Tom and Mary

About 140 years ago, give or take, way over on the Eastern side of Nova Scotia there were two Nickerson sisters, Cordelia and Mary. Cordelia married William Johnston and Mary married William's brother, Thomas. Mary and Thomas had nine children. Clarence, their first, was born in 1886; Everett, their ninth, was born in 1911. Thomas died in 1935 at the ripe old age (i.e., the age I will become if I live another three weeks) of 82. Mary, who was fourteen years her husband's junior, lived on until November 1954, six months after I turned fourteen. I remember her well. She was my great-grandmother.

The house that Thomas built to raise his family in was at the end of a long dirt road - dirt to this day, I believe - in a place called North Ogden. My grandmother (Thomas and Mary's third child) ended up living in the North Ogden house in the last years of her life, so I spent many hours there, always wondering how it managed to still be standing, and worrying that the rotten floor boards would give in at any moment from the weight of the modern refrigerator, which the kitchen was barely able to support. We couldn't use the two bedrooms on the second floor, because of the bats. How Tom and Mary were able to raise nine kids in that house is a mystery. No indoor plumbing. How did they all bathe? I wonder. How did they survive the winters? Uncle Clarence died a year before his mother, so that must have been rough. But not as rough as losing two of her children when they were still quite small, Lola at age two and Everett at age four. No 9-1-1 in those days, no dentists, no vaccines. I like to think I come from hardy folk. I base that on the fact that Clarence lived to 67, Cliff to 85, Mabel, my grandmother, to 83, my grandfather, Mabel's husband, to 94, Harold to 85, and Rollie to almost 85.

Because my grandmother left Canada and moved to Boston, I grew up with a New Englander identity, but the Nova Scotia identity occasionally overpowered it. The daughters of the American Revolution got hold of my grandmother's name somehow and came a-calling one day to invite her to join their organization. They left, tea half-drunk and cookies half-eaten when my grandmother informed them they were barking up the wrong tree. Her ancestors were not of Puritan stock, and had no intention of migrating to the New World in 1776. When they did, finally,  it was to Canada that they came, not to the U.S., and we grew up with photos of Queen Victoria on the walls of our bedrooms, the granddaughter of George III.

My father was never any good at expressing emotions, until he got old - and then he got quite sentimental. But it was clear that he lived for his summer vacations when we would all pile in the car and make the trek "down East" back to Nova Scotia. He loved his many aunts and uncles. Harold was his favorite. Grandma Mary, because she had so many kids to care for, decided to give one of them - Harold - to her sister. So Harold was raised by Aunt Cord and Uncle Will.

I developed a sense of affection for Harold, too. Didn't have the same degree of contact with Uncle Harold as my father did, but I loved his ability to tell stories. People in his generation didn't have much of a social life. No cinemas, no bars, no money to travel. So they memorized poetry and we never tired of another recitation of "The Cremation of Sam McGee."

He had a great sense of humor. When one of his sisters-in-law died, another sister-in-law carried on a bit too long in Harold's view. "What, oh what ever are we going to do now?" she sobbed.

"Bury her, I suppose," said Harold.

I don't know Harold's entire history, but I do know he had a crush on a woman named Geraldine when he was young. But he blew it and cheated on her, whereupon she upped and moved to Calgary, never, he thought, to be seen again. Harold then lived as a bachelor until he was fifty, when he married a sixty-year-old woman named Annie who intimidated the daylights out of me. She was the local postmistress and took her job - and life - quite seriously. I lived in fear of spilling something or saying the wrong thing. Couldn't get away fast enough when we would go visit her house - it was her house, not Uncle Harold's.

She died, eventually, and Geraldine - Gerry - learned Harold was now free and came back to Nova Scotia to see if they could pick up where they left off - half a century later. Things clicked, and they had a wonderful few years together before he passed on. When he did, Aunt Gerry continued to drive over from Isaac's Harbour to visit in her shiny new red Toyota, which she drove at breakneck speed well into her 90s. Each time she said good-bye, somebody chimed in with "How the hell does she manage to keep her license?"

I haven't been back to Nova Scotia in years, but when people ask me where I feel most at home, I tell people I have four homes: "Tokyo, Berlin, the San Francisco Bay Area, and rural Nova Scotia."

 

Cousin Betty - the daughter of Tom and Mary's eighth child - was given to Carrie, Tom and Mary's fourth child - to raise when her mother died and her father felt overwhelmed at the thought of raising three daughters on his own. Handing your children over to a sibling was clearly just one of those things you did when the going got rough. Betty raised five kids and is now grandmother and great-grandmother to a considerable number of others. She lives in Halifax. We are in close touch and spend a lot of time filling in the family tree. Just when you think you've heard all the tales, another one pops up.

This morning Betty sent me this photo of Thomas and Mary Johnston of North Ogden, her

grandparents, my great-grandparents. It was the first time I had seen what my great-grandfather looked like. I didn't know any photos existed.

Had to share...

The photo at the top is of Thomas and Mary Johnston of North Ogden, Nova Scotia, taken sometime (best guess) in the 1920s or early 1930s at the latest. The photo to the right is the house they raised their nine kids in. I've written about this part of the family history before, two postings in 2014 (here and here) and once in 2021.