Love Story

I was sitting in Relief society listening to a lesson we were having on Family genealogy when I heard someone make a comment on how it’s not only the research on names you do it is also learning about the lives of your ancestors.  This comment made me reflect on why I wanted to pursue a degree in History.  Sure you study the dates of important events and what caused them and how those events lead to others later, but in the long run, it is just one enormously long story.  The story part is what I find the most intriguing.  Being able to find these links of relatable events that connect you to the past through stories being told, recorded, and passed on.  Stories are what gain my attention to family history.  I’ll tell you one of my favorites.

I was sitting in the car one day with my dad, and we began to talk about relationships which led to stories of how people got together. Like my grandmother meeting my grandpa Wayne who she later converted into the LDS church, or how my dad met my mom on his mission to Guadalajara MX, and then how he met my former step mom Wendy through his divorce lawyer (not a good plan, by the way).  As he continued he began to tell me that most love stories don’t happen like they do in movies, but occasionally you will get a remarkable one like the one with my great grandparents from the Freeze side of the family.  Given my dad and I had this conversation a long time ago, so I hope I remember the right details.

My great grandpa had a rough childhood.  His mother after finding out she was pregnant out of wedlock, ran away from somewhere in Virginia all the way to Oklahoma.  The father was told to be a man by the name of Tom Freeze.  Sometime later she married another man who wasn’t too fond of my great grandpa.  After being abused and mistreated my great grandpa decided to run away.  Being homeless he was taken refuge by another older man who practically lived in a shed outside a very wealthy man’s farm.  My great grandpa eventually found work with this very wealthy man, who had gained this large amount of land during one of the Homestead Acts around the 1860s.  Through working for this wealthy man he happened his daughter on occasion and in time they fell in love.  With the obvious dilemma of my great grandpa being a very poor runaway, with no land, or means of any wealth, he decided to work extra hard to gain the approval of his love’s father.  Within time and through his hard work he did gain approval and was able to marry the rich man’s daughter (my great grandma).  He was given a portion of land and he and his wife became farmers and from what I know, lived a happy life. 

I know I didn’t give the story too much flattery and justice; I rather just summed it up short, simple and to the point.  It reminds me of the bible story of Jacob and Rachel, just without the part with Leah.  I like to think of how cool it would be to have a story like that, however it’s really not that possible since I am neither from a wealthy family by any means or have never been abused or a runaway.  But I guess the idea is cool, at least to a lot of my female peers. 

My point is, family history is great, and it comes along with a lot of great stories that you may or may not relate to.  Either way there is almost always something to learn.  My new goal for the upcoming year= family history research.