There are many things I could write about using the word “First” as inspiration. First inspires my mind to think of the first time I ever met someone, watched something, got a job, had a date, cried, tried or experienced anyone or anything. First can mean so many things.

But this is about #52Ancestors. Or genealogy Firsts.

For me, this brings to mind the first time I became interested in my family history. The word genealogy was not in my vocabulary yet but I remember hearing family stories at gatherings and I would rather be listening to those than outside playing with the cousins.

For instance, I knew as a young girl the story from my maternal Great Grandmother, Ellen Ada Schofield Frew, that she was born in England in 1893 and as an infant she, her parents and paternal Grandmother had come over on a big ship to a place called Ellis Island. Her father had sold everything, including furniture he had made for his wife and his woodworking tools so they could make the trip, only to discover that his Uncle’s wife had given away his promised job to her nephew.  Her father, disappointed and with little money, left Pennsylvania immediately and for reasons now lost, went to Illinois.

The fact that her family came from England fascinated me. I was in middle school when she told me the story and we had been learning about Queen Victoria and so England was fresh in my mind.

Then she told me that her husband, my Great Grandfather George Alexander Frew “Alec”, was from Scotland. He had died when my mother was 3 years old, so I would never know him. I think that added to the mystique of this family from Scotland.

Then there came the summer that our family was in Kinston, North Carolina visiting my Great Aunt Ellen Rouse, who since my Grandmother had passed when my Dad was 17, was more like my Grandmother. She told me the story of the first time she heard about the First Governor of North Carolina, Richard Caswell. She said she came home from school one day and told her mother that they had just learned about Governor Caswell and her mother told her that was her Dad’s Great Grandfather. When I asked her parents never told her until then, she said that was not what you did, it would be considered as “putting on airs”. Trying to be higher than your station. I do not think that she really knew why it was not talked about.  I told her I wanted to know more, but she fell quiet. I thought it was great we had someone like him in our family.

I still remember going to the Falls Church Library and finding a book by Benson John Lossing, The Pictorial Field Book of the Revolution (1850–52) and there was the story of Richard Caswell. I sat down on the ground between the stacks and just started reading, did not move. Included in the telling of his story, was a reprint of a letter that Caswell wrote to his eldest son, William, about his trip as a Delegate from North Carolina to the First Continental Congress. I fell in love with him right then and there. That letter made me feel like I was on the trip with him. I was learning so much about the Revolution but on a personal level. His spirit, his passionate call to action as a citizen, well it inspired me.

With these stories and more, I fell in love with history and family and wanted to know, no…needed to know more.

What was the first for you?