Charles B. Foster

c1885 - Charles Brooks Foster (1856-1928). He married Ardella Catherine Vinson (1857-1933). They lived in the Milton/Alpharetta/Roswell, Georgia , area.
He is Anna's great grandfather on her mother's side.

Luther Foster

This is of Anna's grandfather's brother Luther Foster and his wife Lilly May Cook. Anna's late mother Marie made very meticulous notes on the back of the pictures. This one points out that Lilly May died almost eleven months after they were married.

Photographing the Deceased

Back in the early part of the 20th Century it was not unusual to photograph the dead.
Here are two pictures of Anna's mother Marie, her two brothers Paul and Charles with a brother that didn't make it, and in one picture is their father Paul Everett Foster, Sr.
They had three brothers to die the day they were born: James 1927, John 1928, and Charles Wilson Foster 1930.

Their sister Eloise was not born yet (1932). She lived.

William Luther Foster and wives

Anna's great uncle William Luther Foster (1879-1941) and his second wife Addie Dryman (1879-1963). His first wife (above) was Lillie Mae Cook (1884-1904). Lille Mae is buried at Midway Methodist Church between Alpharetta and Cumming. He went by Luther. Luther is Anna's mother's father's brother.

Throwback Thursday: Luther and Lilie Mae Foster

Throwback Thursday:  Most of my blogs qualify to be thrown back.  But on Throwback Thursdays I like to point it out.

This is of Anna's grandfather's brother Luther Foster and his wife Lilly May Cook.  Anna's late mother Marie made very meticulous notes   on the back of the pictures.  This one points out that Lilly May died almost eleven months after they were married. 

Throwback Thursday: Paul Everett Foster on a Tricycle

Throwback Thursday, c 1898.  Paul Everett Foster, Jr (1895-1936). on a tricycle.  Paul is Anna's mother's father.  He grew up to be Singer Sewing Machine salesman and repairman, and a teacher.

Throw Back Thursday: 3 Young Men in Apharetta/Roswell area

Throw Back Thursday. c1915.  Left to right: Azech Spence, Luther Chambers, and Paul E. Foster (1895-1936).

Paul E. Foster is Anna's grandfather (her mother's father)

When I first saw this picture my first thought was "See no evil, Hear no evil, Speak no evil".

My Second thought:  "Why the top hat?  Is Luther Chambers a magician?  Luther the Magnificent?"

Charles Brooks Foster Family

This is the Charles Brooks Family.  Anna's mother's father's side of the family.  They lived in the Roswell/Milton/Alparetta, Georgia area.

Left to Rght, first row:  Charles Brooks Foster (1856-1928), Anna's great grandfather), Paul Everett Foster (1895-1936)  Anna's grandfather, and Ardella  Catherine Vinson Foster (1857-1933) Anna's great grandmother.

2nd Row:  William Luther Foster (1879-1941), Lena  May Foster (1877-1939) and Edgar Bell Foster (1884-1932).

What Are They Doing?

click on picture to see better 

This picture is a puzzle.  We are trying to guess what is going on.  It looks like a farming or a road crew taking a break.  The man on the far right with a hat on not quite right is Anna's grandfather  Paul  Everett Foster (1895-1936.  For years I thought Paul was helping his neighbors with their farm but today we were looking at the picture again and saw two men are wearing ties - you can bet those two are not doing much manual labor.

Paul lived in the Cumming/Alpharetta, Georgia, area about then.  He looks about  18 or 19. The picture may have been taken about 1915, give or take a couple of years.

I have read that the country would pick temporary road workers the same way they picked people for jury duty, draw names from a hat.  I know they did it in Macon County, North Carolina in the 1840s and 50s.  They were a new county and were always cutting roads and having to draw on able body men for labor.

That is what I think now, Paul Everett Foster was part of a work detail.

PS My friend Walker Gaines said they look like they are making bricks.  That makes sense.

This is Nancy Jones Buice and her husband Phillip Buice.  she has done a large amount of research on the Jones family or the Forsyth County, and the Alpharetta area.  About 20 years ago we used to exchange genealogy information often.

Her maiden name is Jones.  She grew up with in a Jones neighborhood with uncles, aunts, grandparents, and cousins living all around her.

My late mother-in-law Marie had many things she had picked up and held on to through the years.  Two of the things were poster size pictures of Anna, Nancy, and Marie's  Jones ancestors, William C. "Buck" Jones and Elizabeth Brown Jones.  Both pictures have identical classic wood frames.  We do not have wall space for the two pictures.

I wanted to give them to somebody who would appreciate them, so I dug up Nancy's number and offered them to her.  They came over to Marie's house  a few weeks after I called and loved the pictures.

Also while they were there I  gave them other genealogical information about the Jones family; mostly newspaper clippings.

I think getting those big framed pictures and the genealogical folders on the Jones made their day. 

Copies of the poster size pictures they received:

c1885 - Charles Brooks Foster (1856-1928).  He married Ardella Catherine Vinson (1857-1933).  They lived in the Milton/Alpharetta/Roswell, Georgia , area.  

He is Anna's great grandfather on her mother's side.

Edgar Bell Foster's Family

This is Anna's mother Marie's uncle (her father's brother)  Edgar Bell Foster (1884 - 1932), his wife Sophie Lackie (1886 - 1965), and their son Charles Loy Foster (1909 - 1964).  

The goat wagon driver is Charles Loy, again, several years later. 

Charles married  Lucille Hanson (1909-1952) and they had two children.

Charles V. Foster

Billy  T. Foster

They lived in the Roswell, Crabapple, Georgia, area.

Umbrella Rock on Lookout Mountain & Marietta Familie

The first picture is Anna's father's mother side of the family, the Wrights. 

The second picture is Anna's mother's father side of the family, the Moons. 

They are on Umbrella Rock on  Lookout Mountain, which part is in Tennessee and part is in Georgia.  They are in the Tennessee part in Point Park, a Civil war sight.  The black and white pictures do not show it but they also had a great view of the Cobra Bend of the Tennessee River (below).

The Wrights and Moons may or may not known each other.  But it is ironic that one of the Wrights, Lilla owned a neighborhood store on Canton Road at Kurtz Road in Marietta and the Moons on a neighborhood store on Roswell Street, across from Victory Drive in Marietta.... not that stores ownership  have anything to do with Umbrella Rock or the Tennessee River.

Dr Will Vinson and his Murderess

Here is an interesting story of one of our relatives, Dr. William D. "Will" or "Willie" Vinson.

Will was born in the Lickskillet section of Cherokee County in 1860.  He became a dentist.  He married a redhead, Katie Tribble.  They had two sons.  Katie died of tuberculosis  on March 1, 1898. 

Will married their housekeeper, widowed Jennie Clark Hogan.   

One story by Doctor Vinson's granddaughter handed down this story:  At some point after Will and Jennie's marriage she sent him out to draw water from the well.  It was getting dark.  A fog was settling in, and while he was there it descended into the yard and took the shape of Will's ex-wife Katie's face and hovered over a fence post.  Willie stood there just staring at it Jennie came out and saw the image too and fainted.

Jennie and Willie's marriage did not last very long.  Their divorced was final on Dec 3, 1900.

In 1903 William Dean Vinson married a third time Cora Lou Jackson Tallent, a divorcee with one daughter.  The doctor and Cora had two daughters and one son together.  The couple often quarreled and separated several times.  The doctor took steps to procure a divorce from Cora but she refused, afraid she would get nothing.

On March 30, 1922, Cora hired a taxi to take her to Will's office on Marietta Street, in Atlanta.  She walked  into the waiting room passed the patients, went to the doctor's office where he was bent over writing a prescription, she called his name and when he looked up she shot him right in the eye.  She emptied the chambered shooting him in the head and throat.  She walked back out through the waiting room, passed the  patients, and got back into the waiting cab.  She was immediately apprehended.

She was found guilty of murder , sentenced to die but was not executed.  A second trial commuted her sentence t life imprisonment, where she grew bitter and not the least bit resentful.  She made it known when she was released she was going to shoot Willie and Tillie, her stepsons.

Willie carried a pistol where he went until he died in 1945.

Cora lived on until 1953, having been pardoned some twenty years earlier.  She lived in Atlanta with her daughter.

The story was sent to me by  relative and  articulate detailed  researcher F. Tucker of South Carolina.    

As I typed it I reworded it to conform to my own style - like maybe misspelled a few words and tripped over my grammar, but  facts remained the same.

Cora Jackson Vinson, a raging nut.

Paul Everett Foster Taking a Spin in a Studio

The one closest to the camera is Anna's grandfather, Paul Everett Foster, Sr (1895 1936).

I commented on another photo a few weeks ago that back in the early 1900s  one of the props in portrait studios was the new fangled automobile.  See!  

These Jones men are brothers and cousins, also on Anna's side, her mother's mother's side.

This is Will Tyson.  He is on my side.  He is my father's mother's brother.  He knew how to pinch a penny until until it pleaded for mercy.

Charles Brooks Foster Parents and Siblings Someplace Between Cumming and Alpharetta, Ga.

Anna's Grandfather is Charles Brooks Foster, the second from the right.

click on each image to see and read.

Charles Brooks Foster Parents and Siblings Someplace Between Cumming and Alpharetta, Ga.

Paul Everett Foster (1895 - 1936(

This is Anna's grandfather, Paul Everett Foster, that she never met.  He died about 12 years before she was born.   He was a Singer Sewing Machine salesman and repairman and also a teacher.  He also was in interesting pictures that represented the times of his time on earth.

click on each image to enlarge

family, Paul front center

Paul right

Family, Paul front left

Paul right

Paul right

Paul standing, second from right.

Paul and Myrtle Irene Jones, fiance', proofs

Paul, Irene Jones Foster and Anna's mother.

Paul E. Foster, Sr (1895-1936)

Paul as a tike

on his bike

Anna's grandfather, her mother's father, Paul Everett Foster, Sr.  (1895 - 1936).  He was a teacher and a Singer Sewing Machine man.  He sold the sewing machines and serviced them.  He died at a relatively young age of 41, leaving his wife Irene to raise four kids in the middle of the Depression.

Brothers Charles and Paul Foster

The little boy saluting is Paul Everett Foster, Jr.  (1922-1995).  The younger boy is his brother Charles Jones Foster (1925-2012).  They are/were Anna's uncles.  They both were born and grew up in Marietta.  They both worked at the Strand Theater when they were teenagers.  Paul ran the projector and Charles did odds and ends jobs like distribute the weekly movie program guilds.

Charles loved airplanes.   Charles rode his bike to Atlanta to watch airplanes take off and land.

They both worked at the Marietta Post Office.  They both went into the service.  Paul was a Marine in the Pacific during WW II.  Charles was taught how to fly  airplanes in the Army and he flew supplies in during the war. 

After the war Paul returned to the Marietta Post Office.  He was a window clerk and wore his uniform professionally, just like he did in the Marines.  Many people thought he was the postmaster.  Several people have asked me "How long was Paul Postmaster?"  He was also an active leader in the Elks Club.

After the war Charles became a pilot for TWA.  He and his family settled in Kansas City.  After he retired they moved back to Marietta.

Charles was very health conscious and tried to avoid food that was not healthy.  I think Paul enjoyed life too much to be picky over what he ate.  Once at either a Christmas or Thanksgiving dinner I overheard  Charles talking Paul  and his wife Barbara to share their cemetery plot with him and his wife Florence.  Apparently they came to an agreement because that is where all four of them are buried.  The ironic part,  at that same dinner Charles was trying to convince Paul to not drink whole milk, it had too much fat in it .  Paul died  the following January, at the  most 6 weeks from their discussion.

Young Singles Interacting in 1936 and Homegrown Medicare

1936.  Left to right: First is my mother, Ethel America "Janie" Petty, behind her is her date, my father Ed Hunter; the next lady is Johnnie somebody; next is  Janie's sister Opal Petty;  the lady standing beside her is Lois Carter.  About two years after this picture Lois married a relative, Toy Moon.  I don't know who the other man is.

Apparently the big smoke stack in the back drop is at a Glover family  enterprise. 

Speaking of Glover Enterprises:  My father was probably working there at the time, and his father also.  Glover Machine Works had their own physician.  If any employee or their dependents needed a doctor, the Glover Machinery doctor would pay them a visit and probably in most cases fixed them up.   I think the medical treatment was all paid for.