Category Archives: Rondeau

Furey, Genealogy, Restaurants, Rondeau, Travels

Exploring Our Past

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Bridget kindly letting me shoot the Atlantic Ocean behind her in four day stop at the Atlantis Beachfront Ocean Inn.

We spent four glorious days in Gloucester, taking day trips throughout the area.  I needed a few days at the ocean, my happy place, and Kathy was willing to spend some time there too. We found a great motel right on the coast and every room had a view and patio that looked out on the Atlantic. (The motel was called The Atlantis).

After our first restful night at the beach, we took in a WW workshop in Danvers, then went to breakfast at a little diner called the Peabody Diner.  We were looking for a cemetery called St. Mary’s in Salem.  We asked in the diner if they knew where it was, The young waitress had never heard of it, but went back to ask the owner.  One of the patrons pointed out that it was just cattycorner from the diner.  Unfortunately, the office was closed, but we spent an hour or so looking for graves of the McGinnis and Furey ancestors.  Kathy has information that some of them are buried in this cemetery, but we were not able to find any of them.  However, there is a stone and area in the cemetery that remembers those who died.

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This stone sits alone in an area of St. Mary’s Cemetary in Peabody, Massachusetts. It reads: FIELD OF RESERVATION IN MEMORY OF ALL WHO LIE AT REST HERE REQUIESCANT IN PACE I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in Me shall live even if he dies John 11:25

While we were in the Peabody/Salem area, we tracked down the probable church where our great-grandparents got married, and houses in Peabody and Salem where our Nana lived.

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33 Jacobs Street, Peabody, Massachusetts, today. It is still a two-family home.

This is 33 Jacobs Street, Peabody, Massachusetts where where our immigrant ancestors lived with their family.  They were John J. McGinnis, from Ireland, Teresa J. Ready, from Prince Edward Island, Canada, and their family.  By 14 June 1900, their family included our great-grandparents, Catherine Louisa McGinnis and Patrick Leo Furey and their daughter, my Nana, Grace Marie Furey.

After we were done with our ancestry trip, we continued into Salem to the Salem Witch Museum which told the story of the Salem witch trials, with a second exhibit on witchcraft today. Then it was back to the hotel and a nice walk along the beach

The next morning, we headed to Lynn and Swampscott, where our mother grew up.  Oh my these were lovely cities.  I never realized that they are both on the coast. Completely explained why the beach was Mom’s happy place.  We drove around the areas to get a feel for Mom’s childhood taking photos of  some of the house the family had lived in.  The first apartment house is 68 Chestnut Street, Lynn, Massachusetts, where our grandparents, Louis Roland Rondeau and Grace Marie Furey, lived with their first two children, Mary Lois and Laura Carol in the early thirties.  The middle home is 41 Orchard Circle, Swampscott, Massachusetts, where the whole family lived until they moved to New Hampshire for a year — by then the family also included Cynthia Ann, Richard Bruce, and Francis David.  The last home is 10 Bloomfield Street, Lynn, Massachusetts where Mae Rondeau (granddaddy’s sister) lived with her husband, John Laughlin, their children and Mae’s brother, Omer and Louis, before 1920.  Her mother, Laura Exilda Belleville, later moved in and they lived their lives out there.  When he was successful, Omer bought the home so his mother would always have a place to live.

68 Chestnut Street, Lynn, Massachusetts
41 Orchard Circle, Swampscott, Massachusetts
Side of 10 Bloomfield Street, Lynn, Massachusetts

We stopped for lunch in a restaurant in Lynn that was right on the ocean. Treated ourselves to a sangria (Kathy) and a prosecco (Bridget), shared an appetizer of empanadas and had lovely shrimp dishes for lunch (what, no scallops??). Back to the hotel and another walk along the ocean.

Woke up our third morning to lots of rain. We decided to drive up to Rockport and see more of the area, then drove back down to Danvers, where we made a Target run for lots of little things and a suitcase to take into New York in a couple of weeks. Explored the area some more and the back to the room to watch the ocean in the storm.

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Friday morning, we started down toward Cape Cod. On the way, we stopped at Minuteman National Historical Park and followed part of the trail of the start of the Revolutionary War. As a history buff, I was fascinated by seeing these areas.  We also went to the Wayside house, home of the Alcotts, Nathaniel Hawthorne and Margaret Sidley, author of The Five Little Peppers, and Walden Pond (photo at top of post).

 

After we left Concord, we drove to Hingham, MA to go to the original Wahlburgers. We both enjoy the TV show and have wanted to try their food.  Yummy lunch where we ate too much because we wanted to try everything!  The burgers are great. Then it was on to our next stop in Cape Cod.

Bridget
Days 52-56

Adventures, Genealogy, Rondeau, Travels

More Ancestral Doings

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On Thursday, we drove into Baie St. Paul, through the Charlevoix Region of Quebec. Trees were turning and the Canadian Shield rolled with mountains of red, gold and orange. Still some green there, too.

Trees changing in the Charlevoix Region
Warnings all along the road, but still, we didn’t see one.
More trees
Screenshot_2018-10-03 Espace Muséal et patrimonial des Petites Franciscaines de Marie
Sr. Marie-Joseph from group shot

We went to Baie St. Paul because my great-aunt was one of the 11 founding sisters of an order of nuns, the Little Franciscans of Mary (pfm), that worked with orphans and old people in the French-Canadian communities in New England. The local priest in Worcester (who had asked Marie-Louise Rondeau—who became Sister Marie-Joseph) saw a need among the immigrants in 1889 and asked her parents-Remi Rondeau and Marie-Louise Guertin (Rondeau) if they could see their way to let their young daughter join. Although 18-year-old was reluctant to join because she was still a student at the convent of the Sisters of the Presentation of Mary in St. Hyacinthe, Quebec, after prayer she decided to become the first novice. With three novices and two postulants, cared for some 40 children. After a few years, the priest’s decisions created instability and the bishop informed them they were not nuns. Father Farad in Baie St. Paul had seen a similar need in his community and offered to sponsor the Congregation in Canada and they kept their New England locations as missions. Sr. Marie-Joseph was one of the two nuns who went to Canada to discuss the possibility with the priest and bishop. Their mission changed in Canada to housing old people and insane people.

Sr. Marie-Joseph was elected the Superior when she was when she was 19. She was later sent to St. Joseph’s Convent and Boarding School in Wallagrass, Maine. It was away from her home in Worcester, but back to the teaching she loved. Wallagrass is in the northern tip of Main near New Brunswick. (And, as the crow flies, not too far from Baie St. Paul). She died in 1922.

After we left Bait St. Paul, we drove back on the route towards Quebec and, across from Montmorency Falls, took the bridge to the Ile d’Orleans. We circumnavigated the island and stopped at a couple of shops. It was one of the first parts of Quebec to be colonized by the French. Our ancestor, Thomas Rondeau (born about 1637), immigrated from La Rochelle, France in 1662 and his occupation was listed in the 1666 census as a cloutier—a person who made and sold nails. He died 10 November 1721 in St-Pierre-de-Ile-d’Orleans, Montmorency, Quebec and was buried the next day. On the 31 of October 1666, a marriage contract was signed between Thomas and Andreè Remondiere, a Fille-Du-Roi, who was about 14 years old. It is probable that that was also their marriage date. She also came from La Rochelle and died 21 November 1702, in St. Pierre and was buried the next day. They had at least 18 children,

Our direct ancestor was Francois Rondeau, born 7 April 1678 at St. Family, I’ll d’Orleans, died 28 1748, St. Antoine-de-Tilly, Lotbiniere, Quebec. He had three wives. Our ancestress, Marie Anne (and here I have problems with spelling so hopefully will get it right eventually) Decaux Sindeco (or something similar starting with an “F”) was his first wife and was born in St. Famile, Ile’d’Orleans in 1678 and died 12 August 1723 in Lotbiniere, Quebec. They were married 21 July 1705. St. Antoine-de-Tilly is on the south side of the St. Lawrence, south of Quebec City and Levis. They had at least 11 children, and our ancestor was Antoine.

The island is still an agricultural area (and lots of bed and breakfasts). We would love to come back and stay a few days or week on both the island and in Baie St Paul or Charlevoix.

From here we left for Maine and were the only people in line at Customs.  We found a motel to stay at in Jackman, Maine a town so small there were no food restaurants open at 8:00 pm, just the gas station.

Kathy Day

Genealogy, Rondeau, Travels

Exploring Homes of Ancestors

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We were up early on Monday morning to make our 8:30 pick up for a Grayline bus tour of Montreal. We have discovered that it is really worth the cost to have a tour when someone else is driving around an area that we don’t know.  Montreal is spread out, there is lots of roadwork and new construction going on and neither of us wanted to drive in the City.  Kathy was able to get on and off the bus, but didn’t take the short walking tours at a couple of the stops.  There was a short walking tour to the Bank of Montreal and to the Church of Notre Dame that we had tried to see yesterday. Surprising how easy it seemed to get there with no marathon!  The guide was quite good and the bus driver was a hoot! The tour took us from the oldest building in Montreal, to the World’s Fair site from 1964, through neighborhoods in Montreal, back to St. Joseph’s.

Notre Dame Basilica, Montreal

We were back at the Hilton Gardens around 2 and hit the road for Quebec. We made it as far as a lovely town called St. Hyacinth, where some of our ancestors had settled.  As we had a late lunch on the road, we skipped dinner, but the hotel Le Dauphin had free laundry, so guess what we spent the evening doing!  After breakfast the next morning, we took off looking for old cemeteries to see if we could find any of our ancestors. Unfortunately, many of the old cemeteries have been moved and we were not able to find any old graves, but we did see the areas that they settled in.

Yamaska River, St. Hyacinthe

When we left St. Hyacinth, it started pouring rain and eventually we needed to stop to eat and have a bio-break. We saw a big truck stop and pulled off the road.  First stop was the bathroom.  As I walked into the bathroom stall, the floor was wet and my shoes were greasy from outside, and I slipped and fell hard on the floor. Ended up with my elbow in the toilet and unable to get up for about 10 minutes.  A lovely Canadian woman helped me figure out how to get up, and nothing seemed broken. I was pretty shaken up and I still had to pee!!! Took care of that in a cleaner stall, and cleaned up the best I could.  Had a quick McDonald’s for lunch and Kathy took over driving because I was still a little shocky.  It was still raining, I was cold and shaking so we decided not to go to Quebec, but rather stop at Trois-Rivieres, which is also a site where some of our ancestors had settled.  (Note:  I am OK, bruised and battered, but nothing is broken.  I did make a Dr. Visit when we got to our friends in Maine and had some X-Rays to confirm that I’m OK.)

Bridget
Day 38, 39

Flanagan, Genealogy, Rondeau

Courtship of My Mother and Father

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After the Rondeaus moved to Sierra Madre in 1946, Lois went to work at I. Magnin’s in Pasadena. At Magnin’s, probably the fanciest clothing store in Pasadena, Lois was a salesperson and a floor model. It was a job she loved because she loved clothes and she spent her salary on excellent clothing. Her younger sister, Cynthia, was said to have the most cashmere sweaters of any girl in her high school, having “borrowed” them from Lois.

Patrick had settled in California upon separation from the Navy. Pharmaceutical sales didn’t really satisfy him, so he joined the LAPD. His sisters also settled in California and Peggy brought her parents and younger sisters to El Monte. After he became a policeman, Pat was living in a maid’s apartment setting in the house of Arthur and Laura Felt in Los Feliz, very near Hollywood.

By 1949, Pat’s sister Nell had graduated from St. Andrew’s High School and was working at Magnin’s. She and Lois became friends. Meanwhile, the only male heir of the Flanagans was having a fine social life dating starlets. His mother and sisters were ready for him to settle down and did not think any of these ladies met the appropriate criteria to become a Flanagan.

Nell had invited Lois to her house and she and Addie (her mother) decided Lois would be a good match for Pat.

One July, Nell invited Lois to a slumber party at her home in El Monte with 3 of her sisters. They decided to go to the drive-in. (We don’t know this, but we imagine they went in Flanagan women style: pajamas-legs rolled up, and a trench coat to cover up.) Pat was made the driver and the group was off.

They had a good time and Lois thought that he would call. Patrick did not call, and did not call, and did not call. She gave up on “that damn Pat Flanagan”. Come Thanksgiving evening, after both families had individually finished their dinners, Pat called Lois to see if she would like to go out that night. She was about to turn him down, but thought that if she did he might never call again, so she said, “Yes.”

They started going out constantly, spending late nights down at Tangs in Chinatown. Pat’s boss, Mert Howe, finally told him to either drop the girl or marry her. And as an incentive, in this post war housing crunch, there happened to be an apartment free in his building. By Christmas, they were engaged and, as 1950 began, were planning their wedding on February 4th.

Kathleen Flanagan