*July 4, 1894...My grandmother's birthday*

[CaliforniaPeggy]

Today I honor her memory...

Her parents saw, and lived, the American Dream...

They came from Sweden, met and married here...

She was their oldest child...

She was a bright, hard-working, motivated lady...

She and her husband raised their six children on a farm outside Chicago...

They had a pump in the kitchen...

She would kill and clean chickens for their meals...

She baked bread every week...

And still had time to go into Chicago for concerts...

She lived through the World Wars, and the Depression...

She did not let adversity shrink her soul...

My Grandmother! How much I still miss her, and her example!

I wonder what she would say if she could see what's happened to her beloved country...

Her birthday, today...

I salute her!

[shenmue]

1. Happy birthday to her!

[Mnemosyne]

2. Great tribute, Peggy! Sounds like an amazing woman.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

4. Thank you, my dear Mnemosyne...

She was remarkable.

I really miss her...

[Boomerproud]

3. Your Grandmother and mine sound an awful lot alike.

When I think that my grandma was 37 before she was allowed to vote...well...I get angry enough for both of us. She raised 7 kids during the Depression and became blind in her 50's so she never got the chance to see her grandchildren. Not a word of complaint from her, ever. I salute them both.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

5. Thank you so much, my dear Boomerproud...

Mine raised 6 kids during the Depression...a very strong lady.

Mere blindness wasn't enough to slow your grandmother down.......I salute her too!

[frazzled]

6. It was my Grandfather's birthday as well!

Also a bright, hard-working gentleman.

He and his wife came from Hungary (they came separately and met here), settling first in Pittsburgh where my grandfather worked as a tailor.

Then they moved and raised their three children outside of Chicago (how's that for symmetry!). They owned a little corner grocery store in a largely immigrant community, where my grandmother made sausage in the back room, and rolled out incredible, paper-thin strudels on the kitchen table, and baked 12-layer Dobos tortes.

They lived through two World Wars and the Depression.

I miss both my grandparents. They were so proud to be Americans, and (even though they spoke to each other in Hungarian; their broken English reserved for everyone else), they never looked back to talk about the "old country." They escaped it to embrace a new life of freedom here, so there was little reason to look back. Although they never had a lot, all three of their children made it to college and lived the American dream. Not a big American dream, just a little one.

I'm grateful to my grandfather.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

7. Happy Birthday to your late Grandfather, my dear frazzled!

Do you know what year he was born?

Their stories are remarkably similar.

Hard-working, tenacious and good people....all of them. No wonder you're proud!

Thanks for sharing his story with all of us.

[frazzled]

16. I'm going to have to ask my daughter

She is the keeper of the genealogical facts. But the date 1894 sticks in my mind.

He was actually from Bessarabia, which during the Austro-Hungarian Empire was sometimes a part of Hungary and sometimes a part of Romania. My grandmother was from Budapest, and grew up partially in an orphanage, where her parents put her and her brother (an older sister remained at home), due to poverty I think. It was always hard to get the stories out of them: they "didn't want to talk about it."

I try to keep their memory through culinary associations, a sort of Proustian recollection of the flavor of my grandparents, which is strongest in my mind. So once in a while I make chicken paprikash, or goulash, or stuffed cabbage (the Hungarian way, with sauerkraut); and cabbage noodles; and plum dumplings made from a potato dough and covered in buttered breadcrumbs; and even every once in a blue moon, I attempt a Dobos torte!

[TuxedoKat]

8. What a great lady!

She sounds like my grandmother too. (((HUGS)))

[Uncle Joe]

9. Happy Birthday to your grandmother.

Thanks for the thread, CaliforniaPeggy.

[roguevalley]

10. My grandma was born in April, 1894. What a great year that was. :D:D:D

I remember taking my grandpa to the hospital in 1978 and having to check him in. I had to cross out the nineteen and write 1885 on the paper. What a moment that was. I will never forget it. To all the grandmas and pas, bless their hearts and memories.

[AverageJoe90]

11. One of my great-great-grandmothers was born in Norway circa 1860.

She came to the States sometime around 1880, I believe. Lived in the Upper Midwest just about her whole life after that. Don't know much about her, though.

In any case, thanks for sharing your story, Peggy.

[malaise]

12. Sometimes I think they were made of stronger stuff

than folks today

[ColesCountyDem]

13. Happy birthday, Grandma!

She sounds remarkably like my own, precious grandmothers.

[freedom fighter jh]

14. My grandma was born 7/4/1896

She was my only American-born grandparent. The birthday seemed right.

[WillyT]

15. Beautiful Tribute, Peg !!!

Have a lovely 4th!

[Cha]

17. Sweet!

[3catwoman3]

18. My maternal grandmother was also a July 4th baby.

Born just a bit later - 1899. She ran away from home at age 15 to go to nursing school, which she completed at age 18. She met my grandfather, a dentist, when he was a patient of hers after he got facial burns from an explosion in his dental lab. They raised 3 daughters and a son in the small town of Hutchinson MN. She died in 1982. I have her nursing school pin, and proudly wear her engagement and wedding rings on my right hand.

My mom, who is still here, was the eldest of the 4. She is now 92 and still lives on her own. She also went into nursing, as did I. So, 3 generations of healers.

Thank you for this thread, CaliforniaPeggy. I enjoyed your story, and am glad it prompted me to remember my own grandmother today.

[CaliforniaPeggy]

19. Thank you for telling me your story, my dear 3catwoman3!

I always love to hear these memories...