What Are Your Early Memories of Your Grandparents?

When I was born, my parents lived with my paternal grandparents, so some of my earliest memories are of my grandparents.
I remember sitting in the high chair and my grandfather Tobelmann (Henry Joseph Tobelmann, Sr.) handing me a BIG pretzel stick.  I don't know how old I was but I just remember that pretzel was BIG.  I think I remember a fuss that I might not be able to eat it.  I remember I was sitting in my highchair in their kitchen, my grandfather to my left handing me the pretzel.
I also remember wanting to sit with my grandparents in church because my grandfather always gave me all the pennies in his pocket to put in the collection basket.  My own parents gave me one or two pennies, but PopPop would give me, like, 20!
I also remember the smell of my grandfather's hands.  He was a smoker and his hands smelled, I guess, like tobacco.  Somehow I equated that smell to him and it smelled good to me.

Granny and PopPop Tobelmann ca. 1960s

I remember my grandmother (Ida Mathilda Heffner Tobelmann) trying to tell me the name to call her.  I was standing in my crib calling, "Nanny, Nanny!" for her to come and get me.  She came in and told me not to call her Nanny. A Nanny is a governess.  She wanted to be called 'Granny.'  I couldn't say Granny.  It always came out Nanny.  She was disappointed, but kept it up and eventually I got it, I guess.
I also remember sitting on the back patio and Granny teaching me how to sing "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star."  I got as far as 'How I wonder what you are."  She kept going, but I just couldn't remember the rest.  I thought, wow, how does she know all those words?  My mom told me later I was about 15 months old.
I remember Granny sitting on the front porch on the glider filing her nails.  She always reprimanded me for biting my nails.  I don't know why I did it, but I couldn't stop.  I was fascinated with her filing her nails, though, and I wished I could grow my nails to be long and pretty like hers.
Granny taught me how to crochet and how to embroider when I was in high school.  Where would I be without those skills that I enjoy so immensely today?  At the time it was the hip thing to do to embroider on your jeans.  My jeans were FULL of embroidery.  I would design my own and just go wild.  I also crochteted those cloche hats made popular by Jennifer Cavalleri (Ali McGraw) in "Love Story."
Granny gave me her sewing machine that was a gift from PopPop on their first anniversary.  I still have it--and it still works.  It's the only machine I ever really used, except for a brief stint with a zigzag machine that broke.

I remember my maternal grandmother (Mary Lou Kessler Blumberg McNelly Loebe) was like a movie star to me.  She was flamboyant and beautiful and when she walked into a room every head would turn.  She just commanded the room.  She looked young and stylish and always dressed trendy, with hats and stoles and high heels and makeup.  She was the antithesis of Granny, who was matronly and stoic. 
MeeMaw worked at the BonTon Hat shop in downtown Coatesville where she made hats for all the ladies in town.  She would tell me that I would call her on the phone and say, "MeeMaw, you too busy?"  And she would answer, "I'm never too busy to talk to my beautiful granddaughter."  She always made me feel special.  I think all the grandchildren of my age group felt that way.  I never knew of all the heartache she had in her life.  
MeeMaw gave me my first piano when I was one-year-old.  It was a toy piano, but because of that and how she always praised me when I played it, I knew I wanted to really learn how to play a real piano when I was old enough.

My first birthday with my piano from MeeMaw

When I was five, MeeMaw went to England as a governess for a famous tennis pro, Fred Perry, and his family while he played in Wimbledon.  I remember hearing about Penny Perry, his daughter.  While she was in England, we took care of her prize white Pekingese (only two in the country at the time) and her budgey (parakeet).  Well, budgey died and Pinky got pregnant to the Fox Terrier down the street.  Oh, my!
We visited MeeMaw in Florida a few times. Once when she was taking care of her sick younger sister, Agnes, in Fort Lauderdale.  Then we visited her regularly when she married Elias Loebe (her third husband and love of her life) and they lived in North Miami Beach.When I was about 12, I was at Aunt Lucy's house with all the cousins and MeeMaw was there.  All my cousins called her 'Grandmother.'  It was then that I first called her Grandmother, too.  I realized MeeMaw sounded so babyish.  I could tell she noticed by the look in her eyes when I said it.  It felt so unnatural to me to say 'Grandmother.'  But then she became Grandmother for the rest of my siblings, too.  Had I known that MeeMaw was a southern name for Grandmother, I would definitely have kept the name for her.  But I was 12 and wanted to 'fit in.'  I thought I said MeeMaw because I couldn't say Grandmother as a baby.  I'm thinking maybe I will have my grandchildren call me MeeMaw.  I'll tell them it's a traditional name in the family for Grandmother.  We'll see what happens.
I had a spiritual experience with Grandmother--it happened two weeks after she died!
I was in labor at the hospital with Jewely.  My mom was there and my best friend, Donna Ramsden.  It was an easy birth--20 minutes of harder labor and it went quickly.
Later, my friend, Melanie Joncas, came to visit me from Ohio where she had moved.  Donna came over and the three of us were sitting in my kitchen and I was telling Melanie about my birth and was so happy that Donna could be there.  I told her it was easy only because my mom stood next to me and put her arms around me and just hugged me tightly.  It gave me the strength I needed to get through it.
Donna said, "Your mom was at the foot of the bed with me the whole time."
Since my eyes were closed the whole time, I just assumed it was my mother.  So I said, "Then who was holding me the whole time?" 
She said nobody was holding me.
Just then Melanie asked, "Didn't your grandmother die right before the birth?"  When I said she died two weeks before, Melanie, with tears in her eyes, said, "I feel impressed to tell you it was your grandmother holding you."
My eyes teared up because I knew at that moment that what Melanie said was true.  My grandmother, who was a nurse, would have been very comfortable in that setting and would have known exactly what I needed to get through that painful part of childbirth.
How comforting to know that one's grandmother was her guardian angel in the hospital while giving birth to her great-granddaughter, that she never met on earth, but certainly sent off to me from heaven.
I have thought a lot about Grandmother this past year.  She got divorced from an abusive man, like I did, then escaped far away to get away from him, like I did.  My mantra this year has been, "Grandmother did it, so I know I can do it, too."

MeeMaw ca. 1966

My maternal grandfather (Ralph Watson McNelly) was almost unknown to me.  He was divorced from MeeMaw when I was a child.  He only came around once a year; maybe twice.  My mom said later he used the Lord's name in vain all the time and they didn't want their kids exposed to it, so they didn't invite him over very often. 
My mother was always a stickler about using proper language because she said her father had bad grammar.  Maybe that's why I am so aware of articulation and good grammar--and apparently instilled it in my own children.
I have a memory of his death.  My mother was the one who found him in his apartment.  He had been dead for, like, three days;  asphyxiated due to emphysema.  During the 1940s--in fact, during my mother's whole four years of high school, he was in a TB asylum in the Gettysburg area.   Yet, my mom told me when they visited him there they brought him cigarettes.  Doctors hadn't put two and two together yet, I guess. He had one lung removed due to the TB, I guess, but I'm not sure when that was. 

So he died from emphysema because he never quit smoking.  So sad. 

I found out later he was the one who supplied our big Easter coconut eggs with our names on them, so that was his contribution to the grandchildren.  I found out later, too, that Aunt Lucy had him for dinner at least once a week.  He was her step-father, but she is so kind-hearted.  She told me she was just happy that he took her in and gave her a home--such as it was.  His mother was very unkind to my beloved Aunt Lucy.  She told me that later, too. 
So many things you find out 'later' in life about your relatives.  I am happy to know these things, though, because finding out the notoriety in your family certainly gives you the proper perspective to ponder, rather than always wondering--why this or why did that happen?

I'm so happy I had my grandparents to know and love while I was a child and even into my adulthood. I feel blessed in that respect.

What do you remember about your grandparents?  What are your earliest memories to share?  I'd like to know.

In Honor of My Ancestor Fathers

I see I honored my ancestor mothers on Mother's Day.  Now I will honor my ancestor fathers on this Father's Day, beginning with my dad.

Henry J. Tobelmann, Jr.

b. February 3, 1926, New Orleans, LA

d. November 14, 1989, Palm Coast, FL

My father was born in New Orleans and he and his parents never really felt 'at home' in the Northeast. They were southerners through and through. Many times my dad would refer to his offspring as 'you Yankees,' though he had lived most of his life in Pennsylvania.

My beloved Grandfather, Henry Joseph Tobelmann, Sr.

b. December 16, 1896, New Orleans, LA

d. May 4, 1968, Coatesville, PA

During the Great Depression, my grandfather lost his job at Lukens Steel Company in New Orleans.  My grandmother said he tried to make a go of selling stationery, but only made $2 a week.  Her exact words, "He only made $2 a week selling carbon paper." He was hired on at Lukens in New York, and, three years later, moved his family to East Orange, NJ while he commuted into the big city every day.  He was then transferred to Lukens Steel in Coatesville, PA at the home office.  I believe my dad was about eight years old when he moved to New Jersey.  Wouldn't that make him a Yankee, too?

My grandfather's father was Henry Rudolf August Louis Fritz Tobelmann

b. February 2, 1869 in New Orleans, LA

d. September 5, 1936 in New Orleans, LA

The picture of the children is Henry Rudolf with his two surviving sisters, Ernestine (center) and Laura.

He also had a much younger brother, August, who wasn't born at the time this photo was taken.

Henry R. had two siblings that died within days of each other in February of 1882.  I couldn't find any supporting documents on their deaths.  I assume an epidemic, illness or maybe an accident.  I know of no family stories.

On my trip to NOLA in 2001, I found his obituary and looked him up in the City Directory.
OBITUARY: TOBELMANN--At the residence, 2647 Cleveland Avenue, on Saturday evening, September 5, 1936; at 10:40 o'clock, HENRY R. TOBELMANN, in his 67th year, beloved husband of Susan Hoerner, father of Charles, Henry J., Mildred and Elfreda Tobelmann and Mrs Frank P. Deegan (Olga) and brother of August L. and Laura Tobelmann of this city and Mrs. A. E. Ewing (Ernestine) of Shreveport, La. Relatives and friends of the family, also officers and employees of sewerage and water board, of The Times-Picayune and Louisiana State Board of Health, are invited to attend the funeral, which will take place from the funeral home of Pat J. McMahon-Coburn Company, 2305 Canal Street, corner North Miro, on Monday, September 7, 1936, at 4 o'clock p.m. Interment Greenwood cemetery. (THE TIMES-PICAYUNE, MONDAY, SEPT. 7, 1936)

New Orleans, Louisiana Directories, 1890-1891:  Henry Tobelmann; Edison Electric Illuminating Co.; dynamo tender; (Location 2) 308 Gravier, New Orleans LA 1891.

I know he owned a bar, too.  My dad said he was an ornery man.  As his grandfather, he used to chase his grandchildren away and they were afraid of him.

According to Margaret Deegan Conner, his granddaughter (my dad's first cousin), Henry R. loved full-blooded fox terriers. That probably explains why Dad and Mom bought a fox terrier.  Tippy was my first dog. According to Margaret, he also had a canary. He grew peppers in his garden, and he paid his grandchildren a penny a worm to get them off the peppers.

I remember my grandfather used to recite all his names for me and I couldn't get past Rudolf because I thought of Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer.  When I met up with Margaret in NOLA in 1993, she recited all of his names, to my delight! Henry Rudolf August Louis Fritz.  I now have them all documented.  She said he was named after all his uncles, but I haven't found evidence of that.

In the bowler hat is my great-great-grandfather, Charles (Adolph Carl Friedrich August) Tobelmann, The Immigrant.

b. February 12 or 15, 1844 in Wagenfeld, Hannover, Germany

d. April 13, 1899 in New Orleans, LA

I went on a genealogy trip to NOLA in 2001 and went to the New Orleans Public Library.  I found the Obituary for Charles Tobelmann and his death certificate.
OBIT IN TIMES-PICAYUNE, N.O.L.A.: "He was a native of Germany and a resident of New Orleans for many years. He died at age 55. Mr. Tobelmann started life as a steward on the steamers plying between Bremen, Germany and New York. When the Civil War was inaugurated he remained in this country and in 1866 came to New Orleans. He engaged in the grocery business and remained in it until six years ago. At this time he retired from active life.

Besides his wife, he leaves four children, Mr. Henry Tobelmann, now in business in New Orleans, Mrs. A. E. Ewing of Pine Bluff, Arkansas, Miss Laura Tobelmann and Master August Tobelmann. Mr. Tobelmann was a member of Germania Lodge #46 F. and A.M. and was buried by that order. He was one of ten original stockholders of Jax Beer [Jackson Brewery]." (Times-Picayune obit., April 14, 1899, p.3, col.4)

Death Certificate for Charles Tobelmann, found in New Orleans Public Library, Loyala Street, NOLA, Microfilm #FF650, 1899.

"Be it remembered, etc., etc. ., J. Duffy, undertaker appeared before the recorder of births, deaths and marriages, etc., who herein declares that Charles Tobelmann, (white), a native of Wagenfeld, Hanover, Germany, aged 55 years, 2 mos., departed this life yesterday (13 April 1899) at [home?] Valence and Baronne, this city [New Orleans].

Cause of death: Sarcoma of Cervical Glands (cancer of the throat, I believe)

Certificate of Dr. F. Loeber

Deceased was married and 33 years in city.

Birth place Wagenfeld, Germany."

I have a picture of Charles in his Mason garb. He looks so familiar. Family.

The first old house photo is the birthplace of Charles Tobelmann, Wagenfeld, Hannover, Germany.

This place is still in Wagenfeld and has been renovated, kept up and passed down through the Tobelmann lineage.

Georg Tobelmann is the proprietor of what is now an exclusive restaurant and tavern.

The picture, hanging in the Hofschanke Tobelmann, was taken in 1900. 

The Hofschanke Tobelmann in Wagenfeld as it appears today, taken while my brother John visited Wagenfeld in about 2006.

The house on Valence and Baronne in NOLA, was the home of Charles and Sophie Tobelmann, (photo taken 2001).

Gloria Garrett (my father's second cousin), granddaughter of Ernestine Tobelmann, found abundant information on the ancestors of our Charles Tobelmann.  She hired someone in Wagenfeld, Germany to extract information on the Tobelmann family.  We found out, according to naming customs, we did not start out as Tobelmanns at all!

Charles' father was Friedrich Wilhelm (or Henrich) Auffurth. When he married his wife, a Tobelmann widow who lived at the Tobelmann farm, he had to take that last name because your last name came from where you lived. Thus, his children were all named Tobelmann.

My brother, John, was able to travel to Wagenfeld a few years ago and meet the Tobelmanns descended from Margaretha Dorothee Louise Dehlfing Tobelmann and her first husband, Georg Friedrich Tobelmann. They are our 4th half cousins. It was a grand reunion. 

Cousin Gloria did the family a great service by finding all the information on our Auffurth ancestors back to 1714.

I don't understand why anyone would want to locate to New Orleans--it is stinkin' hot and humid there most of the year--but Charles had a plan, I guess.  He married Sophie Droge, whose parents came from Germany as well.  I do have pictures of her and her parents.

The four generation shot is of Sophie Droge Tobelmann, holding her great-granddaughter, Rheba Steadman. Her daughter, Ernestine Tobelmann Ewing and granddaughter, Regina Ewing Steadman, mother of the baby, are in the photo. Gloria Garrett sent me a copy.

Catherine Sophia Droge, b. July 3, 1845, New Orleans, LA, d. June 26, 1931, NOLA

The little house with the wrote iron fence was the home of Sophie Droge Tobelmann after the death of Charles, at 1021 Foucher St., NOLA, (photo taken 2001 by me).

Sophie's Parents were Elisa Haustermann Droge, b. March 9, 1820, Land Wursten, Amt of Dorum, Kingdom of Hannover, Germanym d. December 26, 1882, NOLA, and Nicholaus (Claus) Droge, 

b. March 4, 1812, Land Wursten, Amt of Dorum, Kingdom of Hannover, Germany, d. May 12, 1879, NOLA.

Gloria sent me those copies too, but they're not very good. But I'm happy to have them.

Wursten was originally a Frisian Land, and was a free peasant republic until 1525 (non-feudal). It is located on the right bank of the Weser estuary, just north of Bremerhaven, the main German port through which emigrants left for the US.

Rheba Steadman, the baby in the photo above, was a great genealogist.  She left her work to her sister, Gloria Steadman Garrett.  Many thanks to caring cousins who shared their hard-earned information.

I am grateful to all of my ancestor fathers (and mothers) without whom I wouldn't be who I am today.  I can't imagine the sacrifices they had to make to leave their country and start new lives here in America.  I am grateful to be born in this land of freedom.  I don't know what I did to deserve it, but it couldn't be done without those who went before.  Thank you. Thank you. Thank you...

Describe Your Childhood Home

I had a few childhood homes. 

I was born into my grandparents' home on Olive Street in Coatesville. That's me in 2012, with blonde hair, visiting back east.  I had the front bedroom (the window far right), and my parents slept in the fixed up basement apartment (sans bathroom).  My grandparents had the back bedroom, all were quite small. There was one bathroom, a living room, dining area and kitchen. It was a quaint 2-bedroom ranch house with an ample back yard for gardens and fruit trees. It was built with my dad's GI bill in about 1950 or so.  I spent the first three years of my life there. It is very like my first purchased home in Telford, a ranch style, only we had three bedrooms.

Added 2017--the hedges and rose bushes are gone

Added 2017--to the left is where the cherry tree used to be. My grandmother's clothesline is till there.

Added 2017--this back yard used to be full of fruit trees and a big garden, and hedges all around it

My second home was right down the street at 1417 Olive Street.  It was a 3-bedroom stucco Tudor-looking home with living room, dining room and kitchen on the main floor, 3 small bedrooms on the second floor and garage and basement on the first floor.  The back yard was large.  Funny how I remember the basement most of all from that house.
My mom would do the laundry down there and I would play with my dolls.  She had a wringer washer/dryer.  I can remember that thing moving up and down as it chugged the laundry clean.  Then my mom would hold the laundry through the wringer to flatten it like pancakes.  Then she would set up a clothesline in the basement during the winter to dry the clothes (summer was an outside line). All the while she would listen to soap operas on the radio.
Meanwhile, I had a knock-off version of a Betsy Westy doll.  I had a bath-a-net for her and I would bathe Betsy while my mom did her laundry.
The basement was also where I had a place set up to do my painting.
I can also remember when my grandmother's dog, Pinky, had her puppies.  I played down in the basement with the puppies there.
This photo is recent (2012). Our house didn't look like this. The bottom was brick, but the top was stucco with wood--Tudor style. I'm not thrilled with what this family did to the house. Orange siding with red brick . . . uh . . . no.

Added 2017--they added a front porch and a garden 

Added 2017

At the end of first grade we moved again to a home north of town at 1107 Scott Drive.

It was a 4-bedroom split level to accommodate our growing family of six at that time, soon to be grown to 10 in the next few years.  It was red brick and wood siding.  That is where I spent the remainder of my childhood.  In the beginning I had my own room.  When Kathy was born, I shared my room with her and any subsequent baby that was born, as a crib was incessantly in my bedroom. We always had two cribs, one in my room and one in another room that housed either my brother, Henry, or my grandmother when she lived with us for awhile.

Consequently, my dad made over the attic into a boys dormitory when I was about 16.  I got my own room; Kathy and Chrissy shared a room; Henry got his own room, too; and the rest of the boys: Andrew, Warren, John and Jeffrey took over the dormitory. My parents, of course, had the master bedroom/bath.

We had 2-1/2 bathrooms.  The main floor was the kitchen, living room and dining room.  A few steps up into the bedroom area, then a few steps up into the attic dorm.  A few steps down from the kitchen was what we called the play room or rec room.  There was also a laundry room and a powder room.  The 2-car garage was off the play room.  In the beginning we did have 2 cars in there, but as my mom began her careers in Home Interiors and quilting, the garage was turned into a warehouse/workplace for her, then a quilt shop.

We had 3/4 acre in mostly oak trees and others like poplar and some evergreen.  My dad was like a master gardener and built lots of gardens with all the stone that was dug out of our yard.  He never could grow grass much because of all the shade trees, but he loved to grow flowers.  We had beauties all over the yard.

With as big as our family was, it astonishes me that we didn't have a vegetable garden.  That was something I undertook when I got my own houses later.  But, like I said, we did not have much sun except in the front yard, so I guess my dad just stuck with flowers, which he loved.

As a result, a few of us siblings have green thumbs like my dad and his dad before him.  Gardening is one love that runs in the family.  I hope my children will inherit that love of plant, tree, flower and vegetable gardening.

How many childhood homes did you have?  What did they look like?