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.

Oh Boy! It's Hot!

My new all consuming hobby is freezer cooking. I don't cook the actual freezer, mind you. I cook the food that will fill it.  And , truth be told , it's more of a need than a hobby. Seriously . what normal human being turns on the stove when it's 90 degrees, anyway.

So anyway , while I was covered in flour and dripping in sweat I started thinking maybe I might be a little bit crazy. Correction : it was really just an affirmation. My relatives , however , and yours too did not have air conditioning. If they were lucky they had some body of water to swim in , but you cant do that when you cook. Can you imagine it being th emiddle of summer and stoking the fire. Ok , I'm pretty sure a lot of the time the fire place wasn't used in the summer but there must have been exceptions.

What about visiting family at the holidays? If you moved far away , you probably didn't. None of my relatives , who came here , ever went back to the old country. Some of them came alone. No family here. I don't think I could have done it.

It's very romantic to consider long beautiful gowns and travel by horse and carriage. The reality is it must have made things very difficult. Especially , no ac. I hate the heat. I really do.

For Grams

My grandmother was born Mildred Annette Fink on 4 January 1926. She was born in Baltimore though  she lived much of her life first in Brooklyn and then Long Island . Her parents were Zelde ( Sadie) Teichberg and Saul Fink(elstein) both from differnt parts of the Ukraine though at the time it was called Austria and Russia(laterPoland). She couldnt cook very well but she made the best soup ever. One day I hope to get the recipes from my Auntie. She also had a couple of crooked fingers due to arthitis. She point straight but would really be pointing to her right. She was , also , one of the most beautiful women I'd ever seen.

She died from Alzheimer's a little more than a year ago.

Annie Craig

Annie Craig was born in Ireland in about 1871. She came to New York in 1884 on a ship called the Anchoria. Along with her came her siblings Charles , Maria and Jane. Neither her parents nor her younger sister Susie accompanied them . She became a teacher for the Brooklyn public schools . She never married. Eventaully , she lived with her sisters Maria and Susie and Maria's husband. She passed away in May 1941 at the age of 69.

What I find really amazing is this woman is my aunt and up until a few days ago I didnt even know she existed. She lived 10 or 20 miles away from me . There are more Craigs even closer to where I live. I am today taking a personal vow to find them.

My Grandfather , Joseph Craig , The Great Sock Bandit of the East

So much for assasinating  a British officier.....

The Brooklyn Eagle--1918

The three men arrested by Patrolman Dunn as they were mailing a case from which they had removed a pile of socks and in which they had placed bricks , old iron and other junk at 500 Coney Island Ave. were held yesterday by Magistrate Steers on a charge of grand larceny. Thes socks were the property of The Block Forwarding Company of Manhattan and were on their way to Pier C Jersey Cityto be shipped to Buenos Aires.

The men are Joseph Craig 111 East Fifth St., Fredrick Hartmaan 45 East Fourth St. and Adam Kurlandt 624 20th St.

Michael John Curtin

Michael John Curtin was born 17 January 1914 in New York. His parents were Denis Curtin and Maragret Kane Curtin. He had six brothers and sisters. there names were Cornelius, Margaret ,Patrick , William, Anna and James. He had an artistic nature. He walked with a limp because he was hit by a car. He married Lillian Craig on 1 October 1939 at the Good Shepherd Roman Catholic Church in Brooklyn , New York. They had two children Kevin Barry ,named for the young freedom fighter ,and Bruce Richard. Michael died on 6 September 1967 from a heart attack. Michael John was my grandfather.