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I think the past few days I have had great success with my genealogy research as much due to hard work as luck.  I say that because if I hadn’t been working on the research all along, I wouldn’t have even recognized the luck I was having.  So, let me tell you what’s been going on with my research the past few days.  Also, this post goes right along with Genea-Musings: Saturday Night Fun this week called Good Genealogy Luck.

This Thursday I took the afternoon off from work and my Mom and I went to the Oklahoma Historical Society Library and I searched some old Hennessey newspapers for my Brown relatives while my Mom looked in the Hobart newspapers.  That was a moderately successful few hours since I found more information about the cyclone of 1912 that I was wanting and Mom seemed to be finding history that can help her with the book she’s writing (Excerpt of Eva’s Story).

The following day, Friday, my mother and I went to Enid, Oklahoma and visited the cemetery.  Luckily, the cemetery office was open plus we got really outstanding service with photocopies of the plot cards and a cemetery map so we were able to locate each of the graves that I wanted to visit plus learn who owned the plots.  We took photos of each of the headstones and plots and I’m sure there’s new information to be gleaned from them once I review them furhter.  After visiting the cemetery we went to public library.

Several years ago, when I was at a library association convention in Enid, I had a few free hours and went to the public library and found lots of information on my Brown and Reddick family.  Sadly, I’ve misplaced what I found that day so, I wanted to find it again plus perhaps find more information.  Unfortunately, there have been several changes in their local history/genealogy section and all those vertical files I previously used appear to be gone.  All was not lost, though, since we were able to get copies of a few obituaries from the local newspapers they have on microfilm plus the cemetery cards, which indicate information from any obituaries.

After the library visit we headed to the little town of Lacey, Oklahoma that is about 10 miles west of Hennessey and visited the very small Lacey Cemetery where my great, great grandfather Isaac Brown and one of his daughters are buried.  While there we sat on a bench under a big cedar tree and ate lunch.  While it was a hot Oklahoma summer day, there was a nice constant breeze under the massive cedar tree and I wondered if that tree was there in 1902 when they buried Isaac.

1919 John and Ella familyEarlier this week my first cousin once removed Bill and his wife, Linda, invited me to their home and yesterday I went to see them.  They know of my interest in family history and wanted me to see more of the old photos they had found in a box at my great Aunt’s house.  It is so wonderful when people remember me and help collect the family history!  In that box was some new information including a real photo card with a note saying it was of the damage from the cyclone in Hennessey.  Turns out that photo matches up to a picture in the newspaper article I found on Thursday (how cool is that!).  Also, among the photos is a great portrait of my grandpa (Claude Brown) and his family (which I’m including here).  Then I set up my laptop and showed Bill several photos that were unidentified and he instantly recognized several of the people plus shared stories and tidbits of information.

I’m currently in the process of scanning the photos I borrowed yesterday plus assimilating the information I found at the cemeteries and libraries.  Overall, I felt that this was a few days of ‘good genealogy luck’.