WEEK 25 of the #52Ancestors Challenge - "Same Name"

"JOHN TAYLOR", of the Hampton, New Hampshire family, had a daughter Sarah, who is seen in records [Desc. of Jasper Blake] as the wife of William Blake of Epsom, Northwood, and Barrington, NH. Their daughter Mary (or Molly) Blake would marry Simon Dow of Rye, Hampton and Gilmanton, NH, and they would name one of their sons:

JOHN TAYLOR DOW, first of his name, was born in Hampton, New Hampshire on 18 May 1788. He died in North Hampton, NH on 9 June 1851, and was buried there in the East Cemetery. With first wife Deborah Page, whom he married on 10/18 Dec 1807 in North Hampton (also recorded in Gilmanton, NH town records), they had six children, including son:

​JOHN TAYLOR DOW, born 31 Mar 1812 in Gilmanton (or Hampton) NH. He was married to Martha Ann Locke in 1835, and would later move to Newington, NH. He died of pneumonia on 12 Apr 1874 in Newington [NH VR], burial place unknown, but perhaps the Newington Cemetery. They had only one known child:

JOHN T. H. DOW (unknown what middle initials stood for), born about June 1842 in Newington, NH. He died in Hampton, NH on 12 Apr 1904, and was buried in the "Hampton" (probably High Street) Cemetery [NH VR]. He had married, on 29 July 1866 in Newington, to Mary Ann (Riley) Leavitt. They had 2 children, daughter Ida May and son:

JOHN TAYLOR DOW, born 8 Nov 1869 in Portsmouth, NH [NH VR]. He had nine children with his wife Dorothy (Yeaton), who he married in 1889, and all of them grew to adulthood, except one:

JOHN TAYLOR DOW JR, who died of whooping cough on 23 July 1910, aged 11 months, nine days [NH VR]. He was first buried in Harmony Grove cemetery on 26 July [Ports. Herald, 7/27/1910], but his death record filed by the New Castle, NH clerk on 17 Aug shows him being buried in that town's Riverside Cemetery on that later date.

Of John T. and Dorothy (Yeaton) Dow's children, seven of them were sons. Only one would have a male child born unto them, and this son was so named to honor the elder John T., who had passed away a couple of years earlier.

Though the naming pattern slightly changed with the next generation (that would be me), I revived the old family name when my son was born, some 200 years having past since the first John Taylor Dow was born. 

[note: no dates posted for my living relatives, though a genealogist can probably figure it out :)]

HAPPY FATHERS DAY!

​For this post on Father's Day 2018, I thought I'd share some photographs of the fathers in my family tree. Some have had blog pages written about them, and links are provided for the earlier postings.

(left) Great-Grandfather William H. Pridham (1881-1934) with daughter;
​(right) This MAY be Isaac C. H. Pridham (1847-1924), my 2nd Great Grandfather (William's father), with other Pridham family members [photo in with other pictures of this family]
I wrote about them back in 2014 on this blog page: The Pridhams of Puddle Dock

5 generations of my Dow family in four photos: my son and I; my dad and I (on Pest Island in the Piscataqua River); my dad and Papa; Great Grandfather John T Dow and his family at Thanksgiving (1919)
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See also my pages: "John T Dow of Portsmouth, NH" and "Same Name"

My Great Great-Grandfather, John Knight, with his family (along with an unknown man in the middle, perhaps a hired hand), probably on the rented farm out on Fox Point in Newington, NH

"Going to the Chapel" - Week 23 of the #52Ancestors Challenge

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The East Eliot, Maine Methodist Episcopal Church [later First M.E., and afterwards United Methodist] was first organized in 1826, and was in existence at its Goodwin Road location until 1973, when the congregation merged with the Methodist Church located in South Eliot [and after moved to its current spot on Rt 236 in 1983].

In 2010, I purchased a collection of papers that were dated 1915, and was in regards to the much needed restoration and repairs of the old church in East Eliot, including the purchase of brand new pews. 

Within the "restoration papers", there was also a small booklet which listed the names of the donors who helped raise money for the new pews by purchasing plaques (or tags) "in honor of" or "in memory of" family members or the past ministers of the church. ​​There were 31 names who subscribed to the memorial pews, with a couple more names written onto back page. 

When the church location in East Eliot was shut down in 1973, the building was sold off, and is now a private residence. The parsonage down the street was also sold off by the heirs of the original grantors, as the deed included a provision that the home would return to the grantors once it was no longer used as a parsonage.

The pews that were purchased in 1915 must have been destroyed or sold off, as the South Eliot location was already furnished. The memorial and pew number tags were saved, however, as I recently found out last year. Stored in Eliot's current United Methodist Church are two wooden plaques, each one having (almost) all the memorial tags nailed onto them for display.

A few examples of the memorials (click on the images for a close view of photos):

There were 31 memorial tags (2 since removed and donated to heirs) on one plague, with 39 pew numbers on the other board (numbered 1-43, #22, 23, 26 (donated) and 42 not present). The pew numbers are interesting, and may have been from the original pre-1915 furniture, as the new order that year had called for 51 pieces (18 each of left end, center and right end sections). 

A few memorial tags differed from what was originally written in the donor booklet, and there is no list as to which numbered pew these memorials were attached to, if the numbers were actually used on the new (1915) furniture.

Below is a 2011 view of the church on the corner of Goodwin and Brixham Road, Eliot, pretty much unchanged today as a private residence, than it was as a place of worship.

Week 22 of the #52Ancestors Challenge - "So Far Away"
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The year was 1966, and the Christmas season was approaching. For those stationed over in Vietnam, the local (Portsmouth, NH) newspaper began a "mail call", with the families of the servicemen providing their addresses to the paper for printing, so Christmas cards could be sent overseas to them. It started the first week of November, with a dozen names, and on December 15th, the cut-off date for mailings, there were nearly 100 names on the mailing list.

​I'm not sure who submitted my father's name to the list, but I clipped one of the entries:

Below are a few pictures brought back from "so far away", taken sometime between 1965 and '67. While Google does not have a "Street View" option on their maps of this region, there are public submitted photos (links given on bottom of page) from various places in the vicinity of the beach, so I was able to match up some of the locations with the old photos (I scanned from original negatives).

(Drive-by) photos of the Po Klong Garai Temple, ca 1966. It was located near the military base (south of the airport). 

I also have several images from the market place and down town area of Phan Rang, but couldn't match them up with current images, so will close this posting with one more beach shot.

Links:
​Website with many other photos from this area in 1965-66
Wikipedia article on the Po Klong Garai Temple
Phan Rang Beach (Oct 2015, Google maps)
​Phan Rang Beach (June 2016, Google Maps)