02 03 John Brown Kin: My Head Hurts from Keeping Them All Straight! 04 05 15 16 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 31 32 33

My Head Hurts from Keeping Them All Straight!

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I realize that reusing a name, and passing a family name on to the first child is a long honored tradition.  I have all the Brown family "duplicates" straight in my mind and records. Frederick, Ellen, Sarah, Owen, Mary - just some of the names that are seen in each generation, and sometimes in the same generation as one child dies, and another is named the same name.

But on Sunday I actually had to close my books and genealogy program to take a break because I was having trouble following all of these --

Brewster Higley  married Esther Holcombe --  They had a son
 Brewster Higley II  who married Esther Holcomb -- They had a son
  Brewster Higley III who married Esther Owen -- They had a son
    Brewster Higley IV who married Naomi! 

And if that is not enough Brewsters and Esthers for you, 3 of Brewster's siblings named children Brewster and Esther, and Esther Owen's mother was also named Esther!

Family gatherings must have been confusing:

Hey Brewster, would you please get me a cider? No not you dad, no not you son, I was talking to my nephew. Which nephew - that one there standing near the cider crock.
 Who made the mincemeat pie? Esther did? Which Esther? Esther Higley?  But which one???

Okay so I am making a joke at the expense of my ancestors, but it is really confusing to keep them all straight. I had to undo and redo 3 hours work the other day because I was on the wrong Brewster/Esther combo when I started to enter children.


Hope you can keep all of your ancestors straight!

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