I'm sure most of you are aware of this, but you can search for anything on line through Google or a similar search engine. Today I realized how very much personal information is out there. My spouse and I were sorting through old pictures, to create a kind of historic gallery in our guest bedroom. Between us, we have wedding pictures of our grandparents, parents, ourselves of course, and various other family members. I decided that I would like to identify the people in the photos I have. I really doubt that my son or daughter would instantly recognize pictures of my grandparents, for example. As I was filling out stickers to put on the back of each frame, I realized that I did not remember (if I had ever known) my paternal grandmother's first name. I had heard stories of her, that she was six years older than my grandfather and had been his family's housekeeper before they were married, but I never knew her personally. Both of my grandmothers died before I was born. Since I don't have any older relatives still living, I asked my west coast brother if he knew. He suggested I check my baby book for a family tree - no luck. I did find some very nice report cards but not the name I was looking for. In desperation I Googled My father's obituary. He died in 2006 so I wasn't sure if it would still be on line, or ever had been. But there it was, with a very nice amount of detail, but no parents' names. Since he was 89 when he died they probably didn't find it necessary to say that his parents had predeceased him. So, no luck there. I decided to try his older sister who had died in 2002. There I got lucky. My grandmother's name was printed out in it's entirety. It was Anna Kathrina Maria. Isn't that beautiful?
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