Wordless Wednesday

 

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

Wordless Wednesday

"Who Do You Think You Are?" - Julie Bowen

 

I suspect I will be running behind all season with my Who Do You Think You Are? commentary, but I'll continue to forge ahead.  Onward to the second episode!

I had not heard of Julie Bowen before the advertising for the new season started.  The teaser for her episode said that she would investigate family lore and learn about two ancestors cut from very different cloth.  One made a daring choice and earned his family's pride.  Bowen was going to need to find a way to forgive the other.

The opening shot told us we were in Los Angeles, and the view looked to be from the Hollywood hills.  Bowen is in her home making guacamole, which even she admits is "so California."  For her intro she sits on a stool in a room in her house.  She was born in Baltimore as Julie Bowen Luetkemeyer (what?  that's not a good name for a marquee?).  Her mother is from the Midwest and always told her and her sisters to go outside and play in the fresh air and sunshine, so being naturally dramatic the girls created plays in the back yard.  Bowen always knew she wanted to be an actor.

Bowen moved to New York to realize her dream and went through lots of auditions.  Her significant roles have been on Ed (2000–2004), Boston Legal (2005–2008), and Modern Family (2009–present) (none of which I have seen, which apparently is why I didn't know who she was; her Wikipedia page mentions that she appeared on an episode of Jeopardy!, which I think is pretty cool).  She feels lucky to have her career and loves what she does.  She shot the pilot for Modern Family while she was pregnant with twins, who were born on the day the show was picked up for production.  She says that was when her life changed, and her family suddenly became the most important thing in the world to her (um, why didn't that happen when her older son was born?).

Bowen's parents are John Alexander Luetkemeyer, Jr. and Suzanne Frey.  She wants to learn about one ancestor on each side of her family.  On her father's side, her father's grandmother, Granny LeMoyne, said they had an ancestor whose home was a stop on the Underground Railroad.  On her mother's side, she knows that her great-grandfather Charles Daniel "Big Charlie" Frey was an illustrator for the Chicago Post.  He died before she was born, but she visited his apartment once and was impressed by how glamorous it was, with smoked mirrors, a black and white marble floor, and two grand pianos.

While Bowen talks about her ancestors, several photos and home movies are shown.  Unlike a lot of the celebrities who have appeared on this program, it seems that the Luetkemeyer family has no shortage of images of its ancestors, which is wonderful.

In the now-standard foreshadowing part of the intro, Bowen says that history is history and she doesn't want to claim any Nazis or slave owners.  It would be incredibly sad to find out she had those in her family, but if it's true she wants to know.  History is important because we repeat it if we don't know about it.  (True!)

Bowen starts with her mother's side of the family.  Her mom has sent Big Charlie's obituary, which was published November 12, 1959 in the Chicago Tribune.

"Charles Frey, Ad Executive, Dies at Age 73", Chicago Daily Tribune, November 12, 1959, page W13

Charlie was born in Denver, Colorado and was 73 years old when he died.  Bowen is looking forward to learning more about him because he's the other "artist" in the family.  No one else was as exotic or exciting.  Because Charlie died in Chicago, that's where she's going to start finding out about him (of course).

In Chicago, Bowen heads to the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (identified by the "SAIC" on the outside of the building).  She tells us she sent the information she knew about Big Charlie to a genealogist, who told her to meet there.  The genealogist in question is Jeanne Larzalere Bloom, CG, whom Bowen asks why Charlie would have gone to Chicago from Denver, where he was born.  Bloom immediately says they should look on Ancestry.com (these plugs are geting more and more obnoxious in their heavyhandedness; this was 7 minutes into the episode).  She adds that normally one would search in the closest census but that they'll have to search in the 1900 census, because the 1890 census was burned.

(I am flabbergasted that a Certified Genealogist would state this inaccurate information.  She must know that the greatest part of the loss of the 1890 census came about due to the paper being waterlogged after the fire and left to become moldy.  I can't think of any reason that someone on the production crew would require her to say it was burned.  On the other hand, Ancestry.com used to have an article on its site titled "A Fire Destroyed the 1890 Census, but It Doesn't Have to Destroy Your Search", so maybe an Ancestry rep asked her to phrase it that way?  The article, by the way, is no longer on the Ancestry site, but this 2008 blog post might be close to it in content.)

So Bowen somehow finds the search page for the 1900 census and enters "Charles Daniel" for First and Middle Name(s), "Frey" for Last Name, "1886" for Birth Year, and "Denver, Denver County, Colorado" for Birth Location, with Exact Search turned off.  Big surprise, she finds Charles "Frye":  born November 1886 in Colorado, living in Denver, Arapahoe County, Colorado (first hit on the page, no less).

United States 1900 Federal Population Census, Precinct 7, Denver City, Arapahoe County, Colorado,
June 4, 1900, Enumeration District 70, page 3B, lines 73–82

After clicking through to see the image, Bowen comments on the spelling of the last name as "Frye."  Bloom responds that the census taker probably spelled the name phonetically.  (That's not the best explanation.  If that were the case, it more likely would have been spelled "Fry", not "Frye.")  Bowen then proceeds to read all the information on the form, which is nice to see.  The two women note that Charlie's father, Daniel, was born in New York and that Daniel's parents were born in Germany (but don't mention that Charlie's mother's parents were from Ireland, so it must not be relevant for the episode).  There's also a comment about Daniel being a plumber and Charlie's "humble beginnings", with nothing said about the fact that Daniel did own his home, nothing to sneeze at in 1900.  (Also not mentioned were the twins in the Frey family, the 11-year-old brothers Harvey and Harry, born in December 1888.  Maybe twins run in the family?)

So why did Charlie go to Chicago?  No hard facts or documentation is available, but Bloom says that if Charlie wanted to be an artist, his opportunities would have been limited in Denver.  The places to go would be Chicago or New York.  And Charlie was in Chicago by 1908, as evidenced by his appearance in the city directory (which is not online anywhere, unfortunately).  He is listed as Charles D. Frey, artist Post h Ill Athl Club.  Bloom explains that Post was his employer, i.e., the Chicago Post, and "h" means home, so he was living at the Illinois Athletic Club.

Suddenly the significance of meeting at the Art Institute of Chicago is made clear:  This very building used to be the Illinois Athletic Club.  The room in which Bowen and Bloom are sitting was the main dining room, and Bloom points out a stained glass window with "I A C" in the pattern.

Bloom explains that in the early 20th century, men's clubs were a big thing.  You could dine and exercise where you lived, and they were outstanding places for networking.  It was the perfect place to be if you were trying to make your mark.  It wasn't cheap, however.  In 1908 the membership fee was $100, about equivalent to $2,500 today.  At the same time, the average hourly wage in publishing was 42¢/hour.  Bowen says that the fact that Charlie made joining the club a priority (which is an assumption on her part) meant that he was an up and comer and was making his career a priority.

Charlie's obituary said that he started his ad agency in 1910, only two years after he was living in the club.  He was young but ambitious.

Bloom takes out a book, Selected Writings of Elbert Hubbard.  The book has an entry for Charles Daniel Frey, which Bloom says was written about 1912:

Selected Writings of Elbert Hubbard, Volume 10:  Hundred-Point Men,
New York:  Wm. H. Wise & Co., 1922, page 380

The piece about Charlie runs for four and a half pages.  It reads a lot like a puff piece in a county history or "mug book", but more sycophantic.  It would be interesting to see how the original writings from which these were selected were put together.

Bloom produces a print ad from Charlie's ad agency for Bowen to look at.  It's very art deco.  (This is the poster that was shown.)  They talk about how Charlie helped transform advertising from merely showing a product to suggesting a future lifestyle.  He was a poster boy for the American dream.

Bowen says that Charlie's obituary said that he had served in World War I.  Bloom points her to Ancestry again and says she should start with the draft registration.

Bowen reads everything on the card, as she did with the 1900 census, but nothing is said (at least not on air) about the birthdate Charlie supplied, which was October 1988, two years off of that on the census.  Charlie said that he had a wife and two children, and Bowen comments that one of them was her grandfather.  She then hits the line where Charlie claimed a draft exemption because he had dependent relatives and judicial service.  She wants to know what that service was.

In another blow against good dialogue, Bloom tells Bowen she should go to Newspapers.com (plug alert!  plug alert!  Ancestry.com product being featured!) and "see if [she] can figure out what's going on in 1917."  (I hope we can blame the show's writers; I'd hate to think that Bloom came up with that on her own.)  For her search terms Bowen uses Charlie's full name, Charles Daniel Frey, and restricts the search to Chicago in 1917.  When she clicks on the result the name of the paper is not stated, but it's the Chicago Tribune again, for August 25, 1917.  (They couldn't show Charlie's obituary on Newspapers.com, because the site has the Tribune only up to 1922, the end of the public domain period.  After that, you need to have access to the ProQuest database.)  The article header certainly catches Bowen's eye:  "200,000 U. S. Secret Agents Cover Nation."

"200,000 U. S. Secret Agents Cover Nation", Chicago Daily Tribune, August 25, 1917, page 1

The article is about the American Protective League.  Charlie's name does appear, as the head of the League's Chicago division.  Based on information in the article, he was claiming exemption from the draft based on his work with the Secret Service.  But what exactly was the American Protective League, and what were they doing?  Bloom defers answering that question herself and tells Bowen she should speak to a historian who specializes in that topic.

As she leaves, Bowen talks about the kinship she feels with Charlie.  He worked at the intersection of art and commerce.  Creative types such as Bowen and Charlie push the envelope and are outside the norm.  But Charlie wasn't a government man, so something is missing in the story she has learned so far.  She needs to find out what the American Protective League (APL) was.

Bowen's next visit is to the Pritzker Military Museum & Library, just one block from SAIC.  The historian who talks to her there is Christopher Capozzola, a World War I historian at MIT.  (We saw him in the Bryan Cranston episode.)  He tells her that APL was founded in Chicago at the beginning of World War I as a national voluntary organization.  Charlie was involved from the beginning.

When the United States entered the war in April 1917, it was a controversial move, and not everyone agreed with it.  There had been sabotage by Germans in the U.S.  APL investigated a lot of people, but it was particularly interested in Germans and people of German descent, who were treated as enemy aliens.  Aliens were also required to register with the government.

Bowen points out that Frey was of German ancestry.  He was the second generation born in the U.S., but all Germans could be considered suspicious.  She wonders if he might have had a vested interest in joining APL early, and Capozzola agrees that it would have helped him look even more all-American.

At this point the narrator steps in to explain that Germans were the enemy in our midst.  They were told where they could live and work.  The American Protective League worked with police to keep tabs on Germans.  During Frey's tenure, APL rounded up more than 10,000 Germans and interned them in detention camps.  Many internees were not released until after the war was over.  The graphics playing during this segment included a man listed as "Henkel Arnold" in what looked like a mug shot.

Capozzola explains that a lot of things APL did are now not constitutional:  tapping phones, getting information from banks.  APL was a citizen surveillance army, and the largest chapter was in Chicago.  The League created a soapbox for Frey's patriotism, who could use his advertising skills to sell domestic fear.  To Bowen, this sounds like mob mentality, and it frightens her.

Capozzola concedes the organization is a dark chapter of U.S. history, but he has found a few documents relating to Charlie.  The first thing he shows Bowen is a photograph of the American Protective League National Headquarters, with Charlie standing in front of the building.  He is wearing a military-type uniform.  Bowen thinks he looks like a jerk, but she admits her grandfather looks just like him.  She wonders about the military-style garb, and Capozzola says he has another document to show her.

This document is a two-page letter on APL letterhead, dated March 22, 1918 (the one-year anniversary of the founding of APL).  I was able to transcribe most of it; I've put in dashes where I couldn't read the text or sections were not shown on screen.

-- >< -- >< -- >< -- >< --

March 22nd, 1918

Captain Chas. Daniel Frey,
1537 "I" Street, N.W.,
Washington, D.C.

Dear Captain:

One year ago today [——]
[—] the formation of the American [Protective League ——]
[three lines I could not read]
build this [——]

As an American [——]
you built the first efficient company in the [—]
of your success as a Company Commander you were made [—]
the Chicago Division, and in that office you built the most efficient American Protective League division in the League and made of it a model on which we are still building all other divisions.

Because of your success as Chief of the Chicago division, you were made a National Director and I congratulate you on the excellent work you are now doing in helping to bring all other divisions of the League up to the standard of the Chicago division, as well as the other and even more important work you are now so efficiently handling as National Director.

At great personal sacrifice you have given your all to your country in your unselfish and untiring work for the Leagueand [sic] in the name of the League and its 250,000 members I extend to you their thanks and appreciation.

Yours very truly,

A. M. Briggs [signature]
Chairman, National Directors

Charles Daniel Frey, A. M. Briggs, and
Victor Elting (left to right), National Directors,
American Protective League

-- >< -- >< -- >< -- >< --

Charlie is addressed as "Captain" in the letter, which Capozzola only addresses in passing, but this page says that was commissioned as an Army captain.  Bowen reads parts of the letter, particularly focusing on the "other and even more important work" Charlie was credited as doing.  Capozzola points out that Charlie had moved to Washington, D.C. and was one of the most important people on the home front in the U.S. at this time.  He thought he was doing good work.  But what exactly was he doing?  As stated in the letter, APL had about 250,000 members in 1918, and everyone reported up the chain, so he was monitoring the efforts of the entire organization.

Bowen wonders why we don't hear about the American Protective League nowadays.  Capozzola says that it became a lightning rod of controversy.  Ordinary people were interrogated over the slightest things.  There was a backlash, and some people started pushing back, asking the APL members who they were to question things and just what kind of country the U.S. was becoming.  In late 1918 Congress debated the situation.  It eventually shut down APL but increased funding for the Bureau of Investigation, the precursor organization to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.  APL became a forgotten chapter in American history.

Bowen then goes off about how someone is villainized in every war and people act unconstitutionally.  Currently the anti-Muslim sentiment in the country follows the same pattern.  She finds it more than a little disturbing that her ancestor was involved in this, but she would rather know it than not.  She hopes it helps start a conversation about the situation.

Leaving Pritzker, Bowen says that it's ok that families have dark corners.  Learning about Charlie doesn't determine who she is.  People need to look at history, but it's scary that mistakes are forgotten so quickly.  If people don't look, they are doomed to repeat the errors.  As a society, we need to remember that this happened and learn from it.

Now that she's learned about an interesting ancestor on her mother's side of the family, it's time to turn to her father's side.  She had asked her father if he had anything to share.  Bowen reads (most of) his response aloud from her mobile phone.

-- >< -- >< -- >< -- >< --

Jack Luetkemeyer

"My side of the family"

Dear Julie

I hear from Mom and others that you are getting enlightened on our ancestors on the Frey side of the family, so I thought I would throw in a few words on my side of the family.  The first name that comes to mind is the Lemoyne's [sic].  My grandmother, Granny Lemoyne, whose real name was Romaine LeMoyne, before marrying my grandfather, Austin McLanahan, was the real matriarch when I was growing up.  Her father's name was John Valcoulon LeMoyne, and his father was Francis Julius LeMoyne.  They were from Washington, Pennsylvania so you may want to start there.

I miss you XO

Dad

-- >< -- >< -- >< -- >< --

Bowen remembers having heard the LeMoyne names before.  The family lore is that Francis LeMoyne was some kind of doctor and that he had been involved with the Underground Railroad.  She hadn't wanted to check on it previously in case it turned out not to be true.  It's been nice to believe the story.  She doesn't know anything else about the story and decides (i.e., was told) she should go to Washington, Pennsylvania to find out more.

In Washington Bowen goes to the Washington County Historical Society.  Over a door inside the building is a sign:  "LEARN FROM HISTORY Or Be CONDEMNED TO REPEAT IT."  With that as a reminder of the theme for this episode, Bowen sits down to talk with Dr. Erica Armstrong Dunbar of the University of Delaware.  Dunbar starts out by saying that the "Washington Historical Society" has a lot of documents about the LeMoyne family because the building is the family's former home.  The two women are sitting in the former apothecary.  Francis LeMoyne was indeed a physician/surgeon, and he ran his practice out of his home.

Then Dunbar tells Bowen that some of the documents are fragile, so Bowen will have to wear gloves.  (No!!  If the documents are really that fragile, using gloves means you lose most of your tactile sensitivity, which is worse for the documents.  Oh, bother.)  Dunbar then brings out a large certificate.  At the top is printed "American Anti-Slavery Society Commission."

-- >< -- >< -- >< -- >< --

American Anti-Slavery Society

Commission

to Dr. Francis J. Lemoyne

Dear Sir:

You have been appointed and are hereby commissioned, by the Executive Committee of the American Anti-Slavery Society, instituted at Philadelphia in 1833, as their Agent for the space of Twelve months commencing with 20 day of December 1837.

The purpose of this Commission is to authorize you to deliver, in the name of the American Anti-Slavery Society, public lectures and addresses in support of the principles and measures set forth in its Constitution and Declaration of Sentiments.

Given at the Secretary's office No. 143 Rassan[?] Street, New York, this 12 day of December in the year of our Lord eighteen hundred and thirty seven.

-- >< -- >< -- >< -- >< --

p
partial image of LeMoyne's commission paper

Bowen is very excited — her ancestor was an abolitionist!  She has never heard of the society before.  Dunbar explains it was the first national society calling for the end of slavery.  LeMoyne signed up in the society's early days.

As an agent and lecturer, LeMoyne would have helped share the society's stand that not only should slavery end, there should be no compensation for slave owners and people should boycott Southern goods, such as cotton and sugar.  His goal would have been to educate people through his lectures, in the north and the south.  Bowen is surprised that he would have traveled to the south and asks if it would have been dangerous.  Dunbar confirms that it was:  Abolition was still considered a radical idea, and when this commission was given, the country was still 27 years away from outlawing slavery. Bowen asks what inspired LeMoyne to become an abolitionist.  Dunbar doesn't have an answer for LeMoyne specifically but says that she believes that for most people it came from within themselves.

Bowen wants to know more about how LeMoyne would have traveled for his lectures.  Would he just get on a horse and go?  Dunbar says he wouldn't have gone alone, because there were great risks to antislavery speakers.  They could be tarred and feathered, and some were killed for speaking.

The historical society has several oral histories that detail what the townspeople said about LeMoyne.  Dunbar brings out two very yellowed typed pages and says it's a copy.  Bowen reads most of the second paragraph transcribed below.

-- >< -- >< -- >< -- >< --

Starting in 1841 the abolitionist party in Washington county had a complete ticket every year for county offices and for governor.  In 1841 Dr LeMoyne was the candidate for governor, polling 85 votes in the county.  In 1843 he was a candidate for Congress receiving 410 votes.    Erichsen

For a long time the abolitionists did not dare to hold their meetings in any public places.  One of the most popular places to hold them was the side yard of the LeMoyne place.  This was the most natural place for them as the lecturers were entertained by Dr. and Mrs. LeMoyne.  On one occasion a large crowd gathered in a threatening manner in front of the house.  The Abolitionist[s] were gathered in the garden.  Dr. LeMoyne took his son John up to the little balcony which used to be reached from the attic on the front of the house.  Here Dr. John Julius LeMoyne kept his bee=hives under the front eaves, and here on pleasant evenings the old Doctor was to be found playing his flute and admiring his bees.  On the evening Dr. LeMoyne told his son, young John:  "If those people try to break up the meeting just throw one of these bee-hives into their midst."  The young man had the advantage and angry though they were the crowd was forced to disperse.

On another occasion the meeting was in progress in another place but was threatened so violently that the speaker was forced to seek refuge at the LeMoyne home where he was staying.  Mrs. Le Moyne herself was his guide through back yards and over fences.  The route was so devious that it took about a half hour to arrive.  It was on this occasion, perhaps, that Mrs. LeMoyne's white bonnet was spotted with the egg missiles.

For the last thirty years of the Doctor's life he was unable to rest in his bed at night, but sat upright in a large easy chair which he kept in his office.

LeMoyne Institute was founded about 1871.    Erichsen

-- >< -- >< -- >< -- >< --

Bowen pauses when she reads the name of Dr. John LeMoyne and says that she named her son John after this part of the family.  Dunbar points out that this Dr. LeMoyne was the father of Francis Julius LeMoyne, and Bowen realizes John LeMoyne was her 4x-great-grandfather.

After Bowen finishes reading the paragraph, the women discuss just what was happening.  Dr. John LeMoyne had told his son to throw a beehive into the angry crowd to protect the people who were at the meeting, so he must have been an abolitionist also.  Dunbar says that John the son did throw the beehive, but I'm not sure that's clear from the text.

Bowen is stunned that this happened in Pennsylvania, which she thought no longer had slavery by that time.  Dunbar explains that slavery in Pennsylvania was almost but not quite gone.  (The account is undated, but Pennsylvania did not fully free all slaves until 1847.)  Even though it was almost gone, there was obviously still great animosity about the matter.

It occurs to Bowen that freed slaves would have been part of society.  Dunbar confirms this and adds that fugitives would have been there also.  Many people were concerned that these fugitives were in competition for their jobs.  This sets off Bowen, who talks about people who feel threatened by "others" who are different from them.  It sounds old and new at the same time, and she sees parallels in today's society.  Dunbar says that Francis LeMoyne fought against that type of thinking and said he "will not agree to the moral bankruptcy of slavery."

The discussion of fugitives brings Dunbar to show another document; she says that this letter and the other documents are all copies.  (But if that's the case, why bother with the conservator gloves?)

-- >< -- >< -- >< -- >< --

Altho, unacquainted with you personally, I feel it my duty to acquaint you (confidentially) of a circumstance which transpired here this morning, trusting my information may save a brother man from slavery.

Mr. McClean, former editor of the Argus, of Wheeling, Va., was in my office this — Wednesday — morning, & in conversation enquired who was U. S. Commissioner in Washington, Pa.  I did not know — He said "I suppose if you did you wouldn't tell me, as one of our citizens wants to seize a slave of his there "?"  He wouldn't tell me who the master was, but I feel it my duty to warn you that if there is no US Com. there the "master" will soon be there himself, in search ——

Please put your colored folks on their guard, especially fugitives from the neighborhood of Wheeling, Va.  The bloodhounds are on the scent. . .

Yours in haste,
(Yrs)
J. Heron Foster

-- >< -- >< -- >< -- >< --

An interesting thing about this letter is that I found a published transcription of it, but it differs from what was shown on the program.  I was able to read and transcribe the entire letter as shown on screen, so I'm confused about the differences.  In addition to differences in punctuation, the published version has an extra sentence between the end of the program's version of the letter and the closing.  I wonder if the original of this letter even still exists, whereby someone could verify what it truly said.

F. J. LeMoyne et al., "Anti-Slavery Letters of Dr. F. J. LeMoyne, of Washington, Pennsylvania",
The Journal of Negro History 18:4 (October 1933), pages 466–467.

This letter confirms that LeMoyne was part of a community engaged in helped enslaved people find freedom.  The "colored folks" referred to in the letter would be both escaped slaves (fugitives) and free persons of color.  Even someone who had never been a slave could be taken and then enslaved.  Dunbar says that this letter (which is also undated) was written after 1850 and passage of the Fugitive Slave Law, which gave slave owners permission to cross state lines to recover their escaped slaves.

The narrator gives a more detailed explanation of the so-called "Bloodhound Law", given that name because slave owners literally used bloodhounds to try to track down runaways.  The Fugitive Slave Act of 1850 required that escaped slaves be returned to their owners, even if they were in free states.  The U.S. Commissioners determined who was a former slave, but they did so without benefit of trials or defense.  The blacks who were caught were not permitted to speak on their own behalf.  Citizens were pressured to turn in not only fugitives, but also anyone suspected of helping fugitives.

Dunbar says that because it was a federal law, even assisting someone was a crime.  You could be sent to jail and fined.  Being caught could ruin you.  Bowen gets herself in high dudgeon again, realizing that neighbors were encouraged to rat out neighbors, as at other times in history.

For someone like LeMoyne, who was well placed in society, to help and to put himself and his family at risk was a strong statement.  Considering the commission from the American Anti-Slavery Society, the abolitionist meetings held at his house, and how he was a known contact to help fugutives, Dunbar concedes that it is safe to say LeMoyne was part of the Underground Railroad.  Bowen is thrilled and squeals, "So great!"  She is proud to have him in the family.

Bowen wonders if the LeMoyne home is comparable to Anne Frank's situation.  Dunbar says that fugitives were harbored in the home.  LeMoyne helped people gain employment and shuttled others further north.  His son appeared to have been in the middle of it.  Bowen says she likes to think she would have done the same thing in the same situation but admits she doesn't really know if she could.

Bowen asks again why LeMoyne would do what he did.  Dunbar can't help but think that maybe he was modeling the behavior and bravery of the fugitive slaves who escaped and made it north.  Bowen sees the same fight going on; LeMoyne chose a side and stood up against the federal government in the face of adversity.  She cries as she says it's good to have heroes.

She then asks Dunbar when LeMoyne died, which was in 1879.  He lived long enough to see Emancipation and the abolition of slavery.  (He also lived long enough to see the failure and dismantling of Reconstruction, but that wasn't brought up.)

In the wrap-up, Bowen describes how she was shocked to see the documentation about LeMoyne, even though she had heard the stories from family members.  She compares LeMoyne's world to modern society, where moral questions are being asked.  She's proud of her 3x-great-grandfather, who had the courage of his convictions.  (I presume she's also proud of her 4x-great-grandfather, who was also involved in the abolitionist movement, based on what we saw.)

Bowen is glad she looked at both sides of her family.  On the one side she found an abolitionist who stood up for people who had no rights.  On the other side was Charlie and his participation in the American Protective League.  He apparently felt the need to do what felt right to him, which was to protect citizens by violating others' constitutional rights (which smacks mightily of rationalization to me).  She plans to share the information she has learned about LeMoyne, who made hard choices.  She wants to forgive Charlie and his misguided actions as much as she wants to congratulate LeMoyne.  But both are family, and you have to love family.  You learn from them and try to do better.

Now that we've learned more about Big Charlie, the profile written by Elbert Hubbard becomes particularly interesting.  Hubbard was the founder of Roycroft, an arts and crafts community.  Check out the "Religious and political beliefs" section on his Wikipedia page.  Considering the kind of man Hubbard was, I suspect that he profiled people he actually respected and that the pieces were not pay to play or designed to curry favor.  He might not have written such a complimentary piece about Charlie if he had known the activities Charlie was going to be engaged in.  He died in 1915, so he never saw what Charlie became.

"Who Do You Think You Are?" - Chris Noth

I am still wondering why Who Do You Think You Are? did back-to-back episodes to end this "season."  I looked at the TLC schedule the next Sunday and didn't see anything I considered particularly special, but I do realize I am not the station's intended market, so I may have overlooked something.  All I know is that I was already behind, and airing two episodes on the same night just made it worse.  I've been telling myself, "Only two to go . . . ."

All of that notwithstanding, the first episode of the double header was Chris Noth, who at least is roughly my generation even if I hadn't heard of him previously.  The teaser told us that Noth would trace his father's family back to a devastating catastrophe.  He would find an Irish ancestor who suffered severe oppression before going to fight in Spain in one of the fiercest battles of all time and then becoming a war hero.

The introduction to the episode tells us that Chris Noth has enjoyed a long, distinguished career in television, film, and stage.  His first major role was as Mike Logan on Law & Order (which I used to watch, but only for Jerry Orbach), and he portrayed Mr. Big (that's a character name?) on Sex and the City (which I've still never seen, but at least I recognized Kim Cattrall's name).  He currently stars on the CBS show The Good Wife.  (I think the definition of "distinguished" is being stretched a little here.)  In 2012 he married his long-time girlfriend, Tara Wilson, and they are raising their son in Los Angeles (Noth's Wikipedia page says that Orion was born in 2008, before the marriage).

Noth's first comments are about his son.  He has come to fatherhood late but it's great.  He is always learning something new through Orion's eyes.

Thinking about his own childhood, Noth says he was born November 13, 1954 in Madison, Wisconsin to Jeanne Parr and Charles James Noth.  His father was a military man and was in the Navy in World War II, which is where he met Parr.  He served during the entire Korean War on the carrier Antietam and earned medals for his bravery.  After his military service he and Jeanne worked on raising a family.

Noth is the youngest of three boys.  His father worked for an insurance company.  He didn't love the job but did it for his family.  His mother had a successful career in broadcasting and was a popular news correspondent for CBS.  His parents separated when he was about 9–10 years old, and his father died in a car accident in 1966.

Noth wishes his father would have lived so he could have known and talked to him as an adult.  Because of his father's early death, it was like a complete separation from his father's side of the family, and he has few details on his paternal grandparents.  His grandmother was Nonna Mae, and his grandfather George was apparently a millionaire who belonged to a country club.  George died before Noth was born, but he has dim memories of Nonna Mae, whom he liked.  He saw her for two weeks once in Chicago on a family trip.  He thinks her maiden name might have been McGuire, which might make her Irish.

Noth wants to do his family history now before it's too late for himself and his son.  It's a great thing to know your roots, and it's better to learn at a young age, instead of having gaps as Noth does.

With no family members to talk to beforehand, Noth starts by going directly to Chicago, where his father's family lived.  He says he is meeting genealogist Kyle Betit (one of the stalwarts of Ancestry.com's ProGenealogists arm) at the Illinois Regional Archives Depository (IRAD), which therefore means he must be at Northeastern Illinois University.  They start by looking for information about Noth's father.  Betit suggests they might be able to find his birth certificate on the Cook County Genealogy site (wow!  how much did that product placement cost?  no comment about it being a pay site, however).  Noth thinks his father was born about 1924–1925, but somehow they manage to find him, even though he was born January 16, 1922 in the Presbyterian Hospital.  (It's nice that Charles Noth was findable in the index.  That index has tons of problems, and I often have to write to Cook County for records because I can't find someone on the site.)  Charles Noth's parents were George Joseph Noth and Mary McGuire.  Noth figures Mae easily could have come from Mary.  The birth certificate also says that George was born in Davenport, Iowa; Mary was born in Chicago; and they were living at 200 South Ellwood Avenue, Oak Park.

Emboldened by this easy success, Noth asks what else they can find.  Betit disingenuously suggests that since George was supposed to have been a prominent person, they can try looking at newspapers for a marriage announcement.  (Seriously?  This is what you propose as a logical next step?)  And then he suggests they go to an Ancestry site, Newspapers.com.  Noth searches for "George J. Noth" (gee, Betit doesn't know something's there, does he?), and of course finds an article, "The Whirl of Society."  They do not state the date or the name of the newspaper (Chicago Inter Ocean, September 21, 1910), but we are told that Mae was the daughter of Mr. and Mrs. C. J. McGuire and the marriage took place in the Church of Our Lady of Sorrows", about which Noth says, "What a name for a church."  (Not mentioned was that Mae's brother had died recently.)

"The Whirl of Society", Chicago Inter Ocean, September 21, 1910, page 9 (edited image)

Noth isn't subtle:  Can they find more on the McGuires?  Betit says they can look in the census.  Noth:  How?  Betit responds that "the one to use for censuses is Ancestry" (which I actually agree with; it has the most robust search pages, which sort of makes up for the lackluster transcriptions).  Of course, they don't first try looking for Mae as an adult with Charles, so they know for sure it's her and can get an idea of her age and where she and her parents were born; they just dive in and search on the general U.S. census form for C. J. McGuire in Chicago with a child named Mae.  (Do not do this at home!)  From that they manage to bring up the 1900 census, showing Charles and Jennie McGuire with their daughter May and other children, living on South Homan Avenue (116 South Homan, to be exact, which might have been an apartment building, because three families were enumerated there; Charles McGuire is listed as the owner of the building, but that isn't mentioned).  Both Charles and Jennie are shown to have been born in 1855, Charles in Canada.  This prompts a comment from Noth about how his wife, who is from Canada, will love that he has Canadian ancestors.

United Staters 1900 Federal Census, West Town, Chicago, Cook County, Illinois,
June 5, 1900, Enumeration District 345, page 5A, lines 18–28

They now show one of the floating-in-air family trees (sorry, Mr. Noth, no fancy calligraphy for you).  It's pretty basic, starting with Noth and going to his parents, Charles Noth and Jeanne Parr; then to Charles' parents, George Noth and Mary "Mae" McGuire; and ending at Mary's parents, Charles McGuire and Jennie McGuire (I wish they would just leave the woman's surname blank if they don't know, instead of using the married name).

Noth wants to know if they can go back further, and just how far they can go.  Betit says (incorrectly) that the 1890 census was completely destroyed (most of it was destroyed, but more than 6,000 names survived, and at least some of those 6,000+ individuals must be related to people living today, so don't discount that census so readily!), so they can jump back 20 years and look at 1880.  This time he has Noth search on the 1880 census page (much better).  Noth finds Charles, who is only 25 years old, in Chicago, living with his sister Agnes and brother John.  Noth asks why the three are living alone without their parents and says, "I have a bad feeling about those kids," in a tone heavy with foreboding before the cut to a commercial.  When the program returns, the two men look at some of the details on the census:  Charles was working as a teamster, and the "street" given for the homes on that census page is "Scattered houses on Prairie", which Betit has no explanation for; he's never seen an address like that.  (I don't see what the problem is here.  The enumeration district, 118, is given on the census page.  The description of that enumeration district, per Ancestry.com, is "North by the south side of Barry Point road, Van Buren sts, and Jackson, East by West side of Western Avenue, south by the north side of 12th Street, west by the east side of Crawford Ave (City limits)."  It specifically says the ED was within the city limits.  There was a Prairie Avenue in Chicago in 1880.  Couldn't the notation simply mean not many houses were on that street?  But maybe he was told to feign ignorance because it wasn't his job in the episode to talk about why there weren't many houses on the street.)

United States 1880 Federal Census, Chicago, Cook County, Illinois,
June 16, 1880, Enumeration District 118, page 57 (written)/236A (printed), lines 6–8

When Noth wants to know how long Charles and the others were in that location, Betit suggests they check the 1870 census.  Noth again searches on that specific census page.  In 1870 Charles, Agnes, and John were living with their parents, Dennis and Ann, and two more siblings.  Dennis was 40 years old and born in Ireland; Ann was 33 and born in Canada.  Noth is happy to have found an ancestor born in Ireland.  He then mulls over the names of his 2x-great-grandparents and thinks about the fact that in 1880 they were not in the census with Charles.  His theory "is that they both died."

United States 1870 Federal Census, 20th Ward, Chicago, Cook County, Illinois,
June 28, 1870, page 101 (written)/376 (printed), lines 16–22

Betit points out that in 1870 the family was living in the 20th Ward, which was in the city proper, as opposed to the location in the 1880 census, where they were "in scattered houses on the prairie" (which is not what the 1880 census said; according to the enumeration district, they were in the city proper, and I don't see any reason to discount that).  Noth feels as though a tragedy happened and that Charles stepped up and acted as the parent for his younger siblings.  He asks how they can find out what happened to Dennis and Ann.  Betit says that to learn about what happened betwen 1870 and 1880 he should go see a colleague at the Chicago History Museum and ask what local records there might fill in the gaps.  (And I hoped they would actually look at records in the museum, because all they did at IRAD was use the computer.  What was the point of being there?)

Before he leaves, Noth asks, "Can I ask you something?"  Of course Betit says yes, and Noth follows up with, "Do you think we can find out who the original McGuire was from Ireland?"  Betit says he'll do some more digging and let him know if he finds anything.  Even though Noth really did ask this, I'm surprised it wasn't edited out, because we had just seen in the 1870 census that Dennis McGuire was born in Ireland.  Doesn't that make him the original McGuire Noth is asking about?  It could be that what Noth meant was if they could find from where he came in Ireland, but that's not the question he asked, or maybe that question was edited out.

On his way toward the Chicago History Museum, Noth says he feels like something dramatic happened to the family between 1870 and 1880.  He really wants to solve the mystery.  At the museum, John Russick, the museum's Vice President of Interpretation and Education, is waiting to greet him.  He says he has pulled some relevant material and begins by showing Noth an image of Chicago as a bustling city from an 1871 issue of Harper's Weekly (to be specific, pages 984–985 in the October 21, 1871 issue).  A search in Chicago city directories had shown that the McGuire family lived on North La Salle Street in the 20th Ward, which lay along the north side of the main branch of the Chicago River in a residential area, and Russick indicates the approximate area on the image (on the right side of the river in the illustration; the perspective is from the east).  It makes sense that the McGuires would have lived there, as Dennis might have worked nearby at a warehouse, offloading items from boats.

Harper's Weekly, Volume 15, October 21, 1871, pages 984–985

Dennis McGuire was listed as a day laborer in the 1870 census, and Noth wonders if that job paid him enough to raise his family of five.  Russick explains it would have been a hard life, but lots of work was available, so it could be done.  Returning to the 1880 census, Noth asks again where Charles' parents and other two sisters were.  He says they were living in "scattered homes on the prairie", which is again not what the census says (see my comments above) and kind of illustrates the game of Telephone, where a phrase changes a little each time it is repeated.

Russick has Noth look at page 1008 in the book he is holding, which depicts the Great Chicago Fire of 1871 (this was from the Harper's Weekly of October 28, 1871).  It affected the entire city, much of which was burnt to the ground.  The center of the city was gone.  And the 20th Ward was right in the middle of it.  La Salle Street was utterly destroyed.  (The program cut to a commercial after this, and when it returned, we got to see a lovely shot of the La Salle Street Bridge.)

Harper's Weekly, Volume 15, October 28, 1871, pages 1008–1009

Noth noticed something a few pages back and says, "There's another picture here."  This one is a depiction of people fleeing from Chicago over the Randolph Street Bridge.  (Currier & Ives printed a similar image in color.)  Noth's ancestors probably ran for their lives, along with the rest of the city's residents.  The fire department was helpless, because buildings, streets, sidewalks, and bridges were all made of wood and went up in flames.  Everything burned.  The fire started on October 8 and continued through October 10.  Rain on the 10th helped put out the fire.

Harper's Weekly, Volume 15, October 28, 1871, page 1004

So were Noth's 2x-great-grandparents killed?  After all, the family was not together in the 1880 census.  Russick has another document which he says will help explain a little (but it really doesn't).  He hands Noth a printout of the funeral notice for Ann M'Guire, which appeared in the Chicago Daily Inter Ocean of March 14, 1892.  (It is also on Newspapers.com, by the way.)  So she lived through the fire!  (As did the other two sisters, who are listed in the obituary with their married names as surviving her, but they're not brought up at all.)

Chicago Daily Inter Ocean, March 14, 1892, page 7

Ann's survival, however, brings new questions.  If she was alive in 1880, why weren't her children with her?  Why did Charles have his two younger siblings living with him?  Noth doesn't get it; she was a mother, so she should have been there.  Russick suggests that she might have been injured or couldn't take care of them.  (Maybe she was living with one of her two older daughters, who were probably married by then, and that daughter was taking care of her?)  And then, of course, where did Dennis go?  Did he die in the fire?  Russick admits he couldn't find any record of Dennis, either his death or his movements after the fire.  Noth figures they'll never know what happened to him.  (So the museum was also disappointing, because all the documents we saw are available online.  Apparently nothing unique in their collection was relevant to the research?)

As he leaves the museum, Noth focuses first on the fact that they don't know what happened to Dennis.  He also didn't learn why Ann split off.  This is a haunting side of his family.  He didn't have conversations about family history growing up (maybe this history is part of the reason why?).  Before he gets too depressed about it, though, he receives an e-mail message from Betit, who has "just discovered" that Dennis' father, John McGuire (Noth's 3x-great-grandfather), was Irish but served in the British army.

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I continued researching your McGuire family's Irish roots and found that the McGuires left Ireland for Canada in 1847, —— [I am missing a few words, which did not appear on screen] Dennis and Ann moving on to Chicago around 1864.  Like so many other Irish immigrants, the McGuires likely left Ireland to escape the Potato Famine.  Their immigration story is very typical of Irish families of the time.

During my search, I was also able to identify Dennis' father — your 3x great-grandfather — John McGuire in combing through Canadian records.  I located an 1880 record from the Ottawa area that may be helpful to you.

[John McGuire death record, page 393, Schedule C, County of Carleton, Division of Cloucester,
Registrations of Deaths, 1869-1938; Archives of Ontario (edited image)]

Unfortunately, John's death record doesn't give a location in Ireland where the McGuire family originates.  However, you may have noticed that his profession was "Pensioner."  That means John McGuire was collecting a government pension, very likely a Military Pension, at the time of his death.  In that era, Ireland and Canada were part of the United Kingdom.  So if John McGuire was collecting a pension — military or otherwise — it would have come from the British government.

To learn more about your 3x great-grandfather, John McGuire, you should go to the National Archives in London, to delve into the original British pension records.  Because the British government keeps detailed records, there's a good possibility you can find out quite a bit about the McGuire family.  This is a rare opportunity given the patchy records one usually encounters when researching Irish immigrants!

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The information about McGuire's death is shown only briefly on screen, and Noth does not read any of it aloud.  Noth is happy to read about McGuire being a soldier, because that makes him military like his father.  Then he says it runs in the family, which is stretching it a little (ok, a lot, with more than 150 years between their service).  Since Betit says that to learn more he should visit The National Archives (yes, the Brits really do insist on that capital "T"; Betit didn't type it correctly according to their preferences) in London, that's where Noth goes next.

London is the only location where Noth does not drive himself around.  (I drove a car in London; it wasn't that bad.)  Heading to his meeting, Noth says he wants to know what John did in the army — whether he was a common soldier, where he lived, any wars he fought in.  He heads to a basement archive at TNA (in Kew, a suburban district of London), where Captain Graham Bandy, a military historian and genealogist, greets him.  Bandy has a book of pension records ready for Noth to look at.  He comments that, notwithstanding the proverb about an army marching on its stomach, "the British Army marches on paperwork."  Noth looks at a pension document for Private John McGuire, who was a foot soldier.  Noth is surprised that he is handling the actual original documents.  McGuire was born in County Cavan and enlisted in County Limerick.  His enlisted first in the 96th Infantry, on May 1, 1808, and finished with that unit on December 9, 1818.  He then went to the 44th Infantry, enlisting on December 10, 1818 and leaving on September 24, 1822.  He served for more than 14 years; the image is not shown in its entirety, but I saw "14 years one hundred."  (According to timeanddate.com, it was 14 years, 147 days.)  From this small amount of information, Noth decides that McGuire must have been a tough SOB (except he didn't use the initials).

first page of John McGuire's pension

Noth asks whether it was common for men to stay in the army as long as McGuire did.  Bandy points out that being in the army meant the men were fed and clothed and saw the world.  Noth, who apparently remembers some of his high-school history, recognizes the years as being around the time of Napoleon and wonders if McGuire might have fought during the Napoleonic Wars.  Bandy tells him to look at the other side of the document, but Noth is afraid to turn the page because of the age of the paper.  (Neither man is wearing conservator gloves.  Hooray!)  Bandy turns it over for him and then also has to read the writing, which is very small.  It mentions McGuire's Peninsula War service and that a medal was sent on May 15, 1874.  The medal was sent to Ottawa (presumably to McGuire, since he didn't die until 1880, even though that was not discussed on air).  McGuire served in the Peninsular War on the Iberian Peninsula (Spain and Portugal).  It was indeed part of the Napoleonic Wars.

The narrator explains that in 1799 Napoleon seized power in France and set out on a series of military conquests to gain control over continental Europe.  Due to the strength of the British naval forces, Napoleon didn't think he could invade the British Isles.  Instead he decided to hurt the British economy by trying to block trade through controlling access to the Mediterranean and to ports in Spain and Portugal.  In 1870 he invaded Portugal, thus beginning the Peninsular War.  To protect its allies and its economy, Britain sent thousands of troops, including McGuire, to fight.

Bandy now has an old book which turns out to be quarterly pay lists.  (Sometime around this point the producers of the program decided that Bandy was unintelligible and needed to be subtitled for the American viewing public to understand him.  That seems to say worlds about what the producers think of their audience.  I had no trouble understanding him.)  Noth has to use a magnifying glass to read the handwriting (the reading glasses he has been using off and on when looking at computer screens apparently were not up to the task).  A page titled "Infantry Abroad" indicates that McGuire was in the 97th Queen's Own, 10th Company, which Bandy says would have been a "light" company, with skirmishers and marksmen.  Bandy adds that the 97th and the 96th were really the same unit, the 96th having been renumbered.  McGuire was in a "camp near Elvas", in eastern Portugal, from March 25 to June 24, 1811.  Noth wants to know if there was a battle there and whether McGuire was involved in fighting.  Bandy tells him that to find out more, he should go to Portugal, where he can meet a military historian.  In one of those rare totally honest comments we sometimes hear on the program, Noth grins and says cheerfully, "I don't mind going to Portugal!"

As he departs TNA, Noth says McGuire was quite a soldier, spending 14 years in the army.  (Ha!  In the Sellers line, one man was in the U.S. Army 40 years, and his son was in the Navy even longer.)  In Portugal he'll find out what kind of soldier McGuire was.

Driving to meet his new expert, Noth muses that if someone had told him he would be going to Portugal to find out about his ancestry, he would have said, "You're nuts!"  Looking around at the scenery, he wonders if the olive trees were part of what McGuire saw.  Being in the army would have carried a certain amount of excitement but also included hardships.  It has become clear to Noth that if John McGuire had not survived, Noth would not be there.  He says that Peninsula War expert Mark Crathorne has looked up information on McGuire and has set up a meeting with him at La Albuera, a town about 25 miles from Elvas, just over the Spanish border.

In the middle of an open field, Noth meets military historian Crathorne of the British Historical Society of Portugal.  (Crathorne was also at one point the British Consul in Lisbon.)  Crathorne explains that where the two men are standing was where the Battle of Albuera, known as Bloody Albuera, took place.  He talks Noth through the battle sequence.  The British army here, which included McGuire, was ready to chase the French out of the Iberian Peninsula.  Everyone was involved in the battle.

The narrator pops in again, this time to say that Albuera was one of the bloodiest battles of the Peninsula War.  It involved 34,000 European allies versus 24,000 French troops  An early French assault was devastating and caused a lot of bloodshed.  Two full French regiments conducted a sneak attack and butchered a brigade of British soldiers.  After several hours the British brought in one last division, which included McGuire's company.

So McGuire was in the action, and the battle was not going well.  To the right of where Noth and Crathorne are standing, from across the crest of the hill, 200 French dragoons were coming at a full gallop.  Noth asks what a French dragoon is, and Crathorne obligingly tells him they were soldiers with heavy sabers riding on horses.  They would have been coming straight toward McGuire and his company.  Noth says that the men probably shot and ran to a different position, but Crathorne corrects him — they would have held their positions, near their companions, shoulder to shoulder, with their muskets primed and their bayonets fixed and ready.

As if that weren't bad enough, worse was to come.  Crathorne describes the sounds of battle in detail.  As the two sides moved toward each other, the question was who could fire more often.  The British could fire three volleys per minute, while the French could only manage two to two and a half in a minute.  The British had the advantage.

Crathorne says the two sides were only 20 yards away, and Noth calls out, "Hold on," and runs about that distance to get a better understanding of how close that really was.  The British lines would have been firing and moving backward, while the French fired and advanced toward them.  He feels it was almost Medieval, to see the faces of the men you were killing.  This particular engagement was the turning point of the battle.  If McGuire's division had not stood firm, the battle would have gone the other way.  But they did, and the French retreated.  The British had won, but at a cost — 10,000 men were dead.  Death was everywhere, with blood on the fields and the groans of the dying.  The Battle of Albuera was the beginning of the end for Napoleon's troops.  Noth feels this is sacred ground and takes some small stones for his son.

Map of the Battle of Albuera, from William Francis Patrick Napier,
History of the War in the Peninsula and in the
South of France: From A.D. 1807 to A.D. 1814, Volume 3, page 93

Noth is philosophical as he leaves La Albuera, talking about how the men who fought there were all brave.  McGuire appears to him to have been a very brave and talented soldier (hmm, I don't think we have enough information to make that assessment).  He had to be as tough as nails to survive.  He must have told war stories to his son Dennis.  Noth's father died young; you only get to hear the stories if the person lives long enough to share them, so Noth is getting his stories here, and "it's a whopper."  Now that he has stood on the land where McGuire fought, he wants to know who McGuire was before he was a soldier.  And so he is going to County Cavan.

In County Cavan Noth goes to the Johnston Central Library, where he meets military historian David Murphy of Maynooth University.  (Murphy is subtitled for all of his dialog.  I again had no trouble understanding him.  Maybe the producers were the ones who had problems.)  Murphy has the Cavan Regiment of Militia Adjutant's Roll to April 24, 1809.  The militia was somewhat similar to the U.S. National Guard.  It was a unit raised from local men.  Its main purpose was to protect against French invasion and rebellion (somehow I suspect they were more worried about the latter than the former).  Ireland did not have a national police force, so the militia also took care of things such as civil unrest.  Murphy says that McGuire joined the Cavan militia in November 1807.  Then he signed up for the Cavan regiment in the regular army and headed to Spain.  (But earlier we saw McGuire's pension form, which showed that he enlisted on May 1, 1808.  I don't know why there is a discrepancy in the dates.)  When the army needed manpower, recruiters would come to town and sell young men on enlisting; not much has changed during the past 200 years.

Looking down the list of men on the Adjutant's roll, Noth says, "I'm pretty good at finding his name, usually," and then does find McGuire.  His occupation had been linen weaver, which Murphy explains would have been weaving flax into linen, probably to make garments and blankets.  The work would not have been in a factory but was a small operation, likely a workshop with two or three men.  When England and Belfast started building big mills, in the early years of industrialization, small operators would have been squeezed out.  Then McGuire's options would have been few.  As a Catholic, he was not eligible for government jobs because of the Penal Laws.  These regulations also prevented Catholics (and Protestant dissenters) from owning land (they could only lease), going to university — such as Protestant-owned Trinity University in Dublin (from which Murphy received his Ph.D.) — and working as doctors and lawyers.  At first Catholics were banned from the army, but when the Crown needed soldiers, suddenly recruiters fell all over them.

Noth is Catholic (even if he's never heard of Our Lady of Sorrows) and is disturbed to hear about the laws.  He asks if McGuire would at least have had a church to go to, but no, that was restricted also.  (What Murphy doesn't say is that existing Catholic churches were taken over by the Church of Ireland, the Irish equivalent of the Church of England.)  Noth is very upset:  "They can't even have a church to go to — it makes me mad."

So McGuire went from unbelievable oppression to fighting for the British, who were the oppressors.  Murphy admits it's complicated.  He explains it was probably the first proper clothes and boots McGuire had owned.  This was the reality of the time; the only choice was to work with the status quo.  When he returned from his service in the army, things would still have been tough.  But in the 1840's McGuire left for Canada, probably influenced at least in part by the potato famine.  He had a military pension, which gave him more flexibility than most.  It also was an opportunity for him to get his family and children out of Ireland.

The researchers were unable to find any information about McGuire's parents.  There are no surviving records, and it's impossible to learn more.  (This is not uncommon with Irish research.)  Murphy tells Noth that McGuire was from just down the road in Knockbride, a "subarea" of the county of Cavan.  Noth asks if there's a graveyard, and Murphy replies that it has only one.  Noth wonders if maybe there's a McGuire in it, but Murphy says there are no markers.  Many of the ones there have worn away and are now just rocks.  It's possible that McGuire's parents and grandparents are buried in the graveyard, as it has been serving Knockbride since the 1400's.  Tombstones or not, Noth will go to the cemetery:  "That local graveyard, I think I'm gonna wanna see that."

Leaving the library, Noth says his only disappointment is that he was hoping for more personal details about John McGuire's family.  (Unfortunately, the Canadian death record didn't include parents' names.  Apparently they didn't find anything in the Drouin records?  McGuire was Catholic, after all.)  McGuire's circumstances were pretty rough; he was repressed by the political situation of the time and did what he had to do.

Noth calls the cemetery a "quintessential, quiet graveyard."  There is moss on the stones, most of which are really nothing but rock at this point.  McGuire knew this place and possibly buried his grandparents and parents here.  There's a primitive but strong bond between the people and the place; the place defined them.

Noth looked at these old tombstones in Knockbride Cemetery.
Image ©Eric Jones and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons License.

McGuire had to be tough to leave his homeland.  Noth thinks that opportunity knocked, and McGuire took advantage and left.  He was a pragmatic man with an inbred toughness to get through situations.  Noth's father was military; Noth believes that McGuire's story would have fascinated him.  He's bringing Orion stones from the battlefield where Orion's 4x-great-grandfather fought.  It's been a revelation to learn he is in a direct line to a man who overcame such things.

While I was rewatching this episode I thought about logistics from the perspective of the celebrity.  I'm guessing they're told to have an approximate number of days open.  They're probably asked to make sure their passports are up-to-date, even though the occasional celeb doesn't travel outside the U.S., such as Lea Michele.  Are they told that all the research has been done beforehand?  Or do they figure it out?  Does someone believe it when a researcher, such as Betit on this episode, says he'll continue to research and let Noth know if he finds anything else?  Is that just part of the acting?  I've done enough movie and TV gigs to know that not every shot can be accomplished in one take, so I'm sure that occasionally they have to redo a scene; that's one of the circumstances where acting will come into play, as the celebrity still pretends to be surprised/amazed/horrified/whatever emotion is appropriate.  I don't think that the celebrity is told everything up front and then just acts through the entire episode, though.