Hello Porterville readers, I am writing this as Brian and Donna are driving back from a trip to Minnesota for a gathering of her family in Stillwater. They took the opportunity to swing down to St. Paul to visit the Sampson/Byrne graves at Forest Lawn cemetery and also to visit Hazel Park where Mama and …
Category Archives: Uncategorized
Oakridge and other travels
Mary and I just completed a home remodeling project. An arduous undertaking over three plus months. One by-product of the work was creation of a small ‘studio’ space to which I could move my paints and other art materials. I also moved the steel case cabinet which contains the bulk of Dad Porter’s binders, notes …
Middle name mystery- Schley
I have always been puzzled about where my grandfather’s middle name came from. His father was Fletcher Smith Porter and Bompop was Fletcher ‘Schley’ Porter. Through families like ours it was common for people’s names to reference and reinforce connections to past generations of folk. I did not realize that this naming convention had a …
Porter Family Book C- Part 2
Dad’s Book C is focused on our Porters in the early years of the 20th century so much of it focuses on Grandmother coming to Carolina (part 1). In this second section, the two Porter brothers as cute babies appear and we see Grandmother(FDP) and Bompop(FSP) as a young couple. Included, I believe are pictures …
Porter Family Book C-Part 1
I have been struggling with my approach to cataloguing the Dave Porter binders in recent months. I recognize my limited time to heavily curate the work as I post it up. My highest priority is to make the material available to family so they can scroll through and find things. I decided recently that the …
Porterville Summer Times
As the school year ended thirty-five years ago, Mama decided that she needed to initiate an activity to engage the minds of her growing tribe of grandkids during the summer. Her natural interest in writing led her to create the Porterville Summer Times. Mom Porter would write a Grapevine column for each edition to keep …
A bunch of “bunk”
One turn of phrase I vividly remember Dad using was “That’s bunkum!” or “That’s a bunch of bunk.” He used it to express deep skepticism about some assertion I’d made and it implied serious lack of critical thinking on my part. I know he used the term in reference to other folks’ ideas from time …
Independence Day-Things We Remember
I have not been able to get back to Porterville for some weeks. Today being Independence Day , I set out in search of the familiar picture of Dad sitting on the front stoop with Greg and holding a sparkler. I finally found it in my Photos archive and scanned it to the Gallery pages. …
Fishing with Nick and other stories
Bruce’s guppies My first memory of fishing and perhaps the most vivid, was also a day spent with brother Nick. I’m not sure this is correct, but it is what arrives when I think of my youth. It comes to me in fits and bursts, but I see a picture of Nick and me on …
Susan Recalls Denfield St and Oak Ridge
I was born in 1953. I really have no memories to share to speak of from those early days. I have one vague memory from Denfield Street. I’m standing on a gate watching people load a moving truck. For years that memory was clear as a bell, and of course it’s fading now. So obviously …