Their strength got us through childhood, but first through birth. What wonders our mothers had...pushing us into the world after we had been snuggled under their hearts so long.
That strength got us through young adulthood, when we discovered our own minds, our own sexuality, our own paths that would start us going toward where we are today. For many of us the strength of our mother was shown when we defied her, and then she had the wisdom to let go.
This Mother's Day I share the strong shoulders who lifted me up so many time when I fell, who embraced me while I cried, and who fed me and gave me life.
My mother in the years before me!
My parents, Mataley Mozelle Webb Munhall Rogers (1917-2003) and George Rogers in their elder years...
Dad's mother, Ada Rogers, in her elder years.
My mother's mother, Mozelle Booth Munhall (1897-1960) in her younger years.
Mozelle Munhall in her elder years
My great grandmother Eugenia Almeda Booth Miller (1873-1936, mother of Mozelle) in her elder years.
This photo below is dated '25, where Eugenia B. Miller stood next to my mother, Mataley, as a child with 2 of her friends, at her home in San Antonio TX. I was named Barbara Booth after my great grandmother! In 1925 my great grandmother would have been 52, and my mother would have been 8.
The Booth family home, built in 1855, Hillsborough TX (photo from the 1970s)
And I'll give a bit of my genealogy of the Booth mothers in my ancestry.
Eugenia Booth Miller's mother was
Eugenia Almeda Witty Booth (1852-1875) who lived in the Booth home in Hillsborough TX.
Her mother was
Susan Elizabeth Hoke Witty (1817-1895) who first moved from Alabama to Hill County TX.
Her mother was
Elizabeth Hunt Hoke (about 1793-1846) who may have been born in South Carolina or Alabama.
Her mother was unknown.
I have a few thousand grandmothers, but many of them don't have their mothers' names. So when I look back 12 generations or so, these mothers were usually through their sons in my records. But this post is just about the mothers of mothers. I would not qualify since I only had 3 sons.
Lovely photographs of the mothers and mothers of mothers.
ReplyDeleteA terrific choice for Mother's Day weekend. Your mother's first photo with the tilt of her head is a stunning portrait. Is it a graduation picture?
ReplyDeleteKathy - thanks...it was fun looking for all of them!
ReplyDeleteMike - Hey, like your new portrait pic! I think that pic of my younger mom was done around the time my folks got engaged...there's a similar one of my father. They were looking rather dapper then.
Wonderful photos, all. But the one of your maternal grandmother, Mozelle, in her later years - dressed in a spiffy black (I'm assuming) and white summer dress, remind me of my Grandma Louise. My two grandmas (maternal and paternal) couldn't have been more different. My father's mother was very prim and proper and dressed in dark, 'appropriate' for an elder lady, type clothes. My mother's mother loved to wear such things as found in "Seventeen" magazine. She could get away with it, though, because she was perky and petite and I admired her so much for being her 'own person' in that way and determined I would be the same which is not difficult in this day and age when anyone of any age dresses any way they want and hallelujah!
ReplyDeleteGail - thanks for telling me about your grandmother's style in dresses. The shot of my maternal grandmother in black and white is probably one of her own styles as she was an excellent fashion seemstress. (And I don't know that it was black and white either, since the photo was given to me years after the fact! It could be red and yellow, wouldn't that be a hoot?)
ReplyDeleteI was going to do this with my mothers, but ran out of steam. I enjoyed yours.
ReplyDeleteHi Kristin...I know what you mean. These days are pulled every which way, and sometimes that means I just don't do what I intended at all but put my feet up with a novel!
ReplyDelete