Doctor Julia Evelyn Sparr Coffin 1919...

Or so...

I'm not certain when this picture was taken, but since it's grouped in the album with Mom's birth pictures, I'm assuming it was around 1919. Julia died in 1920, so she was probably not well in this picture, but she is dressed to... um... heaven knows WHAT she's dressed to do.



I don't know if I've told you, but my aunt took the old photo albums (black and white pictures on black pages) and made copies for all the grandchildren. Actually, that's ME, not the younger set. They are mostly pictures of my grandmother (maternal) and some of my grandfather, but they don't go much beyond 1924, when my Mother was 5. My aunt did a wonderful job of making the albums. She first copied all the pages a bit larger than life (at least 6 times). This produced results that were not particularly viewable, so she set out to enhance them with photographic copies of the actual pictures. This was before the ease of computers. Each of us has a different album in that the actual photos differ. She also used a great technique of putting a real picture in the photocopied picture. I'll show you an example of that at the end of this. If you are thinking of doing something like this (a great Christmas present, by the way), it's a neat way to showcase the pictures.

Great grandmother Coffin, in case you don't remember, is the one who graduated as a physician and surgeon in 1977, and took the train to San Francisco in 1878 ( on the train: General Crook (you remember him, he looked like Peter Coyote) and the son of then President Hayes). She then took the long ocean voyage to China, ending up as the second American woman in FooChow (now Fuzhow) China. That's where she met my GGfather and the story goes on from there.

They both died in Chicago; she in 1920 and he in 1927, which made them almost the same age at death, as she was 6 years older than he... shocking! She was 67 years old when she died.

And probably dressed to the nines at the time....



This is one of the 'overlay' pictures. It's also one of my favorite pictures, as it shows my grandmother TOTALLY unlike any other pictures of her. Flyaway hair, cleaning clothes and a face in, at last, I see my mother. I also see the Irish in my grandmother, which wasn't always apparent. Most of the pictures I have of my grandmother are dressed up and posed, or older, and I don't see much of my Mom in them. This one I love. The boys are the surprise that my grandfather had for her just before they married. His first wife died in October of 1918 and left him with two boys. He met and married my grandmother in February, 1919...

Needed a mother. Pure and simple. My mother was born in November of that year. My grandmother was 24 years old. He later divorced her because she was 'too old'. Nice guy all around...

This picture was taken on Christmas day, 1923, in San Diego. From left to right we have Gene (who grew up to look a great deal like Clark Gable) Molly (the native woman my grandfather brought back from Alaska... she was killed by a drunk driver when she stepped off a bus when the family lived in Gloucester, MA. The neighbor across from the house asked me if that was the family when I was there in 1990 or so. Apparently, nothing else ever happened in Gloucester, as the accident was in 1934!). Then we have Gordon, Sheila (my aunt) Grandmummy and Mom. I love the casualness of this picture. One of the presents was a pogo stick, and there are pictures of my grandmother on a pogo stick...

a pogo stick...