He Was Dedicated

My uncle, Bill Spencer was a unique character. He liked things that some people might find boring, but then again, lots of people would really enjoy. When he was just eight years old, he discovered his mother’s “little black book” in which she kept the names of her ancestors as she knew them up to that time. He really became obsessed with the book and the wealth of family history information he found there, but that was not enough for this young family historian. He began to work on finding more sources for information. He talked to anyone he could think of. He check places like libraries, church records, court houses. He looked for things like land records, baptisms, birth certificates, death records, and census records. There were no computers with which to search in those days, so it was not a job for the faint of heart. You really needed to be dedicated, and he was dedicated.

Uncle Bill’s obsession with family history remained a lifelong project for him. He traveled to a number of places in search of the graves of ancestors. Some of his greatest treasures were pictures of him with the headstone of an ancestor he had tracked down after a long search of a cemetery. Those pictures, and the detail they contained, became treasures to me too, and in one instance they helped me walk right to the grave of my 2nd great grandfather, Allen Spencer (misspelled on the stone as Spenser). I was in the cemetery, and didn’t have any other information, but a hillside and a building made me take a little walk, because it just looked right. It was. I was amazed. Once again, Uncle Bill’s attention to detail saved the day.

Uncle Bill photocopied pictures, documents, and records, and made an ancestor information page for each ancestor he found. As I said, computers didn’t come out until much later on. Much of Uncle Bill’s information is handwritten, which he has always felt was better anyway. Uncle Bill considered the handwritten words almost as much a treasure, as the words themselves. I began to understand what he meant by that, the first time I saw a document with the signature of an ancestor on it. Just knowing that my ancestor had actually signed the very document that I saw, was stunning. Still, while I saw the value of the handwritten letters and such that my uncle wanted, I found it hard to accommodate his desire for letters. Those I wrote were often typed on my computer. I guess it was a side effect of my techy mentality.

Family history, and history in general, wasn’t Uncle Bill’s only area of interest. He loved antiques, collecting and selling them. He also was a gun dealer, and he loved all kinds of guns. That may have started when he found out that the Spencer rifle was invented by his 2nd great grandfather (my 3rd) Christopher Spencer, who actually demonstrated it to President Abraham Lincoln on the White House lawn…an unheard-of idea these days. And Uncle Bill was a bit of an inventor…or maybe re-inventor to be more precise. He built a tractor to be used on the farm, using a 1927 Dodge 4-cylinder engine with a 6-volt electrical system, truck tires, and a 1915 5-ton Wilcox pickup body. It was interesting to say the least. Still, I’m sure that because it did the job he wanted it to, he felt like it was quite the accomplishment. Today would have been my Uncle Bill’s 103rd birthday. He went to Heaven on Christmas day 2020, just one month short of his 99th birthday. Happy birthday in Heaven, Uncle Bill. We love and miss you very much.