My great grandfather, James Handy, and my great grandmother, Ida May Russell, were married in Barrie in 1896. Not long after, they moved to Wheatland, North Dakota. I have been somewhat obssesed with their journey and the steamer trunks that they travelled with!
While growing up, we spent hoards of time exploring the attic in my grandparents red and yellow brick, Ontario farmhouse, and sitting there were two steamer trunks ready to be packed for another journey.
James and Ida had 10 children over the course of 22 years! They had Lorne in Sunnidale, Ontario in 1896, then had May in North Dakota in 1898 and perhaps as well had Russell during the six years they lived there.
They came back to Ontario and had Jim and Willis, and then went back a second time to North Dakota and eventually went back to Ontario and settled in Midhurst, Ontario giving birth to another 3 girls and the youngest boy, Bob.
Here is May and Florence in the back row, and Ida and my grandmother, Jean, sitting on their Dad, James Handy’s lap.
Here is the storage room in the seven bedroom farm house where my grandparents lived their whole life.
James and Ida Handy had four boys and four girls. The eldest girl was May, and the youngest girls were Florence (on the right), my grandmother Jean (on the left) and Ida (in the middle).
I believe one of the four boys went to the war. Let me know if you know which one.
Here is my grandmother Jean, again, with Willis and Florie.
My Mother wrote this out for me many years ago. Ruth has one of the trunks, and I have the one with pressed tin and an alligator design.
My grand mother was 16 when she won an award for the best garden in the community in Midhurst.
Here are some wonderful pictures of the farm house in Midhurst.
