Sir Ralph de Scoville

Today I am thankful for Marene Ebert who a few years ago sent us a copy of her family history file. Today I was investigating how far back it goes...and WOW!!! My 25th great grandfather's(yes, say great 25 times) name was Sir Ralph de Scoville who lived in England in 1194 AD.

That means he lived in the time of King Richard, Prince John, and Robin Hood.

The two pictures are of the Scoville Family Coat of Arms.

The following was taken from the book "A Survey of the Scovills in England and America; 700 Years of History & Genealogy" by Homer Worthington Brainard.

"...court record...designates Ralph de Scoville as a knight,--not a knight by the mere virtue of possessing land... or solely as a knight of the shire (member of parliament), but a true knight of England in both the civil and military meanings, or, in words more specific, a man owning a knight's fee of land or who had received the honor of knighthood from the king, by being touched upon the shoulder with a sword held in the hand of the the king; hence we have judged, and may continue to judge, of the quality of the men of the Scoville family in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries by this fact of knighthood. Ralph de Scoville may have been even a crusader-knight in the third crusade of 1189-1192 under Richard I."

"Ralph de Scoville was one of those manorial lords who joined with the great barons of England in forcing their King John to sign the Magna Charta, the great declaration of independence by Englishmen."

Yes, we have pretty cool ancestors!!!

If you are wondering where the connection comes:
Beth McCullough--Raymond McCullough--Ruth Susan Independence Keysor--Guy Messiah Keysor--Elizabeth Scoville--Ebenezer Scoville--Stephen Scoville--John Scoville--John Scoville--Arthur Scoville (He came to America before 1662 and settled in Connecticut, so he is our pilgram)--Richard Scoville--Louis Scoville--Robert Scoville--Andrew Scoville--Thomas Scoville--William Scoville--Robert Scoville--Henry Scoville--Thomas Scoville--John de Scoville--Phillip de Scoville--Robert de Scoville--John de Scoville--John de Scoville--William de Scoville--Sir Ralph de Scoville

Photo of the week: Edward Callister

This is a picture of my 3rd great grandfather, Edward Callister. He was born November 12 or 20, 1824, Peel, Isle of Man, England. He was baptized in 1843. He married Ann Cowley November 1, 1851 in St. Louis, Missouri. They travelled in the William Field Company in 1854 to Utah. They were sealed in the Endowment House 14 Aug. 1857.

One of Edward & Ann's sons was Edward Henry Callister who married Louise Jane Eddington. They are the parents of Irene Callister. She married Raymond Verne McCullough.

All I know of him was that he was a tailor. If you know more...please comment or e-mail me at funseekerfamilyhistory@gmail.com.

Edward died on the 16th of January 1888 in Salt Lake City, Utah and was buried in the Salt Lake City Cemetery. Here is a link to the death notice from the Deseret News. http://www.eancestry.org/docs/003786.pdf It is in the fourth column towards the bottom. It will be in an adobe file and you can zoom in to read it.

Irene Callister McCullough

This picture is of my Great Grandmother Irene Callister (before she was a McCullough). She was about 18 years old in 1910.

Life is full of contrasts! The following is from the "Life Story" that Marene Ebert put together about Irene. It shows a different side of her than this picture depicts.

“As a teenager around Halloween, Mother and her best friend would dress up in their fathers' pants (girls did not wear pants in those days) and after dark would run through the neighborhood and tip over all the ‘out houses’. She and her friend wore their fathers' pants on other occasions...Mother said that she and her friend learned to jump the six foot fences as fast and as well as any of the boys in the neighborhood and never did get caught. One night Mother was dressed in one of her father’s best suits and as she and her friend, also dressed in her father’s clothes, were walking down the hill, she saw her father coming home from work. He had got off the street car and was walking up the hill from South Temple. As he was going on a trip the next day, he had gone to the bank and had quite a bit of money on him. As he was walking up the hill, he saw these “two bums” (actually Mother and her friend) walking toward him. Thinking they were going to rob him, he gave them a shove, knocking them down into the mud as he ran past them. Later that evening, when Mother came home with his best suit on, dirty and torn, he was so glad that he had not hurt her, that he wasn’t even angry with her.”

Gerry McCullough Ebert

Irene's birthday is November 8th. She was born in 1892. It would have been incredible to know her from her "out house tipping" days to those that the following was said of her:

“I remember that three months before she died at the age of 84, she gave a book review to a group to which I was invited. She spoke for about 45-60 minutes, not using a note. She had a tremendous memory and a thirst for knowledge of things of worth. She was not interested in reading trivial things. She was a peacemaker. My father had many good qualities, but he also had a bad temper and would blow up often. My mother was never a doormat, but at the same time, she would never lower herself to shout or argue. I admired her for this and I’ve always wished I could be more like her. I loved to talk to her about the Gospel and the scriptures. I know of no woman and very few men as well read and versed in the scriptures as my mother.”

Beth McCullough Henderson