I got so lost in memories tonight. I started going through photos of one of my parents trips to Switzerland. Of course, I ended up getting the humongous Walter/Gada Family Tree book down from the living room shelf and spent another few hours going through it's pages. Our cousin Maureen spent years putting the family tree together and to say this book is spectacular doesn't do it justice. I'm so grateful to Maureen for all her time and energy, not to mention finances spent, on behalf of her bazillion relatives.
Our family has had at least five family reunions that I can recall. I'm hoping for many more in the future. One of the really fun things about sorting through all my mom's treasures is finding photos from those reunions. They bring back so many great memories of the people that made our family what it is today. I'd like to share just a few short stories about a few of those folks over the coming days. Tonight is about my grandparents, John Walter and Corina Gada.
This is my grandmother, Corina Gada. I love this picture of her and have it hanging on the wall in "Sisi's room." It's one of only two photos I have of her. She had fourteen children, with my mother being the youngest. Nona Corina died at only forty-five years of age when my mother was thirteen months old. She died from a bowel obstruction which is really crazy because I also ended up in the hospital for a week with the very same thing at about the same age. Kind of weird, right? I never really heard my mother mention her mother other than after my mom's first trip to Switzerland. When she returned after having met so many of the older generation of our Swiss relatives, my mom told me she thought I was probably a lot like my grandmother from the stories she had been told. My grandmother was definitely a farm gal like me and had a ridiculous number of children, also like me. One of the funny things my cousin Maureen found in our history was that Nona Corina "always had kids climbing all over her brushing her hair." This is one hundred percent me! My kids still bring this up and now, as adults, expect me to brush their hair when I visit. We're like a bunch of Swiss monkeys who obviously come by it genetically through my grandmother. ha!
This is the other photo I have framed in my house with my grandmother in it. She is on the right, holding my Aunt Olga. I believe she is pregnant in this photo with my Aunt Ruth. All the children in the photo are hers. I don't think she was even five feet tall. She was a pretty brave gal, immigrating from Switzerland through Ellis Island by herself with three children under five years old in tow. I wish I could have known Corina Gada. I have a feeling we would have liked each other a lot.
This is my grandfather, John (Giovanni) Walter. He also immigrated from Switzerland and settled, with my grandmother, on a ranch he purchased in Cayucos, California. This is where my mother was raised. My mom spoke of her father often and cried out for him when she was dying. She loved her "Pa" very much and from the stories she told, I'm pretty sure she had him wrapped around her little finger. My cousin Maureen tells a story in the Family Book about him that is pretty typical of some of my mother's stories as well. "Was a bootlegger during prohibition. Almost went to jail. The Feds came up to the ranch, discovered the kegs of hooch in the cellar, sealed the cellar, leaving the local sheriff in charge while they went to San Francisco to get a cart to transport the evidence. While the Feds were gone, the local sheriff, who was a friend, helped John empty all the kegs and fill them with water. They had steamed the Federal Seal off the door. When the Feds asked about the seal, the sheriff told them it must have been from the fog." Ok, my grandfather and I would have definitely gotten along.
No comments:
Post a Comment