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Margaret Pfeffer Westfall

on September 11, 2023

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COG: The Love of Reading

Life is funny sometimes, wouldn’t you agree? I sit here this evening checking out my blogger dashboard and find Jasia’s post about reading for the Carnival Of Genealogy . Ah, reading! One of my absolute favorite pastimes. And Jasia wants to know my family’s history of reading? How ironic that on the third anniversary of my father’s death, I am asked that question, for he was influential in the development of my love of reading. Furthermore, I was in a training at work today and we were asked to discuss characteristics about our fathers that we would like to keep, toss, or add in reference to their values, beliefs, etc. One of the items I listed in the “keep” column was his emphasis on the importance of reading and education. My mother tells the story that my father had heard that reading to your child was a good thing, so he instructed my mother to read to me every night. (Until I was about eight, he was often away because of his Navy service.) He purchased several books for me, ...

Military Monday: A Hero and Member of the Dutch Resistance Movement

"Index cards with names of people from the opposition" from the Netherlands Archives I promised to write more about my Netherlands cousin who was a member of the Dutch Resistance Movement during WWII. Harm Molenkamp was the oldest child and only son of Jan Molenkamp and Frouke Olthof (Frouke’s mother was Jantje Timmer, my great-grandfather’s sister). Harm had two sisters, Siep and Jantje. As mentioned in my previous post about the subject , I first heard about cousin Harm from another cousin who lived in the Netherlands about twenty years ago but we lost track of each other. I didn’t get much information to begin with. I’ve always been curious to learn more and have been fascinated to have such a close tie to the historical events that took place during that time. I included the photocopy of the photo I have of Harm when I did a photo history presentation for one of my daughter’s classes a few years ago. For the presentation, I started with a tintype photograph fro...

Bannerman Family Mystery

Among the many old photographs originally in my grandfather's possession, there is one that has haunted me and has remained a mystery all these years. The photograph is of three children with their names and ages typeset at the bottom of the photograph. “William, 10 years, Robert 8, and Maggie Bennerman, 4 Years Old.” Who were they? My grandfather was not able to identify them, though his memory was remarkably sharp and accurate until his death at the age of 96. I first noticed this picture and the others that my grandfather had in 1989 when I embarked on the adventure of genealogy. Since then I have traced all of my father's ancestors at least back to the early 1800s (and a lot beyond). But I never ran into the Bennerman name, anywhere. Not as ancestors of mine, not even as neighbors. I am lucky enough to even have a name to match the faces in the photograph in the first place. Early in my research, I visited the Tampa stake of the LDS church and I mentioned the Bennerman na...

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Margaret Pfeffer Westfall

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