Category Archives: 20th Century

Mystery Photo #1: Girl with tribble, part 2 (solved!)

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As you’ll recall from part 1 of this post, I was trying to determine the identity of the girl in the photo at the right.  I began the process of inductive reasoning to try to figure out who this endearing young girl was.  I wanted this to be a photo of my great grandmother, Gertrude Scott, but barring new evidence, I would have to rule out all other possible persons in order to be reasonably certain that this was Gertie.  But then along came some new evidence, which saved me a lot of work, and which will save you a lot of reading. Continue reading →

Mystery Photo #1: Girl with tribble, part 1

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As with most family photo collections, I have some photos that are unidentified.  The following photo of the girl worried about the dead tribble at her feet is one of these.  Let’s see if we can narrow down the possibilities for who this might be.  The following are the research notes I took as I worked through this mystery. Continue reading →

The drunk-driving triple homicide

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While my grandfather, William Eugene Prettyman, was alive, he alluded on a few occasions to an accident he was in in which three people were killed.  To the best of my knowledge, he didn’t tell the full story to any of his family members, but he conveyed enough overlapping pieces to several family members that the skeleton of a confusing story slowly came into focus. Continue reading →

Research update: Washburn road-building project

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In an earlier post about a road building project in Washburn, McLean County, North Dakota, I concluded that the photo was not of Clyde Askew, as my grandmother had stated, but of Frank Scott, as Frank is clearly pictured and one of the photos was found in a photo album that most likely had belonged to him.

While doing research for another post, I discovered that members of the Askew family also had connections to the tiny town of Washburn around 1916-1918, and may have participated in this same road building project. Continue reading →

The last family portrait of Wilfred and Hattie Askew

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Updated 2013-08-03: Details of Hattie’s death and burial have been revised. Incorrect details have been left in, but stricken out, and revisions are highlighted in blue.

I received this photo from my grandmother, Harriet (Askew) Prettyman a few years back and it’s one of my favorite family photos.

I love the way the edge of the painted backdrop can be clearly seen on the left side of the photo, and that the bottom of the backdrop sits rumpled on the floor, visible in the gap between a child’s arm and his torso. The backless, single-armed chair upon which the father sits contributes only briefly to the verisimilitude of the family sitting casually in their living room. The sad potted plants that appear to have surrendered all dignity complete the scene. All of this stands in stark contrast to the proud, grounded, and solidly built family that is the subject of the photo.

Compositional details aside, this photo is tragic in many ways. It documents a family together for perhaps the last time. It speaks to the effects that death can have on a family. It also serves as an example of how the decisions we make about where to live and where to work can have large and unintended consequences. Continue reading →

Hit the road, Clyde

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Among the handful of photos my grandmother Harriet Prettyman gave me in August 2012 were these two curious images.  When I asked her about them, she said her father, Clyde Lawson Askew, was a hardworking man who did many different kinds of jobs.  One of his jobs, she said, was that of road builder, and these were pictures of a project he had worked on.  In fact, she said, she had been told that he’s pictured in both photos, somewhere among the faces. Continue reading →

Hattie Eddy Askew and her well-hatted friends, part 1

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Updated 2013-08-03: Details of Hattie’s death and burial have been revised. Incorrect details have been left in, but stricken out, and revisions are highlighted in blue.

Four turn-of-the-century women in magnificent hatsOn August 7, 2012, Harriet Prettyman gave me a few of her older family photos, including the photo pictured below.  The woman in the lower right of the photo is my great-great grandmother, Hattie Eddy Askew.

Hattie Eddy Askew lived a short life, dying in her early thirties (32-34) at the young age of 33.  She died around 1908-1910† on February 14, 1909, at her farm home outside Casselton, North Dakota. She died of pneumonia, which I was told she caught on a trip to Colorado as a result of a sudden and unexpected heart failure following an illness of about a week’s duration.  Not only did her grandchildren never get a chance to meet her, but her own children were only about 1, 8, and 10 1 ¾, nearly 9, and 12 ¾ years old when she died, so they also didn’t get much of a chance to learn about their mother as a person.

This is only the second definitive photo I’ve found of Hattie Eddy Askew, which is why I’m interested in learning as much as I can about this photo.  What follows is a log I kept of my initial research on this photo. Continue reading →