WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE

Just a bit irked about this show, or lack or it.    Last night I was all set and snuggled down to watch "Who Do You Think You Are?"  and it was not there.     It was a Steeler's special .  For the past two weeks everything that could have been learned and questioned has gone on 24/7 in this town.  There was no need to go over the obvious again and again.   I must add I am not a sports fan and I am in the minority in this town of sports nuts.

I checked the next local market one hundred miles from Pittsburgh and it was not there either.   This happens again in March with the basketball.   I thought that is why they had sports stations like ESPN.


I did find the airing this morning on the NBC website.   I will be glad when the game is over.  I still wish I had someone to do my research for me.  LOL

PICTURES OF MY LAST POSTS

 

My childhood home and the house my parents built.

At an early stage of construction with my dads truck in the side yard.

Me tethered to the play pen so I would not run into the street while they worked on the house.

POSTED ON WRONG BLOG

My previous post about Doom and Gloom was posted (by me) on the wrong blog.   I decided to leave it there and I have to search and see how the same type of weather would have affected our ancestors?

Did most of them walk to work?  I think perhaps they did since most of them lived in the community where the factory was located.   Our great grandmothers probably we stay a home mothers raising the larger families.   If they did work I would suspect they would have done washing or housekeeping for someone else.

I know my grandmother Gertrude O'Rourke would do housekeeping for others.   I also remember that she did a weekly cleaning for a local Savings and Loan to supplement her income.   I went with her one morning and had to sit still in a chair while she cleaned.   Since the Savings and Loan was a few miles away from her home, we took the street car and I remember the far was about a dime.

My other grandmother Anna Bartels work cleaning the local school HOMEVILLE JUNIOR HIGH SCHOOL.  I note that this school was built in 1939 and that was just a bit after her husband, my grandfather, Willi Schridde had been killed by a lightening strike.   This school was a ten minute walk from her home.

Willie Schridde worked as a millwright at the DUQUESNE STEEL WORKS and they lived up the hill from the plant.   The men walked to work, which was downhill and I do not know if they was trolley service  back up the hill.   Something I had never thought about before.

Thomas Dowd lived near the  EDGAR THOMPSON US STEEL WORKS plant and the men also would have walked to work.   Our grandfathers and great grandfathers did a lot of back breaking work.

I have a little more exploration to do on these two Steel Mills and snow storms of the past.

DOOM AND GLOOM

Weather forecast that is, is over and done for South Western PA.   After listening to the forecast since Saturday or Sunday in my neck of the woods it was essentially a non event.

That may be due to the fact that I did not have to go to work on Tuesday....I did hear of ice and accidents.   Somehow, they never cancel work. 

The major icing did not happen and on Tuesday it was warm enough to warm and melt a lot of the ice.  The ice on my driveway was about an inch and down at the bottom it was about two inches thick.   

When I got home from work today it seems that the melting occurred at the bottom of the ice and it was cracking and there was space underneath.    I got out my metal shovel, I do not know what kind of shovel it is but it done the job.   I was able to spend about a half hour hitting the ice, breaking it off, and tossing it in the yard and out of the driveway. 

The driveway is virtually free of snow and ice and I like it that way.   No ice on the steps or sidewalk.   Most of the snow melted on the roof and the melting water is about finished.

I can not believe that the groundhog said it will be an early spring. It remains to be seen, but I have a hard time believing a large rodent with a weather forecast.

52 WEEKS FAVORITE FOOD

I do not remember having a favorite food, but I do recall plenty I did not like.    My mother cooked to please my father and he especially liked creamed any vegetable, including lima beans, asparagus and spinach.   I hate creamed vegetables even till this day. 

Sundays were roast days, beef, pork or chicken.  Mondays  were hamburger day and my mother would chop up raw onions and put them in the burgers,  I had to go thru them and pick out those disgusting onions.    I often wondered why my mother did not make me a patty with out the onions  for me.  

Tuesday it was baked chicken with mashed potatoes and I liked that meal.   Wednesday's it was pork chops and Thursday was meatloaf, with the same  raw chopped onions which I also picked out.    Friday was fish and french fries and Saturdays were leftovers or hot dogs and baked beans.  

I could always tell what I was having for supper because of the day of the week.   Other people would have spaghetti, lasagna , stuffed cabbage and city chicken but my father would not eat them.   Sometimes mom would sneak in fried liver and onions, which I also do not eat now.

Now I eat almost anything except for the creamed vegetables, raw onions, and liver. 

HOME 52 WEEKS

 

What do I remember.?  Somewhere in the recesses of my brain I remember an apartment on the second floor on Electric Avenue in East Pittsburgh PA.   I have a vague memory of going up stairs and being in the apartment.   Is this where my parents lived with my grandmother?

I know when my father came home from the War my parents lived with my grandmother, or where we visiting someone else in this memory.

My parents bought a lot in Patton Township which is now MONROEVILLE PA   I know he researched this move for a long time, and he and my mother also designed the house.

My father had a cousin about his own age, Thomas O'Rourke, who was a contractor.   His cousin came and dug the foundation for the house.   If he did the concrete and foundation work for the house I do not know.   I do remember a pot bellied stove in the basement which served as the source of heat.   I can still picture my mother burning things in it, it was black and had a little door on the side.   I also remember there was a bathroom with a toilet and shower.  

After the foundation work was done we moved into the basement.  There was a shower and a toilet, which later were both moved to the back of the basement.  My parents had a laundry room and I think that this is where the kitchen was located.

My parents designed and built the house.   I think he was unsure if he could do it but his buddies at work said if others could do it so could he.     I remember the work that was done, the sawing, framing and I remember the smell of the plaster over a metal wire frame on the walls.   When he died I never found the drawings of the house plans, they would have been interesting.

I suppose I was a toddler because I have pictures of myself and they tethered me to the playpen.   The neighbor said she did not know what the new couple names were but she knew the child's name was Claudia. 

The house was a story and two-thirds.  On the first floor was a combination living room and dinning room.   Behind that large room was the kitchen and a bedroom.    There is a center staircase and two large bedrooms and one bath.    My father but in large closets, which are small by today's standards.   

The think that I remember was the outrageous color scheme of the front room.   They had painted the walls two different colors, a forest green and pink.    I thing think they should have researched color schemes a little more on that selection, or perhaps this was the time of aqua and pink refrigerators, in the early fifties I would guess.

I will look on the other computer and post the pictures to accompany this post.

ANOTHER SNOWY DAY

I could post a picture of flowers everyday for a year, but it won't make this winter go away.    I seems to me that  we have been having snow in the Northeast since Thanksgiving.   Although I haven't gotten the blizzards that are along the East Coast, the snow and ice are  a daily finding.

I have not been doing anything on my research.   I would like to go to the Family History Center but  on my days off the center is closed due to the weather.   

I have set a goal for the month of February.   I have to get organized and I will start on Sunday. I have my papers in tote bags and boxes, it is a paper jungle but since I have only been doing my Genealogy for three years I have to admit that it is not an insurmountable task.  I also have a lot of paperwork on my computer, flash drive and external hard drive.   

After reading posts about making everything electronic I do not feel comfortable about not having paper records.   I feel that the electronic records have the potential for disappearing in nanoseconds or becoming lost or  flash drive and hard drive failure.

The first thing I have to do is move my records and findings into my daughters old room, since she has moved on after finding a job in November.    If she moves back I will help her find an apartment or house in which to live.  But she really LOVES her job and that is good news.  

Did you every wonder about your ancestors and their jobs?   My ancestors who all lived in the Pittsburgh area worked in the steel mills.   When you read about the conditions of the workers and the accidents that happened it is downright scary.  Even today people are injured and killed at work, but back them the safety rules were nonexistent.   We are much better today thanks to the government rules and regulations.

Another decision I have made is to retire and this will happen this Spring.   Maybe that is why I am hating this winter and I am looking forward to the change of season.