Genealogy
As the youngest of my Grandma and Grandpa Byer’s family, my Aunt Sandy got to hear all the stories of her family’s lives, starting at a very young age. Her siblings were already out there doing things with their lives, and it all sounded so interesting to her. I suppose that is why she has been the one that was most interested in the family stories, and my go to person when I need information on this person or that person for a story I’m working on. I really need that kind of a person, because there are many stories I hadn’t heard before. I have enjoyed our talks so much, and look forward to the next one. It’s funny, that sometimes when I ask my mom about something to do with one of her siblings, she will say, “I was married by that time, but Sandy will know.” And mom is right.
Of course, eventually Aunt Sandy began to have stories of her own unique experiences, such as the traveling peddler of sorts, who was allowed to take a picture of Grandma, Grandpa, and Aunt 
Sandy, or the trip she and grandma took to Wisconsin to visit my family, when we lived there. And as a little girl, she became an aunt at an early age when my cousin Susie was born. They would be almost like sisters in those younger years, and at least, great playmates. Every life has a story to tell, and Aunt Sandy paid attention to all the stories, keeping them safe in her memory files…just waiting for someone to take an interest in all of those little treasures waiting there. Some people have a knack for remembering the really interesting stories of a family’s past, and Aunt Sandy is one of those people. She has an amazing memory for the details of situations that happened a long 
time ago, and she can relate them in such a way as to keep her audience spellbound throughout her story. That is a great skill to have.
These days, Aunt Sandy has retired from the job she held for many years, and she is taking life a little easier. She and my mom have been spending a little more time together, and that has been such a nice thing for my mom. She hasn’t gotten out as much is the last few years, so those get togethers with Aunt Sandy have become very special. Today is Aunt Sandy’s birthday. Happy birthday Aunt Sandy!! Have a great day!! We love you very much!!
One year ago today…on her birthday, my niece, Ashley found herself in labor with her first child. While her daughter, Reagan would not arrive until the next day, it would still be a day that would herald a change in her life. That birthday…her 22nd…would be the last day before she became a mother. The last day before her precious little girl would come in and change everything. It is hard to imagine what it is going to be like to be someone’s mother…until it happens to you. We all think we have an idea, but we don’t…not until that little teeny life comes and wraps it’s tiny little fingers around your heart, and you find yourself totally smitten. You can’t imagine the love you feel until you feel it for yourself.
For some time, even before she and my nephew, Eric got engaged, Ashley wanted nothing more than to be his wife, and later, the mother of his children. They became pregnant just 6 months after their marriage, and the excitement of their growing family filled all of us with joy. It had been a number of years since we had a new baby in the family, and it would be Jennifer’s first grandchild. It was an exciting time. I had hoped that Ashley would have the baby on her birthday, and I thought maybe I had picked it. Reagan wasn’t quite ready…but she was just a dream away. So, Ashley’s birthday remained her own, and the birth of her daughter would have to wait for the 
next day. For one more day, Ashley would be a young wife, but not yet a mother.
Much has changed over this past year. Reagan is almost one…but that is tomorrow’s story. Ashley has been a wonderful mom, and has had a wonderful first year of motherhood. She and Eric and her parents have been remodeling the house that they bought to start their little family in. They are working hard to finish it, while enjoying their time with Reagan and with the horses her parents keep on their land next door. The year has been a busy one, and also one filled with dreams and their becoming reality. Ashley calls it building the dream, and so it is, but this day belongs to her. Today is Ashley’s birthday. Happy birthday Ashley!! Have a great day!! We love you!!
I never knew my cousin Denny as a child, because I was not born yet, but I love looking at the old pictures of him and his brother, Gene. The both look so happy. Gene looks so proud that he has a little brother. It occurs to me that my cousin, Denny had to be a fun loving kid, because he so often is seen laughing, and I also think he must have been a curious kid, who didn’t like being cooped up in a stroller for very long…but then, what kid really ever did.
When my sisters and I were young, my cousin, Denny and his wife, Sandy lived here in Casper. We got to see them quite a bit, and I even babysat their son, David…my sisters might have too, but I can’t say for sure. We always loved having them come over to our house to visit. Then, they moved to Oregon, and we hardly got to see them anymore. We all really missed them a lot. Distance always seems to make the passing of time seem less noticeable, until you realize just how much time has truly passed….then you tend to feel the loss of those years very deeply. That is how I feel about the years that have gone by since we last saw Denny’s family, Gene’s family, and Aunt Laura. Both Gene and Aunt Laura are gone now, and that makes it all that much more sad. For that reason, I am very thankful for Facebook, so that those relationships can at least be rekindled virtually, if not in person.
Denny, like several of us in the family, inherited the family history bug. He has done extensive work on the history of our family and then collaborated with Uncle Bill to take it even further. Of course, there were others who helped too, including Denny’s brother, Gene, and their mom, my Aunt Laura, and his nephew, Tim, as well as a little help from me. It was a labor of love so that they could pass that precious history down to the rest of the family members…and my family and I have been blessed to be some of those people. Today is Denny’s birthday. Happy birthday Denny!! Have a wonderful day!! We love you!!
My Uncle Jim had a different kind of life than what many of us can understand. His dad passed away when Uncle Jim was only 8 years old, just shortly before his dad’s youngest son, my Uncle Jim’s brother David was born. Most kids his age would have crumbled, so to speak, but not Uncle Jim. His mom needed his help. There were the children to care for, and the new baby was coming. There was little time to grieve, because there was much work to do. When his brother arrived, Uncle Jim instantly became a surrogate father of sorts. He took on the big responsibility if helping to raise his younger brother, and of showing him the kind of man their dad would want him to be. I know that as a little boy, you would think that he couldn’t do much, but he did what he could, and as he got older, he took on more and more responsibility where his younger siblings were concerned.
Even though Uncle Jim had lots of responsibility at home, he didn’t let that interfere with his school activities. While I can’t say what kind of a student he was, I can tell you that he was an amazing athlete…especially in the area of the hurdles. He and his brothers set a number of records in Bassett, Nebraska for various sports, and Uncle Jim, especially in the hurdles. Uncle Jim also set a standard of behavior in that high school. When he went back for one of his class reunions, another student, who was a self confessed wild child, told Uncle Jim that if it weren’t for him, he probably wouldn’t have survived high school…explaining that there were a number of times that he was driving home drunk, and wouldn’t have made it if he had not been able to follow my Uncle Jim home. I’m sure that the man probably surprised Uncle Jim with that revelation, because I know that if Uncle Jim would have know that the boy was driving drunk, he would have just taken him home.
After high school, Uncle Jim and several of his brothers would move to Casper, and some would live with Uncle Jim, including his youngest brother Dave. Later after he married my Aunt Dixie, his mother would move to Casper, and live with them for some time. He and my Aunt Dixie have always been all about family, whether it was his, hers, or their own family. They are close to all of them, and they are a blessing to all of them, and anyone else who has the pleasure of knowing them, too. Today is my Uncle Jim’s birthday. Happy birthday Uncle Jim!! Have a wonderful day!! We love you!!
Before my Grandpa Spencer passed away from cancer, on October 19, 1951, his life had held some difficult, sad, and lonely moments. My Uncle Bill writes that his suffering, from the pain that comes with cancer, “increased steadily for the last year and a half…then it was over”, and no matter what mistakes he had made in his life, all that was left was sadness that it was over…longing for a few more days to settle matters…to find peace with what was coming. My Uncle Bill took care of him in those last years, and while there were some hard feelings between them in earlier years, in the end, Uncle Bill was very sorry that he was gone…I know that by the way he talked about his dad and his death. Grandpa wasn’t always the easiest person to be around, but in the later years, he and Uncle Bill had made a way…a careful relationship, I suppose, but it was a relationship at least, and for some years, there wasn’t even that.
Don’t get me wrong, Uncle Bill loved his dad, but he didn’t always agree with everything his dad said or did…but then, what kid does. Grandpa was a man of the times. In those days you didn’t think twice about giving your kid a good spanking if they needed it, and in fact, you didn’t have an issue with taking someone else’s child to task if they got out of line. That said, you also didn’t pick on someone else’s kid either. One time Uncle Bill had been sent to town to get some money from his dad who worked on the railroad and lived in town during the week. Grandpa decided to buy him a sarsaparilla in the bar…which was ok at that time…and while there, another man began picking on my Uncle Bill. Well, his dad, my grandpa, told the man to leave his son alone, and when he would not, a fight ensued, and grandpa beat him up. Uncle Bill always felt like that was a very special event in his life. He was pleased that his dad had stood up for him in that way. Nevertheless, a few years later, there was some discord between the two men. Theirs was a guarded relationship for a long time, but in the end, they had started to work out their differences, and then time ran out.
Sometimes, when you read through the journals of another person, or in this case, the family history written by a man who dedicated his life to telling the family story as clearly 
as he understood it, you find yourself taking a look deep into the reality of human relationships. No matter how annoyed we can be at someone, we can also love them very much. And when it comes to the point of their passing, those difficult relationships can leave a very different kind of hole in our lives…one filled with “what if’s” and “if only’s”, and once that person is gone, no way to change the relationship for the better or at least, forgive that past. Those who are left behind, must deal with their own feelings within themselves, because there is really no one there to talk to about it all. Nevertheless, I believe that Grandpa knew that his son loved him and I believe he loved Uncle Bill and his other children very much, too.
For many years, my Uncle Bill asked everyone he knew to write to him. With our busy lives, few of us kept at it for very long. He always wanted the letters to be hand written, not typed if at all possible, and whenever he wrote back, it was always hand written. That always seemed like such major undertaking to most people, and sadly I was just as guilty as most other people in Uncle Bill’s life. I tried to write him regularly, but I just never really met that goal. As time went on, my letters got further and further apart. In recent years, Uncle Bill’s dementia has changed things, so now he doesn’t know that we haven’t written in a while, but that doesn’t excuse the fact that we didn’t do the one thing he asked us to do.
The problem was that, none of us really understood the reason. Now that I have begun looking through the many family history documents Uncle Bill has, I am beginning to understand the value of those had written letters. Of course, Uncle Bill’s family history has a variety of letters from different people in it, but the thing that has made the biggest impression on me…Uncle Bill’s handwriting. I never would have guessed that it would be his handwriting that would stay with me so long.
I always thought that handwriting was handwriting. I never felt like it held anything so special…until now. I had asked my cousin Tracey to send me some photos from her side of our family, and she happily obliged. To my astonishment, the pictures were some that were sent to her family by none other than, my Uncle Bill. I knew it because I recognized that handwriting. I think I will always recognize that handwriting. I find that amazing, somehow. It’s like the story has gone full circle now. Uncle Bill understood how valuable handwriting is…and now so do I. I only wish I had seen it sooner, when it could have meant something to Uncle Bill to see my handwriting a little more often.
My Uncle Bill has been a self proclaimed “gun nut” for years. He collected them, sold them, traded them, and went to gun shows for many years to deal his guns. He knows more about guns than most people know about themselves. I don’t remember a time that he didn’t deal guns. He knew about guns of all kinds, and could talk to you for hours about any gun you wanted to discuss, but by far his favorite, was the Spencer Rifle. He was always into the family history, and the inventor of the Spencer Rifle was an ancestor of ours, so that held particular interest for my Uncle Bill. What has always alluded my uncle, however, was exactly how we are related to Christopher Miner Spencer. Knowing how long and hard he has searched for that relationship, and that dementia has now stopped that search for him, made me sad. I decided to expand my own records in search of the elusive relationship…doing so for me, but more importantly for my Uncle Bill. I only wish he would be able to remember it once we tell it to him. As I searched, first backward from Christopher to someone I recognized, and then forward in my own tree to Christopher, my thoughts centered on my uncle and how excited he would be. I intend to write him a letter and include my story, and I only wish I could be there to see his face light up. My search finally paid off, and I know that Christopher Miner Spencer is my 5th cousin 5 times removed. I believe that would make him my uncle’s 5th cousin 4 times removed. Now that I have the relationship straight, I feel like I can proceed with the story about this amazing man.
Christopher Spencer was trained as a machinist beginning at the tender age of 14 years, while working as an apprentice in a silk manufacturing company and then went to work at the Samuel Colt factory in Hartford, Connecticut, where he learned arms making. The colt factory made pistols and other side arms, but Christopher was convinced that he could design a breech-loaded repeating rifle that would be easily and rapidly reloaded. Once he had his rifle…the Spencer rifle finished, it was put through rigorous testing, including burying it in the sand and immersing it in salt water overnight. The rifle fired successfully over 250 times, with only one misfire. The gun was shown to army and navy commanders, including General Ulysses S Grant, who called it “the best breech loading arms available”. The next step was to take it to the White House.
On August 17, 1863, Christopher Spencer arrived at the White House with the rifle in hand. Imagine that happening today…you couldn’t do it. Abraham Lincoln, 
welcomed Christopher into the White House, and after a brief introduction, the two men went over the rifle top to bottom and inside out. The President then invited Christopher back to the White House for a demonstration to take place on The Mall…another amazing thought in this day and age. The demonstration took place the next day, and the rifle headed to the Civil War. In fact, the rifle was to the Civil War what the Atomic Bomb was to World War II. Uncle Bill was always proud that a Spencer ancestor had made such a remarkable and valuable contribution to the victory in the Civil War.
As a young wife, I found myself in the unique position of being the only person in the position to help my father-in-law during the day when he was building their home. We had moved our mobile home onto their land while we were getting our own land ready to live on. At that time, my father-in-law was leveling an area of land so that he could build the home he planned to build on it. His way of leveling the land was to have me drive the tractor…something I had never done before…while pulling a scoop, guided by him behind it. My first worry was that I would go too fast and end up dragging him behind the tractor. He reassured me that it would be ok, and I knew he needed me to be there for him, so with a pain in the pit of my stomach, I set out. There were a few jerky movements, but in no time, I got the hang of it, and found that we worked well together. It was an experience that I will never forget…for a city girl, who had never driven a tractor, it was…well, amazing!
As I was scanning pictures from my Uncle Bill’s lifelong accounting of our family history, I came across something that made my experience look like learning to ride a bicycle. My Great Aunt Bertha, my Grandpa Spencer’s sister, was raised by a family named Hoover. I don’t know all the reasons behind that situation, but Uncle Bill simply states that she and her mother could not get along. The Hoover family used a steam tractor, and Great Aunt Bertha learned to operate them very well. Today, that might not seem like something so awfully special, but that was back in about 1910, and the girls didn’t do that kind of work much. Nevertheless, there were then, as there are now, people go beyond the normal expectations to do the extraordinary. Great Aunt Bertha was one of those people. She was well known for her ability to operate the steam tractor…so well known, in fact that in 1956, while attending an antique tractor and thresher show, one of the old timers, who 
knew Great Aunt Bertha, offered to let her take the steam tractor for one last spin.
He didn’t have to offer twice. Great Aunt Bertha jumped at the chance to drive that incredible machine one more time. She got on and drove it like she had never been away from the farm. I suppose that it is like a bicycle in that way. Once you have learned to operate it, you never really forget. So here was Great Aunt Bertha driving around on that old steam tractor again in the year 1956, at the age of 61 years. I would have loved to be there to see that. There were likely men there who would not have been able to run that machine, and here was this little old girl, driving it like she was born there. Amazing!!
During World War II, while my dad was serving in the Army Air Force at Great Ashfield, Suffolk, England, my Uncle Bill, who was passed over for military service due to his flat feet, worked at the Globe Shipbuilding Co in Superior, Wisconsin. My family was made up of patriots from way back. My aunts, Laura and Ruth worked in the shipyards as well, as riveters on the ships. Times were tough, and the war was expensive, but necessary. They all worked hard, sometimes seven days a week, twelve hours a day, and they were glad to do it. They were doing their part, it was something they were all very proud of…as were many people in those days. It was a time, when people put others first and themselves last. They saw what needed to be done and they did it. They didn’t sit back and expect others to take care of them. The got out there and they worked hard.
Still, as with any occupation, especially one that is grueling physical labor, you have to have some down time is order to rejuvenate yourself for the future tasks that you will encounter. With the gas rationing that was normal for that time in history, they couldn’t travel very far for their rest and relaxation, so the members of my dad’s family who were “holding down the fort” at home, took to the local parks and recreation areas for a little bit of picnic fun.
Places like Pattison Park and a friend’s cabin at Lake Minnesuing became places of refuge. They provided the war weary workers a place to get away from all the worry and fear for those in harm’s way…a little bit of a distraction from all that was going on in a world that had gone crazy. Gas rationing limited the plaes they could go, so they had to stay close to home, and they had to limit the outings. We don’t understand gas rationig in this day and age. We know about rising gas prices, but not rationing, where you only get so much a week or a month…where you learn to walk places or ride a bicycle places, but they did. It was a way of life during World War II. Sacrifices had to be made to ensure that evil did not 
take over this world, and the people of that time, military and civilian did what they had to do to see to it that evil did not take over. They were real patriots, the kind who would never gave up until the war was won. There are still a few of those people today, but I have to wonder if they are a dying breed.
When my daughters had their first children one day apart, almost 18 years who, I thought that was the coolest thing, and it was, but sometimes, sisters get to have their babies on the same day, and that it very rare indeed. Nevertheless, that is the case for my Aunt Dixie and my Aunt Bonnie. Their sons, James and Michael were born 49 years ago today. As a grandmother, I can imagine how busy things were for my grandma and grandpa. Of course, back then they couldn’t be in the room when the baby was born, nor could the father…which seems very odd to us now, but they were definitely in the waiting room pacing the floor. And the excitement must have been very high. Just think, to get two grandchildren on the same day, and they weren’t twins. That doesn’t happen very often. Now, top that off with both babies being born in the same town, in the same hospital, and you have real excitement.
It must have been interesting to the hospital staff too, because they had sisters in hospital with newborns for several days. Back then, the mom and baby stayed in the hospital for 5 days or so. I’ll bet it was the talk of the nursing staff. And for the sisters, they got to share the experience on a much closer basis than sisters usually do. They didn’t have to wait for visiting hours to see their sister’s baby, and in fact, I believe that only the dad and grandparents were allowed to visit back then, so they would have had to wait until their sister and the baby came home. Nevertheless, for the sisters, like their own son, they could easily go and see their nephew anytime they wanted to because he was probably right next to their own son, unless he was having his dinner, which would 
mean that their own son was doing the same.
Babies arriving in this world is always such a special day, and when you double that…without having twins, the day becomes even more special for the family. How wonderfully unique to be able to share the birth of your child with your sister. It adds a bond to the sisters and their families that might not have existed otherwise. Today is my cousin, Jim’s birthday and also my cousin, Michael’s birthday. I’m not sure who is the oldest, but I’m sure they will let me know as they read their story. Happy birthday Jim and Michael!! Have a wonderful day!! We love you both!!
