Mondays With Mary ( a picnic )

I love it when I think I have run across a picture that fits with something Mom wrote in her calendar. It seems there was a family picnic coming up in the summer of 1966.

Saturday, July 2, 1966

killed 8 more chickens
hot again     Margie
went to Lake. Mom & I went to
Jeff - Drove over to Neva's
in evening - Plaths & Marilyn
Dorothy & kids there

Remember when I started down the Who is Carrie Plath? trail. Then one day I was able to say The Wait is Over! Now, I think I might have made a match to their attendance at a family picnic.

Sunday, July 3, 1966

Went to Scranton to
picnic in Park    Hot
but wonderful time. All there
but Jean's family. Spent quiet
evening at home. 

Here is the picture I found. I do not know if this picture is actually from that picnic but I think it is. This is my grandmother, Nina Grisso, in the city park in Scranton, Iowa. I think this couple is the illusive Carrie Plath and her husband. What do you think?

This is the photo which I originally found of Grandma Nina and her cousin, Carrie Plath.

School Reunion

The school I attended, my mother and her siblings attended, my great aunts and uncles attended, my husband attended, his siblings attended, their mother and uncle attended closed a number of years ago. The old three story brick structure has been razed, but the new gym (dedicated in 1953) is now a community center. Many community members have worked hard to update the facility and to especially have everything in pristeen shape for the 2015 Scranton All School Reunion. Since 1965 this event has occurred. I have never missed even one.

This year I had the opportunity to work in the memorabilia room. It was the vocational agriculture room when I was in school. It is filled with the large class pictures which used to line the upstairs hallways. I always loved looking at those composites when I was a student to see my mom, her siblings, and so many faces that I knew in our little town but didn't exactly look quite so young anymore. Every five years at this gathering those faces age a little more. And some of those faces are no longer with us.  But, we remember.

By helping in the memorabilia room, I had the opportunity to help people locate their own family members. I met a man that knew my mother and told me how she lived down the road from him when they were kids.  He pointed out to me one of her classmates that had died in WWII and who had been a beau of his sister. His sister was a generation older than me, but someone I had always known. However, the story was new.

I talked with a woman who said she was good friends in high school with my aunt. My aunt died about ten years ago after several years of living in a nursing home with dementia. But, there in the academic setting with those pictures, letter jackets and school annuals, she was young and vibrant in this woman's memory.

Seeing my classmates from the class of '63 and those up and down the years is delightful since we were such a small school. Anyone in high school from when we were freshman to when we were seniors could have been some of one's closest pals.

And then everyone's brothers and sisters come. It is simply a family reunion of those related by blood and those related by memories. I saw my four very favorite second cousins and hugged my third cousin once removed who just takes my word for it that my genealogy research is correct and that we are related.

It is always over too soon, but every five years we get a more little tired from the hoopla. Still, our next All School Reunion is scheduled for June 20, 2020. I want to say that I can't wait, but at this age I really don't want to wish anymore years away.  I guess I just need to say I hope everyone enjoys the daily blessings of the next five years and reports back in 2020.

My second cousins and me