Today's weathervanes were photographed at Disneyland, Paris, France.
Wednesday, May 31, 2023
Aladdin and his Magic Lamp - Weathervane Wednesday
Wednesday, May 24, 2023
Pirates of the Carribean - Weathervane Wednesday
Today's weathervane was photographed at Disneyland, Paris, France.
The wind didn't cooperate for this photo, but this is a two dimensional silhouette of a pirate weathervane located above the Pirates of the Carribean ride at Disneyland Paris. The pirate is looking through a spyglass, and wears a bandana on his head. He stands above the waves, and over a large cupola.
This ride is much darker than the same ride in the US parks, and includes bigger, wetter water drops! I don't remember a weathervane above the ride in Florida (did I miss one?). There were many, many more weathervanes at the Paris park than at the US parks. One fun extra at this ride in Paris - a waterside restaurant inside the ride! We had dinner at this restaurant, now renamed "Captain Jack's" after the character in the film inspired by this amusement park ride.
Our "crew" at Captain Jack's table |
Wednesday, May 17, 2023
Two toads at Toad Hall, Disneyland Paris - Weathervane Wednesday
Today's weathervanes were photographed over the Toad Hall Restaurant in the Fantasyland section of Disneyland, Paris, France.
One of my favorite books as a child was Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame, first published in 1908. Disney created an animated film in 1949 about some of the stories in this book, and of course, there is a ride in California's Disneyland called "Mr. Toad's Wild Ride" based on one of those stories. At the Disneyland Park in Paris, France we found a restaurant called "Toad Hall" after Mr. Toad's residence in the story book. This little restaurant serves fish and chips right in middle of Fantasyland. Strangely, there is no "Mr. Toad's Wild Ride" at all in Disneyland Paris.
Above the restaurant are two fun weathervanes of Mr. Toad. In one he is riding his motor car, and the other has Mr. Toad riding a unicycle. Mr. Toad was obsessed with motor cars in the book and movie, and got into lots of adventures (and lots of trouble) with his automobile. These weathervanes are simple two dimensional silhouettes, but they are very recognizable above the low rooflines of the restaurant.
Toad Hall Restaurant, Disneyland, Paris |
For the truly curious:
The official Disneyland Paris website in English: https://www.disneylandparis.com/en-usd/
Click here to see over 500 more Weathervane Wednesday posts!
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/search/label/Weathervane%20Wednesday
---------------------------------
To cite/link to this blog post: Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Two toads at Toad Hall, Disneyland Paris - Weathervane Wednesday", Nutfield Genealogy, posted May 17, 2023, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2023/05/two-toads-at-toad-hall-disneyland-paris.html: accessed [access date]).
Wednesday, May 10, 2023
Tinkerbelle at the Disneyland Paris Hotel - Weathervane Wednesday
Today's weathervane was photographed above the Disneyland Hotel in Disneyland, Paris, France.
The Rojos had a three generation family vacation to Disneyland Paris recently. We had a wonderful time in this park, which is much smaller than the DisneyWorld resort in Florida. I loved that the entire park is walkable, including walking from your hotel to both of the park entrances. While walking we were able to explore and appreciate many gardens, displays, artwork, new foods, people watching, and (you guessed it already!) weathervanes!
This whimsical little Tinkerbell is atop the Disneyland Hotel, which straddles the entrance to the Magic Kingdom park. In the rush to get through security, show passes and tickets, many people probably don't even notice this little weathervane. She is two dimensional, gilded, and caught our eye in the morning sun as we approached from the Disney Village. We couldn't tell what the tiny figure on the vane was until we were right next to the park entrance. I was amazed at the detail when I was able to blow up the image at home on the computer monitor.
The Disneyland Hotel is currently under renovations until 2024. It is a pink victorian style building with many turrets and an interesting roofline that mirrors the Sleeping Beauty Castle at the other end of Main Street.
This Disney park had lots of weathervanes! Stay tuned and I'll post more in the coming weeks for more Weathervane Wednesdays.
For the truly curious:
The official Disneyland Paris website in English: https://www.disneylandparis.com/en-usd/
The Disneyland Hotel in Paris: https://www.disneylandparis.com/en-usd/hotels/disneyland-hotel/?hotel=DNYH
Click here to see over 500 more weathervane posts!
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/search/label/Weathervane%20Wednesday
----------------
To cite/link to this blog post: Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Tinkerbelle at the Disneyland Paris Hotel - Weathervane Wednesday", Nutfield Genealogy, posted May 10, 2023, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2023/05/tinkerbelle-at-disneyland-paris-hotel.html: accessed [access date]).
Tuesday, May 2, 2023
Cinderella Amelia (Lyons) Newcomb (1820 - 1910)
Cinderella Amelia Lyons is a half sister to my 3rd great grandmother, Isabella Lyons Bill (1806 - 1872). Her name intrigued me, so I decided to investigate her life. Down the rabbit hole!
I had seen the name Cinderella before on a real person. See this blog post HERE. This is the only time I have found a Cinderella in my own family tree. The two examples of the name Cinderella I had seen were from the early 1800s. So I checked the 1850 Federal Census to see how many women and girls had this fairy tale name! According to Ancestry.com there were there are over 330,000 examples of this name in the 1850 census. Wow! And that wouldn't even include Cinderella Lyons, who was born and married in New Brunswick, Canada.
My 4th great grandfather, Thomas Ratchford Lyons, the son of David Lyons and Elizabeth Ratchford, was born on 3 March 1780 in Cornwallis, Nova Scotia. He married Ann Skinner, the daughter of Charles Skinner and Sarah Osborn, on 30 September 1802 in Cornwallis. Ann was born 9 May 1786 in Cornwallis, and died 19 October 1815 in Cornwallis. Later, Thomas remarried to Anne Griffin, the daughter of James Chipman Griffin and Sarah Harris, on 21 May 1818 in Sackville, Nova Scotia.
Thomas had five children with each wife, Ann and Anne, six daughters and four sons. Of course, the name Cinderella jumped out at me as being very interesting! I was able to trace her life under her married name.
Cinderella Amelia Lyons was born on 19 November 1820 in Sackville, and married William Freeman Newcomb on 11 December 1845. William was born on 18 March 1813 in Cornwallis, but the marriage document listed his residence as Roxbury (now part of Boston, Massachusetts), so he must have immigrated to the United States before the wedding. Cinderella and William also had five children, and their birth records list their birthplaces as Roxbury, Massachusetts; Cornwallis, Nova Scotia; Lewiston, New York; New York; and Massachusetts.
William died 9 June 1857 on Rainsford Island, Boston Harbor, and was listed as being buried there, too. This bit of information sent me down another rabbit hole, since I was not familiar with Rainsford Island. The vital records listed him as dying of apoplexy [probably a stroke], a carpenter, born in Nova Scotia, with no parents listed. After some research I learned that there was a small pox and quarantine hospital on Rainsford Island, which was also known as Hospital Island, Pest House Island, and Quarantine Island. He was only 44 years old, so perhaps William had been struck down by a contagious disease? There was no further information on the death record. There are no gravestones on Rainsford Island today, nor any standing buildings. It is a protected part of the Boston Harbor Islands National Park, being off limits from April to September due to bird nesting, and no transportation to the island. According to Find A Grave, it is estimated that there are thousands of burials on this island, with only about 1, 599 names identified between 1854 to 1896. About 350 bodies were removed in 1947 and reburied on Long Island.
Cinderella lived a long life after her husband died. She didn't pass away until 15 January 1910 in Boston. I found one obituary for her in far away New Mexico, in the Santa Fe New Mexican, 21 January 1910 ""Death of Mrs. C. A. Newcomb - Mrs. Cinderella Amelia Newcomb, mother of Judge William H. Newcomb, and Mrs. H. H. Betts of Silver City, died last week at Boston, Massachusetts, in her ninetieth year." Despite being a widow with five children, and her husband being only a carpenter, her children did well in life. Two lived in Massachusetts, one married the judge and removed to Silver City, New Mexico, and two unmarried daughters removed to Los Angeles and were buried at the prestigious Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Glendale, California.
Cinderella is buried at the Mount Hope Cemetery in Boston. I hope to find and photograph her tombstone when the weather improves.
For the truly curious:
Tombstone Tuesday - Alice and Cinderella, 2012: https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2012/10/tombstone-tuesday-alice-and-cinderella.html
Surname Saturday - Lyons, 2013:
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2013/08/surname-saturday-lyons-loyalists-from.html
----------------------
To cite/link to this blog post: Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Cinderella Amelia (Lyons) Newcomb (1820 - 1910)", Nutfield Genealogy, posted May 2, 2023, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2023/05/cinderella-amelia-lyons-newcomb-1820.html: accessed [access date]).
Wednesday, April 26, 2023
A Guitar in Townsend, Massachusetts - Weathervane Wednesday
Today's weathervane was photographed in Townsend, Massachusetts.
This unusual weathervane is located above a barn attached to a house in Townsend, Massachusetts. I love the details on the guitar vane - the strings, pegs, fretboard, and the hole through the body where the background sky is visible. But I also love that the finial above the guitar shaped vane is a clef, and that there are musical notes on a staff holding up the cardinal point letters!
Monday, April 24, 2023
Weathervane Wednesday on WMUR TV
Early in April I was interviewed by WMUR TV of Manchester, New Hampshire for a story about weathervanes in New Hampshire. They asked about the centaur weathervane in Londonderry located at Mack's Apples, my "Weathervane Wednesday" blog posts, my favorite weathervanes, and also about my genealogy connection to Shem Drowne, the famous weathervane maker of the 1700s. I also gave them dozens of photos of weathervanes from my blog posts to use on air.
Last Wednesday, while we in Spain visiting family members, WMUR aired their story on NH Chronicle "A World of Weathervanes". Due to European Union rules, I was blocked from viewing this program and blocked from clicking the WMUR webpage while I was in Spain. I received several emails and comments about the episode from friends and family, but still couldn't figure out how to view the story from Europe. However, soon after landing at Logan Airport in Boston, and while we were still driving home to New Hampshire, I watched this episode on my phone!
Thank you to WMUR for including me in the story! And thanks for placing a link to the Nutfield Genealogy blog and the Weathervane Wednesday posts on your webpage!
For the truly curious:
WMUR TV, "NH Chronicle: A World of Weathervanes":
https://www.wmur.com/article/nh-chronicle-a-world-of-weathervanes-and-their-stories/43592492#
Previous blog posts about this NH Chronicle episode:
April 5, 2023
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2023/04/weathervane-wednesday-on-tv.html
April 6, 2023
https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2023/04/yes-weathervane-wednesday-will-be-on-tv.html
--------------------
To cite/link to this blog post: Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Weathervane Wednesday on WMUR TV", Nutfield Genealogy, posted April 24, 2023, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2023/04/weathervane-wednesday-on-wmur-tv.html: accessed [access date]).
Monday, April 17, 2023
My Ancestors in Compiled Genealogy Books: A Bibliography
Monday, April 10, 2023
My Cousin Found my Great Great Grandfather's Scrapbook (circa 1895 - 1905)
My distant cousin found my great great grandfather's scrapbook listed in the card catalog of the Phillip's Library of the Peabody Essex Museum. It was listed as "ephemera" and "scrapbook of mounted newspaper clippings, announcements, invitations, tickets, etc.". This scrapbook belonged to Abijah Franklin Hitchings (1841 - 1910) and on the cover it said "Miscellaneous No. 5" and there was a note that it had been donated by Mrs. Thomas L. Henley on 9 October 1974. Who was Mrs. Henley. How did she get the scrapbook? What happened to scrapbooks 1 to 4?
My cousin and I had been exchanging Facebook messages for a few years, but we had never met in person. We both descend from Frank Hitchings. He had two children, a son Arthur Treadwell Hitchings (1868 - 1937) and a daughter Mabelle Cloutman Hitchings (1881 - 1916) who married Moses Stevens Herrick. We determined that we were 3rd cousins, and planned to meet up at the Phillips Library as soon as possible to view the scrapbook. What would it contain? Letters? Family photos?
Frank Hitchings had been a sail maker in Salem, Massachusetts early in life. Then he joined the "Minute Men of '61" when the Civil War started, which was a Zoave unit of volunteers from Salem. He re-enlisted and served a second time during the Civil War until he was wounded in his leg at the Battle of Fredericksburg. Frank walked with a limp for the rest of his life. He married Hannah Eliza "Lottie" Lewis on 22 September 1864, and soon after that he began to work at the Salem Custom House. Eventually he became the Deputy Custom Collector.
Cousins at the entrance to the Phillips Library, Rowley, Massachusetts |
The Phillips Library is free to the public, by appointment. The website includes strict instructions on how to request materials, what is allowed in the reading room, and directions to the archive, which was moved from Salem to Rowley several years ago (see the link below for my blog post about the move). The instructions for the reading room were familiar to me, but new for my cousin who had never been inside an archive or ever requested a manuscript or old book. It was a lot of fun seeing this scrapbook with her!
The book was quite large, but not quite full of ephemera. It ended with about a third of the pages blank, but we could see from this that Frank had used some sort of maritime book with lists of ships and cargo for his scrapbook. The first two thirds of the pages were completely full of clippings and paper items glued down so it was difficult to see that it was a repurposed book. Frank was a very frugal Yankee!
We had a great time perusing this scrapbook, although some of the newspaper was very fragile and started to shed pieces as we turned the pages. One of the first pages had my great grandfather's business cards and some newspaper advertisements for his billiard parlor in Beverly, Massachusetts. This made us hopeful that we would find more personal family items inside the scrapbook. We didn't find much, except for obituaries.
There were several newsclippings with the death notice for Frank's mother, Eliza Ann Treadwell, who was born on 27 August 1812 in Salem, and died 31 January 1896 in Salem, Massachusetts |
Included in the scrapbook were many, many newsclippings and invitations of the parades and reunions attended by the "Minute Men of '61" and the local Salem GAR unit where Frank was a member. The Minute Men of '61 were the regiment that rescued the USS Constitution, Old Ironsides, from Annapolis, Maryland during the Civil War and returned her to the North. They had an annual reunion for many years, and Frank had carefully pasted all the invitations and programs into his scrapbook.
The Custom House was renovated in 1898 and the golden Eagle was restored |
A photo of the Custom House eagle from my 2015 visit to Salem |
Frank Hitchings bought a lot at Salem Willows, and many of the newsclippings mention parties at this house on Juniper Point |
Apparently, Mabelle Hitchings, my cousin's great grandmother, was a fine dancer and banjo player. Many of the newsclippings mentioned her at dance recitals and concerts. This fancy pamphlet from an 1897 dance recital had Mabelle on the cover. She was mentioned inside doing several dances. In 1897 Mabelle would have been about sixteen years old. This is the only photo we have seen of Mabelle, and we knew it was her from a display of photographs at a Hitchings family reunion about 20 years ago, where her daughter Muriel identified her as the dancer on the cover. Frank had carefully pasted this into his scrapbook, too.
Mabelle Hitchings on the cover of a Dance Recital program |
Salem News, 2 February 1898 |
Apparently there had been a huge blizzard on 2 February 1898, and Frank had collected many newsclippings of the storm and saved them in his scrapbook. This was the "storm of the century" and was similar to when I lived through the "Blizzard of 1978". Many ships were lost off the coast of Salem and Gloucester, and the town was cut off from the outside world for several days. The illustrations above show the devastation and wrecked ships.
I loved the headlines here about the Blizzard of 1898 "Salem As it Used to Be: How People Lived in Days of Grandfathers" |
One of the most interesting things in the scrapbook were all the membership cards Frank had for the Essex Institute. The Peabody Museum (the former Peabody Academy of Science), the East India Marine Society, and the Essex Institute merged together to create one institution. Members of the societies collected curiosities from their maritime travels and donated collections, along with artwork, books, and manuscripts. These collections today are valuable for historical and genealogical research. I wonder if Frank Hitchings knew that someday this collection would include his personal scrapbook, and also the two books he wrote on shipping in Salem.
Frank Hitchings' 1896 membership card to the Essex Institute which he probably used for writing his books |
We enjoyed viewing Frank Hitching's scrapbook, but it left us wanting to know more. There were not many personal or family items inside the scrapbook, just items Frank found interesting. We could see that he had many interests in his Civil War service, his career at the custom house, the local weather, and anything related to maritime history. It gave me a better idea of who Frank was as a person, but I was hoping to learn more about his family, and perhaps see more photographs.
And...
Who was Mrs. Thomas L. Henley who donated this scrapbook? Was she a relative or cousin? I found a Thomas Henley who married Mildred Florence Hitchings (1909 - 1981). Mildred was my grandmother's sister, my aunt Millie. Did she donate this scrapbook? What happened to the other scrapbooks?
For the truly curious:
Essex Country Ship Registers, by A. Frank Hitchings, 1883, two volumes (Book 1 includes ships registered 1789 to 1828, and Book 2 has ships registered 1828 to 1851) The call number for this book at the Phillips Library is Mss. 150+
Also: Ship Registers of the District Of Salem and Beverly, 1789 - 1900, by A. Frank Hitchings, published Salem, Massachusetts: Essex Institute, 1906 available online at https://www.google.com/books/edition/Ship_Registers_of_the_District_of_Salem/Z2saAAAAYAAJ?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=%22benjamin+gardner%22+marblehead+massachusetts&pg=PA107-IA1&printsec=frontcover
The Peabody Essex Museum's Phillips Library https://www.pem.org/visit/library
Previous blog posts:
2009 - about Frank's military career during the Civil War: https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2009/11/how-to-find-your-american-veteran.html
2015 - about Frank's career at the Salem Custom House: https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2015/06/my-great-great-grandfather-deputy.html
2023 - A recent discovery of a Civil War photo of Frank: https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2023/01/newly-discovered-civil-war-photos-of-my.html
![]() |
Association of the Massachusetts Minute Men of '61 |
-------------------------
To cite/link to this blog post: Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "My Cousin Found my Great Great Grandfather's Scrapbook (circa 1895 - 1905)", Nutfield Genealogy, posted April 10, 2023, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2023/04/my-cousin-found-my-great-great.html: accessed [access date]).