Tuesday, January 13, 2009

The good old days

I heard today that the 1911 census is available on the internet, thanks to the Freedom of Information Act and some bright spark noticing that it didn't become technically a law that you have to wait 100 years before releasing a census until 1920. And so, even though they make you pay money to look at it, I couldn't resist. Here's my granddad:



That's him at the bottom, Sidney Pridmore, age 10. Yes, my great-grandfather was born in the 1850s - we believe in big, big generation gaps in our family. Sid-Prid is rather an ugly rhyme, but then his parents had had twelve previous children (almost certainly most of them boys - females in our family tree are few and far between), so they were probably running short of names by then.

Funnily enough, if I'm remembering my family history properly, Granddad went on to have 13 children himself, three of whom died in infancy. I had no idea he was taking after his father. That's a weird family trend. And also, if Sid was the youngest of his Pridmore brood, does that make my dad the thirteenth child of a thirteenth child? And just how many magic powers does that grant me?

I really need to find out more about my family. Must get in touch with my cousin Sue, who actually knows about these things...

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

This reminds me that I have a copy of an old newspaper clipping from 1945, featuring our father's family, which our Mother was given by one of our uncles. I'll show you it!

And your post also raises the very important question of whether Neetra and I will have boys or girls. It's all boys on my side of the family and all girls on hers!

Anonymous said...

Sue Pridmore? She's not a physiotherapist is she?

Zoomy said...

She's not, sorry. She's not a Sue Pridmore any more either, she's been married for many years now. Which doesn't mean the Sue Pridmore you know might not be a relative, I've got millions of them...