Week 1 - Foundations

Week 1 of 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks, 2022 version! By Amy Johnson Crow / Generations Café.

Week 1: Foundations
The theme for January and for Week 1 is "Foundations." Some ways you might interpret this include focusing on the person who sparked your interest in family history, a builder in your family tree, or the person who is the bedrock of your family.

This theme got me thinking on who sparked my family history. It was my father, but it was a gravestone he took me to.

Let me start at the beginning, when I was about 14 years old, I believe I had a family history project I had to do in my Social Studies class. Even though, it was after the project, my father asked me if I wanted to visit some relatives. I said yes. I know we picked up his sister and I am not sure who else was with us, but he drove to the countryside and we ended up at a Cemetery.

My aunt had found this gravestone and I thought about their mother. At this point, I did not know who their parents were. When I saw the stone, it was lying on the ground and I could see Patrick’s age at time of death. I recorded the information that I found.

This tombstone started the questions, I knew I descended from the parents, but who were their parents? Was this all their living children and did they have to start over with their family.

Many years later when I started my research I found that their parents were James Crinion and Mary Ann McMahon. James was born on 2 Feb 1832 in Louth, Ireland and died 25 Feb 1923 in Fountain Prairie, Columbia, Wisconsin. His wife was born in 1839 in Monaghan, Ireland and died 11 Aug 1899 in Doylestown, Columbia, Wisconsin.

This cemetery predates the Cemetery at the St Patrick’s Church in Doylestown, Columbia, Wisconsin where the rest of the family is basically buried.

Eliza, Ann and Patrick were their first three children. Mary Ann was pregnant with her fourth child, my great grandfather, David Crinion who was born 15 May 1864 in Fountain Prairie, Columbia, Wisconsin.

James and Mary Ann had a total of 10 children, Eliza lived 7 years, 1 month and 1 day, Ann lived 1 year, 6 months and 15 days, Patrick lived 2 years and 19 days, David lived 85 years, 9 months and 22 days, Rose lived 24 years, 25 days and died during childbirth, her daughter did survive. Jane lived 45 years, 11 months and 28 days, Charles lived 60 years 7 months and 2 days, John lived 70 years, 7 months and 2 days. John went to an institution after his father’s death; I believe he had some sort of learning disability. Mary lived 17 years, 4 months and 4 days, and James (Jr) lived 28 years, 8 months and 8 days.

Mary had to bury 5 of her children while James buried 7 of his children. Of their 10 children, only David, Rose and Jane had children. Rose as mentioned previously, only had one child, a child that James and Mary raised most of her childhood. The child did finally go live with her father, his wife and her half-siblings. David had 7 children, two who died in infancy, while Jane had 11 children. One of Jane’s sons died 4 days after her mother and she had three children who died before adulthood and four children that I know were deceased by 1982, that I need to do some more research on. Yahoo for this 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks challenge, otherwise, I might not have realized that I was missing valuable information.

In the Will of James Crinion, I got a little insight into the Irish temper he might have had. “It is my will that the children of my daughter, Jennie (Jane) Spooner, shall take nothing under this my will, for the reason that provision was made for my said daughter in her lifetime, and because my grand-children, being the children of my said daughter Jennie, have never assisted me in any way , and it is also my wish that my grand-daughter, Rose Mary Kannedy, do not receive any part of my estate, she having previously received One Hundred Dollars ($100.00) from me and being in a position to provide for herself.

Rose Mary was the daughter of Rose, this was the grandchild that James and Mary raised from infancy. I also, show that her married name was really Canada.