Mam-ma's Southern Family

I have a photo of my mother’s grandfather, George Warren Lancaster when he visited their home in Walnut Creek in California. This would have been in the late 1940s, before my mother’s parents, Tom J and Pansy Johnston, moved to Pleasant Hill in late 1949. How do I know? The background of the photo is the yard of their house in a rural part of Walnut Creek. I have other photos of my mother and my grandmother with the house in the background. This photo of Warren doesn’t show the house but it clearly shows a rural location. The Johnstons moved to a suburban tract home in 1949. I don’t know the exact location of the house. Personal records in my archives always listed their address as Route 1, Box 49 in Walnut Creek. My grandmother told me they rented the house from Mr. Ford and had wanted to buy it, but he was not interested in selling it. I did discover a 1947 directory covering Walnut Creek and Lafayette that listed Tom J. Johnston’s address as Route 1, Box 49, living on Castle Hil...

This is my third year working on this year-long prompt, hosted by Amy Johnson Crow. I will write each week in one of my two blogs, either Mam-ma’s Southern Family or at My Trails into the Past. I have enjoyed writing about my children’s ancestors in new and exciting ways. My grandfather, Tom J. Johnston once grew a beard for a contest. I had written previously about my grandfather’s beard . This post is an update because I found a record held at the Contra Costa County Historical Society that substantiates the contest. In Walnut Creek, where my maternal grandparents, Tom J. and Pansy Johnston, and their daughter, Lela Nell, lived is a yearly festival in September called the Walnut Festival. Before large housing tracts were built, the area had numerous walnut orchards and a big packing plant in downtown Walnut Creek to process the walnuts. When I was growing up in the 1960s in Walnut Creek, many of the homes had some of these old walnut trees in their yards. Kids would come to s...

I am working on this year-long prompt, hosted by Amy Johnson Crow . I will write each week in one of my two blogs, either Mam-ma’s Southern Family or at My Trails Into the Past . I’m looking forward to writing about my children’s ancestors in new and exciting ways. I found some color photos of my Johnston line taken in 1946 and I think they might be the earliest ones I have in color. They were living in Walnut Creek, California, about this time so they might have been taken there. Many surplus Army Jeeps were purchased and I guess my grandfather, Tom Johnston, bought one, too. This one is painted yellow! In the first photo is my grandmother (Mam-ma), Pansy “Joni” Johnston, my mother, Lela Nell, and my grandfather, Tom Johnston. The second photo has Pansy, Lela Nell, and Pansy’s father, Warren Lancaster. I need to dig through the box of negatives to see if I can find these to do a new scan. I believe I scanned these from the prints. I ...