52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks - Lucky

This post is part of Amy Johnson Crow's 52 Ancestors in 52 Weeks for 2018. The prompt for the week of March 12, 2018, is Lucky. 

I racked my brain for something to write about for this prompt. I searched through my family tree. I looked up a few more ancestors, but I just couldn't come up with anything. Then my luck changed!

I consider myself very lucky that my dad, Albert S. Pendleton, Jr., loved history and family history, and he loved to write. He wrote the newsletter for the Lowndes County Historical Society for several decades and wrote a weekly column for The Valdosta Daily Times called “Way Back When.” These publications mostly centered on people from, and happenings in, Valdosta and Lowndes County, Georgia. (He was also good at staying in touch with cousins, both near and far.) He even wrote an article about my adventure at an archaeological field school in the Pribilof Islands in Alaska 

When I began cleaning up the paper explosion in my dad’s office after he died in 2006, I filed as many of his papers as I had cabinet space for, with a focus on our family history; his research for the articles and newsletters he wrote; and his stories, poems, short stories, and plays. There are still several boxes left of papers that need to be dealt with … one day.

My cousin, Gretchen Keith, contacted me yesterday and asked if my dad had written anything about her second great grandfather, Judge Richard Augustus Peeples. Gretchen and I share Philip Coleman Pendleton and Catharine Tebeau as second great grandparents. Their son, Charles Rittenhouse Pendleton, married Judge Peeples’ daughter Sally. Charles and Sally are Gretchen's great grandparents. 

I was typing a reply to Gretchen this morning when I suddenly remembered the file I’d started for my dad’s “Way Back When” articles. I had simply put the papers in the folder to read “one day.” Well, as luck would have it, because of Gretchen’s inquiry, I finally poked through this file. 

The file folder for my dad's "Way Back When" articles. I'm sure this is just the tip of the iceberg!

What fun I had going through the folder, reading the article titles (and even reading a few articles)! While I didn’t come across anything about Judge Peeples, I did find a write-up that my dad wrote in 1996 about Judge Peeples' daughter-in-law, Maude Jenkins Peeples. (Maude was the wife of Richard Alexander Peeples).

I was happy to have an opportunity to do a little genealogy research today, and in the meantime, have a topic drop in my lap for this week's prompt. How lucky!

Catherine