Family Homestead
Submitted by: Selma in the City
The Old Family Homestead
I was immediately struck by an image from my childhood of my Great Grandmother’s house in Ireland. It has quite an interesting history.
This isn’t my Great Grandmother’s actual house. Her house is gone now. It is a house I found on the Irish tourist board website, but it is very close in look to the actual house.
Great Gran Min was born in the 1870s into a family in chaos as a result of the potato famine. Her father had gone to work with his own father in New York as a result of the blight forcing them off the land. Her mother had to stay back home in Ireland with the kids as her own mother was ill and had no one else to care for her. Min, being one of the eldest girls, helped run the house, but it was difficult with very little money and not enough food.
When Min’s father died in an accident in a factory a few years later the family was forced to take in lodgers to make ends meet. Min always referred to that time as ‘ the days of dishpan hands and eating bread-ends for dinner’ as her mother gave the best parts of the loaf to the lodgers. She remembered, even once the famine had ended, the bailiffs coming in and people going bankrupt. Entire villages emigrated to Europe and America and sometimes it was so quiet you could hear the wind whistle up the laneways.
By the turn of the century Min was married with children of her own. Her mother continued to live in the house and was supported by Min and her husband.
The house was made of stone. It had a slate roof and low beams inside. The six foot high open fireplaces warmed up the stone floors so well that windows often had to be opened in the middle of winter. When the land recovered from the blight, a market garden supported the household very well for years.
The house had been built in the early 1800s but the land it stood on had been in the family for over 500 years. Generation upon generation were raised there and at one stage one of the outbuildings housed the local school consisting of 15 students.
I never got to see the house because it the 1940s it burned down. No one knows how it started because no one was living in it at the time but it was razed to the ground. All that remained were a few stone walls standing jagged and lonely, like misplaced standing stones.
The stone walls have crumbled now. The pieces that remain are covered with moss and brambles. There is a air of melancholy surrounding the site. A plaintiveness that is somehow sacred. How many homes have ended up like this? Neglected, forgotten, forlorn; once so full of life and laughter but now gone for good.
The land is still owned by the family. One day I would love to build a house there, to bring a sense of purpose back to the land, to honour the memory of Min. I hope that one day I get the chance.
Submitted by: TexasTanya
Friday, the family and I headed out to East Texas to visit with my grandmother. I think the last time I posted about her, my mom and I had just helped her move back home after being in a nursing home/rehab center for nearly 4 months. Well, she is doing much better, but she has decided that it is time to move. Over the next few months, she (with the help of family and friends) will be packing up and moving to a place near my parent’s house. The new place is a good thing, but I can only imagine that it has been a difficult decision for her to make.
The house she will be leaving, is a house that was built by her father, my great-grandfather. He built the house in the late 1930’s. It’s physical description is quite unique. It has stone walls instead of the typical clapboard siding found in this part of the country.
Under the gables, the siding is decorated with broken glass. It’s very unusual, but it’s beautiful glistening in the sunlight reflecting various hues of amber, blue, and green.
The stone walls were decorated with a few special items, especially the area near the front door.
A few of the special items were things my grandmother collected as a child when my great-grandfather took his family on a cross-country trip in the 1930’s. I think the seashells were collected at Seaside, Oregon. I love that giant sand dollar on the lower right.
Granny told me the fan in the bottle was made by a hobo in the 1920’s. I am awed to think a man carved/whittled this fan when Calvin Coolidge was in the Oval Office and it is still just as eye-catching today as it was back then.
She told me she wasn’t sure where the antlers came from, but she said my grandfather told her the small stones on the left were the family jewels. The long piece under the antlers is a piece of petrified wood.
But with all it’s unique physical qualities, what makes the house truly special are the memories of days spent there. Five generations of the family have either lived there, or spent time there. Five generations of birthdays - five generations of anniversaries - five generations of Christmas and Easter holidays - and five generations of plain old every day memories.
A memory my grandmother shared with me is one of the house being filled with the scent of fresh apples. Her parents would buy them and try to hide them in the weeks before Christmas, so the children would not find them before Santa could deliver them on Christmas morning. She said she dreamed of apples because the smell was so lovely and sweet.
I remember my dad telling stories about sleeping on the porch and the almost-famous “china berry incident.” The porch is significant because, he has told stories of sleeping underneath piles of quilts on the screened-in porch and being able to see his breath when he woke in the morning because it was so cold. The “china berry incident” has grown to near tall-tale proportions. It’s his account of the time his “mean and wicked” older sisters (my dear, sweet aunts) “forced” him to pick china berries from a tree in the yard, then promptly shove them up his nose. However, I have my doubts about the accuracy of the tale, because my experience with Dad says he is not one to be forced to do anything.
My childhood memories of the house include Christmas memories with the family gathering in the living room and singing Christmas carols together with Granny accompanying us on the piano. And after we sang, I would sit in my Granddaddy’s lap, while he and Granny read the Night Before Christmas story. Another memory I have is sitting on the bed in Granny and Grandaddy’s room listening for the train, and when it would pass I’d get all excited and run to tell Grandaddy the train was coming. We’d watch the train out the window and count the cars. I also remember hunting for eggs left by the Easter bunny, sitting on the front porch swing watching the cars go by and waving to everyone who passed, climbing and playing on the swing in the magnolia tree out front, and singing hymns with the family around the piano. I remember when I was convinced my visiting great-uncle was Jesus ~ because he had a beard.
Days, perhaps even weeks or months, have been spent preparing meals, washing dishes, calming crying children, hanging laundry, nursing the ill and wounded, cleaning the floors, and eating meals with family in the house. It has weathered scorching summers, beautiful East Texas fall foliage, the rare, but stunning winter snowfall, and the picturesque Narcissus blooms in spring. It’s been a community landmark, a home for family, a bed and breakfast for guests, a warm meal and friendly conversation for visitors. But, perhaps it’s most remarkable quality, is that it has given us the most precious gift of all, wonderful memories of time spent with those we love.
