Balloons Bombed Oregon?

 

In the last desperate year of WWII, the Japanese attacked the American continent with thousands of large balloons carrying bombs. 

Using the newly discovered Jet Stream, the first such weapon was  launched from Honshu, directly beneath the Jet Stream, on 3 Nov 1944. U.S. officials at first thought the balloons were errant weather balloons. Between that November and the following July, some 9000 bombs were launched and 268 of them making it to North America. 

Imagine! These balloons were constructed by Japanese school children to paste together paper balloons in seven factories near Tokyo. By 1944, Japan was suffering acute wartime material shortages. 

The only American fatalities were the Mitchell family. On Sunday, May 5, 1945, the Rev. Archie Mitchell and his pregnant wife, Elsie, were taking five of their Sunday School students on a picnic near their home in Bly, Oregon. As Mitchell was parking his car, he heard his wife call out: "Look what we found! It looks like some kind of balloon!" Before Mitchell could warn his wife to keep away, the bomb went off. Elsie and four boys were instantly killed and one girl died later from her injuries. The above image is of a memorial to those dear Americans.

The really sad part of this tale is that the War Department had known about these balloons since December, 1944, but had its Office of Censorship keep information out of the news in order not to cause panic. That press blackout was lifted o May 22 in an effort to prevent further injuries or deaths. 

Sources: Charles Apple's Further Review in The Spokesman Review newspaper, 4 May 2025;  The Pacific Northwesterner, Summer 1976, article by Randall A. Johnson: image from Wikipedia. 

U.S.-Canada Border Crossings

 

Ever find a brand new pencil in your desk or cupboard? Looking at it, you wonder where on earth did I pick up this pencil???? So it was with this pencil. Brand new, never sharpened. But it did sprout the idea of a blog to share with you!

According to the Ancestry Family History Learning Hub: The U.S. and Canada share the longest international border in the world with its 5525 miles stretching from Maine to Alaska. The Alaska portion of the border is 1538 miles long! Today, the 120 land ports of entry are busy as folks regularly cross the border for work, to visit family and to vacation. 

The U.S.-Canada border as we know it today only dates back to 1903. It formed as a result of centuries of colonization, war, revolution and land acquisition through treaties with Indigenous peoples as well as through diplomacy. (Dave Obee, www.CanGenealogy.com, gave a great presentation to EWGS couple of years ago on how often ancestors went back-and-forth across the Washington-Alberta-British Columbia border.) If your ancestor lived in either country near the border you might realize this and research accordingly.

Despite all of the conflict surrounding the border, the U.S. and Canada have often worked together to build roads, bridges and canals along it to streamline trade and the movement of people. The earliest cross-border infrastructure projects were in the east.... Niagara Falls, NY, and Albans, Vermont, to name two. The iconic Peace Arch crossing sits between Seattle and Vancouver. Our Washington shares 427 miles of border with British Columbia and has 13 border crossing stations.

My son and dau-in-love (yes!) regularly transverse the Oroville-Osoyoos crossing. Perhaps they picked up that mystery pencil??????

Mourning Rings: Have One From Your Ancestor?

 

Have you a mourning ring in an ancestor's memorial box? Have you ever heard of mourning rings? Mourning Rings were (and sometimes still are) jewelry worn to remember someone who has died. Such rings ran the gamut from plain bands to diamond studded. 

Mourning rings of yore were engraved with the person's name and death date and might have contained a hand-painted image or lock of hair. Today, they might have a tiny box for ashes. The tradition of mourning rings dates to ancient times although they gained popularity during the Victorian era. 

The article I was reading gave several examples of metal-detector folks have found such treasures buried in the sand or under a house. 

"If you think one of your ancestors may have had a mourning ring, we recommend searching their last name and the keyword "mourning ring" on the Newspapers.com homepage."

(Found this in the official blog of Newspapers.com; bit penned by Jenny Ashcraft, 8 Oct 2024.)

Washington Digital Newspapers

 

Bet you've searched online newspapers at the several websites offering such. But did you know that there is a website devoted to our very own state newspapers?? Here's the fine print in the image: Washington Digital Newspapers brings together over 600,000 pages from Washington's earliest Territorial newspapers to the present day, freely accessible to the public. And this collection continues to expand! Clicking to the website, you can search by title, by date or by subject.

When I first learned of this resource back in February 2025, I did a search for the surname PHILLIPS, 1900-1960, and got 43,186 hits!  For the surname OSWALD, 3996 hits! For Fort George Wright, 12, 690 hits! 

If you have ancestors, direct line or collateral, and they lived and worked in the Evergreen State, do check out this resource. 

Remember I've taught you always: If it's free, take two! :-) 

Vinegar Flats: Why THAT Name?

 

Vinegar Flats - The Keller-Lorenz Vinegar Works

Jesse Tinsley crafts a Then And Now column in The Spokesman-Review daily newspaper in Spokane. This bit comes from one of his insightful columns:

In an area that was once a seasonal village of Spokane Indians along Latah Creek, a neighborhood was platted in 1888. It became known as Vinegar Flats because of the tangy aroma from a vinegar production plant that opened in 1889....... The Keller-Lorenz Vinegar Company made cider and vinegar and sold the product to stores in bottles or to wholesalers in barrels.... the company grew rapidly and in 1912 the company used 15,000 tons of apples from Spokane's orchards to make 225,000 gallons of cider and 5,000 gallons of vinegar.... their two primary products were pickling vinegar, made from barley malt and molasses, and apple vinegar which starts as cider...... eight men worked full time at the plant with up to 14 more added seasonally..... 

"When the factory began operations in 1890, vinegar was especially important for the preservation of a variety of foods. In an era before household refrigeration, pickling in vinegar was a common method of preserving fruits and vegetables. The Vinegar Works operated in the three-story building at 11th Avenue and Spruce Street until 1958 producing cider, malt, and white wine vinegar. It wasn’t until the 1930s that refrigerators became commonplace and the need for pickling foods became less important. This new era of both commercial and domestic refrigeration, coupled with better roads for transportation, meant that factories like the Keller -Lorenz Vinegar Works eventually went out of business."

 Next time you drive south to Pullman from Spokane on Hwy 195, sniff the air. It just might smell a bit tangy still. 

Roxanne Lowe: A Gem Among Us

 

Roxanne Lowe is a world traveler; here she is in Switzerland. I know she's also been to Cuba and several other wonderful places. 

Roxanne lives in McCleary which is west of Olympia a tad bit. She's been active with the WA State Gen Soc for nearly 20 years and continues to inspire, share and teach us. Short while ago she offered a multi-page handout of FREE GENEALOGY-RELATED INTERNET SITES. Now she offers it again to all of us; here's the link:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ReR_ur57ODbfbp0phtGj_ugocSYoX2F-/view?usp=drive_link

If you'd like to refresh your memory or learn more about Roxanne, she offered a snippet-autobiography to the WSGS Blog on 21 June 2023.... complete with her 3-yr-old pix!

Summer suggestion: On a hot day when you're already sunned-out, have this handout handy (with lemonade!) and have some researching fun!

Honoring Memorial Day Part 2

 

  

In a small cemetery in the Dutch city of Roermond, one can visit this most unique set of tombstones. It comprises two almost identical pillars on either side of a wall separating the Catholic part from the Protestant part. Each pillar has a carved arm and hand that clasp the other across the wall. The monument marks the graves of Josephina Van Aefferden, a Catholic, and Jacobus Van Gorkum, a Protestant, who were happily married in life but had to be buried in separate sections of the cemetery. This Dutch listed it as a State Monument in 2002 and the "Grave with the Little Hands" proves that love is stronger than death. (And certainly stronger than mens' rules.)

Did you know that Memorial Day was originally called Decoration Day? In the spring of 1866, Henry C. Welles, a druggist in the village of Waterloo, NY, suggested that the patriots who died in the Civil War should be honored by decorating their graves. A committee was formed and the plan was implemented. Decoration Day was officially proclaimed on May 5, 1868 and was first observed officially on May 30, 1868. The South did not observe Decoration Day, preferring to honor their dead on separate days until after WWI. In 1882 the name was changed to Memorial Day and soldiers who had died in other wars were also honored. In 1971, Memorial Day was declared a national holiday to be held on the last Monday in May. While families may use the day for welcome-to-summer-fun, the original intent was to honor those who died for our freedom.