How I began my Search
AT THE BEGINNING.
Between year 5 and 6 in primary school our year 5 teacher gave us a project for the holidays: we had to copy out the chart on the blackboard to a piece of yellow foolscap paper and fill in the squares; it was a family tree.
In the class we wrote our name on square 1 and were then told we needed to fill in the rest with the help of our family, we also had to have the name the ladies were born with not their married name.
I showed it to mum and dad and they told me to take it with me to Tasmania, we were going on holiday that year to Tasmania, where grandma lived, and she would help me with her side of the family.
Grandma with my mother
I had what my mum knew about her family, which was not very much, she didn’t know her grandparent’s names on her father’s side, but told me her mother’s family.
When we arrived in Hobart I wasted no time showing grandma what I had and why I needed some names, her answer I will never forget, in the sternest voice I ever heard her use she said, “We don’t talk about that”, Grandma would not tell me I asked her, begged her, but she would not tell me not even their Christian names, much less surnames.
What I didn’t know was that dad knew why Grandma would not tell me anything, his father had told him but made him promise to keep the secret, but even dad didn’t know the biggest secret, nor the real reason grandma would not tell me. That was found many years later.
I have a strong feeling that had Grandma told me their names I would have taken my list to school and eventually lost that piece of yellow paper and perhaps never thought of it again. That is not what happened! I still have that paper.
She should have known that being told nothing would make me want to find out what she would not tell me, from what she said, I knew she knew, what I wanted to know she would just not talk about.
The last time I saw Grandma saying good by to her son.
I took my family tree to school at the start of year 6, and mine had less information than anyone’s, even the girl from Latvia had more names than I did.
Many years later I found what grandma would not tell me, but she had died by then, and grandpa died when I was 7.
That is where my search began, when I was 10 years old.
Biggest lesson from this.
Never tell a child “we don’t talk about that” tell them something, anything other wise they will be determined to find out what you are hiding.