An Answer Back

Well, I didn't expect this so soon, but I received an answer back from an email to a long-lost cousin, so-to-speak. Earlier today I went through a folder of old family emails and tried to re-establish contact with some cousins that I've not heard from (or I've not tried to contact) in years. Mostly I just updated them on Mom's condition, where I am and what I am doing these days, and of course asking for some info on recent births, marriages, deaths, etc.

One cousin, Ronald Mulholland, who is actually my second cousin once removed, is someone I remember growing up. He is the son of my aunt Dorothy Austin Mulholland(actually my 1st cousin twice removed) who I remember fondly - we went to her huge house on Elm Place in the Bronx (more about the family home on Elm Place in a later post) and often saw her at my great-grandmother's house in Grahamsville during the summers. A photo of Ronald Mulholland with Catherine O'Keefe Austin c 1942 is shown above.

Well, I received an email response back from him in only a matter of hours! I did a search on Google and landed on an alumni site for Marist College where he went to college. Luckily they had an email address and I figured I'd give it a chance. Ron wrote me back and said he wondered why his mail to my mother kept getting returned.

Mom was very close to Aunt Dorothy - in fact while I was cleaning out the house this summer, I found a picture of the last visit Mom made to see her in Wheeling, West Virginia. Not soon after Aunt Dorothy passed away.

I remember all the older women in my family - Aunt Dorothy and her dog Tilly, Aunt Loretta McGinnes Murtha(my great-grandmother's sister) and her Parliament cigarettes, Aunt Ethel McCrickert

Hannan who lived in Ft. Myers, FL and many more. These women were wise beyond their years, very opinionated - which was cool, and really held the family and its traditions together. Gosh, I miss them.