Memories

Memories

My early years growing up. --------- We lived in Muskegon Heights and next door lived an older lady who was my grandmother's best friend. Her granddaughter, Noahle, came to visit often and we became best friends. Sometimes both of our families would go up to stay in Woodland Park and visit relatives. My family's relatives had lived there since the lumbering days when the community was called Brookings. great, great grandpa worked in the saw mill as did great, great grandmother; she was a cook. Noahle's great, great grandfather also worked in the lumbering camp. My grandfather was white, her grandfather was black; there was a Chinese family that used to join our families when we went there with a daughter; they had a boy, Chang and a girl, Ai; their great grandfather also worked in the lumbering camp with our great grand fathers. The Brooklings Lumber Camp was there in the 1800's and was very large, after it closed the area was bought for a community of middle income black families and the name changed to Woodland Park. Noahle's and my grandfathers stayed there but our friend, Ai's grandfather moved away. Our families would meet there at one of the big hotels for a week each summer. Last that I knew there were still two of the four hotels there and one I heard was now owned by one of the Hayward boys, who used to live in Volney.

When we would go up there, there were always certain people that were friends of our family that lived up there. One was a family that we all called Aunt & Uncle. They lived about five miles northeast of Woodland Park, behind Doctor Sippy's Ranch. My great grandfather knew both of the Sippy brothers well and we would visit both their ranches. What marvelous ranches. The family, that we called Aunt and Uncle, lived on a side road behind the Sippy Ranch just south of Pettibone Lake. I had lots of pictures, but had them stored during the years that I was on the mission field and have not been able to find them yet. They may be at one of my niece's or nephew's houses. I remember going east of Bitely and then turning on a narrow road going north and then turning east into a long driveway that must have went half a mile with large trees on both sides of the drive. One time when we went up there to visit, they were tapping the trees for maple syrup and boiling it down in the sugar shack that was closer to the house. We road on the sleighs behind the horses and helped with the sap collecting. What fond memories! During the summer, I remember taking the horses and wagon or riding horseback on their beautiful horses down a lane on their property to Pettibone Lake to go swimming. They had an ice house on the lake and one winter when there, we rode on the sleighs and watched the men gather ice and put it into the ice shed to be used later. We ice skated on the pond near the house and slid down the hills on sleds and toboggans in the winter. In the summer when we went up there, we stayed in Woodland Park, but in the winter, we stayed at the old Higley Ranch. They had lots of bedrooms upstairs, it used to be a hotel or something. Downstairs, there were lots of large rooms. One had a old fancy bar in it and another was used for dancing sometimes. The kitchen was huge with lots of pantry space, even a butler's pantry, a poor boy, an elevator to bring canned and other food from the cellar, and a laundry shoot. There was an large attic. There were porches around, with even a two story porch on the south side. I loved visiting there; there was always so much going on and in the evenings the old folks would tell stories of the old days and what stories, they did tell! I could write a whole book on those stories and another book on the lumbering camp stories alone. I also enjoyed staying in Woodland Park, it was beautiful on the Woodland Park Lake!

Wow now, what memories all of this is bringing back! I know this is a history site, my memories of the places are real, but the stories that those Old Folks did tell, I am not sure, how much is true and how much is not; I guess that is what you call Folklore. I will mention a few of the stories and you can check them out for yourselves.

The old Higley house was full of old furniture and house hold equipment that they used every day. This would have been in the 1940's and 1950's. I don't remember a lot before 1940. I remember, sheep shearing, carding wool, spinning the wool, thrashing the grain, playing in the granary and corn crib, shelling corn with the old time corn sheller, grinding grain to make corn meal and flour, cracking walnut (and other nuts that we gathered from the groves) for making cookies and cakes, gathering fruit from the orchard and preparing it for pies, gathering grapes from the vineyard for making juice and wine, gathering vegetables from the garden for supper, gathering the eggs from the chicken coop, and then there was the cheese making, the soap making, the canning, stinging food on thread for drying, tying then hanging herbs for drying, and the butchering! Of course, the animals, all had to be feed every day. Then there was the great fishing in the area winter and summer along with the trapping and tanning of hides. What adventures for a girl being raised in Muskegon Heights.

The week long visits in the summers at the lake at Woodland Park was marvelous, hours of swimming and sharing good times with my friends, Noahle and Ai along with my relatives that I only seen about once a year. Those hotels in Woodland Park were so grand! I remember also visiting with old friends that we only seen about once a year whom lived there year round.  We went back up there also in the 1960's and 1970's. There was the Proctors, the Wares, the Sowards, the Penmen, the Hintens; I hope I am spelling their names right; there were so many nice families, I can't remember all their names now; was it the Mckinsey's north of Woodland Park with all the beautiful girls? I need help with some of these names. I loved the singing in the church up there on Sunday; if I remember right, there were two churches. Oh, how the Woodland Park people could sing! I remember hearing the whistle of the train and watching it go by; we would go down and set on the bank where we could watch it. There were so many cars that it seemed like it would never end. Sitting on the beach at night around the bonfire and singing was always enjoyable. The playing musical instruments in the evenings in the hotels or out at the ranch were so grand.

Some of the stories that were told included that Woodland Park, the Sippy Ranch, Old Higley Ranch, Old Denver, a Finish Farm in Lake County Sauble Township, and a convent or monastery in Lake County (not sure where) were part of an underground group that took part in helping people escape and hide from the 1)1830's & 1840's Trail of Tears and Trail of Death; 2)1850's & 1860's Underground Railroad;  and 3)1930's & 1940's Holocaust. Grandpa worked in the area in the 1930's in a conservation in Newaygo County and heard a lot of these same stories. They were suppose to have helped house and feed people that escaped from  these events, and help them get resettled. I believe these were just stories, but I cannot say for sure. It seems that there weren't anyone much but the Native Americans here in these earlier years (1830), unless they (Native Americans) were part of the early underground movements mentioned above, which according to the Old Folks tails, they were. There were also stories that some family with a large farm on the Beaver also had part in protecting these groups of people. There were also stories of in later years of a mob hideout in the Woodland Park area, stills with moon-shine hidden in the woods, a bravo and old saloon, and fishing on the Great Lakes. Oh, the stories that the Old Folks used to tell, as they sat on the porches in the winter and around the fireplace in the winter.

Stories of the monastery or convent were that there was some place north of the Old Higley Ranch that was in huge gully like place, that was very well hidden, with a grown over wall found deep in a forest surrounded by swamps and quick sand with hidden secret entrances, which had Mediterranean like climate year around. At one time, we were told it was north of Walkup, but I am not sure.

Other places that we all used to go to when at Woodland Park was the Prairie which was like a desert and the Silver Lakes Sand Dunes, which also included going to the Great Lake Michigan. What great memories of my family and friends at Woodland Park. We used to visit with family friends north of Woodland Park at Wakeup, also; sorry, I do not remember any of their names, it was when I was very young, probably in the mid and later 1930's. And we visited friends at Old Denver. All of us called the older couples, Grandpa and Grandma and the ones my parent's age Uncle and Aunt, although we were not related to them by blood; they were just connected to our family from our Great, Great Grandfathers working together in the Brookings Lumber Camp and our families stayed connected over the years. I don't think I ever was in Hesperia though and did not at first realize when I heard of Hesperia, that the area that I had spent much time in was not that far from Hesperia.

More memories of the Old Higley Ranch/Farm. How I loved all the animals. We always had to take a drive up there in the spring to see all the new baby animals and again in the fall for the harvest season. They had all kinds of animals even exotic breeds before it was popular to have the exotic animals -- buffalo, elk, deer, ostriches, emus, rheas, llamas, alpacas, peacocks; plus - pulling horses, riding horses, donkeys, mules, oxen, and many different breeds of - beef cattle, dairy cattle, goats, sheep, pigs, rabbits, turkeys, geese, ducks, chickens, guinea; plus many small animal pets, fish, birds, dogs, and cats.

A little of the Finnish Farm, another great place to visit with many wonderful childhood memories. The couple that lived there had some connection to the Old Brooklings Lumber Camp; great grandparents worked there as did great grandparents of the couple at the Old Higley Ranch/Farm; that was connection between all our families. I don't remember much but it reminded me of the old western towns that you see movies of on television. It, like the Old Higley Ranch, had a long drive and could not be seen from the road. It had two lakes of it. There were many barns with lots of cattle grazing on the hill sides, also sheep and goats. There was an old sauna house, a bunk house that the men stayed in, and a neat old house that over looked a lake. That house had so many rooms that seemed to be hidden behind other rooms. And the stories that were told there were just as wild as the stories told at the Old Higley Ranch and at the Wooden Park Hotel. These stories all seem to be built around the same subjects, the ones that I list earlier, the lumbering camp, the Trail of Tears and Trail of Death, the Underground Railroad, the Holocaust, and the Conservation Camps.

Other memories of Woodland Park and areas around there, were all the wildlife, both animal life and plant life! Deer, raccoon, mink, coyote, fox, squirrel, rabbits, turkeys, geese, wild birds, many species of trees, beautiful wild flowers, beaver, skunk, woodchuck, opossum, badger, fish, wild birds, mushrooms, pheasant, and partridge. And could the people of Woodland Park ever make delicious meals from edible wild animals and plants! We used to go to one other place, south of Woodland Park Lake where the Pere Marquette River ran into a lake. Another family descendents from one of the Brookings Lumber Camp workers. Then there was a place up on the Pere Marquette, that we visited another family. All would tell stories handed down to them through generations from the Old Brookings Lumber Camp.

I'd better stop, as I write this, I keep thinking of more great memories and wild old stories that the Old Timers told. I enjoy looking at all your great old pictures and reading all the great stories. Thank you for sharing, please continue. I very seldom get on here but will continue enjoying your site when I get the chance to get on here.

Bethany

Greetings

Just reading Bethany's post...... I also enjoy your site very much, when I get the chance to get on here, which is not real often. I have yet to have the privilege of visiting your area, but am very blessed to be the educational consultant for the site per the educational grants requirements. I have heard so many marvelous stories of your area and the people from the Old Folks. My grandparents moved from the state of New York around 1947 to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to an area that several families had moved or were moving to from the Volney, Walkerville, Troy, Bitely, and Hesperia areas. I used to enjoy visiting my grandparents and listening to the stories of the Old Folks telling of their life back in Volney and areas surrounding it. They brought their lives back there alive, with their stories; I could see pictures in my head when they were telling their stories. Some of the things Bethany wrote of brought back memories of some of the stories that I heard. Thanks, Bethany for sharing.

Naomi

From Volney to the Upper Peninsula Michigan

After reading Bethany's beautiful accounts of memories of your area, I decided trying to put down on paper my memories of stories that I heard as a child of the area, sitting around listening to the Old Folk tell stories in Upper Peninsula Michigan of their earlier days in the Volney area. I have never been to the Volney area, as of yet, but hope to visit there this summer.

My grandparents (my mother's parents) moved from the state of New York to Michigan's Upper Peninsula around 1947 some time. To get there from our home in Upper New York State, sometimes we would cross into Ontario, Canada from the state of New York by going down and crossing by Niagara Falls, go up and cross from Canada into Michigan by the Soo Locks of Soo St. Marie, and then travel down to the Curtis-Newberry area. I so enjoyed those trips. I loved seeing my grandparents and the trip there was fantastic; the trip often included seeing Lake Erie and Lake Ontario when going from New York to Ontario, then we would usually go see Lake Superior and Lake Huron on our way before crossing over into Michigan, and when we got into Michigan, we would always visit Lake Michigan at some point during our stay. We would always collect shells and drift wood from the shores of each of the five Great Lakes. What marvelous memories! Then the time at Grandpa and Grandma's was the best. We would travel a little different route back home and see different sights. When Grandpa and Grandma came to visit us, we almost always took a trip to the ocean, the Atlantic Ocean, again collecting shells and drift wood.

I loved listening to the stories that my grandparents and their friends used to tell. Some of their neighbors were the Leach's and the McGahan's and of course their best friends, Nedd and Kitty Gleason. Every time that we went there we would visit with Nedd and Kitty (we called them Grandpa Nedd and Grandma Kitty, they never had any children of their own, although Kitty's nephew, a McGahan, lived with them), they would have family visiting them from the Volney area. My older brothers used to hang out with the McGahan nephew, but I can't remember his first name now. He was very handsome and my sister's and I all had crushes on him. Poor boy, there were six of us!

I remember lots of stories of the Dionne Quintuplets which were born May 28, 1934. They were born near Callander, Onterio, Canada. They were the first quintuplets known to have survive their infancy. They were five identical sister and all five survived into adulthood. The Dionne girls were born two months premature and after four months with their family, they were made Wards of the King. For nine years they lived under the Dionne Quintuplet Guardian Act of, 1935 and the government made profit from them. Both my parents and their parents lived in Quebec at the time. This scared them and they moved to the northern part of the state of New York before us girls and our younger brother were born.

There were lots of stories of fishing, hunting, and trapping from the McGahan's. There were also lumbering camp stories from the Volney and Troy area. And of course, they told the stories they heard at the lumbering camps and the hunting and fishing camps. Oh what stories they would tell! Not sure what was true and what was folklore! There were some Bengtssons that they used to mention from your area. At the time I made notes in my diary about some of their stories.

My family long ago was involved in the Underground Railroad and helped bring slaves up from the south through Ohio and lower Michigan sometime through the area by Detroit into Canada and sometimes up the Great Lakes shores. Another route was from the Chicago area up along the Lake Michigan Shore. They told of one of the stops being on the Pere Marquette River. From there some stayed at the  which later became the Bookings Logging Camp and some moved on up to the Upper Peninsula.

A lot of stories were told of Island Lake in Volney, of Native American's having lived on the island at one time. There were some stories of them coming to that area and hiding when the United States Government started sending the Native Americans to the reservations. Also, there was a story of a man murdered and dumped into Island Lake in later years after the white man arrived. There were stories of bears being around Island Lake, a marsh filled with berries.  And there were stories of a blind man that lived in the area, that the young children would help him by taking him on walks and telling him what they saw, I believe a DeLong. There were lots of stories, I do not know which were true and which were just made up. It sounded like a great place to live.

There were many stories of the old dances in the Beaver Town Hall and of the guys coming from miles around to meet the area ladies and find a wife. There were stories of box socials, barn raisings, thrashing, and ladies gathering at Fred and Lizzy Gleason's (Nedd's bother)  to make quilts for people whose houses had burned. Nedd's Uncle Brazilla Giddings (his mother Roxanna's brother) was the first to settle in Beaver Township of Newaygo County in 1863. He settled south of The Beaver. Brazilla and Nedd's father, Edwin broke a road (now Dickinson) from the Hesperia area to what is now 8 Mile Road, the Gidding Corners to where Brizilla built his house. The next spring Edwin bought land north of The Beaver and built his home there near 10 Mile Road. More of the Gleason's (Edwin's father Archibald Ariel and Edwin's brother) and more of Giddings (Brizilla's brothers) started arriving shortly, along with other neighbors from their area in Ohio, including John Knowles, who along with Brazilla and Edwin bought large parcels of land in the area.

Maybe I can get my sisters and brothers to write up some of the stories that they remember the Old Folks from the Volney Area telling when we visited Grandma and Grandpa in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Both Nedd and Kitty came from large families that lived in the Volney Area. A lot of the stories were about logging camps, clearing land, building houses and barns in the late 1800's and very early 1900's. I also loved the stories of the long trip from Ohio in the covered wagons behind the oxen teams with some live stock following and of the big farms and village businesses that they left behind in Ohio. Nedd remembered a little of the early days, but he also remembered stories that his folk's and grandfather told them. His grandmother died and never made it to Michigan, but some of her family the Bells did. Some of the stories from after the first settling were about hunting, fishing, farming, trapping, and socials but I am sure both took place during both periods. These were a tough stock of people; they traveled to the area in wagons pulled by oxen; they cut their own roads, and they cleared their own land to build their houses and to farm. They planted and grew nearly all their own food and live stocks' food. Very little was bought in town and towns were far away. I believe it was round 1880's that they built a stage coach run from Giddings corner to the area now known as Brohman, before that it was traveling to town maybe a couple times a year for supplies by oxen or horse teams with wagons.

Are there any of those older McGahan men in the area yet? If there are, it would be fantastic if we could get them to share their stories. Those McGahan men sure could spin the tales. Most if not all of them, I believe to be true; they were just fantastic at telling those tales. They used to say that they predicted in time large business farms would someday move into the area around Volney and take over all the small farms, polluting the whole area and killing off all the wildlife. Does anyone see that ever happening?

People told that in olden days they came by oxen and wagon, stage coach, and train up from Grand Rapids to Newaygo and then from Otia or Dingham (which now is Brohman) to Giddings Corners on Dickinson and 8 Mile Road. Never being in the area, I can't write about any memories personally from the area, but I do have a lot of memories from the stories that the people who came to the Curtis-Newberry Area from the area in the Lower Peninsula, I guess from Brohman to Walkerville.

I will try to copy and post pictures of the maps that Nedd and Kitty drew for us kids with names of places, people, and dates on them. They were such a sweet couple. The maps are at our parents place in the state of New York; I now live in Maine. But I go there every couple of months to spend a week with them; my siblings and I take turns staying with them.

Naomi

Blasts from the Past.....

When we were born, our father was in the Army and mother became very ill. Naomi and an older brother went to live with our father's parents, who stayed in the state of New York. Our other older brother and I moved with our mother's parents to Michigan, in the Upper Peninsula. One of our mother's sisters who lived in New York, looked after our mother until she got well and our father came home from the service. So living with our grandparents in the Upper Peninsula, I heard a lot of the old stories. Truth or legend, I'll let you be the judge.

As I stayed with our grandparents in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan and they were neighbors of Nedd and Kitty Gleason and several others that moved there from the Volney area, I did hear a lot of stories and I also, kept a diary as did my sister, Naomi.

Some of my great memories of when staying with my grandparents was of going up along the shores of Lake Superior and seeing all the copper colored roads and hill sides. Also, of the big fishing out on the great lakes. I loved the mining camp stories and the lumber camp stories and the fishing stories. Many moved to the upper peninsula from the lower peninsula to work in the lumber and mining camps.

A lot of our own family's back ground was not talked about except with family members and real close friends as to the mission work both our mother's family and our father's family were involved in over a span of many years and generations. They helped the Native Americans hide in the 1830's & 1840's when the United States government took their land and sent them to reservations at the time of the Trail of Tears and Trail of Death; in the 1850's & 1860's they helped move people from the southern states by the Underground Railroad to Michigan and Canada; and in the 1930's & 1940's during the Holocaust, they traveled to Europe to help sneak the Jews out of Poland and to the United States into Canada and Michigan. We didn't talk about it much; when our grandparents were living, it was not talked about of fear for their lives for what they had done. With not being able to talk about the history of my own family, I so am enjoying your history site. And I guess for the same reason, I was so absorbed in the stories Grandpa Nedd and Grandma Kitty (as we called them) and Nedd's family did tell of life from Ohio to Michigan and Kitty's family (McGahan's) did tell of life from Pennsylvania to Michigan. I have in my diary of a Thompson family that visited them from Volney one time and told stories of their family coming from New York state to Ashland Center and then to Volney (both in Newaygo County). It looks like his name  was Horton; it is hard to read parts of my diary. There was a Charles Newville that they talked of; they said he was a French Mohawk Indian and his grandmother (the Mohawk) was from Canada and his grandfather was from New York, with the family coming from France. Nedd and Kitty had a lot of visitors from the Volney area, my grandparents very seldom had any visitors except the neighbors, so I loved to go to Nedd and Kitty's and listen to all the stories and write about them in my diary when I got older (this was after I got a little older and moved back with my parents, we would still go there to visit one or two times a year and stay for about a week). When I was real young, I just sat and listened.

Another story, I loved to hear was when the people came to Michigan Upper Peninsula from Michigan Lower Peninsula, they had to put their cars on a ferry boat to get to the other side. There is a bridge there now that you can drive from one side to the other, but back during these times there was no bridge, just the ferry boat to get you from one peninsula to the other. When it was winter and there was a lot of ice on the Great Lakes, you could not get across; either you had to go the whole length of Wisconsin, through Illinois and Indiana or you had to go through Canada to Detroit or Canada to Ohio to Michigan; these were long rides that would take more than one day usually.

This is supposed to be for the Volney History Site , so I guess, I'd better see what I can remember from the stories of Volney. I remember a Leach family that said they lived in Troy which was north of Volney a bit. There was something about a school and a bridge both by the name of Huntly; about a large ranch with a big house and lots of cattle owned by the name of Yates. Some stories was of when they lived there and some that their family before them told them and sorry, but I do not know which was which. Mr. Yates was a man that owned lots of land, had lots of cattle, and was married a multiple of times. Back in those days because of hardships and childbirths many women died and because of lumbering, fishing, mining, farming, and other accidents many men died young; then there were diseases that took many young lives; also, there were many babies that were still-born, some  died at birth, others died very young. There were many sad times but also many happy times with celebrations - weddings, births, and so.

Of course, I also remembers lots of McGahan's and agree with my sister, Naomi, they were great story tellers. It seems like they also were always bringing over meat or some wildlife for us to cook and eat. Grandpa did go hunting and fishing with them at times. Sometimes they would go out in the big boats on the Great Lakes and bring back big fish, sometimes they would fish the rivers or and smaller lakes; they told of fishing and hunting back in the Volney and Troy areas also. The Pere Marquette seemed to be one of their favorite where what they called Back Home. They said that there were lots of small lakes, rivers, and creeks that had great fishing around Volney; but like my sister, I remember them saying that in time, they were afraid that big business farms would move in and push the small family farmers out of the area down there and ruin all the fishing and hunting by poisoning the land, the environment with all their greed, so they moved to the Upper Peninsula.

Kitty would talk of missing her sister-in-laws from the Gleason side - Lizzy, Della, and Etta; and about them all going to dances in the Olden Days on horse & buggy. She also told of fun times at Lizzy's at the quilting bees. And then there were the big meals they'd all fix at Della's during harvest time for all the family men folk who took part in the harvesting. There was talk of summer picnics, when they still lived down there year around, and all the children running around. Nedd and Kitty used to go back down during the winter months and live in their Volney house (which used to be his dad's house) then they would come back and spend the summers in their house in the Upper Peninsula in the warmer spring, summer, and fall months. They would head south while the ferry was still running across the Great Lakes and come back when it started running again in the spring.

I am writing this same as Naomi wrote hers, for use in the Volney History Book or other education works that Nellie is working on in connection with the book and for Toni Tozer Rumsey's historical research work at the Newaygo County Historical Museum and of course for reading on this historical sharing site.

JoAnne

Early Years - Good Times

Wow, Bethany, did you ever bring back the memories! I will try to write up my memories, but not duplicate yours. My family lived on the east side of the state, north of Detroit. I used to go up and stay some in the summers at my grandmother's in Muskegon Heights. I come from a large family of twelve girls and three boys. Us girls all have unique first names, based on Bible names. My father was looking for a boy, I believe, and they had twelve daughters, then the last three, finally were boys. Bethany and I became very close friends with my visits to my grandmother's.

Names that I remember from the Bitely - Woodland Park area that Bethany did not mention, include (I think it was) a Mr. & Mrs. Griggs and maybe a Tyson  in Woodland Park: in Bitely a large Wilkerson family, several Shineldecker's, several Gleason's and some Lowe's; around the area in different communities, some  McGahan's and talk of a McGahan school near Wakeup some place, some Wolgamott's (they lived near Wakeup);  some Bengtsson, Ward, Bayle and Conley's from the other side of Wakeup and Martin family in Otia or Brohman; and there were the McKinley's. We went up there when I was young and then visited later; I am having a hard time remembering it all, who was there when I was young and who was there later. Both were a long time ago and this old gal is getting old. I am eighty one. On social media, I usually do not put my true birth date as I keep personal information private.

I now live in New York, New York and do not get on the internet or computer very often, but I am enjoying this history site and will try to visit it from time to time. Naomi asked that we write our memories to be used for the publications that this site's historians are putting together; so these writings are for reading on the Volney History Site and for their publications.

My father used to go hunting and fishing with some of the McGahan, Wilkerson, Shineldecker, Wolamott, and Gleason men, along with some other men in the Bitely area and I believe there was a Thompson who was married to an Indian lady that he hunted with in the later years. I remember a Charlie and Margaret Gordon and a Burt and Dorothy Graves, both couples good friends of my folks.

I remember picnics on the Brooklings Lake Beach as it was earlier called and later named the Woodland Park Lake  Beach, also at one time the Crooked Lake. I remember playing volley ball, croquet, table tennis, ping pong, horse shoes, ring toss, tennis, badminton, roller skating, ice skating, and going for bicycle rides and walks around Woodland Park. I remember fish fries and hog roasts and smoking fish. I remember dances at the Woodland Park Hotels and box socials at the town hall. I remember sailing on the lake and canoeing the Pere Marquette. I remember going to drive in movies near Baldwin and roller skating at Big Star Lake and bowling in Baldwin. Rodeos in Hesperia, although, I just recently realized they were in Hesperia; I remember them as the White River Rodeos, because we always had a large picnic in the park by the river. Hesperia Fair, again, I hadn't realized that it was in Hesperia, as again we referred to it as the White River Fair west of Ol' Denver. I loved the rodeos and the fair in the quaint little village. For some reason my parents used to refer to that village as the Greek Village of Flowers or the Flowing White River Village.

Noahle

Two Peninsulas of Michigan and Five Great Lakes

Michigan is so unique with two peninsulas filled with many large and small lakes plus lots of rivers and creeks,  and surrounded by five great lakes. The lakes are filled with many different species of animal and plant life; the land is covered with lots of different species of animal and plant life also. The history of this area is filled with stories touching many areas of history.

I am writing my memories of Michigan as a request of our eldest sister, Naomi. I am the sixth child to be born in the family and the fourth daughter. I was raised by Mom and Dad Little, their baby had died and they took me, as my mother was too ill to care for Gloria and I; Mom Little was also one of our mother's sisters. But that is not what this writing is about. I ended up with more than one family that loved me very much, like several adoptive children have. Our families do not like talking about some of these memories of us being separated and the reasons for that, we want to just focus on the happy memories.

My memories are from around the kitchen with our Grandma Gleason (they came from Canada to New York) and Grandma Kitty McGahan Gleason (these Gleason's came from Connecticut to Massachusetts to Ohio to Michigan). I love milking the cow by hand, bringing in the milk and taking the cream off the top, churning fresh butter, spreading it on the freshly made hot bread that we made and adding homemade jam we made from the fruit grown around the house or honey from the bee hives or Maple syrup made from the sap of the Maple trees. I loved gathering the eggs from the chicken house and frying them with bacon from the butchered hogs and smoked in the smoke shanty. I also loved it when the McGahan and Leach boys brought fresh fish from the lakes, rivers, or creeks for us gals to fry or for them to smoke in the smoke shanty. One side of the shanty was for smoking hogs and other meat and the other side of the shanty was for smoking fish. The Gleason and McGahan men had built the smoke shanty as they had all the other out buildings. We cooked on a wood stove and had an out-house. Water was pumped from the pitcher pump by the house for house use at Grandpa Nedd & Grandma Kittiy's and at Grandpa & Grandma Gleason's from the windmill. Water was gotten from the wishing well for the small animals. And the large animals went to a small creek to drink. I am told most of those creeks and small ponds for watering the farm animals have dried up and are no longer there. We gathered wild herbs and mushrooms and we grew herbs, which all were dried for later use; we also dried fruits and vegetables on large screens in the back yard in the sun with clothe laid over them to keep insects and dust off of them while they dried. The boys did wood carving.

I remember lots of visitors from the Volney area. There were the Routley's and Gowdy's, the Knowles and of course more McGahan's, the Bengtsson boys, the Bayle and Conley boys, then there were some Hunt men and boys and some Munford's and Bettys', also Hammon's and Turple's; a lot of boys and men would come up to go smelt fishing in the summer and deer hunting in the winter; and even moose and bear hunting. Us girls and our mother would help Grandma Gleason and Grandma Kitty (as we called her) fix big meals for the fishermen. Grandma Kitty would fuss about them not bringing the women folks with them; but once in awhile some of the women folks would come and they'd gather in the parlor and talk like a bunch of school girls. The guys would gather on the porches when they came back from fishing or in the big old library. Us girls, would sneak in there sometimes and look at all the wonderful books. We also would gather around the piano in the parlor and play it and sing. some evenings the guys would get their fiddles, harmonicas, and guitars out also. Looking at notes in my old diaries and writing all of this is bringing back some wonderful memories.

Laura

Sisters Exploring Nedd & Kitty (McGahan) Gleason's Attic & Cellar

Sister Naomi asked me to share my memories on this history site. We have older twin brothers, Levi and Ethan; then there was Naomi, then Joanne, and then me, Gloria, then Laura. There are three sisters born after me (Laura, Ethel, and Eva) and a brother; actually 3 brother's, triplets, but only one survived. Solomon was the last to be born and he survived; Seth and Simon died within a few days of being born. Our father was in the army and our mother was not well when I was born so my mother's sister and her husband took me and cared for me, Papa and Mama Fairchild

But for my memories of Volney from the stories that were told at Grandpa Nedd and Grandma Kitty's (as we called them); they were neighbors and real good friends of my mother's parents, my grandparents. I continued to stay some with the family that raised me, but I spent most of time with my birth family, as soon as mother was better and father came home from the service. Us girls all have the same polio condition, polio scoliosis, but our brother's did not have it.

All eight (later nine) of us would then go the Upper Peninsula Michigan to visit Grandpa and Grandma Gleason (my birth mother's parents). You could not separate us girls. We did not look alike so no one thought of us being sisters. I loved listening to the stories that the old folks would tell as they sat around the table at Grandpa Nedd and Grandma Kitty's. Us girls would sit in the parlor where we could hear them, the boys (our brothers and the McGahan and Leach boys) would take off hunting or fishing. Sometimes, Grandma Kitty would let us go up into the attic and look at the old things; we could still hear them talk from downstairs about the Good Old Days in Volney. In the attic there were trunks of fancy old clothes that we loved to dress up in and look into the big old mirror at ourselves. There were a couple old rocking chairs up there, an old settee, a kitchen cabinet, a kitchen table with chairs, a old dresser with mirror, a old wardrobe (closet) and an old library table. There was a spinning wheel, old curtain stretchers, a quilting frame, and a couple looms. There was a trunk load of old pictures of the McGahan's and of the Gleason's. They also had a lot of old pictures hanging on the wall downstairs on the main floor. We loved when they told us about their family members that were in those old pictures. The attic part over the kitchen had its own stairway that you pulled down from a trap door in the ceiling in the downstairs pantry (there was also a trap door in the floor in that panty that lead to the cellar).

We also liked exploring the basement large room with the cellar rooms behind it with rows of canned goods, bins of fruits and vegetables, and many crocks of food. In back was the big old coal and wood furnace and large bins with a hole in each near the ceiling with doors to open and let the coal and wood in; there was a door that lead to a hidden stairs to go up and out to the wood shed. There also was an area (a attached add on room) with a spring running through to keep the food cool; the door to it was behind a cabinet; you opened a cabinet door & another door was inside the cabinet that went to this room if you went straight, if you went through the door on the left wall, you went to the woodshed. In this area was another hidden door that lead to the root cellar and to a green house, which lead to the vegetable garden, berry patches, grape vineyard, and orchard with bee hives. The grain shed and chicken coop was to one side. When we went there years later, someone remolded it and removed all of these wonderful areas of the house.

Another area that we enjoyed exploring was the animal housing areas, the chickens, ducks, geese, turkeys, and rabbits. There was also a barn with a couple of cows that they milked at our grandparents that they shared as Nedd and Kitty went down to Volney for the winters. That barn at Grandpa and Grandma Gleason's had so many rooms, it was fabulous to explore. They would butcher before leaving for Volney (together with our grandparents and other McGahan family) and then leave all their breed stock at our Grandfather Gleason's and get it when they came back to the Upper Peninsula in the spring. They took their dog and house cat with them to Volney for the winter.

Gloria

Two Peninsulas of Michigan and Five Great Lakes

Michigan is so unique with two peninsulas filled with many large and small lakes plus lots of rivers and creeks,  and surrounded by five great lakes. The lakes are filled with many different species of animal and plant life; the land is covered with lots of different species of animal and plant life also. The history of this area is filled with stories touching many areas of history.

I am writing my memories of Michigan as a request of our eldest sister, Naomi. I am the sixth child to be born in the family and the fourth daughter. I was raised by Mom and Dad Little, their baby had died and they took me, as my mother was too ill to care for Gloria and I; Mom Little was also one of our mother's sisters. But that is not what this writing is about. I ended up with more than one family that loved me very much, like several adoptive children have. Our families do not like talking about some of these memories of us being separated and the reasons for that, we want to just focus on the happy memories.

My memories are from around the kitchen with our Grandma Gleason (they came from Canada to New York) and Grandma Kitty McGahan Gleason (these Gleason's came from Connecticut to Massachusetts to Ohio to Michigan). I love milking the cow by hand, bringing in the milk and taking the cream off the top, churning fresh butter, spreading it on the freshly made hot bread that we made and adding homemade jam we made from the fruit grown around the house or honey from the bee hives or Maple syrup made from the sap of the Maple trees. I loved gathering the eggs from the chicken house and frying them with bacon from the butchered hogs and smoked in the smoke shanty. I also loved it when the McGahan and Leach boys brought fresh fish from the lakes, rivers, or creeks for us gals to fry or for them to smoke in the smoke shanty. One side of the shanty was for smoking hogs and other meat and the other side of the shanty was for smoking fish. The Gleason and McGahan men had built the smoke shanty as they had all the other out buildings. We cooked on a wood stove and had an out-house. Water was pumped from the pitcher pump by the house for house use at Grandpa Nedd & Grandma Kittiy's and at Grandpa & Grandma Gleason's from the windmill. Water was gotten from the wishing well for the small animals. And the large animals went to a small creek to drink. I am told most of those creeks and small ponds for watering the farm animals have dried up and are no longer there. We gathered wild herbs and mushrooms and we grew herbs, which all were dried for later use; we also dried fruits and vegetables on large screens in the back yard in the sun with clothe laid over them to keep insects and dust off of them while they dried. The boys did wood carving.

I remember lots of visitors from the Volney area. There were the Routley's and Gowdy's, the Knowles and of course more McGahan's, the Bengtsson boys, the Bayle and Conley boys, then there were some Hunt men and boys and some Munford's and Bettys', also Hammon's and Turple's; a lot of boys and men would come up to go smelt fishing in the summer and deer hunting in the winter; and even moose and bear hunting. Us girls and our mother would help Grandma Gleason and Grandma Kitty (as we called her) fix big meals for the fishermen. Grandma Kitty would fuss about them not bringing the women folks with them; but once in awhile some of the women folks would come and they'd gather in the parlor and talk like a bunch of school girls. The guys would gather on the porches when they came back from fishing or in the big old library. Us girls, would sneak in there sometimes and look at all the wonderful books. We also would gather around the piano in the parlor and play it and sing. some evenings the guys would get their fiddles, harmonicas, and guitars out also. Looking at notes in my old diaries and writing all of this is bringing back some wonderful memories.

Laura

Fading Memories

My memories are fading and are from further ago. I am Noahle's mother. I too used to enjoy our trips to Brooklings or Woodland Park. I loved the big Royal Breeze Hotel. I loved the dances there. I loved being on the boats on that beautiful lake. Old stories and drawing that I saw of the Old Brooklings Lumber Camp Town, reminded me of an old time western town; it was a very large lumbering camp. There was a stage coach stop and a post office in the old general store. It was the perfect picture of what one sees on old time westerns. We don't see pictures around here like that, but before people started going west, the places around Michigan looked just like the towns that later were built out west. The Booklings Lumber Mill was located north (from the east end) of the Booklings Lake or Crooked Lake, right next to the railroad. There was a school on the north side of the lake, located about where the town hall later was. We would canoe from the southeastern tip of Crooked Lake down the creek to the Pere Marquette River. This was the same route that used to be used to move some of the logs from the large logging camp, but as it did not lead into another larger water way, I believe most of the logs were taken by oxen teams to the large mill located next to the railroad track at the stop there. We would also sail along the lake, the in and out of the crooks or bayou's in the large beautiful lake.

The railroad was on the eastside with the mill just north of the lake; the lake's creek was on the south west corner of the lake. The lumbering camp was huge.

In 1923, the Royal Breeze Hotel was built; it was a hotel / clubhouse which provided evening entertainment and summer fun.

In later years we used to enjoy visiting Loda Lake Wildflower Sanctuary. I am told that it is the only National Wildflower Sanctuary in Michigan's National Forest System.

I remember stories of the monastery/convent north of Wakeup. I recall them telling it was a large complex, with both a monastery (an area where the monks lived) and a convent (an area where the nuns lived) with a large church in between these two in the area which also included a school and orphanage with some family housing for persons that they recued in the underground activities of a.)1830's & 1840's Trail of Tears and Trail of Death. b.)1850's & 1860's Underground Railroad,  and c.)1930's & 1940's Holocaust.  Stories told of buildings still standing in the monastery complex of the church, the dormitories, the cloister, the refectory, the library, the balneary, the infirmary, the barns, the stables, the forge, the brewery, the greenhouses, and a full range of agricultural and manufacturing buildings. Stories were told of the underground activities moving people through southern areas of Michigan, with stops in the Crooked Lake Area and then on to the monastery/convent site; stories of both areas being beautiful and full of God's wondrous animal, plant, and landscape creations.

Nanctoinetta

Fun with Needle Work

I am another sister of Naomi and JoAnne's. Sister, Eva and I were taken in together and grew-up together. Our birth father was in the service when we were born and believed to have been dead; later it was found out that he had been a prisoner of foreign war from World War II. Our birth mother was very sick when we were born and they thought that she wasn't going to live; she spent some time in a hospital although we were born at home. We all spent time together at the Christian camp that Eva and my adoptive parents were directors of. Mom Little was another sister of our birth mother, Mother Thompson. Eva and I later married brothers. Enough about us and our families. I am suppose to be writing my memories of spending time in Michigan's Upper Peninsula at Grandfather and Grandmother Gleason and of stories told at their neighbors, Grandpa Nedd and Grandma Kitty's (as we called them). Our eldest sister, Naomi asked us to each write our memories and put them on the Volney History site for the  history book that is being made to use in schools.

My best memories are of Grandma Gleason and Grandma Kitty teaching us girls tatting, new crocheting, knitting, and embroidery stitches, of latch hooking, quilting, loom work, appliqué, needle lace, lucet, felting, braid and tassel making, macramé, needlepoint, bead weaving and Grandma Kitty telling of learning to do all of this back in Volney with her family and friends back there. I especially remember her talking about Della, Lizzy, and Etta, Nedd's brother's wives and of his sisters, Philly, Lanta, and Abby and his mother Roxie; and of her and Nedd's early courting days. I like all five of my sisters kept a diary filled with these memories. Maybe someday we can type them up and post them on your history site. We made our own dyes for our art work from wild plants and berries.

I think the Grandm's, as we called them, enjoyed us coming as much as we enjoyed going there. They taught us to make paper dolls from different nationalities and then make paper doll clothes for them. These we took them back to the State of New York with us and our mother took us girls to a children's hospital to give them to the girls there. Our brothers took some carved toys to the boys that the granddad's taught them how to make when in the Upper Peninsula. This was very meaningful to us sisters as we all had spent many months in the children's hospital with scoliosis caused by polio.

Ethel

Old Crafty Days

Some of my best memories was of learning to do pottery and basket weaving. Grandma Gleason and her best friend Grandma Kitty were so very talented. They could cook and sew and do so many activities so very well. I loved going there and hated it when we had to leave. We made a papier-mâché' display of the Volney area that Nedd and Kitty came from with clay and flour dough characters; we also made an Native American villages from bark, twigs, moss, hides, grasses, and other nature materials. We did not do all of this the same time, it was over many visits over many years. We also did paper cutting and book making one time. Another time we did decoupage, origami, kerigami, and paper punching; we also made paper with seeds, leaves, etc in it. The boys learned to make bow and arrows and made fish lures along with tanning hides.

Both our birth parents' (Father and Mother Thompson) parents had twin and or triplets in their family trees. Both of their families had moved to Canada but after the Dionne Quintuplet dilemma, they all moved to state of New York.

I enjoyed the day long road - fieldtrips that we all (Grandpa & Grandma Gleason, Grandpa Nedd & Grandma Kitty, Father & Mother Thompson, Ethan & Levi, Naomi & JoAnne, Gloria & Laura, Ethel & me, and in later years also Solomon) took during our summer visit to Grandpa & Grandma Gleason's. I remember going to different light houses along the Great Lake shores of Lake Michigan, Lake Superior, & Lake Heron; visits to Fort Michilmackinac, ferry rides across Great Lakes, Mackinaw Island, Picture Rock, and then in much later years when we all meant there grown up with our own families, the glass bottom boat trip.

Eva

Greetings from FHC Educational Group's Home Office

Sorry, I don't have memories of living or visiting Michigan. My wife and I manage the Faith-Hope-Charity Mission Center here in New York for the Thompson and Gleason Family and the F-H-C Educational Group for Naomi and her sisters, also here in New York, from their old family farm. We will be the ones to organize the use of your Volney History Book when it is finished to be used in educational programs throughout the United States and also in the mission schools throughout the world. Thank you all for all of the sharing of memories and pictures.

I just want to attach a piece on Native America Full Moon Names, as many have mentioned on your sight of the Native American's living there before the history that you are gathering. This came from the Farmer's Almanac.

Nellie has worked with this group since long before my wife & I started working here. Most of our educational materials are from curriculum/books that she has wrote connected with her education; much through Grand Valley State University and her teaching at an inner-city school that as often is the case, does not have enough or the appropriate materials needed for classrooms, especially special needs classrooms that need a wide range of levels of materials for all subject areas. We use The DEL-A-LAC Way Curriculum and  The Beaver Creek Series of books that she wrote over the years in all our programs as our basic curriculum. The Thompson Sister's and their colleagues have their student teachers write additional material that go along with these and this is our instructional materials along with a few other resources. We are looking forward to getting copies of your history book to add to the above mention materials. What started out to be the working on of one history book, looks like (from what I have read on here) is becoming 2 volumes plus the teacher handbook that Nellie is writing (for educators to use) to go along with your book.

Christian & Michal Livingston