The Historic Family Bible

For my Saturday Style today I am going to share one of my favorite stories about my old house.

 After we bought the house in 1997, a neighbor told us that Florence, who had been born in the house in 1910, and who inherited it in 1935 was still alive and living in a neighboring town.  They gave me her phone number and I was able to go and talk to her, in her home, about the house, and her memories.  She had some great stories and I loved talking to her and seeing family heirlooms, including a picture of my parlor taken in 1911.

Several years later, I was attending an estate sale in this same town, as I looked around I saw an urn like the one I had seen when visiting Florence, and it struck me that I was in the same house and that this was her estate.  Of course I scooped up lots of memorabilia, including the items shown in the shadow box below.

Among the effects of this woman who had gone into a care facility, was the bible shown above.  Old family bibles are popular here in Utah and go for a pretty penny, so I didn't want to buy it if it was not from the family that had built my house.  I checked it for family pages to be sure, but could find none, there were no family pages in the front or back, nor was their a name inscribed.  I decided against it, since I couldn't be sure it was the Dixon's

After I got home, the antique dealer running the estate sale called me (remember I am also an antique dealer, so I know him personally) and said he had found initials on the clasp.  They were the correct initials, so I went back and bought the bible, brought it home and placed it in my entry way.

6 or 7 years later, my next door neighbor, Coralee, who is descended from the brother of the man that built my house, was visiting.  She saw my bible and said she had one just like it that had come down through her family.  I told her how I knew it belonged to the Dixons because of the initials on the clasp ... that is when she said, "Well, the family pages in my bible are in the middle."  Sure enough, there they were!  We laughed and laughed.

I even submitted the story and it was published in Victorian Homes magazine a few years back.  I still smile when I lay eyes on 'my' bible with its illusive family history!