Sunday 14 October 2018

Me and my sister. My son and his.

I've been on a project to crop out hundreds of photos from scans. These are from the collection of my mum. I tend to scan 2 or 3 per page, save the whole project as a PDF for accession to my Family Tree spreadsheet as well as saving each scan page as a TIF. I then crop out each photo, which remains a TIF.

I found this quite an emotional project because I was going through photos that documents events through 5 generations of my family.

While going through the photos, I came across the one below. I'm holding my sister and our auntie Veronique is sitting with us. Along this I've put a photo of my son, Noah, who is holding his day old sister. The photo of them was taken on 12 September, 2018.

I just liked that while these events capture an event that was unique, but these events happen during each generation. Each time this happens it is extremely special to the people involved, and yet is common throughout many families.

Tim Havenith holding Naomi Brown (left), Noah Havenith holding Ellie Havenith (right).

Wednesday 10 October 2018

The Euro coins

My mum (Brigitte Havenith) once gave my opa (Jan Havenith) a journal to complete entitled 'This is dad's life'. In it, there was once question: What have been the biggest changes you’ve seen in your lifetime?

In answer to this question, part of his reply was: "The arrival of the Euro."

The handwriting of Jan Havenith
When the Euro did arrive, I remember opa giving me 2 coins, dated 1999, featuring Beatrix, the Queen of The Netherlands at the time. They were a 1 Euro coin and a 2 Euro coin. He made me feel like these were special, so I resolved to keep them. For a long time, the were kept together with black eletrical tape (doh!), but these days they are kept in a plastic coin bag and will be properly stored in future. Below are the front and obverse of the coins he gave me.



Sunday 30 September 2018

Sunday 23 September 2018

Jan Havenith and Ida Magermans - Marriage Plate


This beautiful plate was made by Frans van Gerwen, a cousin of Ida Magermans, who worked at a factory that made that porcelain. This factory called Mosa, is based in Maastricht and is still going.

These days the focus seems to be on tiles and since 2005 have had a turnover of 100 million. However, searching the Internet reveals a healthy market place for the old Mosa plates and ceramics.

I've always appreciated this plate as I saw it hanging on the wall everytime I visited my grandparents. It's in such amazing condition for a plate that's over 60 years old.

The company can be found here.

Sunday 16 September 2018

Tim Havenith and Lucy Newbury: Wedding Locations

Registering for the wedding
This was the register office in Trowbridge when we registered for our wedding in October 2013.

These days it's a car park!
Night before the wedding
Lucy stayed with her mum and sister the night before the wedding.

I stayed with my visiting family at our previous house at Tower Road, Melksham.
Wedding Day
We were married at Devizes Register Office at 2pm on the 30 May, 2014.

We then followed this with photographs and a meal at the Shaw Country Hotel.


Followed by cake back at Tower Road!

Sunday 9 September 2018

The Bottomley's of Ancoats

This is an incomplete story as I don't yet have all the details. I just wanted to jot down what I have at this point, so I don't lose track of where I'm at - as my daughter is now overdue, life is going to get very busy very quickly sooner rather than later!

We meet the family in 1901 on Marth 31st, the night of the census. William Bottomley is the head of this household and works as a flagger, someone who lays paving stones. He resides at 22 Marcer Street with his wife, Mary Ellen,daughter, Katie, and sons Herbert and William. William the son is my great grandfather and moved to Lincolnshire, at some point between 1901 and 1917 to marry my great grandmother, Lilian Smith - but that's another story.

17 Marcer Street in 1896, the house where my great grandfather was born.
Posted by Manchester Libraries.
The story gets complicated because I have found a William and Mary Ellen Bottomley at a nearby address in 1890, but Herbert, who would be around 5 years of age at this time is not present on the record. Perhaps he's spending the night with his biological father? Maybe that's why the couple's youngest son is called William - after his father William, and Herbert is named after his father? I have found a Herbert Kennedy born in nearby Salford - Kennedy being Mary Ellen's birth surname. My next step here is to buy the marriage certificate of William and Mary Ellen, which is around 5 years after the birth of Herbert, to find out if Mary Ellen is recorded as being a widow or previously married.

Back to Marcer Street, today this house and this street no longer exist. The area was bombed around 1940-1941 with at least 1 house being demolished. Eventually the area was purchased by compulsory order and being redeveloped. These days there's a Marcer Road, but not quite on the footprint of the old Street.
The blue circle is for high explosives, the red shading for demolished buildings. This map was created by
Manchester City Council City Architect's Department (Building Surveyor's Division) in 1940-1941.


As yet, I have been unable to find the family in 1911 (apart from my great grandfather). But as I continue to research, perhaps I will rediscover them, hopefully after the war having survived and prospering.


References:
Maps Collection. 2018. - Maps Collection. [ONLINE] Available at: https://luna.manchester.ac.uk/luna/servlet/detail/maps002~1~1~351132~123655?qvq=w4s%3A%2Fwho%2FManchester%2BCity%2BCouncil%2BCity%2BArchitect%252527s%2BDepartment%2B%252528Building%2BSurveyor%252527s%2BDivision%252529&mi=48&trs=49https%3A%2F%2Fluna.manchester.ac.uk%2F...%2Fmaps002~1~1~351132. [Accessed 05 September 2018].
Marcer Street Photograph: Flickr. 2018. Flickr. [ONLINE] Available at: https://www.flickr.com/photos/manchesterarchiveplus/6431339079/in/photostream/. [Accessed 05 September 2018].

Sunday 2 September 2018

Tim Havenith - Birth Plate


This beautiful birth plate was made for me by my opa's (Jan Havenith) best friend, Toon van Hoof, who he had originally met in the early days of his career at DSM. Sadly I never got to meet him as he died when I was around 2 years old, but I'm very honoured to have this wonderfully crafted plate as a reminder.

Sunday 26 August 2018

Known Addresses of: Lilian Elizabeth Mary Smith (1897-1934)

These 'Known Addresses of:'posts will detail places documented (or known by living memory). They will be updated, but kept in chronological order, as additional documents/interviews reveal additional addresses.

This posts details the addresses of Lilian Elizabeth Mary Smith (1897-1934). Born in Grimsby/Caistor in 1897, she seems to have lived in Grimsby/New Clee all her life before dying in 1934.

Current known addresses are:

02/04/1911     15 Spencer Street, New Clee
26/03/1917     67 Taylor Street, New Cleethorpes (New Clee)

Spencer Street:
1911 Census

15 Spencer Street. Sadly no longer a residential street.

Taylor Street:
Lilian's marriage record, 1917.

67 Taylor Street, 'New Cleethorpes' (New Clee).

Sunday 19 August 2018

Roy Brown: Fox Street and the church incident

In the early 1990s, my dad (Roy Brown) lived in a house on Fox Street, Scunthorpe. At that time we would stay overnight sometimes at the weekend.

While a lot of the time seemed to be occupying ourselves while dad watched telly, we did often walk to the newsagent, which must have been on Froddingham Road. He would buy my the 'Discovering Nature - on the trail with Billy Bumble' magazine, which seems to have been issued in 1991/1992 - which possibly provides dates for this period of time.

On one occasion we were walking back from the newsagent's and were walking past Centenary Methodist Church and an old lady fell down the steps while leaving the church and cut a large gash in her shin. I remember dad rushing inside to get a chair for her and making sure she was ok. I was proud of my dad that day and wish I had more memories like this.

He lived at Fox Street for a while, and had a dog there for a time, he moved around a lot and this is one of the only streets I remember him living. I remember me and my sister (Naomi Brown) playing in an alleyway there, I'm not sure if this was at the back of the houses or down the side of the house.

Here's the first tape of that magazine series:


Sunday 12 August 2018

Ida Magermans: social smoking

When I visited my grandparents bac in 2017, I spent a lot of time talking to them about current events as well as past events.

My opa (Jan Havenith) suffers from COPD from smoking when he was younger and from this he told me that oma (Ida Magermans) used to smoke in social situations. He mentioned that the height of her smoking was while they lived in the US, but that when the returned to the Netherlands, she eventually stopped.

I'm certainly glad that she did. It would be horrible if they both had to suffer this horrendous condition.

Sunday 5 August 2018

Ida Magermans: Workplace in Heerlen, Limburg

Prior to getting married, oma (Ida Magermans) worked in this building, which was a maternity hospital, opened in 1923 by Queen Wilhelmina. Oma worked in the lab doing blood work. She still has this photographed framed on the wall at their home. It must have meant a great deal to her. It was given to her by her colleagues as a leaving present.

At the time is was common for women getting married to leave their jobs and be financially supported by their husbands.

These days the building is a residential living community (Parc Imstenrade), but prior to this 80,000 babies were born here and it's now a national monument (no. 506441).  Here is a Google Streetview of the building and the address is Parc Imstenrade 3, 6418 PP Heerlen.

Friday 27 July 2018

Friese staartklok

This clock is very important to me as it has been hanging on the wall of my grandparents houses my whole life. In fact, it has seen many generations and was bought by Johannes Saris (1873-1959) and then passed down to his eldest child, Hubertina Saris.

Tuesday 24 July 2018

Surname: Bottomley

This is the birth surname of my grandmother, Rita Bottomley (1925-2002). It is a location/habitational name from a hamlet in Calderdale, Yorkshire, called Bottomley. It is derived from the Old English words of 'botm', which can mean broad valley, bottom, ground; and léah, meaning piece of ground or woodland clearing (1)(2).