Beginnings

Amy Johnson Crow is the professional genealogist that came up with the concept of 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks. Simply put, it is exactly what the name implies: sharing 52 ancestors over the course of 52 weeks — or multiple years, whatever it takes. For each week, there is a provided prompt to inspire the basis of the post — this first week in 2021 is BEGINNINGS. So, here I am … at the beginning!

It is my hope that over the course of the next 52 weeks (or multiple years!) that I am making my documented research more accessible to those that also find themselves connected to these ancestors. I encourage and welcome you to comment, ask questions, or share a story — these ancestors are not mine alone, they are who connect us to one another — they are our family!

If you have an account with Ancestry, you can access the documented timeline in my publicly shared family tree.

Rosemary Betty (née Murray) Hirons, my paternal grandmother, was born in Muncie, Indiana on 26 September 1914 to parents Carver and Rosemond (née Shuttleworth) Murray. The younger sister of Max and Carver, she was named after her mother Rose and a maternal aunt Mary, her middle name being an homage to her maternal grandmother [Elizabeth] Betty (nee Felton) Shuttleworth. A 1932 graduate of Muncie Central High School, she married my grandfather Gerald O. Hirons at the age of 18. They eloped during a trip to a weekend youth church rally in Louisville, Kentucky. When they returned home to Muncie, she knew her mother would be very upset to find out that she was married, so she didn’t tell her parents! Day after day, for about two weeks, she stayed at her parents’ home, not sure how to tell her mom, acting as if nothing had happened. My grandfather Gerald finally said he was going to tell them if she didn’t; at last the news was out — and for the record, her mother ‘went into hysterics’ — her words, not mine. Every time Nana conveyed this story, she was quick to add that she never regretted getting married so young because it afforded them 25 years together, but not nearly enough time. My grandfather, the love of her life, the father of her 5 sons, died at the age of 46 in 1959, after battling nephritis for years.

At barely 5 feet tall, my Nana was a pillar of strength, a joyful vivacious force who also knew intimately the depths of immense heartache — throughout her lifetime she experienced the Great Depression, lived through two World Wars, buried two husbands and two sons, wept profuse tears when a son left for Vietnam and cried tears of joy when he returned. Even so, throughout it all she shared the stories of her life, filled with a sense of awe and wonder that someone would be as blessed as richly as she, never failing to point out the Lord’s faithfulness in her life. Recounting a tale, she would often proclaim, “Can you imagine?!?”

It was quite simply impossible not to feel that I personally knew all those that had been a part of her life, long before I ever was. I never met my great grandmother Rose, but I know her through my grandmother’s stories. I never met my grandfather Gerald, but yet I know him through her and my father’s and uncles’ stories, their shared experiences and memories.

In 2008, at the age of 93, Nana went home to be with Jesus. Shortly after her passing, as I was going through her pictures while cleaning out her house, I began my journey in genealogy — documenting and recording for myself and for others, the stories of those that had come before us. Not just the names and dates, but their experiences, their trials and sacrifices, their joys and their sorrows. Over and over again, I find myself proclaiming, “Can you imagine?!?”