It's Grama T's Birthday!

Today is the birthday of my (step) paternal great grandmother and a wonderful woman, Elizabeth Ann "Bess" Madden Torrance (1888-1985).  I am behind in my research but I do know her parents were Thomas and Margaret Hurley Madden. She was born in Jay, Essex County, New York.  She had 4 children, 3 of whom made it to adulthood including my grandmother, Helen Marguerite Torrance Coughlin (1910-1995).

Here is a cute picture from 1971 with "Grama T" and a friend of my father, Thomas Raymond Coughlin (1944-1998), along with Grandma Helen's note!

Note:

I just love this picture! It shows that poor Grama T had to put up with so much from my father and yet still had a smile on her face!!

Happy Birthday Grama T!! We love and miss you!!

Helen Torrance Coughlin - Birthday Girl!

Today is the birthday of my paternal (step) grandmother, Helen Torrance Coughlin.  She was born on May 15, 1910 to Elizabeth Madden and Walter Torrance in Upper Jay, Essex County, New York.

I recently found this birthday of "Grandma C" at her 75th birthday gathering in 1985.  I can only imagine she was on the phone with one of her children!

Happy Birthday Grandma C!!!

Happy Birthday Grama T!!!!

Elizabeth "Bess" Ann Madden Torrance
Fall 1974

Today would have been my paternal (step) great-grandmother, Elizabeth Ann Madden Torrance's 124th birthday (1888-1985)!! "Bess" or "Grama T" to us was always fun to be around.  She helped raise my father and his siblings when my grandparents married.  My father absolutely adored her.  It was always so funny to see how he acted differently when Grama T was visiting.  Loved it!!

I would sit and listen to her for hours talking about her experiences in the one room school house in Essex County, New York to the first time she saw a "horse-less carriage".  I so wished I would have recorded her or wrote down every word is said to me.  But hindsight right??

One of my favorite memories of Grama T was after my grandfather, David Francis Coughlin, died and everyone was at the house in Jay.  From the kitchen door I could see my father and uncle were loudly "discussing" something in the dining room where Grama T was reading in her chair.  The next thing I know she's saying "Boys" and they both started with "but, but". She would have none of that and said "I don't want to hear it".  In unison they said "yes, ma'am" with the dejected faces of reprimanded boys.....and then she turned down her hearing aid!!!  I laughed and then quickly got out of there.

So to Grama T I say "Happy Birthday" and hope you are enjoying a "nip" on your special day!!