Nellie Sophia Tomlinson

GEDCOM Note

Jennifer: I think Momma said Grandma and Grandpa had a house that burned down? Or am I only imagining this? Wilson Jan Thompson: Yes, it was the old farm house Grandpa Greene built. This was before Grandpa and Grandma were married. Grandpa rescued the hired man’s wife, who was pregnant, by carrying her through the bedroom window. Everything was destroyed. I wonder how man letters and photos, etc.? Grandpas’ Masonic ring was lost. He found the stone by sifting through the ashes and had the ring remade. To rebuild the house Grandma Gehl (who had title then) took out a mortgage on the farm. The money built two identical houses, one on the ill fated investment property in South Dakota. This was a fine new house with inside plumbing. This was the house Grandpa and Grandma lived in when they were first married. Mama remembers this house. Then the Depression hit and the Dakota farm failed. Grandpa lost the farm which was bought from the bank by his brother Fred Wilson. Grandma;s brothers Will and Lester came with horses and wagons and helped Grandpa and Grandma move to the run down farm on the Ridge Road. It was owned by Grandpa Tomlinson. He’d probably bought it as a foreclosure. The place was a wreck. The walls of the house were built from old packing crates and were so so thin “you could throw a cat through them,” as Grandma said. That’s the farm we remember. And then Fred and his wife Hattie were moving into the house as Grandpa and Grandma moved out. Hattie was bubbling over and when her piano got moved into the parlour she sat down and played some happy tunes. This was as Mama and Emma Jean and Joe sat on the boxes waiting to be moved out of the house where they were born.