I feel so fortunate to have home movies that include my great-grandmother, Nettie Patchen Duncan. She was born in 1858. This movie is from 1944 or 1945 so she is about 86 years old. She died in 1949.
Once again, the quality is poor, but I’m still thrilled to have this record. Nettie is the tall, white haired woman. She’s sitting in the yard in Rockford, Illinois, with her daughter-in-law, Florence Duncan (my grandfather’s second wife). The children are my older brother and sister, Tom and Jeanie. The woman in uniform is my Aunt Helen – Nettie’s granddaughter. Late in the clip is my grandfather, Thomas Leroy Duncan, Nettie’s son.
Relics from my kindergarten year (1950-1) at Lindo Park School, Lakeside, California. Kindergarten was a time to learn to be away from home, to get along with other people and listen to the teacher, and my favorite parts: graham crackers and milk, and naps. Seems ridiculous to have to mention but there was no homework as there is today. It was a year of fun. There were two classes – I was in Mrs. Lyon’s class and next door was Mrs. Westrick’s class. Mom took the movies and they have those qualities of movies then – no sound, too light or too dark, moving too fast, heads cut off, and yet, brings back memories of those times.
The first video shows the playground activities. I can recognize a few kids: Louise Hayward, Susan Diamond, Celeste Harrison, and maybe Esther Thomas. And Mrs. Westrick. I’m in the red overalls, and that surprises me – I would have expected to have to wear a dress. But you can see, pants are much more practical when you play on the bars!
Dorothy Lyons and kindergarten class.
Dorothy Lyons and kindergarten class.
One day Mom put one of our lambs into the family car and brought it to our kindergarten class for the kids to see. Of course at the time I didn’t appreciate the effort this must have taken.
The second video is our graduation day. I do remember making the construction paper hats. Both teachers are in this. I can also see Dennis Busgen, Susan Diamond, Erin Macgillivray, Ken Walling, Ron Carlson, Esther Thomas, and I think, Pat Fazio. I’m in the blue and white polka-dotted dress.
If you are in these videos, I’d love to hear from you. And if you recognize anyone, we could add that to the post.
Grandma Claycomb (Ruth Bressler Claycomb) visited us in California in the early 1950s. One of the things she did was sew geranium leaf hats for the girls. This is a clip from a home movie showing her with my sister, Jeanie, and a neighbor, Linda Renner.
This is the first time I’ve embedded a video. Found out how to convert the DVD files to an mp4 file and then make the selection into an mp4 film. Set up a channel on YouTube and uploaded it there. And wrote this post embedding the YouTube link. It seems to work. But wow, all this is not easy the first time. A bit stressful.
This I Leave 