Karen's Family History - to be continued...

My family ancestry was traced back into the mid-1800's by my dad, who was very interested in genealogy. My father's side traces back to Denmark, while my mother's side goes back to the island of Barbados.  I have an old Family Tree which covers my mother's side of the family, and it goes back 8 generations from the branch my sister and I occupy...  

On my dad's side, basically my great great grandfather came to America looking for a new beginning back in the 1890's. The family settled in New Jersey and Massachusetts. My father was born in New Jersey, and spent much of his life in Newburyport, MA living practically right on the coast. My grandparents turned part of their home into a pottery/crafts shop, and my grandfather kept it going pretty well right into the 1970's. My grandmother did some modeling; in fact she appeared on the cover of the Saturday Evening Post, June 16, 1934! The house they lived in, known as "Port Potters", was built partially from ships; you could see the mast of what was once a large sailing ship, built right into the attic ceiling.

My Aunt Ruth was my dad's great aunt - she and her sister Rachel were missionaries in Saudi Arabia in the 1910's, and the two of them started the first school for girls in that area. Back in those days, girls were largely unwanted and some families would send a servant out into the desert with the baby, to drop it off somewhere to die. Ruth and Rachel took these children in, and educated them in math, the sciences and Christianity. There is a point to this :)....my Aunt Ruth lived to 105! She passed away this past summer of 2000. A reporter asked her on January 1, 2000 what her favorite invention of the 20th century had been. "Cool Whip", she replied. She knew how to live.

My mother's side of the family stayed in the West Indies, Virgin Islands and Panama areas until well into the 1960s. My grandfather was a highly decorated naval officer in the Canal Zone, having served for more than 30 years until his retirement in 1975. Unfortunately, he suffered a massive heart attack at his retirement party...luckily he was saved and nursed back to good health. I got to know him very well as a child, and always looked forward to the time I spent with him. He passed away in 1997 after a long bout with heart disease. My grandmother has since remarried - she was the first female president of a temple in the state of Florida, heading up a synagogue in Sarasota. My mom and dad met down in the Canal Zone and married in 1961, apparently without my grandparents' consent, but they eventually came around. My dad turned down another tour in the Navy later in the 1960's to concentrate on starting a family. As it turned out, the boat he would have been stationed on went to Vietnam and its entire crew was wiped out.