Notes
- Johnson family. Starting at the left My grandfather Baste, back row, Gilbert, John, Mable and Anton. In front Cora, Esther (my mother) and my grandmother Julia. I do not know when this photo was taken. However, I suspect it was after the death of the twin infant boys who were born on Dec. 19, 1898 and died of infantile diarrhea at about 6.5 age months or about the middle of 1899. I do not know their names they were always referred to as the twins.
- My grandfather caused serious problems for his family after he became a follower of John Dowie a faith healer and swindler. I do not think my grandparents divorced. The only evidence of a divorce is based on one of Bastes census reports reports and I don’t think that is sufficient evidence. It is possible that my grandmother told him to leave but that is based on a recollection of a comment made by my mother. I know is that at some after 1900 he stopped supporting his family.
- My mother and Aunt Mable told me that my uncle John quit school and worked to help support the family when he was 17 and that would have been 1901. I think my uncle Anton may have also worked when he was old enough to help support the family. My mother often talked about the Settlement House in Gary IN and said that she worked there. If so that would have been when she was in High School.
- When my grandmother died in 1912 my mother was still in high school and John and Anton supported her until she graduated and had entered nursing school at Columbia Hospital in Milwaukee. That delayed their marriages and they both married in 1914.
- I do not know what the occasion was but at least three had flowers and I suspect they all did. Gilbert was in the Navy during WW I so that gives an idea of when the photo was taken. Starting at the left John, Gilbert, Cora, Esther, Anton and Mable.
- Baste my grandfather, John William my uncle and John Alvin my oldest cousin. John Alvin was born in 1915 the photo was taken in Milwaukee probably before 1920. I suppose that Baste wanted to see his grandson.
- My aunt Amy wife of my uncle John and her son John Alvin. She died in 1937 when I was 2 and I have no recollection of her. My sister was very fond of her and her father.
- Baste my grandfather and my Uncle John in Wittenberg Wisconsin at an orchard planted by Baste after he retired. A seed had fallen into a crevice in a rock and the growth of the tree split the rock.
- My parents had told me about this and they showed me a photo of the tree and rock with Baste, my parents and an infant. I assumed that the infant was my sister because if it had been me she would also have been in the photo.
- My cousin Glenn Johnson said that he and his sisters had also been taken by my Uncle Gilbert to Wittenberg to meet their grandfather. There is no way for me to tell if Aunt Cora Viden took her son Ted to see Baste. The same is true for Uncle Anton and his daughters.
- A Johnson family reunion about 1940 at the home of Frank and Mable Mack. On the left Audrey the oldest daughter of Gilbert and Pearl. Aunt Hulda Uncle John’s second wife, my Aunt Pearl, Marian the second daughter of Gilbert, Lucy my sister, my cousin Glenn youngest child of Gilbert seated in front of Lucy. We think the woman in the dark dress was a sister of Frank Mack, Harriet the wife of my cousin John Alvin and my Uncle Frank Mack. In back a cousin Rusty (Norman) Revheim, Uncle John, we do not know who the woman was who was standing behind Lucy and one possibility is Anna Revheim the sister of Rusty, my mother Esther then Aunt Mable and Uncle Gilbert behind her.
- My sister and I did not know the history of the woven scarf. It was either under the clock in the our dinning room or on a dresser. Aunt Mable also had a larger woven piece that we also don’t know the history of. In any case it was of importance to the Johnsons. On the left was Esther, then Gilbert, Anton and John and it was taken at the home of Gilbert probably after 1945 and before 1949.
- After Aunt Hulda died in 1960 my Uncle John moved to a retirement home in Alexandria VA near the home of John Alvin. He decided to learn how to do something new each year. He had a number of projects and one was learning how to paint. Another one was photographing fountains in the Washington DC area. Evidently, those slides were not kept so we can’t show them.
- The last photo of my wife Darlyne, Frank Mack and Mable Mack at their home in Roswell NM. I think the photo was taken in 1961 when I had worked that summer at solar observatory at Sunspot NM. When Frank died Mable moved back to Chicago and we visited her several times at her retirement home.