Lost In The Greenwoods

This past Sunday my family , my friend Drea and her beau Manny and myself went looking for John G Schmidt in Green-Wood Cemetary. The five of us trekked through this one section back and forth well five times--maybe more. Yet again , I was rewarded with no headstone. To be fair , I think the head stone exists and has just been eaten by the earth. It would have been really easy for us to miss given that there are no numbers on any headstone there.

Green-Wood is an interesting place. First of all, in the section we were looking in there were a lot of headstones in German. Secondly , it is as hilly and park like as any place  I have been . Minus of course the person six feet under. Most of all , the volunteers there are so nice and so helpful. Drea and I were invited into the chapel even though they were setting up for some kind of event. And we were stopped  as we were leaving to learn about an emergency crypt < 600 people it holds> .

We ended the day with mexican food and The Chip Shop for dessert. A deep fried Mars bars made everything worth it.

In a few weeks we are going to Holy Cross again. I want to put something there for Violet and of course another Mars bar.

E'valuating Cornelius Curtin

It has been awhile since I done any kind of ancestry research. Don't you love when life gets away from you like that? Last night I decided to check out Griffith's Valuation. Oh ,  I know what you are thinking. How hard could it be to find someone's who's last name is Curtin ? I found four of them. Or one of them four times. Cornelius lived in Abbeyfeale parish in Limerick , Ireland. Twice his landlord was Edward O'Grady. Once it was deCourcey O'Grady. And once it was John Hartnett. I'm guessing these were all the same Cornelius' , but I can't be certain. Here is an interesting thing < though not as interesting as sock thievery> Cornelius' father in law was James Hartnett. I have to wonder if this was an uncle in law or even a brother in law. And this still more interesting...Cornelius Curtin is listed as John Hartnett's landlord. Clealry I'm not getting the finer points of the Griffith's Valuation. Either way though , Cornelius is listed which makes it pretty cool.