FARM KIDS TO CITY KIDS

There's no doubt about it. These Ryland kids - Bobbie and Florence standing on the ground and Virginia (my mother) sitting on the horse - were farm kids.

Ultimately there were seven kids in the Ryland family. Two were born in Colorado Springs, where my grandfather often went for short periods of times for his health. The rest were born in Caldwell, Kansas, where "home" really was. Caldwell was a real "cow town" -- a place where in the 1870s and 1880s the cattle drives up from Texas heading toward the railroad in Wichita brought those longhorns right through the area on the old Chisolm Trail. But by the time my mom was born, the cattle were gone and farm life was pretty much what was going on day after day.

The picture above comes from an old family album that finally came into my possession. So many of the formal portraits are unidentified, but my grandma took lots of snapshops, stuck them in every available space, and labeled and dated each one. Lucky me. The Haystack picture says "Grandpa 75, Byrd 43, Bobbie 16. Mulvane farm August 14, 1926. 112 degrees." The grandpa noted above was James A. Ryland, my great-grandfather and "gentleman farmer." Byrd was my grandfather, who died before I was born. Bobbie was my mother's oldest brother.

In 1929 my grandmother Jessie divorced my grandpa Byrd. The family was living in Colorado Springs at that time. In the settlement Jessie was given the Mulvane farm in lieu of alimony. As often happens, some families do not talk about unpleasant affairs, and the Ryland family was certainly this way. In spite of all us cousins asking our parents about the "whys" of the divorce, our parents said they didn't know. Of course they knew, but they weren't talking. The most my mother ever said was, "Oh, well, I was a teenager and I was busy with my friends and I know my dad wasn't easy to live with, but I don't know any details." I have copies of the divorce papers that say he was abusive to his wife, and the judge ruled he wasn't fit to have custody of the children.

After the divorce, Jessie packed up the kids and headed for the farm at Mulvane, and it is here that the picture below was taken. Shown are my aunt Marie and my uncles Bert and Hughie. This was also the place where my grandma had chickens that she always told us grandkids about when my sister and I were little girls. Oh, how she loved her chickens.


Shortly after this picture was taken, the farm burned down.
On July 17, 1930 the Mulvane News reported the following:

THE JESSIE RYLAND HOUSE IS BURNED THIS MORNING.

Fire destroys farm house of Mrs. Jessie Ryland and family who lived four miles east of Mulvane. It was first noticed about 9 o’clock this morning. The fire had progressed so far when discovered that it was impossible for Mrs. Ryland to put it out with just the aid of her children, and when neighbors came in response to her phone call all that could be saved was the furniture and other articles from the two front rooms where the flames had not made entry impossible.

Mrs. Ryland’s home was a nice, seven-room house and was one of the well-kept, better-appearing homes of the country east of Mulvane. Mrs. Ryland was out caring for her chickens and after having been away from the house for some time she noticed black smoke coming from the kitchen. She ran to the house and attempted to spread the alarm by giving a line call on the rural telephone line. However, the flames and smoke prevented her from staying at the telephone only long enough to say, “My house is afire” after ringing. Neighbors who heard that brief statement had to find out for themselves whose house it was that was burning. W. H. Ferguson who lives a half mile east of the Ryland home first discovered the location of the fire and telephoned to other neighbors to help.

A brisk southwest breeze carried burning embers to the other buildings on the place but these were saved. The many dense cedar trees near the house were thought to be an aid to holding the fire from spreading to the other buildings.

Contents of the living room and a front bedroom were all that were saved of the family’s household goods and all clothing except that worn by the family at the time of the fire were destroyed. The loss was estimated at $3,000. This was of course partially covered by insurance.

The three oldest children (Bob, Florence and Virginia) were out on their own prior to the family moving back to Kansas. My mother, after graduating from high school in 1928, had taken a job with a local portrait studio and was learning how to retouch and color photographs. The picture below was taken of her by the studio so she could practice her skills. It is retouched, and mother always kept it because she was the only one who ever knew what the original looked like! All she told us kids was that she loved her work and did a good job!


After the fire, my grandma decided to come to California, where her son Bob had already moved. This was in 1930 during the depression and he told her jobs were plentiful in Los Angeles. My mother was needed to help grandma with the move, so mother left Colorado for California. There is a possibility that if the family had stayed in Kansas I might have been a farm girl too.

While I am actually pleased that we became California kids instead of farm kids, I have always had it in my heart to have and raise a fat hen. It's obviously not going to happen in my lifetime, Jerry says, but I suspect that desire comes from my grandma and her chicken stories.

GETTING A CONSENSUS

Genealogy is not a real scientific endeavor for the average person, much as we would like it to be. If money and superior brains were no object, then this average person, whom we will now call "Me", might be able to come up with more definitive answers. But since they are an object for me, having neither money nor superior brain, I'm going to ask you to throw your two cents in on this little problem and tell me what you think.

Below are some photographs. I can identify 3 of them easily, because they are of my grandma Jessie. Now here she is, along with a few facts about her.


My mother, Virginia, is the little tyke in the chair. I'd guess this was taken on the farm in Caldwell, Kansas in the spring 1912, as my mother was born in June of 1911. Grandma, Jessie Davis Ryland, was married in 1905. Bob (really Nevalyn Eugene) was born in 1906 and Florence in 1909. Grandma would go on to have 4 other children, divorce her husband in 1929, move the family to California in 1931 and die in 1947.

The picture above is undated. The hat tells me it was during the "flapper" era. For purposes of this blog, only her face was necessary, but the full picture shows her in a very frothy but hangy dress. Without dating the picture more closely, I don't know if it was taken before or after her divorce, but my inclination is to think that this was her trying to be fetching once she became available again.

Family stories my mother told were that she had a boyfriend just before she came to California. He wanted her to move to Missouri, where he lived, and she packed up the kids and started the drive, but when she hit the Missouri sultry heat she turned around and drove instead to California where her oldest son was in Hollywood hoping to get his break in pictures. He told her that jobs were plentiful and she would have no problem finding work, which turned out not to be true at all because of the depression.

In California she married again. None of her children ever told any of us cousins that she had been married a second time. I learned this long after my mother died, and I asked my dad who "Mrs. Fred Abel" was, this person whose named appeared as a witness on their marriage certificate. He said it was Grandma Jessie, and that it was a short marriage. He thought Jessie probably figured Fred would provide some help in her getting set up in California. Whether this was the Missouri fellow or someone else will never be known.

Grandma Jessie worked hard to support her children; at various times she worked at an ice cream store, a roadside vegetable market, as a practical nurse and later in life as a companion to a very crabby and disagreeable old woman. However, in what spare time she had, she went dancing, and after all the children were raised she and her beau danced at all the ballrooms around Southern California. She had plans to be married, but at age 62, before the marriage could take place, she died of a sudden heart attack.

Now here is where I need your help. There exists a picture in our family that merely says on the back "Grandma" It is thought by my cousin who has the original that this is a picture of our grandmother when she was young -- that is, Grandma Jessie. I am not convinced that it is. Take a look at it. What do you think?

If it is our grandma Jessie, taken at a much earlier date, you need to know that Jessie was born in 1885. If the person in this picture is 15, are those the kinds of clothes that were worn in 1900? Are the features of this young girl consistent with the features of grandma Jessie in the three pictures above. I don't know, but I wonder.

Here's who I think it may be. Below is Louise Hall Ryland, who was my mother's grandma. She was born in November 1863 and married in November of 1879. She was very young when she married - not yet 16. The picture below is the only picture we have of Lousie Ryland, and it is on a memorial card made at the time of her death from cancer in 1919.

I am much more comfortable thinking the young girl is Louise Hall and I base my theory strictly on facial features. And so while this poll isn't scientific, and the results at any rate wouldn't solve anything, I want you to weigh in and tell me, do you think this young girl is Jessie or Louise? And if so, why? Thanks for your help.