Waking the Tree
If my people are your people too, welcome!
This is a collection of translations, transcriptions and histories that I’ve generated over many years of research. The people I write about are little people, working people, often women – the ones you wouldn’t read about in school.
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Did we have a farm in Ireland?
As a kid, I remember thinking that my grandfather’s family owned a farm called ‘Moyaver’ in a place called ‘Armoy’ – – but none of that turns out to be true. Here’s what’s true…
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The Formans. 1508-1913
The first ‘Forman’ in America is an Englishman named Robert Engle Forman who arrived with his wife, Johanna Pore, in 1645. Robert and the 12 generations that follow him are well documented and undisputed – but the 4 preceding English generations are a bit in question.
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Rooneys of Chorley
Elizabeth Rooney, my great-grandmother, was born in Chorley, Lancashire on the 7th of October, 1883 to John Rooney – an Irish immigrant to England who worked all his life as a farm labourer.
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John J. Costello of Newark
My great-grandfather, John J. Costello, was a blacksmith born in Connecticut probably in June of 1871. He moved to Newark, NJ sometime in early childhood and lived there until he died there at the age of 35 from kidney failure.
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Elizabeth Irene Wiggans
My grandmother, Elizabeth Irene Wiggans was born on the 16th of April, 1916, in the back bedroom of 290 Peshine Ave, Newark, NJ. She was named ‘Elizabeth’ after her mother but to her father, she would always be ‘Lovey’. Everyone else called her Irene.
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John Patrick O’Mullan
On January 4, 1907, my grandfather, John Patrick O’Mullan was born to Daniel William Mullan and Elizabeth Gallagher in Moyaver, County Antrim, Ireland. They christened him at St. Olcan’s church – where his father was christened and his family is buried.