Sometime between and 1950 and 1955 my grandfather Dudley Howery and cowboy dad Dudley Jr. (aka Ridge Durand) bought a ranch property near Tie Siding, Wyoming. That’s the best date I’ve come up with so far. The 1950 Census shows them both in Laramie, but when I was born we were already living at Tie…
Loyalist Ancestry
I joined the United Empire Loyalist Association as a descendant of Anthony Walliser. I’ve been wanting to do that for a long time. As we approach the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, a reminder that many old American families have ancestors who fought on both sides of the Revolutionary War. The Wallisers had…
1852 Utah Slave Code
I knew, vaguely and in the back of my mind, that Utah was a slave territory before the Civil War. It’s one of bits of trivia I trot out from time to time to serve as a reminder that I’m a history nerd. Not that anyone really cares. Not that it matters to Civil War…
Durand Coat of Arms
Did our immigrant ancestor Dr. John Durand (1664–1727) have a coat of arms? I don’t think so. John (Jean) Durand (1664-1727) was a French Huguenot, orginally from the Île de Ré, near LaRochelle. He came to America about 1685, eventually settling at Derby, Connecticut. The usual reference for John Durand’s coat of arms is Bolton’s…
When Bill Met Essie
My great grandparents Wilford “Bill” Luce (1864-1948) and Essie Wilson (1878-1927) got married October 24, 1898 in Champaign, Illinois. So, where did a Wyoming rancher meet this woman from south central Illinois? I’m afraid I might have been responsible for a bit of erroneous information here. I answered an email off the cuff many years…