Celebrate Your Life, June 2, 2017

The more you praise and celebrate your life,

the more there is in life to celebrate.

~Oprah Winfrey

A Shepard Anniversary. Today is the 38th wedding anniversary of my brother Gary and his wife Cindy Ann Shepard of Oak Harbor, Washington. They were married June 2, 1979 in a small garden wedding in Los Alamitos, California. Only a handful of us were in attendance but it was a beautiful event. Those of us who were there remember it well. Happy Anniversary to Gary and Cindy!

Gary and Cindy lived in the San Diego area for most of their married life. They moved to Western Washington in 2003 to help care for our aging father Eugene Shepard who died in the summer of '03. Today they are an indispensable part of the small team of folks who are caring for our mother Maida Shepard. Gary has had his own health concerns in the last year but is doing better. Mom continues to need constant care but is doing quite well for 92 years old.

Another Shepard Anniversary. It was 102 years ago today that Gary's grandparents William and Bura Davis Shepard were married in Beaver County, Oklahoma. At the time they had known each other for less than 2 years. In the spring of 1913, the Davis family moved into the part of Beaver County where the Shepards lived. It was a sparsely populated farming community where potential marriage partners were in short supply. So when 26 year old William met 18 year old Bura, he knew she was someone special. They were married in 1915 on the 45th Birthday of Bura's father James Brooks Davis (1870-1928).

In 1975, the year before William Shepard died, he reminisced about his 1915 wedding day, and his bride, by saying this:

She was quite a Sunday School girl. I had just come into the church myself [the South Flat Church of Christ] in December [1914]. My dad had come in a little earlier than that. He was on his death bed with cancer and wanted to see me become a Christian before he died. So I did.

I had my first model T car. [To get married] we had to go to another sod house where the preacher lived. It was a real wet spring and water was standing everywhere. We didn't have highways. Just old roads. I didn't think we could make it by the regular road so we went on the higher country and ran into a lake and got stuck. We sat there in that car in the mud nearly all day. Finally an old gentleman who lived there pulled us out with his team of horses. It was about 3 or 4 o'clock. 

The preacher then tied the knot and we went home the way we should have when we went out to see him. He must have done a good job tying the knot because it is still tight.

Yet Another Anniversary. Yesterday was the 15th wedding anniversary of Will and Bura Shepard's Great Grandson Jeremy Ortiz and his wife Desiree of El Cajon, California. Best wishes to them for a very happy anniversary! The triptych above shows all three sets of anniversary celebrants: Will and Bura at the top, then Gary and Cindy, and then Jeremy and Desiree.

Congratulations to Graduates. I have mentioned numerous times in this blog my Grandfather William Shepard's sister, Sadie Shepard Pruett (1892-1980). I have been corresponding with one of Sadie's Granddaughters, Lisa Allred Parks of Forth Worth, Texas. Second cousin Lisa responded to my last post concerning this spring's graduates by sharing about two young folks in her part of our family.

Best wishes and kudos to Kenny Wheeler, the son of Lisa's sister Shawna Allred Wheeler. Kenny graduated from High School in Fort Worth just last week. Congratulations also to the daughter of Lisa's brother Steven Allred. Angela Allred Kornegay graduated from the University of Texas at Tyler with a Civil Engineering degree. We celebrate both of them on these fine achievements!

The diptych on the left shows graduate Kenny at the top with a friend, while the bottom section shows graduate Angela with her proud father Steven Allred.

One More Celebration. I recently heard from my cousin Michael Harrell, son of Vicki Gower Johnston of Arizona. Michael and his wife Carole live in Tokyo on a 3 year assignment for Mike's work. He was back in the U.S. last month and contacted me. He and Carole are doing well almost a year into their time in Japan. He reiterated his welcome to any family members who might be visiting Japan to be sure and let them know. If you would like Mike's contact info just let me know and I will gladly pass it on to you.

Mike had a birthday just a few days ago, on May 29. Happy Birthday to Mike and best wishes to him and Carole on their extended stay in Tokyo! To keep up with Mike and Carole, visit them on Facebook.
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Steve Shepard

Looking Toward Ground Hog Day, February 1, 2017

You are who you are - not your parents.

~Leslie Burke

William Elmer Shepard (1862-1915). Tomorrow, February 2, will mark the anniversary of the birth of my Great Grandfather William Elmer Shepard. William Elmer is one of the most compelling and fascinating persons in our Shepard family tree. He was born in 1862, the same year his father died in the Civil War. When a teenager he became estranged from his mother and step-father, and set out on his own. He is also the person whose only brother chose to spell his last name "Shepherd". 

As a young vagabond in the early 1880s, William Elmer settled in Madison County, Illinois, where he met and married Elvira Owens. With her he made his own family, happier than any family he ever had. They and their 2 children William and Sadie ended up moving to Oklahoma where they lived the rest of their lives. On this 155th anniversary of his birth we celebrate his life and honor his memory.

Sadie Shepard Pruett (1892-1980). Last Friday marked the 125th anniversary of the birth of Sadie Shepard Pruett, daughter of the aforementioned William Elmer Shepard. Sadie was the sister of my grandfather William Shepard.

Sadie and William were the only two children of William Elmer Shepard and Elvira Owens Shepard of Madison County, Illinois. William was born in 1888 in the Mississippi River town of Alton, Illinois, while Sadie was born January 27, 1892 when the family lived a few miles south of Alton in the town of Venice, also in Madison County.

When Sadie was barely a teenager, this small Shepard family of four moved from Illinois to Beaver County in the panhandle of Oklahoma. A few years later young Sadie, who lived in the small farming community of Sophia, met a neighbor who lived in nearby Elmwood, a fellow named Levy Pruett who was 10 years her senior. Sadie and Levy were married in the town of Beaver, Oklahoma on June 22, 1910 and spent 58 years together. 

The first image shows a copy of Levy and Sadie's wedding license from 1910. You can click on the image to get a larger view of it.

Sadie and Levy had three daughters, Alberta, Gayle and Twila, who gave them four grandchildren, Norman, Steven, Shawna and Lisa, and then an assortment of Great Grandchildren. Lisa Allred Parks is the granddaughter who contacted me online a few months ago and began a conversation that has connected me to Sadie's descendants like never before. Today Levy and Sadie's descendants live primarily in Oklahoma and North Texas.

Sadie and Levy lived and farmed in Beaver County for many years, although the 1910 US Census indicates that she was a public school teacher at the time she and Levy were married. They made their life in the Oklahoma panhandle, in contrast to Sadie's brother William Shepard who settled in California in 1940. Sadie and Levy did travel to California a number of times to visit brother William and his family.


The second image is one I have shared before in this blog. It shows Sadie and Levy Pruett while on a visit to California in 1946. This picture was taken when the family took a day trip across the border to Tijuana, Mexico. In the very middle of this image, in the black dress, is Sadie Shepard Pruett. In back row in the middle is her husband Levy Pruett. On either side of Levy and directly in front of him are 3 other members of the Pruett family visiting from Oklahoma: Glen Barker, Gayle Pruett Barker, and Alberta Pruett Getz. The others pictured here are members of the Russell and Shepard families who were living in San Diego.

Sadie died 2 days after her 88th birthday, in Oklahoma where she had lived for 75 years, ever since she had moved from Illinois as a school girl in about 1905. She and Levy rest alongside other family and friends in Sophia Cemetery, the longtime burial ground in Beaver County located in the community where they spent most of their lives.

Happy Birthday Cindy Shepard. Tomorrow (Ground Hog Day!) is the birthday of Cindy Ann Shepard, the wife of my brother Gary Shepard. Cindy and Gary live in Oak Harbor, Washington and are among the caregivers for our 92 year old mother Maida Shepard of nearby Anacortes, Washington. 

Last week I visited with the family in Washington and took this picture which shows my brother Gary and his wife Cindy on the right, and me and my wife Cindy on the left. Best wishes to Cindy for a very happy birthday!
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Steve Shepard

A Picture Is Worth, January 7, 2017

Our ancestors dwell in the attics of our brains

as they do in the spiraling chains of knowledge

hidden in every cell of our bodies.

~Shirley Abbott

A Fascinating Picture. A few months ago I mentioned that I had recently begun an online conversation with a second cousin on the Shepard side of our family, Lisa Allred Parks. She lives in the Fort Worth area and is the Granddaughter of Sadie Shepard Pruett (1892-1980), the sister of my Grandfather William Shepard (1888-1976).

A few days ago Lisa was thoughtful enough to email me a copy of a picture that she found among her mother's photos. It is obviously an old picture, only 1 1/2 inch square, and shows two children, who Lisa thinks are her grandmother Sadie Shepard Pruett and Sadie's brother William Shepard.

The first picture I am including is a composite image which shows, in the middle, the picture of the children Lisa sent to me. On either side I have added an adult picture of Sadie (at 23 years old) and William (at about 30 years old). Comparing these images might help us decide whether the children shown here could indeed be the adults pictured on either side. What do you think?

As you might imagine I was fascinated by this picture, and excited about the possibility of it being a childhood picture of my Grandfather and his sister. As far as I know the oldest existing picture of my Grandfather is the wedding picture of him alongside his wife Bura Davis Shepard, taken in Oklahoma in June, 1915 when he was 26 years old. If this new image does indeed show Sadie and William as children, it would be something extraordinary.

Here's what we do know, or can deduce, about this small picture: It was found among the photos of Sadie Shepard Pruett, who was born in January, 1892 (125 years ago this month). William was born 3 years and 1 month earlier, in December, 1888. In this picture, the young girl looks to be just a few months old, while the little boy looks to be a few years older, so their ages would be about right. If it is Sadie and William, it would have been taken in 1892 in Madison County, Illinois, where both of them were born.

I'd like to ask the readers of this blog: Do you have thoughts on whether or not this might be a picture of Sadie and William? Especially those of you who knew William and/or Sadie when they were alive. Do you have any thoughts or ideas about whether this might be them? I would appreciate hearing from you.

Happy Birthday Cindy! Today is the birthday of my wife Cindy Harris Shepard. Born in the San Joaquin Valley, as a baby she and her family moved to San Diego where she grew up, and where she and I met while in High School. Cindy is the mother of our son Nathan, and grandmother of his three children, Preslea, Logan and William Shepard. 

The second picture shows Cindy with our youngest grandchild William Shepard (the Great Great Grandchild of the William Shepard mentioned above).

Happy Birthday, Mary! This coming Tuesday, January 10 is the birthday of Mary Shepard, wife of my brother Darrell Shepard, of Bothell, Washington. Originally from Chicago, Mary and husband Darrell live today in the Seattle, Washington area. The biggest joy of their lives right now is their 4 young grandchildren, Logan, Mason, Kellan and Finley, the children of their kids Patrick, Rachel and Christopher. 

This third picture, taken last month, shows Mary with husband Darrell and their youngest grandchild Finley Shepard, daughter of Chris and Jessica.

Best wishes to Cindy and Mary for very happy birthdays! And thanks to cousin Lisa for that amazing picture of those children!
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Steve Shepard