Norma Louise CRANE Hungerford C H R O N I C L E S .................................................... |
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November 10, 2007:
Gazette article on the P.O.W. camp ? About twenty years ago John and I met a man ( through Rotary ), who I believe, lived in the Grand Ledge, MI area who had been there as a German P.O.W. during WWII and who later emigrated to MI because the people here treated the prisoners so humanely -- unlike how his country treated Americans who were P.O.W. s. He also said that Michigan's topography and climate were similar to that of Germany. Did I
tell you about Russell
Skinner who lived on a farm northwest of our farm and how the nodmadic
goat herders hid him from the Germans who were searching for him after
their company was wiped out in North Africa?
When I was 10 years old I used to
write v-mail letters to
Howard Beagle from Fennville who was a best friend of my brother
Richard. The paper was thin like an "onion skin" paper, went
through censors, and had to be addressed to a common East or West
Coast address for security forwarding.
At our
one room school
Peachbelt School, we knitted scarves and mittens for the military,
learned about victory gardens, and brought money to school to buy war
bond stamps every Friday. We sat in our front yard and
watched and waved to convoys of American troops going from Fort Custer
to Chicago and Westward. And then there were the occasional
"blackout drills' where we turned out all of the lights and and pulled
down shades and hoped that enemy planes would never come to the United
States -- or to Fennville, in particular. I think that you were
too small to remember any of this or the food stamps, clothing stamps,
or the gas rationing -- but as the Older Citizen ( that you
thought me to be ), I do have to admit that I remember.
My husband, John, as a thirteen or fourteen year old was a volunteer Civil Defense "plane spotter" on roof tops and high hills in Maryland where he grew up along the Potomac. |
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November
12, 2007:
I had not researched my
grandfather (John H. Crane ) to much degree as I focused on my
grandmother ( Hattie Crane ) because
she was the first white ( non-Potowatami ) baby born in Fennville
( Then Fenn's Mills ) and her parents: Henry Lee Blakeslee and Irene
Fenn Blakeslee and her grandparents: Elam A. Fenn and his wife.
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November
15, 2007:
Referring to the 1895 plat map I have just received. So
interesting ! The J. H. Crane property of 63 acres was inherited
by my Dad along with what may be the 40 acres across the road and to
the East. The Eastern property was referred to as " the old
place". My Dad and his father J. H. Crane were in the fruit
growing business together after my father, having graduated from
Michigan State ( then Michigan Agricultural College ) and having taken
a job with the State of Montana as a fruit inspector in the foothills
of Montana. He
returned to MI, married my mother and shortly after, Grandma and
Grandpa moved into town; Mom and Dad stayed on the farm.
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December
13, 2007:
About roller skating in Zeeland. I didn't even know that there
was a roller rink there. We used to go to the one in
Allegan. Because my mother worried about us driving through the
"pine plains" (the Allegan State Forest)
at night, she would drive us and would take a book to read or something
to sew on and sit in the bleacher section until we were ready to go
home. Quite often some cute boy or another would want to pick us
up at our home and take us to go skating there and this gave our mother
a chance to look those young men over and give or not give her
approval. She was very protective of us. Sometimes we dated
Allegan boys because it seemed that there were more females than males
in our high school classes.
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December
14, 2007:
Reading Arthur Coxford's "Obit" was very
interesting. I knew that he had taught at one time at University
High at the U. of M. Did you know that Albert Crane's sister
Shirley Crane Walton, (later Gallaher) taught at the U. of
M. Elem. School. About the same time I taught at The W. M. U.
Elementary School ( before I went up to the College of Ed to
teach in higher education -- students undergraduate who were going to
become teachers K-12 and Special ED ? Funny -- all three of
us from small town Fennville and the Fennville Public Schools.
The Michigan Legislature closed all Campus K-12 schools in the
state as a money-saving gesture at a time when educational
innovation and research weren't as welcomed in the public schools.
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March
15, 2008:
History about our dad's name being just two
letters, "U S" without periods after each letter. My father told
me that his father John H. Crane really admired Ulysses Grant as a
militant strategist --
although not as a president and wanted to name Dad after him but did
not want him to get stuck with a name such as Ulysses so just named him
U S Crane. Dad was many times asked what the U and the S stand for and
he would just say that it was his name and not initials for anything.
Funny thing is that Mother was born Carolina ( pronounced Carolena and
she later used Lena as her legal name ) In the family bible she was
listed as Carolina Mathilda Miller, daughter of Carl and Mathilda
Moller-- later "Americanized" to Miller, who were German
immigrants from Rugen Germany. Carl and Mathilda came to
Kalamazoo where he had a sister and later settled in Decatur, Michigan
with their older children. My mother was born there. Her mother
was pregnant with Mother's baby sister, Augusta when Carl became ill
and died. Mother's older brothers had to help raise and support the
young family. My mother never forgot that. Her dreams of being a
nurse were lost. She and my father later sent Aunt Augusta
through nurses training and my mother thought her dream would be
realized through Augusta. Not to be! Aunt Augusta
died having mastoid surgery while she was still in
training. Mother never really got over the loss. My sister
and I often talk about Mother going to the aid of anyone needing help
in the community with food and supplies in case of illness or hard
times. Sometimes as children we went with her. Most people never
knew all that my Mother and Dad did to help others. Later she went on
to serve on the Douglas Community Hospital Board. Our parents taught us
one of the most valuable lessons that we learned - - that
of "Giving back".
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March
15, 2008:
U S Crane's father was John Hulse Crane b.
April 22, 1858 Battle Creek, MI; d. October 16, 1939 in Douglas
Hospital -- Douglas, Michigan.
John Crane attended business school in Battle Creek and came to
Fennville and opened the first general store, which later had the first
telephone in the town. He met and married Hattie Elizabeth
Blakeslee, b. June 20,
1862 the first white child (non - Pottawatamee Indian child) to be
born in the then village of Fennsville. The settlement had
previously been known as Fenns Mills.
Hattie Elizabeth Blakeslee was the only
daughter of Lydia Irene (Fenn) Blakeslee and Henry Lee
Blakeslee. Henry Lee Blakeslee had come to Fenn's Mills from
Plymouth, Connecticut to work in Elam Fenn's lumber mill. Elam
Fenn
had built a boarding house and had written back to the East Coast to
hire workers from friends and family to come and clear the forest
and saw the logs in order to build homes for the onslaught of new
settlers. Henry met "Irene" Fenn and they were married and had
baby Hattie Elizabeth b. June 1862 and who was named
Hattie to honor his sister Harriet back in Connecticut.
Henry L. Blakeslee and others from the
area joined the Union Forces and marched off to try to push the Conferate Forces back as
they -- The Confederates -- tried to push further
North. Henry was a member of Company B, The 19th
Regiment of Michigan Volunteers. He enlisted in Aug. 1862.
Baby Hattie was only a young infant but, as the story goes, and is
related in the marvelous letters that he wrote to his wife : all
the young men were going and Henry's brother back in Connecticut was in
the Union Army so he thought that it was his duty to go and that he
would be back soon. And then they would go back to Connecticut
for a visit so his family could meet her, "Irene" but they were
purchasing land from her father Elam Fenn and would live in Michigan.
Irene and baby Hattie lived with her parents so he felt that she would
be well taken care of until he returned. Not to be !
! Henry Lee Blakeslee was killed in the Battle of Franklin
Ridge, Thompson Station, in 1863, Therefore, Baby Hattie never got to
know her father.
I treasure having been able to read Henry Blakeslee's hand-written
letters to his wife and then hearing "first-hand" my grandmother
Hattie's recollections of growing up. Her father wrote wonderful
tender letters to Irene expressing his turmoil over his decision
to march off to war, leaving her and the baby when their future had
been so bright. He chronicles army life and its spirit of
patriotism as well as its difficulties on an almost day-to-day
basis -- so much history -- names and places too --I
almost felt as though I was there. He was a true
patriot.
Irene eventually re-married, about 4 years later. The man
who sought her out was a Civil
War friend of Henry's, named James
George Reeve, originally from England. He came to Michigan, won
her heart and stayed in Michigan and he and Irene had six more children.
Hattie was particularly close to her grandparents Elam Atwater Fenn b.
March 2, 1821 in Plymouth,
Connecticut; d.Dec.
19, 1898 and Mary J. (Barker) Fenn b.Aug 12 ___? in Bristol,
Connecticut: d.May 5, ___? in Allegan, Michigan. The Fenns
eventually moved to Allegan (the county seat) to be near their son
who was a lawyer there. Elam Fenn became the village president of
Allegan.
I have the lineage back to Elam Atwater Fenn's great
grand-parents: Thomas b. 1707; d. 1769 and Christian Fenn of Litchfield
Co. Connecticut. They had 9 children.
Elam Atwater Fenn's grandparents were
: Jason Geains Fenn b.? He was the 4th of 10 children -- He was
a Volunteer and Minute Man in the Revolutionary War -- I (N. H
) understand that there were only 30 Minute Men ) and Mary Potter
Fenn, of then, Plymouthtown, Connecticut. Jason was a seargent
inthe 8th Company, 1st Regiment and his discharge date was
11-25-1775. (Aside : my sister and I have papers verifying
this as we are eligible for membership in the DAR "Daughters
of the Ameroican Revelution" but neither of us have chosen to join.
We always have been told that our
first Fenn family members to come over from England came on the
Mayflower but not on its first sailing. I have the listing of
those who came on the first sailing to Plymouth MA and, correct, they
are not on that list. Haven't pursued later listings for the
Mayflower. Shall leave that for others to do, if interested.
I have much more (with lots of strorie ) as
I reasearched the
history of Fennville when I was in college for a Michigan History
class assignment paper, of choice.
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