Mom was a great genealogist and she taught me everything I wanted to know about tracing our roots. Between her, my sister and I, we went back on both sides of our family to the early 13th Century. One thing about researching is the stories that are being told. Not just in the history books, but by family.
One such story is of my grandpa Dalrymple. His was a complicated life. He was born into poverty, lived in a poor shack with his family and had many, many, siblings, half siblings and step siblings. His father (my great grandfather) was a bigamist and would often find himself in trouble with the law; which I will save for another article.
Out of all his children, my grandfather was one that made it in the world – albeit similarly poor to others during that time, including many periods of grief and despair. His other siblings were not so fortunate. Most all dying in asylums, from diseases, or tragic accidents fairly young in life.
I would be the first to admit that Grandpa wasn’t perfect, as he himself often got into trouble by the law; but I can’t help respect his determination and feverish individualistic attitude to try to make a better life for him and his small family by whatever means possible.
One thing that my father often talks about is how grandpa loved the horses. No I don’t mean to bet on. He loved taking care of horses, and, according to my father, it is what something that grandpa was very good at. Yes, my grandfather was a farmer and they rented a little plot of land with just the basics. Dad often said that they had to bring in water from the well, gather eggs, milk cows, and harvest the crops. They had pigs, chickens, roosters, ducks, horses, and cows. It is like a fantasy out of an old storybook. But that was far from the truth. It was a hard life. Still, at 88, my father, reminds us that, “they had nothing, but everything”. Unfortunately, I only knew my grandfather from the stories that were told. Some good and some bad.
A story that I do remember is that, although grandpa lived a life close to the soil, there were needs that needed to be met to support an ever growing family. So to supplement that income, grandpa, in the 1940s, with his great aptitude for horse sense, got a job as a caretaker for those horses that were pulling the barges up and down the Erie Canal. The days were long and the pay was small, but, as my dad once said “one does what one needs to survive”. Something that he said he learned from his father, and something that wanted to pass onto his children.
To be continued …