harrison Clarke, Marcella's brothers. It isn't dated, but 1912 seems like a reasonable guess; H. Harrison Clarke was born in 1902.

I'm scanning these at 1200 dpi, to try to capture any fine detail that is lurking in the grain. Here's a first attempt at cleaning up dirt and scratches on the image and adjusting the contrast. Take a look at the blousy shirts, the ties, the pantaloons, and the shoes!

Retouching is a compromise; I've used Photoshop's spot healing brush along with my Wacom tablet to blend out a lot of dirt and scratches. That's an endless process, though, so at some point you have to stop and focus just on the faces and most visible damage. If you get too aggressive with the spot healing, then you start to get a plastic-looking surface, and if you clean up one area very thoroughly and leave other areas dirty, it looks strange and uneven. Also, at this point I'm not even going to attempt to clean up the whitish rubbed areas across the middle of the picture; it's beyond my current retouching skills.

To bring up the sharpness, I hit the unsharp mask filter pretty hard. The image starts to look a little grainy, but you get some details back that tend to look blurry if you don't sharpen them. It's a compromise and I'm still learning how to get the best results.

Of course, I'm also preserving both the original paper album as best I can -- although in another hundred years the acidic black paper will have probably rendered the images even more illegible -- and the original scans, for someone else to play with in the future. That someone might be me in a few years.

Marcella Armstrong's Journal

2008-11-18T08:11:00.000-08:00

I have received my grandmother's journal back from Joan and Don Joy! So, now to get it scanned, and restored in a new cover. I'm going to see if the Bessenberg Bindery can do this kind of job for me.

A Pile of Long-Lost Slides

2008-10-04T22:06:00.001-07:00

I found a handful of loose slides and today I'm scanning them. This batch needs a lot of hand-restoration with Photoshop; I'll leave the touchup of dirt and scratches to later, but just getting the colors even remotely correct has been a challenge, since these are old and have not been properly stored.

This one seems to be me, on the right, maybe circa 1969, in Seattle, but I'm not certain where. Is this in my yard at the time? I don't know. I think the boy on the left is Michael, the son of my mom's friend whose name escapes me at the moment. I look to be about two. I've never seen this picture before. There's probably a story behind it. The slide is marked July 1970, and I think my parents' relationship was either hopelessly broken or badly damaged at this point. I don't look happy. But maybe I'm reading too much into it. When I look at it I feel as if I'm on the verge of remembering what it was like to be that two-year-old boy (I had not yet turned three), as if those memories are still in there somewhere!

This next one was over-exposed to begin with and the dyes are very faded, meaning that it lets most light of the light from the scanner through, and comes out almost white. This means it requires a lot of darkening and contrast-enhancement to see much of anything, and there is hardly any color left to correct. I'm sure a pro could get this looking better, but here it is: Richard, Joan, and Susan Armstrong perhaps around 1955. Are they all in the water? The way the shot is framed, it is hard to tell. Hand-written on the slide is "at Sun Lake, Washington."

Next, a fantastic photo of my mom. This one was remarkably well-preserved. The slide is stamped "61R" which I'm thinking might indicate 1961 -- was this taken at Fircrest School?

This next one is my father's family in Eatonville, Washington: Thanksgiving, 1975. I'm not certain who everyone is, but Amby, Mary, Elmer, Sally, Aaron, and Ted I recognize.

And finally, my mother at Niagara Falls. My father wrote "Fascination" on a label on the slide's cardboard holder! The colors have held up reasonably well but this slide is badly stained and very dirty. I was able to clean some of the gunk off with emulsion cleaning fluid but it will still need a lot of touch-up in Photoshop if I'm ever going to use this one for high-resolution printing.

Newly Found Photos of the Armstrong Siblings

2008-09-29T23:06:00.000-07:00

These photos came to my mother Susan Zahner from Lenore Frimoth (Beck) in 1996. Some of them were in rough shape; I put Photoshop through its paces to get as much contrast as possible out of the originals, and used my new tablet to do a lot of touch-up to fix dirt, stains, scratches, and even tears. Time-consuming, but I'm very pleased with the results!

Dora Armstrong (Bagley), around 1915.

Ruth Armstrong, Richard Armstrong, and Ella Grace Armstrong (Ruth and Ella Grace later married and took the names Beck and Findley).

Richard and Ruth, exact date unknown. My grandfather looks like he was probably under two years old.

This one indicates 1906 or 1907 on the back of the photo.

Richard, age 12, and age unknown (perhaps around 18).

The Cherry Pudding

2008-09-29T22:46:00.000-07:00

Dick Zahner recently found a few more photos and documents that had been my mother's and grandmother's. To introduce these, here is a short story written by Ruth Beck (Armstrong), my paternal grandfather's sister. The Cherry Pudding (PDF file of page images, 513K) The story describes an idyllic day in Iowa nearly 100 years ago, in 1912.

My great-aunt Ruth dedicated this story to the memory of my grandfather, Richard Armstrong. The characters she mentions include Uncle Harvey (I'm not sure who that is), Aunt Harriet (Hattie), "the baby" Ella Grace Findley (Armstrong), Dora Armstrong (Bagley), and "Grandmother" (Ruth's grandmother, who I'll have to find out more about). I know very little about my grandfather Richard's family and childhood, but this story has just helped remedy that. There's even enough detail given that an enterprising cook could probably make the cherry pudding described, or at least a close approximation.

Summer's Over

2008-09-02T10:07:00.000-07:00

This is not really on topic, but... we're back from a week's vacation in Grand Marais with my father and stepmother, visiting from California.

I made a video -- my first -- using Apple iMove, and uploaded it to a brand-spanking-new YouTube account. The video is our family vacation, in the form of a music video for Jonathan Coulton's song "Summer's Over" (Thing a Week #51).

Here is the video link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tSVuCYOYYKM

I find Mr. Coulton's lyrics to be simple but beautiful; the song has been stuck in my head for the last few weeks.

Summer’s over
You’re going back to school
I’m staying here
Where else would I go?

Watch the leaves turn
Close up the swimming pool
Winter comes in
Sooner than you know

Nights get cold
And the flowers let go
Bide their time
Under the snow
As they go down they say
Goodbye
Goodbye

Summer’s over
Because it has to be
Just like before
Around and around

It’s a circle
Bringing you back to me
Stay where I am
I’m lost and found

When you go
You come back again
Close the door
The cold’s getting in
As I go down I say
Goodbye
Goodbye

Cross-Blog Information and Introductions

2008-07-22T07:47:00.001-07:00

In order to try to avoid boring people with material they aren't interested in, I have divided my writing up into five separate blogs. The downside to this is that I have a tendency to wander from one area of interest to another over the course of a typical year, so it may look like I've dropped off the face of the earth. In case anyone is interested in following what is going on in one of my other blogs, I thought it might be useful to post this road map once in a while.

Geek Like Me Too is my general-purpose personal blog. The most recent postings are about a recent Jonathan Coulton concert in Pontiac that I attended and recorded. I have provided recordings of the show as a set of MP3 files, of interest to geeks who like music.

Geek Like Me is its predecessor, done in Blosxom, now still up only for archival purposes.

Geek Versus Guitar is about guitar playing. Recently I've recorded a few Jonathan Coulton songs myself. It will also be about learning to produce songs with my home studio.

Praise, Curse, and Recurse is about programming topics, mostly Haskell, Python, and Scheme. My free time has been devoted to other things but I will no doubt be back around to programming before too long.

The Marcella Armstrong Memorial Collection is about my family history, and the big task of scanning, restoring, preserving, and archiving family photos and documents. Of interest to any family members, but also of possible interest to people doing their own similar projects.

Tales from the Potts House: William Hope Hodgson contains information about the "Hodgecast" podcast available on iTunes, in which I record classic William Hope Hodgson novels and stories. I have more podcasts planned in both this series and possibly others in the near future.

Anyway, there it is... please join me on any of these blogs that might catch your interest. I always have far too many projects going at once!

Brian at Seventeen

2008-02-09T09:45:00.001-08:00

I think this may have been Brian's high school graduation photo, but I'm not entirely certain, since I have several similar ones.

Brian at Ten

2008-02-09T09:42:00.000-08:00

I think Brian was about ten when this portrait was taken.

March of 1973

2008-02-03T14:55:00.000-08:00

The skin tones are kind of ghastly after rough color restoration, but here we are! I was five, he was three.

I am hoping to eventually acquire some of the more specialized Photoshop plugins for doing more accurate and nuanced color correction.

Brian at One

2008-02-03T14:47:00.001-08:00

He had to Beat the Young Girls Off with a Stick

2008-02-03T14:22:00.000-08:00

Color Shift

2008-02-03T13:46:00.000-08:00

Here is an excellent example of how the scanner software can correct very faded photographs. Here is a grade-school portrait of Brian; I think this might have been from the first grade:

The original is terribly faded:

It still could benefit from some work; the colors have faded unevenly. But even so, it is quite a surprise to find that he was wearing green!

Brian Dennis Potts

2008-02-03T13:30:00.000-08:00

His middle name comes from our great-grandfather, Richard Armstrong's father, Dennis Armstrong, whom we never met. And I forgot his birthday!

Sorry, Brian!

The Best of the Blue Album Web Gallery

2008-02-02T16:45:00.001-08:00

These are my favorite pictures from the blue album. Uploading pictures to Blogger seems to be pretty unreliable, so I am hosting them offsite. Here is the link:

The Best of the Blue Album Web Gallery

This gallery contains about 51 images at modest sizes for web viewing. The files were created by using Aperture's Web Gallery feature. The original album has about 150 pictures.

The Blue Album, Cover

2008-02-02T14:53:00.000-08:00

This is why I called it the Blue Album.

The Blue Album, Page 10

2008-02-02T14:45:00.000-08:00

This is one of the digital photos I took of a page in the Blue Album. These were done just for a reference as to how the prints and captions were laid out on the page. These are photos that I also have as slides, although I also found a couple of prints of slides that are missing from the sets of slides.

The Blue Album, the Missing Photos

2008-02-02T14:42:00.000-08:00

These are the photos of Linda that I managed to miss when making my high-resolution scans. I think there is another copy of at least one of them in the collection.

The Blue Album

2008-02-02T12:33:00.000-08:00

Before our family vacation, I was able to take apart and scan the pages from a large-format photo album that I'll just call the "Blue Album." This album was easy to disassemble because it was held together with a string. The full pages were too large to fit on the scanner, but I took digital photos of each page to help preserve the layout, and then took a high-resolution scan of each photo, and a lower-resolution scan of each caption.

The photographs in the Blue Album are in mixed condition -- some of the black-and-white portraits are absolutely mint, but many of the color snapshots are fading badly. The pages are fibrous, acidic black construction paper, as was commonly used. It sheds little black fibers everywhere, so despite my best efforts at cleaning the scanner glass and dusting the pages between scans there are little black fibers on some of the images. I will need to do some extra cleanup with Photoshop in some cases. Some individual pictures have torn spots where glue has stuck to the prints, but most of them are in decent enough shape. I considered various preservation options up to possibly soaking the prints off the pages, but in the end just reassembled the album and put it in a sturdy drop-front box from Archival Methods. I made several gold DVD+R backups of the images. I will eventually get these sent off to Linda.

Anyway, we took the train to Gaithersburg, Maryland, and I took the album in its big black box with me. I presented the reassembled "Blue Album" to the family. Linda and David got a chance to look at it, and Joan and Don took it back to Myrtle Beach, along with Marcella Armstrong's journal. I have not yet finished reading and transcribing the journal yet, so I am hoping to borrow it back at some point, and perhaps to get it bound in a new cover while I'm at it.

Meanwhile, I have also done a first round of cleanup and enhancement on the images from the blue album. I am trying to come up with a more efficient workflow -- uploading images individually to Blogger tends to be very slow and unreliable. Aperture can export a web album, so I'm trying that. I've taken my picks for the best photos from the Blue Album and put them into a web album. On this G5 iMac, Aperture takes a very long time to generate the web album -- in fact, it has been at it for a couple of hours, but the time estimate keeps going up, not down. When it is done, I will upload this web gallery separately to my Dreamhost space and provide a link here.

While assembling the gallery, I realized that I apparently missed scanning the images from one of the album pages. These are three black-and-white portraits of Linda. The page they are attached to was badly torn, so I probably was having trouble getting the photos onto the scanner without tearing the page apart completely. I must have set it aside to scan later and then reassembled the book without getting to them. Fortunately, I do have the low-resolution digital photo of that particular album page, although it shows some distortion due to the angle. I may also have other copies of one or more of these prints elsewhere in the collection. If not, I'll have to see if I can eventually get these three portraits scanned.

One last thing -- while there are numerous pictures of me in this album, including some I don't think exist elsewhere in the collection, there are unfortunately none of my brother Brian. Apparently this album was assembled before pictures of Brian were available. This doesn't mean there aren't lots of pictures of Brian! I have many, many more in the collection, and will get to them as I work my way through the project.

Civil War Bingo

2007-12-16T03:03:00.001-08:00

I couldn't help trying to match up as many faces as I could between the two different group shots of Civil War soldiers. Here are the matches I came up with. Are they all correct?

A Civil War Bagley?

2007-12-15T23:05:00.001-08:00

Among the loose black and white prints I found a set of re-photographed Civil War pictures. They are kind of fuzzy and dark, but a little cleanup can restore the contrast wonderfully. I don't know who took them or where the original photographs were found.

First, here is a picture captioned "Group of 21st Iowa Infantry Volunteers." The fine print reads "Photo with Battle Flag at Dubuque, June 4, 1879. The Regiment was organized at Dubuque August, 1862."

The man in the upper right appears to be W. E. Bagley, Company C. I think he must be Dora Bagley's father, or my great great grandfather on Richard Armstrong's side.

My grandmother Marcella could not read the caption on the re-photographed picture that indicated who was who; on another copy of the group shot she wrote on the back that Richard Armstrong's grandfather was "in there somewhere." I can't read it with my naked eye either, but the scanner can magnify it enough to read:

There were also are some additional photographs of portraits. I presume there was some evidence that they were of the same man, but I don't have any documentation to back that up. Here are the portraits of the man who might be W. E. Bagley. I'd guess these were taken closer to 1862 than to 1879, but I don't have an exact date.

Here is a group shot taken in camp, presumably within a few years of 1862. It is unfortunately pretty blurry.

I've zoomed in on the blur that I think might be W. E. Bagley:

And last, another group shot, undated but perhaps taken a decade or so later than the other group portrait, maybe around 1889. It seems to show most of the soldiers in the first group shot.

I've again zoomed in on the man I think might be W. E. Bagley.

I chose this one in part by a process of elimination; I was able to pair up most of the men to a fairly high degree of certainty with their images in the earlier group portrait. But it is hard to be certain when the portraits were taken years apart, and so much of his face was covered by hair! The second man from the right in the bottom row is also a possibility.

I will keep a sharp eye out for any further information about W. E. Bagley. It seems unbelievable to have both Revolutionary War and Civil War soldiers in my ancestry!

Richard Armstrong's Side of the Family

2007-12-06T23:00:00.000-08:00

More pictures from the piles I've been scanning. These are from my grandfather Richard's side of the family. Unfortunately they aren't very clear, but I'll do what I can.

First off is a snapshot of Richard Armstrong with his parents in Granger, Iowa. Dennis and Dora Armstrong are on the right, Richard is in the middle, and on his left is his sister Ruth Armstrong. The woman on the far left is unknown. My grandmother's caption read "Ella Grace?" but this was then crossed out. It definitely isn't her, but that means we have another mystery -- who is the woman on the left?

Next, a couple of close-ups of the picture above. Ruth Armstrong was quite a looker!

Finally, another picture of Dennis Armstrong. I have a couple more but none of them are very good photographs, unfortunately.

Some Sharper Pictures

2007-12-06T22:42:00.000-08:00

Here are some of the sharper pictures from a pile of loose pictures of Isabel, Henry, and family.

This one shows Joan and her grandparents Isabel and Henry. The original is very faded and also very "silvered out" or tarnished, which makes it extra-challenging, but with some contrast enhancement we can see it a bit more clearly:

Here are Isabel and Henry from their 50th wedding anniversary. This is a detail from what is probably the clearest photo I have of the two of them. In the collection I also have an invitation to their wedding, circa 1901, if I recall correctly, and the guest book which includes the guests from the 50th anniversary party.

Here is another shot of the somewhat mysterious Uncle Will!

Lots More Prints

2007-12-06T21:26:00.000-08:00

I set aside the slides for a while, because they are proving too difficult to work on with Aperture. Meanwhile, I have a mountain of older black and white prints to go through.

A family snapshot showing Isabel and -- not Henry Clarke, but his brother Will:

Detail of Joan:

Detail of Marcella and Will:

I don't know very much about Uncle Will, as my grandmother called him in the photo captions. Here is a close-up showing Isabel and Clara, Marcella's sister:

Detail of Susan:

Album Pages and Exposing Captions

2007-12-02T21:39:00.000-08:00

I have a stack of loose pages on that old black construction paper. Here is what one of them looks like:

The caption, written in white ink on the black paper, is quite difficult to read, but it says "Miss Rice at Camp" and "Music Instructor." And this is one of the more legible captions. Some of them are nearly impossible to read.

In some cases, the pictures are already nearly falling off the black paper, but bits of the paper are securely stuck to the photo. After scanning the photo, I pulled it off the paper, which brought some of the black paper with it. I decided to take a chance and try soaking off the black paper residue.

In fact, it comes off very easily. The picture dried nicely with no apparent damage. Now I can see what the back of the picture says!

Miss Rice, Music Instructor at Camp Chedwel, Summer of 1917.

There is a side benefit: getting these pictures off the black paper removes them from a source of leaching acids, so they may actually survive longer this way. The photo shows no sign of damage to the emulsion side and actually seems cleaner for having been washed for a few minutes. It did, however, gain a couple of visible water spots. That means I have to figure out a better way to dry it. I'm going to try a nylon mesh drying rack. Should I be using some kind of squeegee? Maybe, but these prints are kind of fragile, so maybe I will just try to make do with paper towels. Do they make acid-free paper towels? Maybe I am losing my mind...

I may try this technique with the rest of this batch of loose, disintegrating album pages. That way I'll have a high-resolution digital image, a scan of any annotations on the album pages, and a scan of any hidden annotations on the backs of the original photos.

The Easter Basket Talk

2007-12-02T19:26:00.000-08:00

I came across the text of a talk that my mother must have written for her work at Fircrest in Seattle. I have no idea if she ever gave the talk or not. This would have been about 1964, I think. I scanned the cards with the typewritten text on them and fed them to an OCR program. I did a quick run-through to fix a few typos and OCR errors, and here it is.

I had nearly forgotten that my mother was quite a decent writer, especially when she had something to write about that she was passionate about. I did not really get into writing to emulate her, because I rarely saw her write very much except for short personal letters, but she did always read my essays and make suggestions.

Some of the text seems a little bit politically incorrect by modern standards (I don't think the word "retardate" is used anymore to describe a mentally retarded person). But I found it quite interesting, even somewhat radical and fiery. Some of her language was deliberately targeted to get people out of their complacent attitudes. It was especially interesting that she was quite critical of the usefulness of her own field, occupational therapy, and in this essay makes a strong case that traditional OT techniques, and even ways of thinking about how to help people, were completely useless in the job she found herself doing. That's the attitude of a young person who wants to make a difference. I had always thought of her as someone who was on the more conservative side of culture in the 1960s, but this talk tells a different story.

"Radical" is not a word I usually associate with my mother. It occurs to me that had I known more about her life and career, and been in less of a state of shock at her abrupt illness and death, I could have given her a much better eulogy by talking about her values and the things she worked for. I can't go back to her funeral and rewrite the eulogy, so consider this an appendix.

I don't know just how extensive my mother's role was in the program she described. Did she conceive and set up the whole thing? It does give me an interesting flavor of the work she was doing before I was born, which I didn't really know very much about. I know she also worked in a tuberculosis sanitarium in the early 1960s, and there was still evidence visible on a chest x-ray of her exposure to TB.

I might reconsider and include some of the photographs from her talk now that I know what it was all about. Privacy concerns just may not be that important after over forty years have passed and the residents of Fircrest are probably already a matter of public record, given that it was a state institution.

Fircrest School is the newest of four state supported institutions for the care of the mentally retarded in Washington. The residents are classified as severely and moderately retarded. There are some who are sometimes called "human vegetables" and require complete physical care; there are the active children who are being trained in self-help and motor activities; and then there are the adults who are capable of caring for their own physical needs and can do simple jobs under supervision. It is this last group that we will be concerned with today* These men and women vary in age from 21 to 71 and coincidentally their I.Q. is from 20 to 70.

A person in an institution for the mentally retarded has been placed there because he was unable to cope with the world outside -- and for various reasons he has been rejected by his community. This community has found it more and more difficult to cope with this handicap in the last several decades due to such social changes as increased occupational and residential mobility. Just as one finds fewer grandparents in the homes of their children, our increasingly socialistic world finds more efficient and maybe better ways of dealing with its non-productive people. Despite the new very much in vogue interest in mental retardation sparked by the late John F. Kennedy, the actual tolerance levels for the presence of very oddly formed, mumbling or non-verbal, drooling, and maybe limping people has probably increased very little. We pay our taxes and establish reservations for our community eyesores.

Yet after we have deported these human beings our task has only begun. We have assigned the responsibility for their every need in their very limited environment to employees of the state. Only in very recent years has it become the policy to utilize professional personnel and attitudes in the lives of these people. The employment of occupational therapists in Washington institutions for the retarded has less then a ten year history.

The factual account of the process by which a person ends up in an institution need not be a cynical account. The difference between the expectation levels of the community and the functioning capacities of the retardate is so vast that the handicapped person suffers from the knowledge that he is a second class citizen. The community is not his community. Its pace is not his. Its activities preclude him. He often realizes that he is an impediment to someone's standard of living.

The establishment of institutions has in many ways been a humane process. It has been a way of instituting a community within a community. The retardate now lives in a community designed to fit his needs -- a community where there are no pressures to function above his ability, where he need not feel he cannot keep up. Here he can feel secure and here he can be an important person.

What we as occupational therapists need to do for these people is to help them to function better within this sub-community. It is important to help them to develop a meaningful life and to help them to interact with each other more effectively. They must gain a feeling of natural interaction. This feeling of natural interaction can only stem from a need - like the need to cooperate effectively to complete a worthwhile project.

We could offer him high hopes in the use of traditional O.T. projects but he would soon realize the senselessness of his effort. What could he do with his looper pot holder when it was finished? His family has lost interest in him so there is no one to present it to as a gift. It is probably not made well enough to sell to a staff member. Why should he make another one?

When I came to Fircrest five years ago the larger part of O.T. time was spent doing tasks that were generally designed for people of normal intelligence suffering from a temporary disability. These projects were another useless vestige of the values of the larger community. It became obvious to me that the world of the retardate was one that I was unprepared to deal with. An appropriate approach needed to be developed.

In the time it takes one retarded person to complete one looper pot-holder five more retarded people have been born in the city of Seattle. At Fircrest there are three occupational therapists and two handicraft workers in the midst of a community of 1,000 retardates.

Net only have the old techniques been inappropriate to the needs of individuals but they have been grossly inefficient in the face of the real problem of numbers. We therapists were able to work with a few who had special problems in behavior, in self-help, in coordination, etc., but what about the several hundred residents needing only that feeling of being important?

In keeping with the general trend of all of the medical and psychological services, occupational therapy can fit very smoothly into the treatment of large groups.

When I came to Fircrest a small group had already been established with the name of Sheltered Workshop. Soon after this time in 1962 an opportunity came to us that was to change the lives and the personal outlook of many Fircrest residents. The owner of a small candy packing company offered us the opportunity to assemble the Easter baskets which would be sold under his company's name on the open market.

Through the cooperation of the administration we appropriated a large empty building on the edge of Fircrest grounds. Because of the newness of these pioneering ventures involving the cooperation of business and treatment people there were no precedents to follow in establishing a working division of labor. The problems were many and complex. They involved the coordination of logistic operations between Seattle and Hong Kong, Formosa, Tokyo, Switzerland, Mexico and Panama. Truckloads of baskets, artificial grass, marshmallow eggs, chocolate bunnies, cellophane bags, unassembled cartons, etc. began to arrive. You can imagine the excitement among the residents as the building was made ready for use.

We were in the manufacturing business and had to start thinking like industrial people. We decided to use the assembly line method whereby each person would perform one task as his contribution to the finished product. This involved my having to divide the complex operation into small manageable task units. Once I had made these divisions I was ready to decide which residents could be most fitted to and could benefit most from each task.

As you can imagine, the limitations suffered by these people are many and great and the process of selection involved a great deal of knowledge of each individual. This knowledge was not at our fingertips however and we had to call for the help of all those who knew the residents. Thus we depended very heavily on the cooperation of the administration and the non-professional living supervisors in our project. This opened new lines of communication and made the Easter basket project a Fircrest-wide endeavor. By getting everyone involved this became not only a high-priority project among the staff but a high-prestige project among the residents. Everyone hoped to be chosen for the project and many who had previously spent their whole day watching television or roaming around the grounds now enjoyed a new feeling of importance and status. The resident workers were graded according to their ability and were assigned a pay scale commensurate to how much they could produce.

There is much talk lately about dehumanization in institutions as compared to some abstract thing called human dignity. After hearing these discussions out it seems that human dignity boils down to a state of personal independence. In the midst of an environment geared to the mass treatment of large groups of state dependents there are few things which give a person a feeling of individual freedom like having a pocketful of spending money which they themselves have earned. Even though most of the residents cannot tell a penny from a quarter they are somehow aware that they are earning a measure of power.

When I state that we make Easter baskets some of you may have images of people sitting around weaving baskets and maybe packaging the candy. What we actually do is take ready-made baskets and roll newspapers as filler, then lay on a thin layer of artificial grass, then tape on pre-packaged candy Easter eggs, then tape on various chocolate Easter bunnies and candy bars, put a label on the bottom, then place them in a cellophane bag or wrap them with colored cellophane, tie on an artificial flower or bow which we make on the bow machine, put it in a carton along with the correct number of other baskets just like it and put the carton in the right pile to be counted and shipped.

[Demonstration]

We divided the workers into two groups -- one meeting in the morning, the other in the afternoon. The morning group prepared the baskets for the afternoon group by filling them with papers and applying the grass and then left them at the head of the afternoon assembly line. As you can see these two tasks require quite a bit of judgment and for many of the retardates it took a considerable amount of training. The majority of the morning workers were people with mongolism. They are especially good at gross operations requiring little in the way of delicate dexterity. They form habits easily and this learned behavior was remembered from year to year. There were several workers who were only capable of carrying baskets from one point on the assembly line to another. They were still paid and received satisfaction for their part in this job.

The afternoon session required more of a traditional assembly line procedure. The workers performed their one small task as the baskets were handed down the table from station to station. It was necessary to keep a sharp eye on quality control because if a person made a mistake in his job he would generally repeat this mistake on the next 500 baskets without recognizing his own error. At the end of the assembly line we used one severely cerebral palsied wheelchair-bound man who could not perform any of the physical tasks but who could count. He took a great deal of pride in always being accurate and would remember for three hours exactly how many baskets had been boxed.

The baskets were then carried to the storage area to await shipping.

[Slides]

Apart from the details of the basket making per se the job of the therapist involved much in the way of supervising and encouraging interaction and discussion among the workers. Many arguments arise between these people who live so closely together. Any kind of friction interrupted the working rhythm and upset the rest of the group. Many of the residents were chosen because of their inability to cooperate. Others have problems of withdrawal and the necessity of interaction did much to help them relate more effectively.

The project lasted three months and in this time many new acquaintances and associations were made which carried on the year around.

The workshop was an excellent opportunity to teach many of the values which are so crucial to smooth and effective group life. We stressed promptness by using a sign-in system. Personal cleanliness was necessary. The temptation to steal candy and the personal belongings of others was an ongoing opportunity to stress honesty and mutual trust.

We developed a policy of paying the residents every three weeks. The first year the pay rates were 5, 10 and 15 cents an hour, paid according to how well the resident worked up to his capabilities. The pay has been raised each year and this past year went as high as 40 cents an hour for a few. A few of the residents are wise enough in the ways of the world to save their money until they have enough to buy something they want such as a watch, an electric coffee maker, a coat or dress, or even a used typewriter. Receiving money for work was a unique experience for many of the residents. It was certainly a motivating force and had much to do with attracting and sustaining attention and interest in the project.

The company paid for the work by the piece -- paying 5 cents each for the completion of small baskets, small sand pails and cowboy hats, 10 cents each for medium sized baskets and large sand pails and 15 cents each for large and extra large baskets.

The Easter Basket Workshop has now been in operation three months a year for five years. Our goal the first year was to make 18,000 baskets. Since then this number has increased to 25,000. The workshop is anticipated by the residents for many months before it is to start each year. Each year new residents are given a chance to work. This year 143 people worked on the project. Those who have participated each year have become experts in the work. Each year they become more proficient and less supervision is necessary. Many are now able to recognize their own mistakes and correct them. Some have even learned to take being corrected without becoming immediately defensive.

The Fircrest workshop has also had contracts for some other one-time projects such as placing price tags on plastic flowers for an import company and sticking a Koroseal label on 150,000 advertising leaflets to go into a magazine.

It is our hope that a year-round Sheltered Workshop will eventually be established at Fircrest.

Sheltered workshops do present several important questions to the therapist. Does the venture into the business field detract significantly from the therapeutic aspect? And is the large group technique a significantly more efficient therapeutic device than a one to one therapist-patient relationship? The answer to either of these questions will be in terms of a compromise but there are several facts which present realistic arguments for the group technique. With ever-expanding institutional populations and with increasingly more sensitive diagnostic techniques the need for effective O.T. practitioners indicates to us that we must consider sacrificing our preconceptions of tidy Ivory-tower therapeutic relationships in the face of the real problem.

I Used to Have One of These

2007-11-30T16:17:00.000-08:00

My first camera was a Brownie Hawkeye. It was old at the time (the late 1970s). I must have taken quite a few pictures with it; I wonder what became of them?

Technicolor Box, September 1963

2007-11-28T17:48:00.000-08:00

These slides are all mixed up, so I've been trying to sort them into the original batches. I can only do this when I can find some distinguishing mark on the slides themselves, or by the images.

I think these are actually Kodachrome slides processed by Technicolor. The colors are extremely darkened, and it does not help any that the original was not well-exposed to begin with; here is part of an uncorrected scan:

It makes the image look posterized to bring up the brightness in the foreground, but at least you can see who it is:

I'm pretty sure this is H. Harrison Clarke, Marcella Armstrong's brother. Now that I have the batch put back, though, I can make sense of some of the people I didn't recognize at first. When I get through the rest of the slides, I'll go back and try to identify everyone.

Susan, July 1965

2007-11-27T21:36:00.000-08:00

This shot is from a box of very clean and undamaged but faded slides marked July 1965. It looks like they may have been taken on an Armstrong family camping trip to the Canadian side of Niagara Falls. These slides are 3M "Dynachrome" film, which I've never heard of -- probably because it wasn't very good!

The uncorrected colors look pretty weak:

But fortunately they have faded in a relatively uniform way; it isn't one of the difficult cases where there is no cyan left, or the slide has become incredibly dark so that you can't get enough light through it for a good scan. All the colors can have their saturation boosted rather dramatically, and with a little tweaking the original film's inability to properly register colors actually becomes a strength, as you get some artistic blending of colors. Here is my attempt at restoring the colors:

I kept thinking I had the skin tone wrong, because her cheeks look pink. Then I realized she actually has a bit of a sunburn in this photo! You can see at the base of her neck that she must have been outdoors too long.

I think this is a great picture; it shows a Susan who has the beauty of her youth but at the same time the graying hair and laugh lines that hint at the older Susan. It has an ageless quality, just like she did. It is how I remember her.

Who took this photo? It was probably either my grandfather, Richard Armstrong, or my father, Richard Potts. I think both of them were on that trip. It is hard to know how carefully staged and planned the shot was; it could have been relatively spontaneous. Some of my best shots show up without planning.

I could try to make the colors in the shot more "accurate," but this shot looks like it was taken in late-afternoon sun, perhaps even opposite a sunset, in a partially shaded environment, with a lot of reflected or filtered light. It's hard to know just what "accurate" would mean. But I kind of like the colors the way I have them here. It reminds me of one of my favorite photos of Veronica here. That shot initially appears to be way too yellow, but the color is accurate; it was taken on late summer afternoon and the light had that same quality to the naked eye.

Interestingly, I was just looking at some of the work of a photographer who buys up expired slide stock for the express purposes of getting interesting effects like this. And some photographers (including my friend Art) have long been exploring the "low fi" effects available by using inexpensive digital cameras and the various striking, but inaccurate, images that they produce.

Richard Potts, April 1967 Box

2007-11-27T19:50:00.000-08:00

This isn't the greatest image, because I had to enhance the brightness a great deal and that brought out some scanning artifacts. But it shows my father around 1967. I am not sure what he is doing -- maybe attaching a boat to a car? The original is very dark; I think it was shot at dusk, or before a storm.

My father was (and still is) quite a handome guy! Unfortunately I only got a small portion of his good looks.

This box of slides was addressed to:

Mrs. Richard Potts
5608 237th S. W.
Mountlake Terrace
Washington 98043

Interior and Car Design March 1963

2007-11-27T18:58:00.000-08:00

These shots are from a box of slides stamped March 1963. I assume they are scenes from her life with the man she was briefly married to, Ted Rose, but I don't know much at all about that period in her life. These slides are in poor condition and I have not done much to restore them.

I love the period furniture (actually, it looks like late 1950s design to me, but I'm not an expert):

Apparently Ted was very proud of his car, since there are a number of pictures of it. It was a pretty cool car:

There's a slide that appears to show some guys sitting around a kitchen table, maybe for a poker night.

The box of slides had an address label made out in my mother's printing: Susan Rose, 12009 33rd NE, Seattle 55, Washington. I'm not sure what the significance of the "55" was.

Does this picture show that address?

Wedding Dress and Bouquet

2007-11-27T18:50:00.000-08:00

Another wonderful shot of my mom in her wedding dress.

Easter Baskets, April 1967 Box

2007-11-27T18:22:00.000-08:00

I have a set of slides that appear to show a group of mentally retarded adults. They are creating really pretty Easter baskets. I'm assuming my mom was working as an Occupational Therapist with this group.

I'm not going to post any of these pictures of the people, because of privacy concerns, but I wanted to include a shot of the Easter baskets to show how colorful these slides are. I did a little bit of tone correction, but for the most part they don't need much. These pictures look like they have never been projected! The slides are stamped April 1967.

Cleaning Slides and Making Prints

2007-11-25T14:01:00.000-08:00

I'm cleaning and re-scanning slides. The slides are of all different types. The wedding pictures are Ektachrome, and seem to have aged quite well, although some of them have mildew spots. I wiped them with a "tiger cloth" (anti-static micro-fiber cloth) and PEC-12 emulsion cleaner; this did nothing for the mildew spots, but did remove some dust and dirt. It seems impossible to get everything off the slides, so some of it inevitably gets scanned. Digital ICE works on the Ektachrome slides, and removes some of the dust spots, but does not work on the Kodachrome slides.

I've also been experimenting with post-processing to improve the color, and making 300 dpi versions of the images for printing on my inkjet. The results are pretty good, now that I'm using Adobe RGB and a monitor profile for proofing. Some of these will be going out as Christmas gifts. Color pictures look pretty good on my old HP Business Inkjet 1100, although it does a poor job rendering blacks. I'm eventually hoping to replace it with an Epson R2400, which uses three different black inks for excellent rendering of black and white images.

The slides also really need to go into better storage boxes, which I'll eventually order from Archival methods.

A Gross of Slides

2007-11-24T22:45:00.000-08:00

I have about twelve dozen slides remaining to examine. Here is a mystery box. I'm coming across people and places I don't recognize. Does anyone recognize these people and/or places in this batch?

Better Scans

2007-11-24T12:05:00.003-08:00

Some further color correction is still in order to compensate for fading dyes in the originals, but these look remarkable even without it.

A Special Commencement

2007-11-24T12:05:00.001-08:00

Mount Rainier

2007-11-24T11:54:00.000-08:00

Washington Slides (Details)

2007-11-24T00:11:00.000-08:00

Amby and Mary Potts, my grandparents on my father's side. These slides are in far better shape than I was expecting. The sharpness and color are wonderful!

I don't remember the circumstances of this next photo. I'm guessing it was about 1977, on a trip to Washington.

This next one was taken at Mount Rushmore:

From left to right (back row): my grandfather Amby (holding Brian), my grandmother Mary, Yours Truly, Ted, my grandmother Marcella, my grandfather Richard, and in front: Sally and my mother Susan. To the best of my knowledge this is the only picture in the collection to show all four of my grandparents together; having them all in one place during my lifetime was an extremely rare, possibly unique, event!

Don't judge the slides by these screen images; they tend to be grainy and a little dull. The last image looks particularly bad on the web; my apologies. The original has an extremely wide dynamic range with highlights and shadows from direct sun, and some very saturated colors. To get a good version for printing, I needed to tweak it quite a bit and apply a lot of unsharp masking, and that tweaked image then doesn't look very good when converted back to the sRGB color space (technically, it exceeds the gamut of sRGB) and the highly sharpened image becomes gritty-looking when I reduce it back to screen resolution. Ideally, I'd go directly from the uncorrected 6400 dpi master to the different derived files (for printing and web) in completely separate processes. If this doesn't make any sense to you, be glad you don't stay up late worrying about things like this (but be glad someone does).

There are a lot more slides, but it is 3:30 in the morning and I have to get some sleep! These images are so sharp and lifelike, I really am enthralled with them!

Recalibrating for Slides

2007-11-23T18:51:00.000-08:00

So, I created a new calibration profile using the transparent target that came with the scanner, and the uncorrected scans look more natural now. I have a monitor profile, but it is only a rough one, made by eye rather than using a sensor. The results look a lot more natural even with no color correction applied. Take a look at the difference in the tones:

Getting smooth tones without weird artifacts is a good start. It's probably best to work on the rest of the color correction and possible unsharp masking in Photoshop. With the black and white prints, I didn't have to worry nearly so much about color space, just getting a full dynamic range. Things get much more complicated with slides, but they have a huge amount of detail and a lot of gorgeous color, so think the extra effort will be worth it!

Captivating Colors

2007-11-23T10:40:00.001-08:00

A winter's day, probably in Washington state, perhaps 1967. I'm not quite satisfied with the quality of the scan (the Digital ICE dust removal gave me some weird fringing, and the colors could be better), but even in this draft the image is wonderful. This one deserves to be printed.

Starting to Scan Slides

2007-11-23T08:24:00.000-08:00

I was getting kind of tired of scanning prints, so I decided to take a look at some of the slides. Scanning slides is a bit more complicated and much slower. There are all kinds of options to try for backlight color correction, color restoration, sharpening, and dust removal. These should be considered rough drafts.

Mary Potts (my paternal grandmother) and my uncle Ted:

Sally and Elmer (I think that is Elmer):

Bonus points to anyone who knows the name of the dogs, or the year, or the exact location.

Hazel Bucklin with John Bucklin

2007-11-20T21:48:00.001-08:00

John is the son of Harrison and Henrietta Bucklin, nephew of Isabel Teresa Bucklin, my grandmother's first cousin; I guess that makes him my third cousin. This was probably taken somewhere around 1950.

Hazel Bucklin

2007-11-20T21:25:00.000-08:00

John Bucklin is the son of Harrison Bucklin (Isabel Teresa Bucklin's brother) and Henrietta ("Aunt Etta") Bucklin (Hoffman). This makes him him Marcella Armstrong's first cousin. John married Hazel (I don't know her maiden name). I am not sure if they had any children or not (there are none that I know of). According to my grandmother's records, John died in 1981.

Here is Hazel. I don't have a good date for this picture, but it could be around 1950. The original was very overexposed, taken in bright sunlight; I didn't even realize there was a dog in the picture, since it was hidden in the deep shadows, until I did some adjustments! The image shows a very "bimodal" distribution; I can bring down the highlights and bring up the deep shadows, but there just isn't all that much data in between to spread out in order to provide some gray tones in between. I took a shot at fixing it with Aperture, although I may be able to do a better job with Photoshop later.

Archival Supplies Ordered

2007-11-20T11:16:00.000-08:00

To start getting these pictures into their long-term homes, I ordered an initial round of storage supplies from Archival Methods. These include tissue paper, a big 11x17 box for some of the oversize prints, a smaller box for 3.5x5-inch prints, 500 print sleeves, a number of open-ended paper envelopes, and index divider cards. While this certainly won't hold everything, it is a start. I think I'll probably be placing a monthly order for at least the next few months.

I also ordered 50 gold DVD+R discs. They are relatively expensive, four or five times the price of Taiyo-Yuden DVD+Rs as sold under the Verbatim brand. Because the gold reflective layer does not oxidize like aluminum, marketing materials claim that they can last 100 years or longer. Some gold CD formats even claim 300-year longevity. That seems unlikely, and even if they survive for 100 years, consider: how many 100-year-old media formats can you use today? How many 25-year-old media formats?

Still, my hope is that they will last long enough for a member of another generation to explore. If that person is smart, perhaps they will copy the files onto some undetermined future format and create their own distributed backup for yet another generation.

Richard Armstrong, Childhood and Graduation

2007-11-19T22:07:00.000-08:00

Both of these photos are pretty poor, but I'll include them here to finish off tonight's series of older photos of Richard Armstrong and family. The first shows him as a boy, and the second shows him in his commencement gown. The back reads "graduation from Des Moines University."

Two Armstrong Family Meals

2007-11-19T21:59:00.000-08:00

A New Year's dinner. 21151 Nunes Ave., Castro Valley, California. Richard Armstrong is standing. Around the table are, left side back to front, Lenore Frimoth (face partially hidden), Bud Frimoth, Susan (front). On the right side, back to front, are an unknown man (the photo says "-- Navy"), Don Nelson (a friend?), and Marcella. It looks like a Thanksgiving-style menu with a roast turkey, mashed potatoes and gravy, and the traditional cylindrical can-shaped slab of cranberry sauce. It looks like Susan got milk in her glass. The rest probably had water, not wine; my grandmother was fairly disapproving of alcohol of any kind.

A picnic with Joan, Richard, and Susan. The back of the photo says "Lake Erie shore." I am not sure why he is wearing a suit to a picnic, but it seems to go with the nice china coffee cup. It looks like they're eating oranges, Hershey's kisses, milk, a thermos of coffee, and sandwiches on white bread wrapped in wax paper. Is that some kind of wrapped up chocolate swirl cake, in front of the glass of milk, to go with the Hershey's kisses?

Richard and Ella Grace

2007-11-19T21:54:00.000-08:00

An enhanced detail from a larger photo. It looks like they are on a college campus, but I'm not certain which one.

Dennis and Dora Armstrong with Ella Grace

2007-11-19T21:46:00.000-08:00

There's not a whole lot I can do with this image because it is quite blurry, but it shows (left to right) Ella Grace (Richard Armstrong's sister), Dennis Armstrong, and my great-grandmother Dora Armstrong (maiden name: Bagley).

Richard Armstrong, Summer 1930

2007-11-19T21:39:00.000-08:00

Most of the images I have from this pile of assorted snapshots are unfortunately rather poor, with weak contrast and focus, but this one was sharp enough that I could bring some detail out of the shadows.

Dennis Armstrong

2007-11-19T21:25:00.001-08:00

My great-grandfather on my mother's side, father of Richard Dennis Armstrong, my grandfather on my mother's side. My brother Brian's middle name is Dennis, in remembrance of this man.

I don't think I've ever seen this picture before. I never met him and don't know anything about him, although there may be some more information with my grandmother's papers. This photo needs some restoration work; it is covered with scratches that make him look like he has stray white hairs all over his face.

UPDATE: Linda reminded me that Dennis is also the middle name of Joan Joy (Armstrong).

Richard Armstrong as a Boy

2007-11-18T20:58:00.000-08:00

I did a lot of print organizing today and came across an envelope holding a series of class pictures of Richard Armstrong, Marcella Armsrong's husband and my grandfather, in 8th, 7th, 6th, 5th, 4th, and probably 3rd grades. The envelope says this was in Omaha.

The images themselves are group shots, but they are quite sharp, so I was able to zoom in a great deal and pick out Richard. I don't have the exact dates, but I think he was born in 1905, so I think we're looking at about 1912-1918.

Let's work backwards, since he looks more familiar in the later grades.

8th grade:

7th grade:

6th grade:

5th grade:

4th grade:

Not specified, but probably 3rd grade:

I don't think I've ever seen these pictures before. I was a bit startled to see how much I looked like my grandfather. Here is a shot of me from around the same grade:

I was a bit startled to come across this girl in the earliest class picture.

Were the Omaha public schools really integrated around 1912? Was it a private or parochial school that was integrated? There is probably an interesting story behind her presence in this photograph, but 95 years have passed and I am not certain anyone who is now alive can still tell it.

UPDATE: Grace pointed out that Nebraska as a Northern state was not segregated like schools in the South. But I still find it hard to imagine what it must have been like for that girl in the overwhelmingly-white classroom around 1912. She was not in any of the other class year pictures.

Susan in 6th, 7th, and 8th Grade

2007-11-18T20:34:00.000-08:00

Here is my mother, Susan Clarke Armstrong, in 6th, 7th, and 8th grades in Castro Valley, California, 1949-1951.

Known Unknowns -- Maybe Bucklins or Hoffmans?

2007-11-18T09:24:00.000-08:00

Donald Rumsfeld famously said:

Reports that say that something hasn't happened are always interesting to me, because as we know, there are "known knowns"; there are things we know we know. We also know there are "known unknowns"; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also "unknown unknowns" — the ones we don't know we don't know.

In the family tree our "known unknowns" are the people that show up in the photographs that we can't name. Here are some of my known unknowns. These two may be Bucklins, or they may be related to Henrietta ("Etta") Hoffman, who married Isabel's brother and became Etta Bucklin. My best guess for the date is of the photographs is 1895, based on Harry's age, but that could be off by +/- 5.

Is this a young Bucklin? I looked through my family tree trying to find someone in that branch of the family tree who was born around 1893 or 1894, but did not come across anyone. Trying to match up facial features is a bit hit-or-miss.

Is this Henrietta's mother?

Who is this man, pictured standing next to Isabel in the same 1907 family picnic?

And this young girl, pictured in a group with Isabel in 1907?

Tidioute Bucklins, Again (Including Celia Bucklin)

2007-11-17T22:02:00.000-08:00

Last time we figured out who most of the children were in a family portrait of an Isabel in 1907 (she would have been about 27 and Marcella would have been about 3). Let's see if we can identify the older adults. The caption mentions 3 names, "Cousin Rhoda," "Aunt Etta," and "Aunt Celia." These annotations are in my grandmother's handwriting.

After some head-scratching, I think I am pretty certain which one is Cousin Rhoda. Recall that I have a portrait of a somewhat younger Rhoda Bucklin. I think this is the same woman, about 12 years later. Look closely at the shape of the nose and chin.

I also have a good lead on Isabel; I have a formal portrait where she looks very similar:

OK, now they get harder. Recall that I had an earlier extremely faded portrait containing several faces that I was unable to conclusively identify. Could this be Etta (Henrietta), Harry's wife? Oh, yes, I think it could!

Hmmm, then could this be Aunt Celia?

Well, that one is slightly tougher, but I think it's the same woman. Look at the lips and ears.

If it is the same Celia Bucklin as the only Celia Bucklin listed in the Bucklin Society database, that would mean she was born on June 1, 1855 and died on May 5, 1942, the child of Francis Keyes Bucklin and Laura Ann Wilcox. That would make her the sister of Rhoda A. Bucklin 1857-1931, another second cousin to Isabel.

Unfortunately there are several people remaining that I can't identify. I don't know who this man is, standing next to Isabel; it doesn't look like either brother Harry or husband Henry, and her father died young. And there are a few other people I can't identify. I'll talk about them next time.

Back to Tidioute

2007-11-17T20:17:00.000-08:00

In the back of the small album of cyanotypes of Tidioute, probably owned by Isabel Teresa Bucklin (who became my great-grandmother), the following picture was included. It is marked in her hand "Family Picnic," followed by something that looks like "Sunny Brook Farm, August 1907":

Maybe I can use this as a key to identify some people in the Tidioute pictures! It is labeled on the back, but unfortunately the labeling is confused and incomplete. Fortunately, I have other pictures to use as well. Here is a great formal portrait of the Clarke siblings:

From left to right, that's Joseph, Marcella, Clara, and Harrison.

So in our Tidioute picnic photo, I'm pretty sure this is Clara:

I'll go along with the caption that claims this is Harrison:

The caption indicates that this is Marcella, but the hair doesn't look very familiar and since I can't see her face it is hard to confirm that claim.

And, finally, this girl's face looks vaguely familiar, but I just can't match it up for sure:

Next time I'll look at the adults; they are a bit harder to identify!

The Armstrong Family in 1959

2007-11-17T19:31:00.000-08:00

This remarkably candid-looking photo was actually staged and taken with a timer. Richard and Marcella Armstrong are shown sipping tea in Kennewick, Washington. It took them several tries to get a good shot!

Here is Susan in her wedding gown. The caption originally read "Susan Armstrong Rose, September 7, 1958, Kennewick, Washington Presbyterian Church." But then "Rose" was crossed out!

She graduated from the University of Puget Sound in June 1959. Here she is receiving her diploma. It's a shame this shot isn't sharper; there isn't much to be gained by enlarging it.

I think this photograph shows my mother with her then-husband Ted. She was listed as Susan Rose in her University of Puget Sound yearbook.

The focus and contrast in most of these photos is relatively poor, but here is a closeup of one of the better ones, processed a bit to sharpen the image, showing a smiling graduate:

The Armstrong Family in 1958

2007-11-17T14:15:00.000-08:00

I've been scanning batches of sorted black-and-white deckle-edged prints. This particular group is dated on the face of each print, which is very helpful when it comes to sorting them. Here are some prints from 1958.

My mother, who at the time went by Susan Clarke Armstrong, had a very brief marriage to a man named Ted Rose. I wasn't aware of this until I was, I think, almost 30. She did not talk about it much and apparently the marriage did not last very long. This photograph, dated September 7, 1958, shows Richard and Marcella Armstrong and Helen and Ted Rose (Senior). I think they had come from Long Island, NY. The text on the back, which I think is in my grandfather Richard's handwriting, calls him "Teddy" so they must have been on good terms!

Here are Joan, Marcella, Richard, and Susan decked out for the wedding:

I have pictures of the groom, but they are not part of this batch of prints.

Busy Week for Paul, Slow Week for the Blog

2007-11-16T11:32:00.001-08:00

I have not managed to post much of anything to the blog this week -- between home life and work life I've been pretty busy. I will get some new scans completed this weekend, as well as some re-scans. Right now I have about 3 DVD+R discs' worth of completed, final scans that I'm satisified with, in high resolution. Some of these files are very large (200 MiB or more). I think the largest is around 400 MiB, which requires a pretty capable machine to open or edit.

I'm scanning them with a variety of settings, depending on the nature of the print. Black and white prints with decent contrast are generally getting scanned at 600 dots per inch, but some that are extremely sharp are getting scanned at 1200 dots per inch. All of the very oldest are getting the 1200 dots per inch treatment even if they are large. A small handful of prints are getting scanned at 2400 dots per inch. Three of these are tiny contact prints that are of the same size as the original negative, so I can recover a lot of detail if I scan it at a resolution closer to what one would normally use for a negative.

The relatively modern black and white prints with good contrast are getting scanned as 16-bit grayscale images. But the older prints, in sepia or cyanotype and often very faded or stained, I'm scanning as 48-bit color images, even though they aren't really full-color images. That sounds wasteful, but I've discovered that for many of the faded or stained prints, a cleaner image can be obtained by picking and choosing what RGB data is mixed down to gray. Sometimes stains are a particular color that differs from the photo tint itself, so using three color channels give me a better shot at removing the stains. Basically, this gives me more options to work with for later attempts at image restoration.

Image restoration plug-ins and tools seem to be a growth industry right now so I'm imagining that in a few years there will be tools that can do things with the high-resolution, high-color images I can't even think of yet.

These are the sets of files that I want to start shipping out to family members on gold DVD+R discs, together with index prints, as off-site backups of the Armstrong Collection. Gold DVD+R discs are a bit pricey so I have not purchased them yet, although I have made test backups of each group on conventional DVD+R discs.

These big files are the "master" scans that feed into Aperture. Most of them are just as they were saved by the scanning program, although I have rotated and cropped some of them, or stitched together multiple scans (in the case of prints that were too big to be scanned in one pass). There is no contrast or color correction, no de-skewing, and no touch-up for dirt removal, except what I could achieve by cleaning the prints. That means these aren't the best images for actually looking through the collection. For that, I'll need to distribute galleries of lower-resolution enhanced images.

Unsolved Homicide, Still

2007-11-14T15:36:00.000-08:00

From the Chautauqua County office of the Sherrif:

"On December 13th, 1990 the body of Rebecca Nicholson was discovered in her home in Westfield, NY. Nicholson had been shot and killed. Anyone with any information on this murder is asked to contact the Chautauqua County Sheriffs Office at (716)753-4231."

Grace Bucklin?

2007-11-11T23:00:00.000-08:00

I just scanned a snapshot dated August, 1956 of Richard Armstrong, Marcella Armstrong, and my mother Susan Zahner. On the back was written in my grandmother's handwriting:

"Kennewick, Washington. Dick, Susan, Marcella, August 1956. While Grace Bucklin was visiting us from Jamestown, N. Y."

Who is Grace Bucklin?

In the Bucklin Society database I found two Grace Bucklins, one born in 1873 and one born September 23, 1912 to Washington Irving Bucklin Jr. and Dora Veronica Riley, and married at an unknown date to Herbert M. Skippe. Is the one born in 1912 the Grace Bucklin my grandmother was referring to? She would have been about 44 years old in 1956. If so, how did my grandmother know her?

To get from her to me in the family tree, you have to go up through her ancestors through two Washingtons, a Henry, and three Nehemiahs back to Joseph Bucklin II, (up 6 steps), then work your way back down through Joseph II's son Joseph III ten generations to me. Would that make her my tenth cousin?

Or is there another Grace Bucklin who should be in the Bucklin Society database?

UPDATE: see the comments. A Bruce Bucklin has contacted me with information about another Grace Bucklin, who died in 1957. Born in 1884, she would have been about 20 years older than my grandmother, or about 72 in 1956, the year my grandmother referred to a Grace Bucklin visiting. Was this the G. B. in question?

Seasons Greetings from the Lynch Family

2007-11-10T13:11:00.000-08:00

Marcella Armstrong's sister, Clara Louise Clarke (1908-1989) married a man named Gerald Lynch (-1960). Their two children were William Howard Lynch and Rebecca (Beckey) Ann Lynch, born 1937 and 1941. I say "were" because unfortunately, both have died; Bill of a brain tumor, and Beckey of homicide. But on a more cheerful note, they appear in photographs in a series of Christmas cards which Marcella preserved.

By the way, writing "Season's Greetings" instead of "Merry Christmas" is not a recent innovation. If it is part of an alleged "War on Christmas" this war has been going on since before World War II; most of these cards read "Season's Greetings." Two are missing the apostrophe, so I guess the "War on Apostrophes" also has a long history.

1939

1940 (estimated)

1941

1942

1944

1945

1946

1947

1948

Rhoda Bucklin?

2007-11-10T11:23:00.001-08:00

I have one portrait of Isabel and her brother Harry along with an older woman; the writing on the back, in Marcella Armstrong's hand, claims that this woman is "Cousin Rhoda Bucklin."

Who is Cousin Rhoda? Well, I am not positive, but in my family tree if you go up a generation from Isabel, her parents were William Decature Bucklin and Clara Elizabeth Bucklin (Shearer). We already know about the Hannah Bucklin (McCue) branch of the family. There aren't any Rhodas to be found there. If we go up one more generation, William Decature Bucklin's father was Parker Bucklin and his father was Minerva Bucklin (Hazen). (Parker Bucklin also had another wife, but I have no record that they had children together). Anyway, there are some Rhodas there:

However, Rhoda Parker would have been a great-grandmother to Isabel, not a cousin. It is interesting that perhaps Parker Bucklin was given his mother's maiden name as his first name. The other Rhoda, the daughter of Rhoda Parker and Francis Drayton Bucklin, would have been of Isabel's grandparents' generation, and although I don't have dates for her, it seems likely that she would have been too old to be the woman in the photograph.

Instead, I suspect that the Rhoda in question is the daughter of Parker Bucklin's brother Francis Keyes Bucklin (1810-1865), Rhoda A. Bucklin (1857-1931). You go up two generations, across one brother, and down, so I guess that is a second cousin.

If you assume that the photograph above was taken around 1895, putting Isabel's age around 15, that would have made Rhoda Bucklin about 38. Is it possible that the seated woman in the photograph is 38? Or is she yet another Rhoda Bucklin that I haven't found documentation for? In the absense of more rigorous documentation this should all be considered highly speculative!

Henry Elliot Clarke and Isabel Bucklin Clarke, More Pictures

2007-11-10T08:01:00.000-08:00

Henry Elliot Clarke again:

The scan above is derived from my 1200 dpi, 48 bit-per-pixel "master" scan that I took before attempting to clean the print.

This portrait represents my biggest accident to date. It is quite dirty, so I decided to try the emulsion cleaner on it. For some reason, although it worked successfully on other prints from this time period, on this particular print, the PEC-12 cleaner dissolved the emulsion very rapidly. Since I started at the edge, it is only the background that got damaged, not the face, but the original now looks much worse. It is a reminder that I need to be more careful. The conservator's creed is something like "don't do anything that you can't undo." I hope my granchildren will forgive me!

I also have some more pictures of Isabel. Both are undated:

Another picture of Isabel and Henry:

The original is kind of blurry, but some improvement of the focus is possible. Here are some computer-sharpened close-ups of the photo above:

Lost Friends and Relations

2007-11-10T07:58:00.000-08:00

The back of this photo is dated 1897 and indicates the people in it, left to right: Lavantia Dimick (Miller), Isabel Bucklin (Clarke), Cousin Wallace Miller (with a question mark after it), and Harrison Bucklin. I have no idea who Lavantia Dimick or Wallace Miller are or how they fit in to the family, if they do.

This photo shows Henry Elliot Clarke in the center, but I don't know who the other two boys are; is the one on the right Wallace Miller who appears in the first picture? The one on the left looks to me like he could be a brother of Henry, maybe?

This next photograph shows a group with Isabel Bucklin. According to the writing on the back, which looks like it could be in Isabel's own hand, the woman on the left is Maude, and the one on the top right is Lora Cummings (if I'm reading her handwriting correctly). The middle row shows, left to right, Anna Martin and Florence Siggni (the last name is hard to read). I don't have any more information on Lora, Anna, or Florence.

Perhaps you can decipher the names better than I can?

Here is another group picture:

The picture is not labeled, but if the labels on the other one are correct, it looks like (left-right) Maude, Anna, Florence, Isabel, and Lora.

Here is yet another group shot, again not labeled except for Isabel. I think that is Florence in the lower right, but the rest are unclear. Is that Maude on the left, or could it be Lavantia Miller? Help!

Finally, there are several photographs of Isabel and Maude together. Here is one of the best ones:

Discovering More Bucklins

2007-11-08T20:58:00.000-08:00

Here's another picture taken from the small album of cyanotypes, from around 1895-1900.

The first one shows, I think, Isabel Bucklin's brother Henry Harrison Bucklin; the caption reads "Time to Laugh." This fits the general theme of the cyanotype album, which is upbeat and silly.

That is likely Isabel Bucklin's handwriting, although I don't know that for certain. The album is full of her friends and relatives, most of whom I can't identify. Fortunately, she provided an "answer key" page in which she identifies people who appear in the photos. Here's what that page looks like:

And here are closeups on the little thumbnails:

Is this last one really a photograph of her father? It looks like the back of someone's head in a crowd. I still don't know who most of them actually are, and of course her answer key doesn't cover the relatives that appear in the cyanotypes. So we'll have to introduce a few more characters. To help figure out who is who, here is a piece of the family tree (click on it for a bigger version):

This tree shows several generations of the Isabel's Bucklin ancestry. Of particular interest here is that her father, William Decature Bucklin, had another wife: Hannah Bucklin (McCue). From that branch come three more people that feature in the photographs: Ella, Maude and Marshall Bucklin. One of Hanna's sons with William Decature Bucklin is Cornelius Penn Bucklin; he is Isabel's half-brother. Maude and Marshall would be Isabel's "half-niece" and "half-nephew," or the children of her half-brother, the grandchildren of her father. Cornelius Penn Bucklin was 18 years older than Isabel, which made it possible for Maude and Marshall to be close to the same age as Isabel rather than a generation younger.

I know very little about Ella, Maude, and Marshall. There may be further information in my grandmother's journal or papers that I haven't gotten to yet. However, I do have pictures of Ella and Maude:

They are obviously closely related! I have not come across a portrait of Marshall, but he does appear in the cyanotypes in some group shots. We'll have to figure out which one he is.

On a melancholy note, a note on the back of Maude's portrait says that she died at Allegheny College, but I don't know when or how.

UPDATE

I was able to find a Social Security death notice for a "Marshall Bucklin" born March 1st, 1893, who died June 1967 in Warren, PA. There is no guarantee, but since Bucklin is a rare name and Marshall also relatively uncommon, this could be the Marshall Bucklin in question.

That would make him about 13 years younger than Isabel. That means in 1895, Isabel would have been about 15 and Marshall about 2. In 1900, 20 and 7; in 1905, 25 and 12. So we have a possible age, or at least an age difference, to look for in the Tidioute cyanotypes.

I have no solid information about Maude, but I am very tentatively placing her birth year around 1885; that puts her about five years behind Isabel, making her about 10 in 1895, 15 in 1900, and 20 in 1905.

Fourteen Generations of Baby Sam's Ancestry

2007-11-08T08:52:00.001-08:00

With the help of The Joseph Bucklin Society, I present one path through my son Sam's family history.

SAMUEL AMBROSE POTTS was born in Ann Arbor, Michigan on October 19, 2006 to Paul Richard Potts and Rebekah Grace Potts (maiden name: Benjamin).

His FATHER was Paul Richard Potts, born September 26, 1967 in Seattle, Washington.

His paternal GRANDMOTHER was Susan Zahner (maiden name: Armstrong).

His GREAT GRANDMOTHER on his paternal grandmother's side was Marcella Bucklin Armstrong (maiden name: Clarke), born February 18, 1904.

His GREAT GREAT (2x) GRANDMOTHER on Marcella Armstrong's side was Isabel Teresa Clarke (maiden name: Bucklin), born July 12, 1880.

His GREAT GREAT GREAT (3x) GRANDMOTHER on Isabel Clarke's side was Clara Bucklin (Shearer) 1857-1884; his GREAT GREAT GREAT GRANDFATHER was William Decature Bucklin, 1834-1899.

On William Decature Bucklin's side, his GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT (4x) GRANDFATHER was Parker Bucklin.

On Parker Bucklin's side, his GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT (5x) GRANDFATHER was Francis Bucklin, born 1788.

On Francis Bucklin's side, his GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT (6x) GRANDFATHER was William Bucklin, born 1762.

On William Bucklin's side, his GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT (7x) GRANDFATHER was David Bucklin, a Revolutionary War hero, 1726-1820. According to the Bucklin Society, he moved to Herkimer, NY around 1779 and was wealthy. His wife's brother was personal physician to George Washington.

On David Bucklin's side, his GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT (8x) GRANDFATHER was Joseph Bucklin III, 1694-1776. According to the Bucklin Society, he was Deacon in the Baptist Church in Coventry, RI and built and ran a grist mill and machine shop.

On Joseph Bucklin III's side, his GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT (9x) GRANDFATHER was Joseph Bucklin II, 1662-1729. According to the Bucklin Society, he was born in Rehoboth, MA, and was buried in 1729 in Newman Cemetery, Rumford, RI.

On Joseph Bucklin II's side, his GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT (10x) GRANDFATHER was Joseph Bucklin Senior, born June 23, 1633. According to the Bucklin Society, in 1716, he obtained land, 400 acres north of Providence, RI and died in Rehoboth, MA on March 26, 1718.

On Joseph Bucklin Senior's side, his GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT (11x) GRANDFATHER was William Bucklin, born approximately 1606. According to the Bucklin Society, he was born about 1606 in Dorset, England, emigrated in 1630 from England, and in 1635, obtained land at Hingham, MA.

The records of the Bucklin Society fade out there. But if you go through Joseph Bucklin Senior's mother instead of father, Sam's GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT (11x) GRANDMOTHER was Mary Bucklin (maiden name: Bosworth). The records give us one more generation to work with. And so (drum roll please...)

Sam's GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT (12x) GRANDFATHER was Edward Bosworth. His date of birth is not known, and he died before August 5, 1634.

The Bucklin Society records fade out there, but with all the greats, my grandmother, and myself, that's fourteen generations of ancestry for baby Sam! That's enough for me, at least for now. And of course that leaves out his ancestry through his father's father (my father, Richard Potts), or his mother's two parents. But I'll let him take it from there!

Where's Waldo? (Susan Zahner Edition)

2007-11-05T21:31:00.001-08:00

This is one of the biggest pictures in the collection: a class photo from Castro Valley High School, June 1951. There are almost 150 people in this picture! (That's an estimate; I did not actually have the patience to count each one.)

This print is almost 17 inches wide and had been stored folded in half, so it has an ugly crease down the middle. It is a good example of why I need some specialized boxes for storing these photos flat. Despite this damage, the big print is extremely clear and still has a lot of contrast.

Because it is so big, I had to scan it in pieces and assemble it. This was a bit tricky because the print won't lie entirely flat because of the fold in the middle, and the scanner cover distorts the creased paper in slightly different ways depending on how it is positioned. I had to assemble pieces from three different scans. I'm pretty decent with Photoshop, so the join is almost completely invisible even at extreme magnification.

Can you find Susan?

The back of the print is signed: Marcella Armstrong, Irene Robertson, Shirly Hoffesher (sp?), Jane Roberts, Adele Dawson, Darleen Lansford, and Sally Locke. My mother's high-school friends; back then her name was Susan Clarke Armstrong.

Samples from Archival Methods

2007-11-05T12:55:00.001-08:00

The samples and catalog arrived from Archival Methods. Grace and I agree that their high-density polyethylene envelopes will be great for storing prints. They are not fully transparent, but translucent, which I think is OK for prints that people will access infrequently. So we'll start with some of those.

From there, the prints will go into some of the "shoe box" boxes. I'm not sure how many, or exactly what configuration I'll buy yet.

Also, for some of the larger items like portraits and class pictures, I'll be ordering a couple of flat drop-front boxes.

The oldest stuff is all over the place as far as size and shape goes; items range from big colorized portraits over 15" tall to tiny portraits on heavy card stock. It is hard to figure out what to do with the smaller items!

Where's Waldo? (Marcella Armstrong Edition)

2007-11-04T16:40:00.001-08:00

One of the joys of looking at these school portraits is playing spot-the-relative. Here's a class photo for Marcella Armstrong's 5th and 6th grade class in Tidioute, taught by a Mrs. Scudder. Mrs. Scudder may be a relative of my college roommate John Scudder, although we're not positive. This photo is from 1915.

Where's Marcella?

This one is pretty easy: she's down in front. In this close-up, she's the one with the "casual Friday" loose tie look and her elbows up on the desk.

Unfortunately, I don't know who anyone else is in the big class portrait.

I Made Aperture's Head Explode

2007-11-04T16:27:00.000-08:00

I have yet to crash it, which I think is pretty impressive, but I did find that if I scan a huge (the size of my whole scanner glass) color image at 48 bits per pixel, 1200 dpi, Aperture will throw in the towel. It completes the import, but shows "Unsupported Image Format" in the viewer.

This makes a certain amount of sense, given that the image file is 489 megabytes.

Fortunately, Photoshop Elements -- yes, the one that came free with my scanner -- will open up this image and save it to a lower-resolution version.

This machine has 2.5 gigabytes of memory -- and that's all it will hold. I wonder if Aperture would handle it if it had more memory? There's always the possibility of getting an even beefier machine in the future.

Clara Elizabeth Bucklin

2007-11-04T07:19:00.001-08:00

These photos show, I believe, Clara Elizabeth Bucklin (Shearer), 1857-1884, my grandmother's maternal grandmother, Isabel Clarke's mother. That makes her my children's great, great, great grandmother. The first print is particularly faded, dirty and stained. I made an attempt to clean it with PEC-12 but the cleaner did not do much.

This one is much cleaner but it has a painted look, which leads me to believe it is a retouched rendering derived from the same photographic source as the print shown above.

My grandmother's writing on the back reads "Mother of Isabel Bucklin Clarke, died 1883." Unfortunately this contradicts the notes in her journal, so I don't know which year is correct.

I'm Not Quite Sure

2007-11-03T19:56:00.001-07:00

The young man in the upper right is Harrison Bucklin, my great-great-uncle. On the back of this print was scrawled "Harry and Etta Bucklin." My guess is that Etta (Henrietta) Bucklin (Hoffman), who married Harrison Bucklin, is the young woman seated below him (lower right). Who is the other young woman? Isabel Bucklin? Is the older woman in the middle Clara Elizabeth Bucklin (Shearer), 1857-1884, my great, great, grandmother? And who is the child? Could it be Marcella? Or maybe Clara?

There ought to be some clues in the rest of the portraits, and in the cyanotypes in the Tidioute album.

Bucklins and Clarkes 1

2007-11-03T18:35:00.000-07:00

I've been scanning in some of the older photographs, and drawing family trees. These prints are in remarkably good condition, although they could use some more advanced digital restoration. Here are some photographs of Isabel Clarke (Bucklin), born in 1880, also known in some of the notes as "Belle." Here she is in 1897 (this is the only dated photo I could find):

Isabelle is often shown with her brother Harrison Bucklin, born in 1874 (the names Harry, Henry, and Harrison appear frequently in this portion of the family tree -- it is a bit confusing!) Here he is, the same year:

Here is baby Belle:

A young Harry (nice skirt!):

The two together:

Some very nice portraits, probably from about 1897:

A beautiful portrait:

Now, here is the man she married: Henry Elliot Clarke, son of David William Clarke and Louisa Clarke (Curtis).

They were married in 1901.

Faces from Tidioute, Pennsylvania, in '95

2007-11-01T18:15:00.000-07:00

1895, that is. 1895 was 112 years ago, a few years closer to the signing of the Declaration of Independence in 1776 than to 2007.

I just finished 1200 dpi, 48-bit scans of a small photo album of cyanotypes of Tidioute around 1895-1905. I think these cyanotypes may have been re-photographed from earlier images on glass plates, although I'm not an expert on this kind of thing. Judging by the captions this album was likely owned by Marcella Armstrong's mother, Isabel Bucklin Clarke.

I'm really enjoying using Aperture -- it's a really impressive program, although I suspect I won't really be using it for what it is best at until I start creating prints.

While the prints are low in contrast and the faces are tiny, there is a tremendous amount of detail to be recovered from these images.

Unfortunately, I don't know who these people are, although with a little cross-referencing I am hoping to figure out at least some of the faces.

I feel like I'm seeing ghosts, since no one in these photographs is now living. The younger ones are members of my great-grandmother's generation. The older ones are a generation older, the generation of my great-great-grandmother.

The youngest of them no longer have living children. My grandmother Marcella Armstrong was of their children's generation, born in 1904, 8 years old when the Titanic sank, and she lived to be 102 years old.

The youngest of their grandchildren are of my mother's generation or older, and if still living, getting on in years.

Their great-grandchildren are my age or older.

The youngest of their great, great, grandchildren are my children's ages or older.

Henry Eliott Clarke and Isabel Bucklin Clarke

2007-11-01T17:27:00.000-07:00

Henry and Isabel Clarke were Marcella's parents and Susan and Joan's grandparents. They were Paul's and my great grandparents, but we never knew them. Henry, one of 11 children, was employed by a bank in Tidioute, PA, after graduating from high school. He worked as an assistant cashier and then a cashier for 23 years, according to genealogy notes that my mother sent me a few years ago. Henry rode a bicycle to work. He wanted to be a farmer so bought a grape farm east of Westfield. NY, instead of moving to Boston when the bank relocated there.

Isabel Teresa was born on July 12, 1880. Her mother died when she was 3, and her father died when she was 19.

Isabel and Henry had four children -- Henry Harrison Clarke, born June 30, 1902; Marcella Bucklin Clarke, born Feb. 18, 1904; Joseph Cornelius Clarke, born Feb. 9, 1906; and Clara Louise Clarke, born Aug. 8, 1908. Today, being All Saints' Day, is a good day to think of them, and especially of Susan, the most recently deceased in our family.

I have more old photos like this, but it will take some time to identify who's who. And I have to pack -- leaving early tomorrow for a business trip. So, I won't be able to post any new photos for a little while.

Samples Coming

2007-10-31T11:24:00.000-07:00

Angela at Archival Methods responded to my request and is going to send me a catalog as well as samples of their various envelopes!

We'll see if Light Impressions responds to my sample request as well.

Making Sense of the Prints

2007-10-30T20:29:00.001-07:00

So I've learned a few things about sorting prints -- often times, their backs, not their fronts, hold the clue to dating and placing them.

I've got several hundred prints with nearly identical corrugated edges, printed to nearly identical gray tones. But what isn't identical is a stamp on the back that seems to be a stamp used by the printer. It isn't just the number that is unique, but the ink, color, and even the placement of the numbers on the back of the prints. It then becomes a jigsaw puzzle.

Even photos that have been cropped, glued down into an album, and torn out of an album, some kept in the dark and sum exposed to the sun -- if there is a fraction of that stamp there (in one case, even a tiny speck of the purple ink in the same approximate position), I know it belongs to a particular batch for printing. And then if even one of the prints in the same batch is dated, or has a place reference, I have some additional clues as to where it came from.

This is a significant help because this helps me make sense of prints that come from something on the order of _sixty_ similar-looking batches. A neat trick! And so large swaths of the collection start to fall into place.

This is my work surface for sorting these prints.

I could easily make good use of five or ten times this much space!

Archival Storage Materials

2007-10-30T11:29:00.000-07:00

Figuring out what to do with all of these thousands of photos is hard!

Some of them can go into albums -- suitably archival albums -- but if I fill up the albums with the second-rate or third-rate photos, no one will want to look at the albums. And at somewhere upwards of 10,000 photos, that's a lot of albums. A lot of shelf space. A lot of money!

So, the plan is to put most of the prints into storage boxes. But not to clip them together with paper clips or wrap rubber bands around the bundles, stuff them into mailing envelopes and cram them into shoe boxes. They should go into sleeves or envelopes that are appropriately acid-free and which won't damage the prints, and which will also support them and keep them flat, and then into solid boxes.

There are various companies out there that will sell sleeves, envelopes, etc. of all different types; side-loading, top-loading, with flaps and without, of polypropylene or polyester, frosted, clear, with stiffening cards or without... a dizzying number of options. I was going through the online catalog for a company called Archival Methods picking out products I'd like to try, but the minimum purchase seemed to be either 50 or a 100 of each sleeve or envelope. I realized I was going to spend over $150 just to try out a variety of items, most of which I would probably not use. So I wrote them a note and requested one each of a variety of sleeves and envelopes to try out.

We'll see what they say! I will write to Light Impressions too and request the same kind of thing (they have similar products, but some that don't overlap). And maybe I'll be able to settle on a storage method and start getting these things packed up!

Linda, Christmas 1961

2007-10-29T21:31:00.000-07:00

Looks like she got a dolly, a horsie, a ball, and one of those little stacking-ring toys that I'm always tripping over in our own living room. Plus ca change!

The Scanner is Amazing

2007-10-29T10:53:00.000-07:00

Here's an example of why I'm really glad I got the nicer scanner. It does an amazing job of capturing detail at high resolution.

Here is one of the pictures from the collection as I came across it: a tiny little print:

This is a tiny little thing, and is too bright in the foreground and too dark in the background, but I noticed that it appeared to be a contact print -- that is, printed with the negative directly in contact with the paper. This means that it has potentially quite a bit of detail in it. So although there is normally no point in scanning prints at a resolution higher than about 600 dpi or so, because there just isn't more detail to be found, I decided to scan this one at 1200 dpi. After a little tweaking of highlights and shadows to bring out detail that initially appears to be over-exposed and under-exposed, I had a grayscale image that I was able to print at 8 1/2 x 11:

It's hard to show in this digital picture of the print, especially since my printer isn't all that good (it doesn't do dark blacks well), and I don't have a profile for it, but there is a huge amount of image detail that the scanner was able to retrieve from that itty-bitty picture. And I'm sure a much better print is possible.

I'm really looking forward to tackling the 1910 cyanotypes -- I suspect that there are astounding details in those pictures that no one has ever seen, except possibly the photographer who printed them in Tidioute, Pennsylvania almost 100 years ago.

The Possibilities of Image Restoration

2007-10-28T09:01:00.000-07:00

I'm just barely beginning to learn some techniques for image restoration, but already what I'm finding is amazing. Here is a scan of one of the old instant pictures:

It's very dark -- perhaps the flash didn't go off. But with only a few seconds of cropping and adjusting of levels, you can see a lot more:

There's a person there, hiding in the shadows! It is probably Wence. It's the kitchen of the house at 765 Highmeyer Road in Harborcreek, Pennsylvania in around 1978, undergoing kitchen remodeling. I think Wence did most of this work, although I can't recall if he had contracting help or not.

Here is an instant photo that has undergone severe color degradation. In particular, the cyan is blown all out of proportion. That seems to have happened on a number of the Kodak instant photos:

I know very little yet about the best way to do this, but I'm finding that there is tremendous room for improvement and a lot of information in these images that I can't really see, but the scanner can:

And this is before doing any detailed cleanup whatsoever.

Finally, here is a shot from the trailer on Big Bend Lane -- my favorite restored image so far! Although there is a lot more that could be done to improve the surface texture, and color.

The possible improvements in black and white images are also amazing... more on that later.

In Conway, SC, 1998

2007-10-27T14:36:00.000-07:00

This was taken in July 1998 when Marcella was staying with my parents, Don and Joan Joy, in Conway, SC. Marcella stayed with my parents for several weeks when Amy Potts was pregnant with her second child, Collin. At the time, Marcella was living with Susan in her house on Bird Drive in Erie. Wence Witkowski, Susan's husband, was ill and in a nursing home. Marcella was 94 at this time, and although she was sharp and still able to do many things, she was becoming frail and unable to live alone. So, a few months after Wence moved to the nursing home, Marcella moved into to Susan's house. To enable Susan to go to Ohio to help her son Brian and his wife Amy through a difficult pregnancy--Amy was hospitalized, Marcella went to stay with Joan and Don in South Carolina for awhile. Susan went to Ohio and watched after Madelaine, Brian and Amy's oldest child, until Amy was able to return home with Collin. Then Susan travelled to Conway for some R&R and to bring Marcella back to Erie. Amy and Brian and family have since moved to Las Vegas.

From left: Don Joy, Paul Potts, Susan Witkowski, Marcella Armstrong, and Joan Joy in Don and Joan's backyard.

Susan and Dick Zahner

2007-10-27T14:25:00.000-07:00

Susan and Dick at one of their favorite restaurants--the Waterfall in Erie--not long after they were married in September 2002. Susan and Dick truly enjoyed the time they had together before Susan's unexpected passing in August 2007. They came to Myrtle Beach in June 2007 to help celebrate my parents' 50th wedding anniversary; they enjoyed a week in Chatauaqua, NY, in July, just before Susan began to feel ill. Earlier this year, they visited friends in Oregon and went on a cruise on the Columbia River.

Brian, Marcella and Paul

2007-10-27T14:15:00.000-07:00

I don't know exactly when this photo was taken, but "8 20 '0" is visible in the lower right corner. I saved the file on my PC in April 02, so my best guess is that the date is Aug. 20, 2001. Brian is on the left, Paul on the right. The furniture looks like Dick Zahner's living room in North East.

Marcella Clarke Armstrong, 101

2007-10-27T14:03:00.000-07:00

This photo is among the last I took of my grandmother. I went to visit her in December 2005, knowing that none of us knew how many more opportunities we would have together. She lived in the Presbyterian Lodge nursing home in Erie at that time. I stayed with Susan and Dick Zahner in their new house on Sandy Trail Drive in Harborcreek. It was a lovely visit--one of the few times I went there on my own without other family members. Aunt Susan showed me old photos and Marcella's journal. I remember the wonderful baked salmon dinner she fixed me (my mother later told me that Susan asked her what I might like for dinner and my mother suggested the salmon). We also went to church together and visited grandmother each afternoon. Marcella died very peacefully at the Presbyterian Lodge with Susan holding her hand on March 14, 2006, at age 102 just three months after my visit.

Marcella at 100!

2007-10-27T13:53:00.000-07:00

Here we are at Marcella's 100th birthday, Feb. 18, 2004. From left, seated: Dick Zahner, Shannon Ford, Katie Ford, Marcella Clarke Armstrong, Brian Potts; in back from left: David Joy, Susan Zahner, Isaac Potts, Paul Potts, Grace Potts; on floor: Linda Joy. First Presbyterian Church of North East, Susan and Marcella's church for several decades, held a party for her following the service on the Sunday nearest her birthday. Nearly 70 friends attended. She received about 100 birthday cards. She seemed overwhelmed by all the attention, but I know she was pleased to have her family around her.

Marcella's 90th Birthday!

2007-10-27T13:43:00.000-07:00

This was taken very close to Marcella's 90th birthday, Feb. 18, 1994. From left, seated: Katie Ford, Shannon Ford, Cameron Ford, Wence Witkowski, Susan Witkowski (Zahner); standing: David Joy, Donald Joy, Joan Joy; in chair: Marcella Clarke Armstrong; to right of chair: Paul Potts and his girlfriend Beth Snyder; on floor from left: Linda Joy, Carson Ford, Amy Potts, Brian Potts, Tony Witkowski.

In 1994, Susan and Wence lived in a small rambler on Bird Drive in Erie. Marcella lived in an apartment at Parkside (senior living) in North East, PA.

Venture Magazine, December 18, 1955, by Marcella Clarke Armstrong

2007-10-27T12:32:00.000-07:00

As she notes in her journal entries, our grandmother pursued creative writing training and joined a writers' group when the Armstrong family lived in California. She published some of her short stories including this one in Venture Magazine. The full text is below. As with many things, she was characteristically humble about her writing. Years ago, I was excited to learn that she was a published writer because I was a professional writer too--a newspaper reporter at that time. She was dismissive about her published stories, as if they weren't very significant. I was more proud of her than she probably realized.

For Junior Highs
Venture
December 18, 1955

An Angel at Work

By Marcella Clarke Armstrong

“Why aren’t you dressed, Virginia?” Mrs. Holmes’s voice edged sharply, impatiently. She looked up through the well of the high stairway to her daughter above.

“Oh, I don’t know. I thought I might stay home.” Ginny leaned over the railing, her chin on her arms. Now that she was fifteen, she should make up her own mind. Wasn’t that reasonable?

Her mother had disappeared, and Ginny sank again to the top step, he dark eyes filled with memories. She hadn’t always had to worry about clothes. Form the pedestal of fifteen years, she looked down and back to Christmas Eve services when she was a child. In white silk dress, scattered about with rosebuds, she had lisped the tiny greeting from the first graders. And the next year a long white nightgown had been sufficient to draw applause. But now she was too old for speaking pieces and not one cared how she looked.

Rudely, Don pushed by her, smelling of soap. Down the bannister he glided. “Com on, Sis,” he called as he landed. And her father’s voice from below questioned her right to decide.

“What’s this I hear about your staying home?” The words were stern, warning her that she’d better get ready. Ginny recognized the tone.

“I just don’t want to go. I can celebrate Christmas here.” She added the last to give her independence the build-up that it needed. If she as much as breathed the real reason, her father was sure to blow up and there’d be a dreadful scene.

“You’re making us all late. Get into some clothes.” Then his voice changed and became kinder. “Virginia, we want to be together on Christmas Eve. We can’t go without you. Have you forgotten that Bill Todd and Judy Stevens will be there? And a lot of others are home from college.”

A silence followed in which Ginny sat huddled, retreating into the shadows on the stairs. She has forgotten that the college kids were home. That made it impossible. She just couldn’t go.

“Why aren’t you coming?” Again her father’s impatience boomed from below.

Frantically she thought. “Well, if you must know—I haven’t anything to wear. I never have anything as nice as the other girls.” Ginny had risen and had come down a few steps ready for the impending, inevitable battle. She had always loved her father. Why was he so stubborn? She grasped the railing to withstand the shock of his reaction.

He was silent. After a moment, he said quietly, “I don’t want to ruin this evening for our family, but I do know that your closet is full of dresses.”

“But they’re old. Everyone’s seen them. Jane has a new velvet dress for tonight. Barbara’s mother bought her a knitted dress. Francie has a cashmere. I’ve worm everything I have!” Ginny’s white face under the soft brown bangs and short hair was not Ginny’s at all. Hardness and snobbishness had no right there.

Don, wise at thirteen, had thrown himself into a chair, waiting until this was over. He now rose, a little bored and advised, “Well, you keep your coat on then.”

A sizzling, hissing sound made them all look at the girl above, It was Virginia trying to find words.

“Why, why—that coat! I’m so ashamed of it. I wouldn’t keep it on if—if—Oh!” She turned and ran up the stairs. The brief run along the hall ended with the slamming of a door.

Soon another door closed firmly. The sound of the car backing our of the snowy driveway made Virginia raise her head from her bed and listen. They had left her alone on Christmas Eve. Her wild sobbing now protested against the unfairness of her parents, the party she had missed, the cruelty of life.

Some time later, enveloped in a scarlet quilted robe, Ginny wandered into the living room. The now outside gave a twilight felling in the room. The Christmas tree was a shadow in a corner. She inserted the plug into the wall socket and the tree emerged into sheer beauty.

“Jeepers,” Ginny said aloud. She sat down on the nearest chair, pulled her feet up under her, and stared at the quiet glowing of the transformed tree. Gradually the individual ornaments began to bring back other times. The gold tinsel she had chosen in the ten cent store years ago. Donnie had made the silver fan in kindergarten. The Santa she had colored. She guessed these things never stopped being—well, precious to he mother and father, no matter how worm out. They still helped to make the tree beautiful.

Suddenly Ginny slid to the floor and carefully reached toward a branch where a little figure rested. Slowly she lifted it out and held it in both hands. The little angel she had always loved, her blue dress faded, the tiny stars all erased. But the shining face and smooth gold hair, the erect and happy figure charmed her again.

Ginny sat a long time holding the image, thinking of the time when it was new. The Italian woman had been so old and wrinkled, sort of like a dried grape, selling little figures in the snow. It had been several days before Christmas, she remembered, for she had kept it wrapped until just the right moment on Christmas Eve. She had held onto her mother’s hand in the street and has shyly pointed to the blue angel. It had looked so cold.

Now the little dress was faded and part of it had chipped off. She had worn the dress so long—

Footsteps on the porch startled Virginia. She waited until she heard a soft knock. She shouldn’t go to the door for she was alone in the house. She put the angel on a bit of snow under the tree and sat, not moving. The knock came again, this time on the window, and as Virginia looked, a little flattened nose was pressed against the pane and two dark eyes reflected the color and wonder of the tree.

Ginny jumped to her feet and opened the front door, letting in the joyous notes or carollers down the street, of sleigh bells riding high, and the cold misery of a child who grasped a wreath of evergreen.

“This is the last one. I’ve sold all the others. Won’t you buy it, please won’t you?”
came a scared, muffled voice. The child was breathing fast, his gaze clinging to the colored balls and the tinsel.

Virginia took the wreath, led him over to the tree, and left him standing while she went in search of money. He was in the same position when she returned. Into his pocket she thrust a dollar and onto each cold hand she pushed a warm red mitten, her skating mittens, lined with fur. As he felt their warmth, his eyes turned to her. A smile so warm and bright lighted the boy’s face that Ginny stared unbelieving. She filled his pockets with candy. She couldn’t think of anything else to do.

After he had gone, Ginny again picked up the angel. She sat thinking. She wished she had given the boy more. That smile of his! It would have made everyone happier if she had smiled tonight. A faded angel and a ragged child where making her ashamed. Ginny knew now that velvet and cashmere were only substitutes for a bright shining light inside you. The thing is to make people forget how you’re dressed and to love the real you.

Of course, you couldn’t be queer, she thought. But dresses a year old wouldn’t be queer, maybe.

When the family came home, the Christmas tree was sending out a vivid welcome. A small table with clean white cloth was set with four saucers and four cups. Hot chocolate steamed from them. In the center was the blue angel. And Virginia was carefully dressed in—why, no one could afterward remember. She looked so shining that you didn’t even notice.

###

Marcella Armstrong's Journal, Installment 9

2007-10-26T17:24:00.000-07:00

Dick had a second heart attack December 10, 1976. I had taken him to Dr. Gordon Massey, who said to take him to Hamot Hospital. Dr. William Underhill happened to be in the emergency room and became his doctor. In a hospital room Dick went into an attack. The "blue team" was caled and with electric paddles brought him out of it. He was in Intensive Care for several days. Then in a semi-private room he began to walk with a nurse in the hall. He came home the day before Christmas.

While he was waiting to come home, he realized that his roommate was in trouble. He called a nurse, who immediately called the blue team. Dick saved his life.

But all of the weeks into Spring Dick wasn't well. He would sit up many nights with hearburn and pain. Why didn't we find help then? He saw Dr. Massey many times. Dr. Massey called it diverticulitis. and later pneumonitis. He was not thorough enough.

Finally in April Dr. Massey realized that he was very sick so he sent Dick to Radiology Associates on _April 13th_. Dr. Underhill was determined that he would find the trouble. Blood work, then x-rays. They showed that Dick had cancer which had spread from the colon to the liver. It was too late. There was nothing that could be done. He was sent home.

My brother Joe Clarke and William Hiller from Westfield drove to Erie and brought Dick home. He was very, very ill -- and kept falling. That was _April 23rd_.

Susan and I tried to care for him. Susan had to work daytimes and couldn't stay up all night. We couldn't lift him when he fell. Susan arranged with Homemaker Upjohn Agency to send nurses around the clock.

So that is what happened. I bought a comfortable chair for the nurses. They came and went -- very kind and efficient girls.

Joan flew here from Washington, D.C. She was met at the airport by Donald Campbell of our church.

Ruth and Ella Grace came. They talked to Dick only briefly. He knew them. But Joan felt so badly she couldn't to in to see him. She helped me and answered the phone.

Reverend Baird came every day. He prayed with Dick and with us. The day came when he realized that Dick didn't know him.

Dick was so yellow. His abdomen was swollen and hard. He couldn't eat and soon he couldn't take medicine.

On May 3rd the North East Rescue Squad took him to Western Reserve Convalescent Home in Erie. Susan made the arrangements. The nurses were costing $1,000 a week.

I will _always feel badly_ that we took him away from home to a strange place where he knew nobody -- he must have realized. From May 3rd to May 8th, he was there. At 4:30 on Sunday morning, May 8, 1977, Susan received a phone call that he had died. Dear Dick.

Ella Grace, Ruth and Joan had gone home, but Joan, Don, Linda, Kathy and David drove here from Maryland. And Harrison flew from Eugene, Oregon. Joe and Clara met him in Buffalo. It was a sad time.

The following two years -- and more -- have been very lonesome. Susan and Ethel Wells have phoned every day. Susan has never left me alone on weekends or holidays. And Joan writes every week. They are the finest daughters that anyone could have. I will never like living alone.

Living Alone

Always I have seen homes where only one person lived, a widow or widower. I never wondered abouth is or her life. I never wondered how she spent her time. I never thought she might be lonely.

And now I am one of those... It is like a world set apart from the mainstream of life and activities of couples. There is so much silence unless I fill the air with stereo or radio music or TV.

When I close the drapes at night, I close out the world. Inside there's a small space with me and my thoughts -- and regrets -- and memories. There are the gost sounds of words said when my world was normal.

There is Dick's empty chair -- always to remain empty. There are his books, a notebook with pages in his writing: a schedule of what he planted in the garden -- with dates. There is the bookcase that he built in the basement. He had thought of standing it between the living room and dining area, making it a divider and more a continuing of the living room. He made the wood so smooth, satiny.

I try to find meaning for my life. I will keep going in the same direction as we did together. Curch, Bible study, prayer group, worship on Sundays, trying to keep friends.

To me, the church library is a ministry. To encourage someone to read the right book is a service. Perhaps I was getting ready for these years when I learned library procedure.

I am sort of "left over" from what used to be. Dick was the strong one, the intelligent and charming one, the one who was consulted and listened to. I think I am becoming stronger -- driving the car, managing the dividends which are accumulating; paying taxes; health, house and car insurance; writing letters; keeping the house.

Dick always said that he would die first. That is the reason for arranging his pension so that it would go on as long as I live, why he bought stocks and bonds. I do not have financial worries as long as I stay well. He was so good to take care of me.

Marcella Armstrong's Journal, Installment 8

2007-10-26T17:23:00.000-07:00

I am afraid that I have digressed from writing about Dick.

He was transferred again, this time to Central Quality Control in Westfield, N.Y., but we continued to live in North East, Pennsylvania. We had bought quate a new house on Haskell Rd., three miles west of the borough. It had been built by Earl Dailey, who worked for Welch Co. He had planted many trees and shrubs.

Dick commuted in a car pool with several girls. Normal Jell was one.

He was liked by everyone. He was on the Session of the First United Presbyterian Church. He was chairman of the church library board for a while. I was the librarian then. He as very interested in church.

Because I wanted to live in Westfield so badly -- he agreed to move there. We found a one-floor house at 73 Third Street and moved. We rented our North East house to Tony Balut, who worked for the Welch Co. Dick had a feeling that we would come back. The year in Westfield was not happy -- even though we were near his work.

So we moved back and sold the house to Norman and Irma Kramer, who had lived in Kennewick and were transferred back too. Their home had been in Silver Creek, New York.

When Dick retired from the Welch Foods, Inc. there was a dinner for him at the Country Club near Dunkirk. There were speeches and gifts. Two brown suitcases of different sizes and bookends were given to him.

After he retired he was very busy. He was asked to help at the Lansmith Cherry plant in Ripley. He trained their chemists. Then he went to the big Veterans' Administration Hospital in Erie and asked if he could do volunteer work there. They interviewed him and put him in the Physical Therapy Department one day a week. He chose Mondays. He enjoyed the work and did far more than he was required to do. He cleaned the whirlpool bath, repaired anything needed, helped patients, made friends. His last certificate of service award stated that he had given "1681 hours and 6 years_ of dedicated voluntary service on behalf of veteran patients." The last certificate was dated May 5, 1977.

He also drove the GECAC van every Wednesday. He picked up senior citizens for the government's nutritional program. It was for lunch and recreation at our church. The women liked him so much. He was nice to them all. He always got out of the van and helped them in and out. He drove extra times too -- to the dinner theater in Erie, etc.

Every Saturday morning at 8:30 he was at a Bible class at church. It was taught by Reverend Lloyd Baird. Dick was faithful and became such good friends with Dan Reese and Glenn Shorts. He would sometimes take our dog Kees to class.

On Tuesday evenings he played Duplicate Bridge, a Y.M.C.A. project. He played Bridge well.

We were in a Bridge club with Adelaide and Roger Marshall, Paul and Nina Homer, Mae and Peter Smaltz. The latter couple dropped out. Evelyn and Philip Hatch took their place. We played in the club for 15 years at least.

He loved his garden. His rose bushes bloomed. He had enormous dahlias and gladiolii. He raised string beans, peas, broccoli, cabbages, Swiss chard, tomatoes and even cantaloupes.

He canned peaches, pears, prunes and tomatoes with my help. He froze vegetables. He kept the yard mowed and trimmed. He bought riding mowers, beginning with a small one and ending with an International Harvester Cub Cadet. He bought a cart to attach to it. He took Paul and Brian for rides and Kees. He could fix anything, even the color TV set.

He liked photography. We had a movie camera and projector when the girls were small. He bought a Retina Reflex camera and we had slides and a slide projector. Our trips to the Grand Canyon, to Yellowstone, to Yosemite, to Victoria, British Columbia, to Grand Coulee Dam, to Grants, New Mexico, to Idaho Falls, Idaho, to Los Angeles and Mexico, to Glacier National Park, etc. were more interesting with a camera. We joined the Erie Color Slide Club.

Marcella Armstrong's Journal, Installment 7

2007-10-26T17:20:00.001-07:00

At Grand Junction, Colorado, we stopped for a week, living in a motel. There were peaches that Dick had to inspect. It came time to go and he found that he was being sent to Vancouver, British Columbia. We were put on the train, the Union Pacific, for San Francisco and Oakland. Our dog was put in the baggage car. It was so new to us -- travelling in a Pullman car. We were met in Oakland by the Welch plant manager and taken to the big Leamington Hotel, where we stayed for 13 days -- waiting for our furniture.

School began and I had to find out where the schools were. Dick had bought a very nice new house in _Castro Valley._ this was a community of all new homes. Susan was to go to Castro Valley school. Joan's school was in Hayward, a big High School. At the desk in the hotel I found where and what time in the morning to board a bus to the two places. So that was my schedule every day: to take Joan and then Susan. Finally our furniture came and we could leave the hotel and retrieve our dog Brownie, who had stayed at the plant manager's home.

It was Halloween before Dick came home. We were well established by that time. I was helping with a Girl Scout troop. I had gone to a PTA meeting and had volunteered. I was assistant leader. Dr. Runyon's wife was leader. Later I was given the troop alone. Also I began to write the publicity for many troops for the Hayward paper.

Hayward High school looked like a small college. There was an English building, a science building, an adminstration building, etc. Joan and Susan were very good students. Joan made California Scholarship Federation -- Susan in seventh grade began to learn the clarinet.

We like California. I went to an adult education evening course in Creative Writing at Hayward High School -- and made "writing friends" -- Alice Robb, Dorothy Hutchens and Florence Sims. We met for lunch in our homes and read and criticized what we wrote.

But it all came to an end. The Welch Co. again transferred Dick -- this time _to Washington State._ It was the summer of 1953 when we moved to Kennewick. Susan was a Junior in High School. Joan had a year at Oregon State College.

While Dick was finishing the Welch Co. work in California he had a severe heart attack. (The Welch operation had been moved to Redwood City in the S and W plant). He had a 50-50 chance of surviving. There was a blocking of an artery in his heart. I flew down from Washington and later Joan and Susan flew to Oakland, where people met them. Dick was in the Redwood City Hospital for five weeks.

We had to go back to Washington because school was beginning. I drove Joan down to Oregon State at Corvallis. But first I drove from Redwood City to Kennewick. It was a little difficult climbing 4,000 feet over the mountains of northern California, then up the Columbia River.

Leonard Cook, an engineer at Welch's, came up on the train with Dick when he left the hospital. It took so long to come up the front steps of our rented home on Olympia Avenue in Kennewick. When he was ready to go back to work, I took him to Welch's where he worked only an hour a day at first. The time was gradually increased.

We liked Kennewick and bought a new three-bedroom ranch-style home at 320 South Ledbetter Avenue. We went to the Presbyterian Church across the river in Pasco. Dick was ordained an elder. The minister was Reverend Jack Adams.

Susan was in the band with her clarinet at Kennewick High School. It was hard for her to change shcools just before her junior year. She entered the College of Puget Sound in Tacoma, Washington and decided on a career in Occupational Therapy.

Joan was majoring in Bacteriology. She joined a good sorority and lived in the house for three years. After she graduated she worked for a year in cancer research at the college. She met Donald Joy, who was studying mineralogy. They were married June 15, 1957 in Westminster House near the campus. Don had another year so Joan worked as a research assistant at Oregon State College.

After his graduation, they left with a U-Haul trailer for their home at Grants, New Mexico, where Don was to be in the laboratory of a uranium mill. We visited them there. The company had built rows of new homes. Albuquerque was the nearest city.

Back in Kennewick -- the Yakima Presbytery wanted a church in Kennewick; so we started to make plans. We met first in the Odd Fellows' Hall, then in an old Lutheran church, where Susan was married. Dick was on the committee to find a minister. At first a very modern manse was built at the edge of the golf course. The men of the church built it. The architecht was a church member. Reverend Jack Wilson was the first minister.

I was the first president of United Presbyterian Women. I had gone to Whitworth College two weeks of two summers for training. The other officers were Lu Murphy, Frederico Uhrenholt, Augusta Clements, Hannah Chamberlin, Barbara Wilson and Lillian Stradford. Also my friends were Treva Rudnick, Jessie Pease and Vera Stahl.

We couldn't stay to see the church built but we have gone back -- even to see the beautiful sanctuary, which was built last.

While we were visiting Joan, Don and their Boxer Sam, a telephone call from Westfield asked that Dick come back east to be quality control supervisor at the North East, PA plant. It was a _hard move_ -- leaving the West and our girls. That was in the summer of 1959.

We stayed with Joe and Tootie in Westfield while we looked for a place to live in North East. We found a duplex apartment on South Pearl Street and lived there until the next summer. We moved down near Lake Erie to a quite new grey house which belonged to Ted Sprague. We signed a 2-year lease. We enjoyed living there because of the many birds which came to our feeder. We had the use of a private beach.

I had needed something to do so I drove to Chautauqua to summer school and enrolled in a Library Science course in Reference Works. I drove to Westfield and over the hill for 3 weeks. It was a course from Syracuse University.

I applied for a job at the Westfield library -- and got it. It was part time, for the library was open only afternoons and two evenings a week. I loved the work.

Mother and father were in a nursing home in Westfield. Joe and Tootie lived in Hartford but visited Westfield often. We were in Washington. Harrison and Molly in Oregon. Clara -- in North Carolina. It was the only thing for Joe and Tootie to do -- to sell their house and move Mother and Father into Caldwell Nursing Home, a large house which was once Bill Welch's home. It was on the corner of East Main and Cottage streets. They were in one room with their own single beds.

I saw them many times. Mother died on August 7, 1962. Father died on December 31, 1962. He was very lonesome alone.

Marcella Armstrong's Journal, Installment 6

2007-10-26T17:18:00.000-07:00

Richard Dennis Armstrong

I now want to talk about your father. He was an Iowa boy, born in Missouri Valley, Iowa, on September 22, 1905. His mother was Dora Bagley Armstrong, who had been a teacher of Latin at Missouri Valley. She graduated from Grinnel College. His father, Dennis Eugene Armstrong, was a mail clerk in the Rock Island Railroad, which ran between Omaha and Des Moines.

Richard's two sisters are: Ruth Emeline and Ella Grace. Rugh was born on April 10, 1903; Ella Grace, May 25, 1910.

The family lived in Omaha, Nebraska, and in Des Moines. Richard was in Omaha High School until his junior year -- when they moved to Granger, Iowa. His senior class was composed of one girl and five boys.

Dick went on to Des Moines University while he lived on the farm at Granger. He went to college on the interurban (street car), leaving early in the morning after milking cows and carrying cans to the station. He majored in Chemistry. He graduated from Des Moines University.

Then he entered graduate school at Iowa State University in Ames, Iowa. He earned a Master's degree in Organic Chemistry [in black ink: Biochemistry?] He was studying toward a doctorate when Howard Johns came to Iowa State looking for a chemist to work at the Welch Grape Juice Company at Westfield, New York. He interviewed several and chose Richard.

So Dick arrived in Westfield, by bus, one very cold February morning in 1932. Nothing was open but a diner.

He found a room in the Y.M.C.A. and lived there until September 1933. He started work at the Welch laboratory in Quality Control. There were only two chemists, Harry King and Dick. Now there are many, with a whole floor devoted to research, quality control and new products. It is now Welch Foods, Inc.

I met Dick when I was home for a weekend from Jamestown. Clara knew him and invited him to a party at Healy Hall. it was a brickh ouse across from the Westfield school. Mrs. Healy was opening a tea room. Clara asked Richard to bring Verna Dodge. But the next party was different. He asked me -- and from that time on "I was his girl." He proposed marriage _after he called on Mother and Father_. We were married on September 2, 1933 in St. Peter's Episcopal Church. It was a beautiful day and a beautiful wedding.

The attendants were:

Maid of honor (in pink) - Clara Clarke
Matron of honor (in yellow) - Dorothy Miller Stone (my cousin from Rochester, New York)
Bridesmaids (in blue) - Genevieve Waterman, Caroline Anderson, Verna Dodge, Gertrude Fuller
Best Man - Howard Johns
Ushers - Harry J. King, Charles Welch, S.C. Weir (Y.M.C.A. secretary), Allen Fripp, Charles Miller (now a doctor in Rochester), Melvin Bemis
Organist - William Welch
Rector - Rev. Dimmick Baldy

My gown was white satin with long sleeves. The veil had a small cap which fit over part of my hair. The bouquet was beautiful. The attendants gave me six sterling silver salad forks to match the Louis XIV silver pattern which I had chosen. Mother and Father gave us one half dozen forks and one half dozen knives. Dick's mother and father gave us the same.

There had been many showers by friends: Edith Thompson, Ruth Horning, Verna Dodge, Gertrude Fuller and Frances Barhite, Genevieve Waterman, Marie Bemis and a supper at the home of Mr. and Mrs. Harry King. And on September 9th, a shower by Agnes and Sholer [sp?] Weir (Y.M.C.A. secretary).

Our first home was on Elm Street, a furnished house. We bought furniture and moved to a house on Cottage Street -- around the corner from Mother and Father's house. Our daughter Joan was born on August 25, 1934 at Jamestown hospital.

We moved quite a few times in Westfield. We next lived in a large brick house on the corner of Union and First Streets. Susan Clarke Armstrong was born January 24, 1937. Then we moved to Howard Johns' former home on upper Elm Street. After that -- to the house on Academy Street next door to Mother and Father. Joan was in school by that time.

Finally we decided to buy a house, the Eddy house on Union Street across from the Baptist Church. Dick took off the glass enclosure on the front porch and painted the house white. It improved it so much.

At that time the _Welch Co. transferred Dick to Lawton, Michigan_. We left Westfield by train on Joan's 12th birthday -- 1946. We lived in a large grey house in that small town 15 miles from Kalamazoo and a mile from Paw Paw. The school was inferior but we found that there were very fine people. The Hardys next door were so friendly. Lillian took me to Kalamazoo often. She sould knockon the back door and say "Here comes temptation!" Then she would invite me to go shopping.

The Hardys loved our Cocker Spaniel, Brownie, about as much as they loved their own dog, Inky. They would go out to eat late at night and would bring back hamburgers for both dogs. Lillian had a beautiful voice and sang in the Methodist Church choir. There were only two churches -- Methodist and Baptist.

I had a large Girl Scout troop. During the meetings there would be a badge group in every room downstairs, including the kitchen pantry.

Dick was gone so much -- back to Westfield, to Arkansas or California.

It was August 1948 that he flew back from California with the news that we were to move again -- this time to California! We didn't have time to pack our furniture but left it to the movers. We left by car for the West.

Marcella Armstrong's Journal, Installment 5

2007-10-26T17:14:00.000-07:00

Beckey went into nurse's trailing at Albany, New York, but she did not finish. She met Tom Nicholson who was at a military base nearby. She got a job as ward clerk in a hospital at Chapel Hill, North Carolina, where her mother was house mother in a sorority. Tom and Beckey were married in an Episcopal Church. They went to Bridgeport, Connecticut, to live. Laurie was born there.

Tom and Beckey did not get along very well. Tom flew to Mexico and got a quick divorce.

Clara then gave up her position in Chapel Hill and helped Beckey, staying with Laurie while Beckey worked. Soon they sold Beckey's house and came to Westfield, where a house was built across the driveway from Joe and Tootie. The house is very nice -- large rooms, two fireplaces, two bathrooms, family room, double garage attached, a large lot. Clara had the patio enclosed -- planned by an architect.

Becky worked in the cardiac unit at Hamot Hospital in Erie, Pa. She drove at least 60 miles each day in all kinds of weather.

She met Paul Marsala... [Redacted]

It was in December. The Episcopal Church in Westfield was filled. Beckey wore a cream white gown and veil. The reception for 100 or more people was at Clara's house. The "elite" of Westfield were there. A wedding trip to Niagara Falls.

The marriage lasted only a few months. Beckey asked to come back to Clara's. [Redacted].

It was a long time before Beckey was accepted into Hamot Hospital. She got a job at Lansmith's in Ripley -- working with cherries, a factory job. Finally Hamot Hospital hired her as messenger in the kidney unit. Laurie is now ten years old, very active. Beckey keeps her busy -- with Girl Scouts, church junior choir, baton twirling lessons and later parades all summer, swimming, softball, flute lessons, Chautauqua girls' club, ice skating, etc. And she would fly to Hartford for every vacation with her father and his new wife, who is a registered nurse. Tom lost his position and now he is in Denver, Colorado, learning to service guns. His wife works in the VA Hospital there.

Clara is very busy in Westfield. She was president of the Episcopal Guild, president of Garden Club, is very active in the Episcopal Church. She attends a Wednesday morning prayer and communion group. She plays in the Bridge club and goes to the dinners of the Cabin Crowd near Jamestown. She takes Weaving at Chautauqua summer school.

Gift Cards from 1933

2007-10-26T14:13:00.001-07:00

These seventy-four-year-old cards from my grandmother's album of shower and wedding mementos are in amazingly good condition. Some of them look brand new.

Marcella Armstrong's Journal, Installment 4

2007-10-26T13:00:00.000-07:00

My sister, Clara Louise Clarke had such curly hair. She was a pretty girl. She was eight years old when we moved to the farm. She attended the country school near our farm. Then to Westfield school. She graduated from high school in 1926. She entered Lake Erie College and after two years went to Fredonia Normal (now a State University) to study art. Finally -- to Cornell University, where she became a Home Economics teacher. She taught in the Celeron [?] and Chautauqua Schools.

She married Gerald M. Lynch December 18, 1936 in the living room of Mother's and Father's home in Westfield. There were no attendants. Jerry worked in a bank in Jamestown and soon beame treasurer of Chautauqua Institution. They had a Cape Cod home built in Chautauqua at the end of Cookman Avenue. They also had a home in Southern Pines, North Carolina, where they played golf in winter.

Gerald died of cancer September 15, 1960.

There were two children. Bill (William Howard) was born November 15, 1937. Rebecca (Beckey) Ann was born March 28, 1941.

Bill was a handsome boy with curly hair and a nice smile. He joined the Marines after high school. Then he went to a two-year school in upper New York state (Delhi, N.Y.), where he studied surveying and building roads. He decided to go to California, where he attended the Police Academy in Los Angeles. He became a highway patrolman. He married Kay, who had a boy, Donnie, by her first marriage. A second boy was born -- Jeffrey. They lived at Tehachapi [sp?], California, up in the mountains.

Clara and Beckey once drove out to see them. They chose a route through the Rocky Mountains. The mountain driving frightened Clara. It was through Rocky Mountain National Park.

Bill collapsed one day at home in 1978. He was taken to a Bakersfield Hospital where it was discovered that he had a brain tumor. He was operated on but was left in a coma. Clara and Beckey flew out but he did not know them -- he showed no signs of knowing anything or anyone. But he did begin to move. He was transferred to the Veterans' Hospital in Los Angeles, then to Tacoma, Washington. He received much physical therapy and cooperated well. He was made to walk in Tacoma. He was taught cooking and typing but he was legally blind.

Harrison and Molly went to see him several times, staying in a motel overnight each time. They took him to a restaurant for steak dinners. They phoned to Clara each time to report Bill's progress.

[Redacted]

Clara is going to take him. [Redacted] It is now 1980.

[Redacted]