We're from a very small town in Texas and one of my "hobbies" is to go walking through the old cemeteries, taking pictures of the angels, making rubbings, etc. Okay, since it IS such a small town, sometimes it's pretty easy to find out the "story" of the graves, even within the last 50 years or so. But here's one that's got me stumped......

I wandered across it several years ago. Her name, as it's spelled on the stone, was "K. Regzena (Rex) Moss" and the picture is so striking -- She's gorgeous -- with a flapper hairstyle, looking over her shoulder at the camera. August 29, 1911 - March 22, 1936.

In the plot BEHIND her, there is "Robert L. (Bob) Moss)" -- very dapper, handsome -- brother or husband? His dates are September 12, 1913 - November 13, 1943.

How can I find out who these people were or what happened? I don't know why I'm so intrigued, but I've been visiting her grave for years and no one knows who I'm talking about when I ask around town. Where can I begin? The newspaper wasn't there back then. Any ideas or suggestions? It's not of great significance in MY life, but I'm very curious. Also, the grave(s) have long been abandoned.....

I like cemeteries too. Especially the old ones in New England. :)

You could go to the town hall and pull up birth, death, marriage certificates. I think you can pull up the census reports as well, but I'm not sure if it would give you much info. Then you can go to the library and see if they have old newspapers on microfiche and read up on the people. I think the LDS church has a genealogy place in Utah (?) where you can request information about people. I don't believe you have to be LDS to use it, but I dont' know much about it, maybe another mama would know more. Also, try googling the names...you might come up with genealogical charts, or at least some genealogical websites. Some libraries have memberships to ancestry.com and other websites, and you can use them if you have a library card.

And I thought I was the only one who liked to look at gravestones and imagine the people's lives....the ones I am always the most interested in are those with several young children who died in teh same year...makes me wonder what they all died of. So sad. :(

Michelle

I took pictures of the stones -- with THEIR pictures on it. Problem is, I have a new camera and can't figure out how to upload the pics to my computer yet. When I googled the names, I got a list of the Cemetery plots.

In this particular cemetery, there are lots of interesting stories. Michelle, there is one that is looooooong and white. The center part of it is really tall and that's the family name and where the parents are buried. And then there are 2 or 3 small children buried on one side that died before they were 2, on different dates. Then there are 3 more children that all died on the same date as the parents. It was a house fire.

One of the saddest ones is a girl who died when she was 17 and there's a picture of her on her stone. She died in the 1970's, so she has the typical straight hair with a part in the middle. She was the daughter of a man who still lives in the town. She had gotten really bad into drugs, running away all the time, etc. etc. He kept dragging her back home all the time and I guess things were really awful because the last time he brought her back home, she shot herself in the head and left him a note that said "Now your g*d* problems are over." That's another grave I always visit. Actually, I have to FIND hers first (and it's easier because it's white) and then from hers I can find Regzena's.

I took some pictures of one today that was bizarre. The stone was like two flat rocks, really tall, stuck in the ground with the names and dates. And then the whole thing was about 8' x 10' and it was COVERED with Christmas ornaments, statues, and lights.

I've got an excellent book called Texas Graveyards that discusses the imagery and symbolism associated with different things you might find on tombs and stones in different areas of Texas. I guess I'm a freak, huh? But I don't feel ghoulish or anything. I feel like these were people who laughed and cried, lived and loved and now here they are. I have the same kind of "thing" about going in old, abandoned houses. I like to think about the babies that were born inside those walls, the Christmases, the lovemaking, the conversations..... I love to feel a connection with the cycles.

since you have the names and dates you can look them up on ancestry.com or if you have family tree maker software you can find details on those cds as well

good luck, i am also a cemetary walker

Did a quick look up on ancestry.com and found this on the 1930's census

Name: Robert L Moss
Age: 15
Estimated birth year: abt 1915
Relation to head-of-house: Son
Home in 1930: Precinct 7, Live Oak, Texas
Family and neighbors: View Results
Occupation: View Image
Education: View Image
Military service: View Image
Rent/home value: View Image
Age at first marriage: View Image
Parents' birthplace: View Image
Owned a radio: View Image
Image source: Year: 1930; Census Place: Precinct 7, Live Oak, Texas; Roll: 2370; Page: ; Enumeration District: 9; Image: 1168.0.

I cannot find any record of him dying or going missing in WWII

WOW, Branwyn! Ok, here's some more of the puzzle:

The stone beside them is also surname MOSS.
The names and dates on it are:

Myrtle B
May 16, 1884 - Nov. 9, 1970 (she hung in there a WHILE!)

Newton C.
Jan. 12, 1876 - Jan. 5, 1965

Do you have a membership to ancestry.com? I'm finding it so fascinating, but it seems EXPENSIVE. My dad used to be a geneology NUT and he traced us back until he discovered that we're related to Tom Horn, the bounty hunter. Whoop de doo.

The other part of my family was a *little* more aristocratic. They actually have a THICK hardback book that goes all the way back to the beginning, in the 1600's with the first of us that landed in America. There is some argument as to whether he was Dutch or German, but he was a physician and it was a shipwreck that landed him in America. It's fascinating because many of the men were either "physicians or poets," and there are lots of their personal essays included. It goes right up to the birth of my mother before it ends. Several of the women seemed to "take leave of their senses" after their childbearing years. Uh oh.....

Everytime I do a search on Ancestry.com, I get 3000+ entries. What am I doing wrong?

By the way, they are buried in Bowie, Montague County, Texas -- Elmwood Cemetery.

I do have a subscription, it is expensive but my mama helped me pay for it. we are both genealogy hounds and she knew if she paid for a subscription she could get me hooked :D
i would be happy to look up some more stuff! i love this stuff!

when i do look-ups i just try to be as specific as possible and lookup as many forms of the names as possible (bc, as i am sure you know, many of the census takers would mis-spell things)

So with a subscription, do you get THAT many returns? Like the 3000+ that I'm getting?

Can you look up obituaries? Newspaper articles?

When I was pregnant with Anabelle, I was searching for names in our family tree that went back about 6 generations. I was only looking at the names as possibilities for what to name the new baby. Well, it redirected me to a site where a woman had posted that she was looking for relatives of SEVERAL of the people on our tree. So I e-mailed her, but it was out of date.

Good grief. Am I growing a new obsession? That's just ALL I need!!!! :eek:

you will get that many returns but they will show you which ones are more likely (not sure without a sub, do they use the star system?)
you can get info from these areas:
All Records
Census
Birth, Marriage, & Death
Military
Immigration
Newspapers
Directories
Trees & Communities
Family & Local Histories
Court, Land, Probate
Reference & Finding Aids
Living People Finder

and it gives pictures! I am sooo hooked :D
I was so flattered when the historical society that my mom works for asked me to take pictures for their county history. Now iI am a published photographer. WooHoo! I knew all that cemetary time would come in handy....

Did you try the Social Security Death Index? Not sure how far back it goes (IIRC birth year 1875), but a good resource to have...and the only free one I know of that's not full of annoying ads.

http://www.newenglandancestors.org/research/database/ss/


Also, a good access to free geneology info is Cyndi's list www.cyndislist.com

Another thought...call your Chamber of Commerce and ask if your town has a Geneology Society. If not, call surrounding towns (many collect countywide) to find out...then you can pick a bunch of old ladies brains on this.

Here's a listing of people in Elmwood Cemetery

http://www.rootsweb.com/~txmontag/CemElmwood.txt

Record of Robert LaFair Moss from http://www.familysearch.org


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Robert LaFair Moss
Male


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Event(s):
Birth: 12 SEP 1913 Seymour, Baylor, Texas

Christening:
Death: 08 NOV 1943


Burial:


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Parents:
Father: Newton C. Moss Family
Mother: Myrtle Nickols


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Messages:
Record submitted after 1991 by a member of the LDS Church. No additional information is available. Ancestral File may list the same family and the submitter.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Source Information:
No source information is available.

Myrtle's SS Record (notice the birth year is 1 yr earlier)

Myrtle MOSS
Birth Date: 16 May 1883
Death Date: 15 Nov 1970
Social Security Number: 457-88-6909
State or Territory Where Number Was Issued: Texas

Death Residence Localities
ZIP Code: 76230
Localities: Bowie, Montague, Texas
Fruitland, Montague, Texas
Newport, Montague, Texas
Postoak, Montague, Texas
Stoneburg, Montague, Texas

Here's a website where you may be able to ask someone

http://www.rootsweb.com/~txmontag/index.html

:)

Sometime I would love to find out who my half-siblings are from my fathers first marriage. Met one in the mall years ago. The lady was with a boy. She knew my name and my mom. My mother had no clue who she was, but she said his name and it was the same as mine.

I am just not willing to stick my nose into it that much.

WOW, Jayme! Did you get all that on the LDS site?

Robert LaFair Moss..... beautiful name.

So aside from the above, I now KNOW that Robert was the son of Myrtle and Newton.

Now the question about Regzena -- Was she Robert's wife or Robert's sister?

I sure do wish I could get those pictures loaded. You mamas have GOT to see how gorgeous these two people were.

Yes, that was all on the LDS site. There's alot of great stuff there, and links to other sites. I couldn't find any mention of the woman though. I checked Regzina, Rex, and "K" which is her first initial. It's certainly intriguing!

Are you nearby and LDS meeting house with a Family History Library? You can check here http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/Library/FHC/frameset_fhc.asp . You can go there and order microfilms to view. It's free and there are people there to help you. Also, it doesn't matter if you're a member of our church or not (no pressure ;) ). From Family Search, it looks like the following are available for Montague County. You can click on the descriptions to see what they are.

http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/Library/fhlcatalog/supermainframeset.asp?display=localitydetails&subject=193799&subject_disp=Texas%2C+Montague&columns=*,0,0

and

http://www.familysearch.org/Eng/Library/fhlcatalog/supermainframeset.asp?display=localitydetails&subject=193801&subject_disp=Texas%2C+Montague%2C+Montague&columns=*,0,0

I'm a cemetery walker too! Actually, I'm related to many many people in the cemeteries here. The best free place to do searches in genealogy that I've found was at rootsweb. The message boards are arranged by family name also and I've found tons of stuff from that!

One of the most interesting things I've found actually came in the way of my grandma. First, she has pieces of an old family Bible from her mother and father. In it is listed all of their children. Included with the children was a name I didn't recognize. It seems my grandma had forgotten about a brother that died perhaps at birth (she couldn't remember exactly, she had only heard stories about him). Sounds wierd, but it happened before her time.

And for whoever here said they found childrens graves interesting...my great grandma was the only one of 11 chidlren to live past the age of 8! Some of the children died the same year. Pretty much every year that my great great grandma had a child, she had one die also :(

I am a total genealogy buff and history buff. I second the rootsweb.com for free service. I traced one line of my family back to the 1600's from that site alone (be careful and verify all info received - some people like to just make stuff up).


AND....DITTO!!!!!!! on the walking through old abandoned houses idea. I love the feeling of stepping into a house that holds those secrets of everyday life. There is one that I love here in Oregon - outside Condon, OR - a little town in the middle of rolling hills. I have a pic - let me run a little off topic and I'll post it.

Good luck finding your info!

Julie

OK - thread stealer - but only for a moment. Just wanted you to see this awesome abandoned house -




http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v55/obliviousmama/condonhouse.jpg




ETA: when you drive by on the road - you can see the paint colors inside the house. An old pale pink in one room - green in the other. All the windows are gone and it's personality speaks volumes to me.


OK - all done now. Just excited to share my fascination with someone else!

Oh, WOW!!! I love that house! I found one once that had peeling wallpaper upon peeling wallpaper, upon peeling wallpaper.... just layers and layers through the years. One of the rooms had little boy cowboys on horses on the wallpaper.

One of the more interesting abandoned houses we went in was.... I wish I knew the story. My cousin knew it was abandoned, so we went to have a look. There was a pink 54 or 57 Chevy still sitting in the driveway, with all the tires flat. There were dishes in the sink, with black grime from all the years. They matched the really awesome antique dishes in the cabinets. There were clothes in the closets and most wonderful of all -- a cigar box full of old pictures and letters. It was as if whoever lived there had just walked out the door and never returned.

Another one was a lady who had finally been taken "away" after being discovered living in filth. We were there to help clean up and get her some clothes, etc. It was a BEAUTIFUL home, but ankle deep in clutter and trash. Her son had died in the war and her husband had died shortly thereafter. She had become an alcoholic and then basically went crazy. Up in the attic, there was a beautiful old dollhouse. But the most wonderful, wonderful part was the millions and millions of canvases. The lady painted. All during her grief and her craziness, she painted. The one I most remember was a darkened room and there's a woman's body laying inert in the middle of the floor. There's a light cast across her body from the doorway where the silhouette of a man is standing. It was so sad. Further back, she had painted picture of clowns, etc., but then the darkness set in. All these canvases were large and stacked in big stacks all over the kitchen, the attic, the pantry, the shed, everywhere. I wonder whatever happened to them and to her......

Everything I type in that's NOT on ancestry.com takes me right back to ancestry.com. :mad:

I'm beginning to think Regzena was the wife and that's why there's no record of her -- no maiden name.

I can hardly wait till I figure out how to upload these pictures and you can see who I'm talking about.

Fairymama - your house stories give me the chills ( the good ones). I cannot believe you've found such treasures! I hope the house that still had all the dishes, pictures, etc. in it is well protected. What a treasure trove of history and people's lives. Amazing. You are so lucky!

And the paintings. oh my. Words cannot express. Just wow!

Hm Mm. The house with the dishes and everything had already been discovered by the partiers or whatever. There were beer bottles laying around in the middle of everything. The mattress was gross. But I could open the closet door and run my fingers across the most beautiful dresses. One was like a pink formal, made of tulle, but the moths or age or something had eaten it away to almost nothing. There's always this tendency to want to tuck the pictures or the letters or SOMEthing under my arm and take off with it, but then I always leave things as I find them. It's a secret that I got to see once. People may ruin it, but once it was my beautiful secret. :)

OK, now y'all have got me hooked on Ancestry.com!

I know quite a lot about my ancestors, but I just emailed a lady who posted in 1999 looking for descendants of my great great great great grandfather, so who knows????

These are great stories, keep 'em coming! And I can't wait to see the pictures!:thumbsup:

Oh wow! The old house stories are amazing! And that picture! Everytime I see an old house like that I want to buy it and restore it....if only I had the money! We had an old house just down the road similar to what you all have described, only my dad knew the man who lived there. Apparently he lived well past his wife, they had no children so when he died pretty much everything was just left there. I can remember going in the house when I was much younger with my parents, there were always bits and pieces of cool old things inside, of course partiers had long since found it, in fact I think someone had to be living upstairs! I live in a very rural area, so anything is possible I guess. But the cars, tractors, etc were all still parked under their shelters rusting away :(

I also wanted to share another experience I had with cemetery walking when I was doing my own genealogy....hope you don't mind me taking over a bit ;) Many of my relatives are buried in a very small cemetery waayyyy out of town. The church that it
once belonged to is long since gone, building and all. However, a few people still maintain the cemetery. Anyway, one day I was out taking pictures of tombstones in it. On my way back to the car, well away from all the other graves I somehow noticed concrete grown almost completely over with grass. I was curious so I tore some of it away and low and behold a grave!!! So my DH and mom helped me unearth 7 tombstones altogether, who knows how many more may have been there! I'm not sure if the people were somehow outcasts from the church or what, but it was strange how far they were from everyone else and the very simple tombstones. I'll attach a picture of one of the ones we found (and a picture of my Grandma's family Bible pages or what was left) There were no dates just names...

http://www.shutterfly.com/view/picture_dt.jsp?state=67b0de21b6c3e8de1512&idx=0

http://www.shutterfly.com/view/picture_dt.jsp?state=67b0de21b6c3e6ab1560&idx=1

http://www.shutterfly.com/view/picture_dt.jsp?state=67b0de21b6c3e63894c3&idx=2

There are lots of cemetary restoration committees around the US - it might be fun to get involved with one. we have one in my little rural community that just cleaned up and restored a cemetary from the late 1800's that was located on someone's farm land.



Can't see the images you posted -

Well, apparently I have no idea how to post pictures! I can never get them to show up here no matter what I try! Help! :juggle:

Are you in Bowie?!?! That's literally 30 minutes away from me. Small world.

Boy, this thread is interesting. I too think that old houses and cemeteries are treasures. History is amazing, and it's even better when it's personal, you know? I mean they teach an over view and such in school, but it's never enough to take you into someone's life. That's real history. I love to hear how people lived.

There's a house in Nevada on 80, I think around Elko that is real interesting. It's built from junk. When we drove through there several years ago my grandma told me about how my grandpa used to like to stop and look at it. That would have been in the sixties or seventies, so it makes me wonder if it was abandoned then even, and how old does that make it?

I love old photographs. My great great grandmother was very good about writing tidbits on the back of photos. I think she did a lot of it as an afterthought because some bare question marks around the dates and stuff. The history of my family is very rich, in my view. I've learned a lot about my grandfather in the last few years. He was an illigitamate child, his mother later married, had 5 or 6 more kids, then died in a car crash when he was 13. (They were all there, his very youngest sister was two and grabbed the steering wheel). He then took a train back to Nebraska where his grandmother raised him. He found out who his father was when he brought his half sis home to meet grandma :eek: ! And later travelled the country after taking up photagraphy. He was engaged when he met my grandmother, even. (That's actually very funny, Buzz, his boss tried to woo my grandma, she turned him down so he married her sister, but wanted my grandma to work with them so had my grandpa woo her into the job just for her to find out he was engaged after she left and went on the road with them.... Later when things didnt work out with his first fiance he called and proposed to her on the phone and she had to ask her family if they thought she should! And after all that she didn't even find out his real name until they filed for their marraige certificate and boy did that get a look from the secretary there!) Further down the line, after my parents were married, my mom's parents were having dinner with my dad's mom and step dad, just for grandpa and him to figure out that they were related! Grandpa's aunt was married to my dad's stepdad's cousin. (they never met eachother untill my parents did here in california, they're both from stratton nebraska and knew a lot of the same people )

It's really strange how small the world is, and I love learning more about my family. It's the little stories that are neat. I really should join a genealogy page. Maybe after I get my fill of my family I could start taking walks through cemetaries.

Please keep us updated on what you find out. You have to wonder if they had any children, or if he lived as a lonely widow after she died....

Yes, Starleigh, when I first saw the stones (many years ago), I wondered if he had lived as long as he could stand it after her death and then maybe committed suicide or something. See, if I can't find the stories, I can make them up. That's interesting about your grandfather. Here's a couple of stories from my way past family:

My great aunt had 4 boys -- 2 were older, skipped about 15 years, and then 2 younger ones. They all lived in St. Elmo, IL. One of the older boys drove a gas truck for a living. His mother sent one of the young boys to tell him it was time for lunch. He did, and then hitched a ride with his brother by hanging onto the running board of a truck. No one knows why, but the boy crossed the railroad tracks, was hit by a train and the truck exploded, killing them both. I didn't know the other older boy, but the other younger boy never married -- spent the rest of his life taking care of his mother.

Then my great grandmother had 2 sons whens he was pregnant with my grandfather. They had one of those old Model T cars or whatever where the kids road up high on the back kinda. The oldest boy fell off the back. He was 4 or 5. At the time, they laughed about it because he wasn't hurt and he thought it was funny because a great big oak leaf was stuck to the side of his knit cap. A few months later, he died of a brain hemorrhage. My great grandfather carried him through town to the funeral home. My great grandmother could never figure out why God would take the child she had known and loved to give her this new child that she had never met (remember, she was pregnant with my grandfather). I have all of the pictures of all 3 boys, as well as the professional and framed portraits of the one who died. I also have their baby book -- she never entered my grandfather's name.

Anyway, back to cemeteries -- In the really old cemeteries, you find lots of young mothers buried with their "infant" -- obviously died in childbirth.

BUNNY!!!! You're 30 minutes away from Bowie?!?! How can that be??? Are you in Decatur? Saint Jo? Muenster? I had no idea anyone even knew where it was. My husband and I were both born in Bowie and both of our families are still there.

I'm in Henrietta! Small world, eh?

REALLY small world. One of my ex-boyfriends lives in Henrietta now. :p

Well, I got a new camera for Christmas, so it's taken me some time to figure out how to upload pictures. But here they are.... I'll do them one at a time so maybe they won't take so long to load. Also, I found a friend with a membership to ancestry.com, so I'm going to follow my obsession until I figure out this whole story. (hopefully!)

Here's Regzena.... There's a chip in the picture right on the side of her nose, but otherwise perfect. Isn't she beautiful? Can you tell that her hair is a wavy bob?

http://members.sparedollar.com/poobadilly/Regzena.JPG

And here's Robert....

http://members.sparedollar.com/poobadilly/Robert.JPG

Two others from the same cemetery....

Gracie Fern is the most adorable name and this little girl had beautiful blonde curls like Shirley Temple.....

http://members.sparedollar.com/poobadilly/GracieFern.JPG

And I don't know if you can see this or not, but this little boy is wearing a paper birthday hat and the hat has been painted blue...

http://members.sparedollar.com/poobadilly/BobbieLee.JPG

And this grave was completely decked out for Christmas, including lights in that bush that's covered with tinsel.....

http://members.sparedollar.com/poobadilly/ChristmasGrave.JPG

Finally, I know this whole topic is sad in itself, but this just tore my heart out. I didn't know this lady, but I knew her parents. She was somewhere in her mid-twenties when she died in a car wreck on her way to work one morning. Her parents were just the sweetest people in the world and everyone who knew her said that she was too. Now, there's a regular stone that's not in the picture, but this was on the curb beside the stone -- It's her children's handprints -- once on a tile and also into the curbing itself (on the right side of the picture). The poem on the stone reads:

If Tears Could Build A
Stairway, And Memories
A Lane, I'd Walk Right Up
To Heaven And Bring
You Home Again.

http://members.sparedollar.com/poobadilly/Kody.JPG

This is a cool thread! I used to walk through a cemetary that my friend lived by, everytime I stayed with her. It was so intriguing to me to look at all the tombstones. This thread makes me want to go check out some of the older cemetaries around here. There is a really small one off of a road near me that says "Old Settlers Cemetary" I think I will go check it out this weekend when dh is home with dd!! Cool stories mamas.....I hope you find out about these people...they are beautiful.

Wow,she really was beautiful! My granny used to do her hair like that. I didn't realize they set pictures into tombstones back then.
I like checking out old graves too.The one in Deadwood,SD (Mount Moriah Cemetary)is really neat.Wild Bill Hickock and Calamity Jane are buried there.
I have tried to search my ancestry but nearly everyone in my family is deceased.I do know my grandpa side was descended from Clan Armstrong,a Scottish border rievers clan with quite a colorful history (same clan Neil Armstrong is descended from,he took a piece of the tartan to the moon).
Back to cemetaries,a local one has banned most all manners of decoration.It caused a big stink in town too.So the picture you have of that grave all decked out would not be allowed at this cemetary.Even little stuffed animals or balloons,etc for childrens graves are not permitted.