The History Of My Great Grandfather

As I embarked on this assignment I was unsure how to begin and what stories to tell. I did not know if I should commence with how my family came to America, my family tree, or a fascinating story about how my grandparents met. In order to complete this assignment I convened with my grandfather, Earl W. Stafford Sr., who knows a lot about our family history, to learn as much as I could.

There is an old African saying, “When an elder dies, it is as if an entire library has burned to the ground.” This happens to be the case when it comes to my family history. Unfortunately, my grandparents' on both sides of my family have passed away and the rest live across the world which can be difficult to contact. My parent’s are going to be my sources for this assignment. They both have provided me with information about their childhood and the lives of my grandparent’s. By using the stories provided from Deborah A. Miranda’s book Bad Indians, I will compare and contrast the lives of my family to hers.

strong effect towards the reader as a very inspiring story. He was a young Indian child living on a

My current plan as far as outlining where this thesis is going to go involves dividing Grandpa’s story whereby every part of it will fit into each among the five assigned milestones, starting with his earliest memory in 1941 of Christmas Day at 4 River Lane.

Greeting...I am Anna and i'm 11 years old and i'm going to explain to you guys what kind of things my ancestors did .

A very little to almost none is known about my family history because of the backwardness of the eastern culture as opposed to that of the west. Our forefathers are said to have been nomads all their lives searching pasturelands for their cattle and cultivating land for the subsistence farming. They bartered animals for salt, hides, clothing, etc. Civilization remained unheard to them until after mid-eighteenth century. Our

There is an old African saying, “when an elder dies, it is as if an entire library has burned to the ground.” This happens to be the case when it comes to my family history. Unfortunately, my grandparents on both sides of my family have past away and the rest live across the world which can be difficult to contact. My parent’s are going to be my sources for this assignment. They both have provided me with information about their childhood and the lives of my grandparent’s. By using the stories provided from Deborah A. Miranda’s book Bad Indians, I will compare and contrast the lives of my family to hers.

History is a subject that can define a person’s heritage. Each one is different, but can have a few similarities. Each person’s history can explain where their family originated, the culture that they are originally from, the struggles that their family encountered, and so much more. But the most important thing that a person’s history can show, is how they ended up where they are today.

My Papaw, Ronald Christie Smith has inspired strength and in almost everyone he meets. Whether it be helping around in a lower class house as a kid, working for his family after his father's death, or even raising a family of six at such a young age, Ron has always been a major stronghold for his family.

I’m amazed at how many Americans don’t know their own family heritage any further back than their grandparents. For many years, I was one of them. I would casually tell people, “My family never really talked much about our family tree, because we were afraid we’d find horse thieves hanging from the branches.” But, bad or good, I always wondered about my roots.

To start my family origin paper we have to go way back to 1976 when my parents met in Alamo, North Dakota; a town of about 200 people in the northwestern part of the state. They met while going through school playing sports, mainly basketball. Both were pretty good at the sport and won some awards and had chances to play more but decided to get married and start a family instead. Both grew up around the whole farming scene. My mom actually lived on a farm growing up and also as she started her own family. My dad lived in the small town but his grandpa had a farm not far from where he grew up and also helped a lot of the local

History isn’t always the glamorous and fast paced events like war, but sometimes it's just explaining things the average Joe might experience during his time on the Earth. This paper will not have any war or conflicts that are life or death for the delicate system of a community, but it's history nonetheless. The History of my family and how it connects to bring us decades later to where we are today.

I have an abundance of grotesque, yet, barely visible memories of childhood. However, no breathtaking family trips, no unique family togetherness that taught a moral lesson, no abnormal holidays. We still ate family meals together, but most often the children and adults lived in different worlds. When I needed comforting or wanted the best of both worlds, I could turn to my Grandpa.

“I can’t believe that’s true!” I exclaimed, my laughter echoing through the room. My grandpa and I had been chatting on the phone for the past half an hour. You would imagine a man his age would be boring and dull. However, he was quite the joker. At least with me, since I was, of course, his favorite granddaughter.

When we were together we were invincible, us against the world. I’d look up to him, not only because he was 6’4, but because he was my grandpa. I have clear memories of him picking me up from school, playing old school reggae music during our adventurous car rides. We’d always sing along to our favorites, sometimes turn the music up so loud the people in the cars next to us could hear it. When I would visit his apartment, the familiar smell of drywall and pennies would fill the air. It was my hideaway, my home away from home. My grandpa collected pennies in water jugs. He would say that one day they’d be worth more than just pennies. I loved it there, not only because he had a freezer filled with many flavors of ice cream to which he would often say to me “you can have all you can eat” but because it was our time to bond. For five years it was my mom, my dad, and my grandpa helping me to grow. Those are my favorite people, my role models. Being around my grandpa brought me such comfort and joy.