Today is the beginning of a new project for me. This is a picture of my mother as a baby. Whenever she showed me this picture, as I was growing up, she'd say "The first time my father saw me, he said, 'She has a big mouth just like her mother!'"
... And that is my project, to share her story.
Here she is as a high school graduate.
This picture shows her as a young married. They were married in 1936 but did not have their first child until 1940.
She was born in 1917 and I will finish her biography in time to celebrate the 100th anniversary of her birth. She was an extraordinary woman and I hope to capture that in my telling of her story.
Norma was born the tenth of eleven children, two of whom died before she was born. When she was three, with a pregnant mother, her father died.
Then two years later, in 1922 her mother remarried. Her new step father told her mother he would only take on one child. That child was my mother's youngest sister. So at the age of 5 she was farmed out to relatives, an event not uncommon in those days, before the Social Security program came into being.
Good for you! I love seeing family stories on my favorite blogs. Usually summer is a perfect time to work on those stories...I'm doing my dad this year...there isn't a lot of holiday crafting in summer once we've decorated for the 4th. Your mother was born in 1917? Wow! Mine was born in 1935...but I was the oldest child in my family.
ReplyDeleteYes, Shirley, and I was toward the end, she was 37 when I was born, that's a whole generation from yours.
Deletemy grandma swenson was born in 1917 and i never tire of hearing her stories. i'm looking forward to hearing your mom's stories.
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