My Family Immortal

As a child there was a drawer full of old photographs that I loved digging through, one day my grandmother pointed out a picture of her mother, sisters and brother. The photo intrigued me as I knew her mother died when she was quite young. Now as an old woman in her 70s that picture was one of the only things she had to remember her mother. There were many other pictures in the drawer including old wedding photos of women in black, photos of people long unremembered.

Fast forward 45 years, my grandmother has been dead for 40 years, my parents are gone and life has moved on. One day my brother who still lives in the family home called that he had a box of old pictures and since I'm the one doing the genealogy he thought I might be interested...I was.

Picking up the box one day I couldn't wait to take a look at the people who's lives have put me in this place and time. One of the first pictures I found was of a group of people in front of an old car.

The back was labeled" Danny Rieck, Joan Bleth, Fred Rieck, Alma, Alma's mother, Herman and Elsie". I knew the Alma is not my grandmother Alma and Alma's mother could not be my great grandmother Bertha since she died in 1900 and this picture was taken many years after that it was time for a bit of detective work. I knew Joan was my dad's first cousin and Elsie his aunt, So Herman would most likely be Elsie's father Herman Lucht. But who is are the other four people?

Continuing through the pictures I found this one of Herman and the older woman. Who was she that they would take a picture together with just the two of them? The back of the picture said, "Herman and Bertha Belitz". I knew Herman's wife Bertha Belitz was not right since I already knew that Bertha died in 1900 but Herman had a younger sister named Bertha. Could that be her?

Pulling out my lineage chart I mentioned in my last post to see if I could make some connections.  Herman did indeed have a younger sister named Bertha, who married Fred Bodanski. Fred and Bertha Lucht Bodanski had a daughter named Alma. Looking at my first picture the woman labeled "Alma" is linked arms with the older woman...So that would be Alma Bodanski and her mother Bertha.

Taking another look at my chart, Alma Bodanski married a man named Fred Rieck, as she is linked arms with both the man and the woman that is a good chance he is Fred. I also had that they had a son named Daniel, so that would be the Danny Rieck in the picture. After just a few minutes I was able to name all the people in my photograph.

Sadly I still haven't found the picture of my great grandmother I remember as a child but I have hope one day I'll get another call from my brother to come see what he found.