New Family Information

The genealogy of the Gill family has long been an interest of mine, but there have been limitations to what we could find.

My father was Vernon, his Louis, then Levi, and finally Samuel.  And that was about as far as we could go in tracing the family.

My grandmother was known to have done some exploring, but supposedly when she learned that some parts of the family may have been "Scottish Pirates" she dropped it.  She didn't want to dig too far, I suppose, in fear of actually finding out more than she wanted to know.

There were rumors and intimations that John may have been Samuel's father but no proof.  My middle son, Louis, had also done some searching using a variety of methods, including Ancestry.com.  As genealogists often lament, we couldn't get "across the pond" to find out from where the family emigrated.

Until today!

A cousin from down the Fred Gill line (my grandfather was Louis, a brother to Fred - we're all related to Levi), Linda Gill called the other day saying she had read some of the information I had written and published in the Daunt to Dillonwood column in the Recorder.  She was traveling in Ohio, not far from the town of Circleville, where our Great-Grandfather Levi lived, married, then emigrated to California.

She called to get a little more information explaining she was nearby, and might as well go into the community and see what she could learn.  I gave her everything I thought she might like to have in a rush of information.  When we finished, she said she was "...38 miles from Circleville." She later laughed that they had intended to be in Circleville a few hours, and ended up staying two nights.

In her searching information in Circleville, she did confirm that Samuel's father was indeed John, but still couldn't get any link to Scotland, Ireland, or any other place for that matter.  But by confirming John as being in our chain of family, she opened some doors.

In a series of excited calls this morning, Louis finally found the link "across the pond."   But it was not to any place we had expected.  It turns out that John's father was Edmund, and Edmund was born in 1680 in the northern part of the Isle of Man.  That would make him my Great-Great-Great-Great-Grandfather.

So, it turns out that the Gills emanate from a little rock in the middle of the Irish Sea, nearly equidistant from England, Scotland, and Ireland.  IOM, as it is referred to in most of the Genealogy listings, is not governed by any of the three, but is their own entity.



Like the folks on the TV show "Who Do You Think You Are?" this info had to be dug up.  If it were not for Linda going to Circleville, searching out the proof that John Gill was indeed the the father of Samuel, Lou would probably not have found the definitive link to Edmund.  It is fun to finally get enough information to actually be able to track our ancestors back to where they were living when they emigrated to America.

In fact, we found they lived in the Lezayre province, near the town of Sulby roughly five miles inland from the port of Ramsey on the northeast coast.  Digging around on one of the web sites, I also found the John Gill family emigrated through New York on June 28, 1831, having sailed on the ship Meridian.



Apparently my Great-Great-Grandfather Samuel and his wife Isabella had already emigrated and settled in Circleville, Ohio.  When his parents, John and Isabella, and the rest of the family arrived in America, they settled around Warrensville, Ohio.  Today, it is apparently known as Warrensville Heights, and is a suburb of Cleveland, some 170 miles north of Circleville.

A search for Warrensville simply brought up a main road in Cleveland, Warrensville Center Road.  I enlarged that map and poked along up and down that road until I found an area, presumably a suburb name, that was Warrenville Heights.  So apparently when it became a part of the city of Cleveland, the name was changed a bit.

The interesting part of all this is that much has to be assumed, though many different things can be proven. Still, it is exciting to know that the Isle of Man was home to the ancestors, and that the Gill clan is neither Scottish, nor Irish, nor British.  Instead we are Manx, the name given to residents of the island.

And, yes, the Manx cat, the flat-rump, tailless cat, was a breed originated there too.

Snow in Springville

When I got out of bed this morning at 5:30 a.m. and went to the back door for wood for the fire, it was snowing steadily.  Not hard, but steadily.

But the air temperature was 40 on the porch, and the driveway never did allow snow to accumulate. But, as it does once in a while around here, it dusted the hillsides nicely.

In the early morning light, the iPhone camera takes a pretty grainy picture, but you can see the accumulation on the pasture, and the top of the entry light.

A few minutes later, the light was better, but you can see even that fast, some of the snow was melting off the pasture.

 The view the other way down toward the barn reveals even more of the lower ground is melting off quickly, and the driveway is not accumulating any snow at all.  But if you look carefully, the top of each post is holding a little dab of snow.

It is precisely this condition, when followed by a warm "Pineapple Express" storm coming right up out of Hawaii which rains up to 10,000 feet altitude, washing off a good snow pack, that causes major flooding in the Tule River.  And the river bottom ground is definitely ripe for flooding.  With all the little brush, and a solid 20 years of big tree growth, the pieces are all in place.  Whether it happens or not depends entirely on the weather.

Rain, Horses, Trip, and Diesel. This and that.

With the rain yesterday, my gauge shows about 0.60 inches, so a good bit more than the Recorder is reporting fell in Porterville.  But then, that is the way the foothill rains work.  As the clouds and associated moisture approach the barrier of the foothills, and ultimately the entire Sierra Nevada range to the east, they "hang up" on the hills.  And while they are "hanging along the hills" they give up moisture.  The further you go up the canyons in the area, the more you observe the additional moisture.  A friend of mine who lives several miles up Balch Park Drive will often find 25-50% more in his gauge than in mime.

This morning, I had to chuckle at my big gelding, Dandy.  First thing in the morning I feed his mother, Shiplay, a bit of Senior Mix for horses, aiding in both her digestion, and nutrition.  Shiplay came up to the pen when Sharon was leaving for work, and the big drafter Strawberry was there too.  But no Dandy.

Then I realized, he was making all sorts of racket from down at the barn.  When I looked, the barn door had blown shut during the storm, leaving Dandy inside, and Shiplay and Strawberry outside.  And let me tell you, Dandy was NOT a happy camper.

Of course, he's a big baby anyway.  If Shiplay is out of his sight for even a minute, he's upset.  And he doesn't ever suffer in silence.  With great whinnying cries, he lets everyone within a country mile know that Dandy is upset about something.

When I went to the barn to feed hay to the cattle and the horses, I opened the door and let him escape his storm-imposed imprisonment.  You'd think the Governor had issued him a stay of execution.  Out the door he dashed, as if he was heading for a fire.  Then he discovered Shiplay and Strawberry standing passively in front of the barn.  He set up, sliding to a stop, then tried to act as if he knew that all the time.

I throw two flakes of hay for Dandy and Shiplay, who almost always eat their hay together.  I put that in one corner, then put another flake of hay down for Strawberry about thirty feet away near the other side of the barn.  If I don't keep the two locations separated, Dandy will try to control both spots, keeping the hay for himself.  Shiplay on the other hand goes to her corner, head down, and quietly has her breakfast.

Dandy will first go to his two-flake spot, and start eating.  Strawberry peeks in the door, then makes a trotting dash behind Shiplay and Dandy, to get down to her one-flake location.  Some mornings, Dandy will decide it's not worth the effort, and let her eat in peace.

But sometimes, like today, Dandy wants to run between both feeding spots, keeping Strawberry away from either one.  But she's gotten smart.  When he goes to the one-flake location, she strolls to the two-flake spot, and grabs a bite.  When he dashes toward her, she simply circles around and goes to the spot he abandoned to chase her away.

This seems to last for about three or four minutes, and then they all get bored with the game, and peace settles into the barn.

With a crystal-blue sky, not a cloud to be seen anywhere at this hour, it's going to be a beautiful day at least for a little while.  Sounds like things will cloud up and rain again by evening, and that tomorrow is going to be a solidly wet one.  Bring it on!

My monthly dash to Sacramento, attend an Area meeting on Saturday from 10-4, and then dash home again, comes up this weekend.  Sharon and the dogs will keep the hilltop warm, while I slosh up the Valley and back.  I'll leave Springville about 5:00 a.m. and get home around 9:00 p.m. after a dinner stop in Fresno.  But it does make for a long day.

Holy COW!  I came past Eagles Nest yesterday and gaped at the price of diesel!  $3.719 a gallon.  Man, that is just ridiculous.

With the price of Crude Oil futures in the mid-$80 range, where it's been for many weeks, I cannot fathom why distillate prices are so doggone high.  And I don't buy into the concept that all the upset in Egypt has brought this on, either.  If so, why aren't Crude futures shooting up?  That's where the refineries would turn to hedge their purchases.  It has always caused me to shake my head when I hear from friends who live in the eastern half of the US, and they tell me their gas prices are $0.25 to $0.35 per gallon cheaper than right here on top of the pool of oil.  And it's not like the refineries are that far away either.

With fuel costs this high, I have begun to really think about bundling all my "town chores" into one trip, then staying home if at all possible on other days.  That said, today I think I may be forced to get ready and go to town at least two hours before my job starts at 1:30 p.m. so I can run some errands, and pick up groceries, get some copies made and prevent having to go back to town tomorrow.

Spring in the Foothills

This is without a doubt, my favorite time of year.  The hills are green, the weather is bright and sunny, and the temperature is mild, often cool in the morning and shirt-sleeve weather by midday.

Coming up out of the river bottom a week ago I noticed the willows that have stubbornly insisted on growing around the telephone terminal box along Globe Drive, have put out the bright green/yellow blooms.  The long narrow leaves will follow soon, but for now, the stark thin sticks are accented along the tops by the bloom.

The spring season is also a time when ranchers build fences.  The ground is wet and will dig much more easily than any other time of the year.  The weather is not overly hot, so being out in the sun all day is not such a huge job.  And, well, that's just when we've always built fence.

My neighbor and I have a pair of bulls that tend to want to butt heads, and this means fences between us often need repair.  Finally, this winter, we decided one particular stretch needed to come down entirely and be replaced.  So ... that's what happened.

Because we both have other obligations, the project has run out over several weeks to get finished.  But this Saturday is finally "Finish Day" and should wrap it up.

Not a huge length, and the braces at the top of the hill, and also at the bottom , are all in, and the steel posts in between are all driven.  All that is needed now is to pull the six strands of barbed wire tight, then clip them to the steels.  

Fortunately, I have a hillside that the cattle are grazing on now, as my field is to the left of this line, his to the right.

Bottom set of braces, with my transportation parked out of the way.  You can see how pretty it is out here now.

Strawberry and Spirit

Several folks have asked about or newest arrivals on the hilltop, Strawberry the drafter mare, and Spirit the twin calf.  Well, here they both are.

Spirit is on this side of the fence, Dandy with the blaze face, his mother Shiplay hiding behind, and Strawberry up next to Spirit.  

As you can see, all are doing well.  Spirit is still taking a bottle twice a day, but may get cut down to maybe 3/4 bottle or less, as she picks up on Calf Manna, a grower grain ration, and alfalfa hay.

Strawberry on the other hand is enjoying green grass, and daily alfalfa hay down in the barn.

And, though Dandy still likes to lord it over her, she has manages to get past him and into the barn so she can get to the hay.

Spring is Sprung

The old saw about "Spring is sprung, Fall has fell, Summer's here, and it's hotter'n ...." is not true now, for sure, but it is indeed starting to be true.  At least the part about Spring, springing.

The first harbinger of a change that I saw was the rate at which my Hummingbird feeders are being emptied.

Five of the six feeders hanging on my front porch.

During the late summer, we have 75-100 birds coming and going all during the daylight hours, especially during the very early and last-light times.  But during the winter months, I have taken down two feeders, until that slows down, and then removed two more, leaving only a basic two feeders for the mid-winter months.

This year, I cut down to four hanging feeders, but never went lower.  In November and December I would fill them about every third or fourth day.  But in late December, and especially during January, the activity level picked up, at first slowly, but still increasing.

But about mid-January, the feeding frenzy in the early and late hours has become frenetic again.  I am now filling all four feeders every other day, to stay up with them.  I think it is a bit early to put up the final two feeders, but that time is surely not far away.

Morning feeding time.

In this forum, I have talked about things I observed in the surrounding Nature, and reported them to you. This increase in Hummingbird activity was quite expected, but not until now, maybe even another couple of weeks, before we began to see an upswing in activity.

So I am wondering if that 13.30 inches of rain we got a month ago was not only the high point in winter storms, but may have also been the last shot out of the cannon.  We have seen this happen in years before, as the winter rains quit early, but it means for a somewhat shorter grass year, too.  The final flush of growth on our hillsides depend on a good drink of water sometime in late-February and hopefully a little more in March.

But, that time is still a ways off, and we could still get a good rain.  Nothing is drying out around the ranch yet, as every possible niche is either oozing water, or only now beginning to stop leaking.  So the ground is wet, and the grass is feeding on it.

Above the fog level, here in the foothills above Lake Success, the sunshine is delightful.   It is beginning to warm up during the middle of the day now, and that will certainly put the plants into a growth burst.

Speaking of fog ... which nobody likes to drive in ... many folks commented on the "smell" of the fog Wednesday evening.

About 4:30 that afternoon the evening fog came swirling in with a vengeance.  I stepped outside the building on Olive, just west of the PHS, and was startled as I smelled smoke.  Then I realized it wasn't smoke, like from a burning fire, but smelled more like a fireplace.  

I puzzled on that one a bit, wondering why we suddenly had early and thick fog, as it has been a little less aggressive.  Then I realized an old science fact, and it began to make sense.

Fog is nothing but a high level of humidity floating along.  When something solid gets in the way, a small bit of that humidity attaches to the tiny piece of something and becomes a floating water droplet.  The smoke from the Main Street fire during the morning hours threw a large quantity of smoke in the atmosphere.  And smoke is nothing more than a plethora of tiny particles of carbon and other chemical compounds, floating away from the fire.

So when the sun went down, and the air began to cool, the humidity found the smoke, and bingo ... we had a thick, aggressively-formed fog bank.  Granted, we had fog that morning, but it wasn't nearly as thick, and only formed during the late-night hours.

Spring is fencing time in the ranching country, as the ground is wet and much better for digging than during the summer months.  The weather is more comfortable too.  My neighbor, Rusty Hunter, and I are replacing a fence between us, renewing the entire thing.  The only way to fix this one was to tear it all down and start new.  The new posts on the ends are in, and the first wire will soon be strung to define the line where the two or three wood posts in between will be placed.  We'll both be glad to get this one finished, and get the cattle back in that pasture.

Wow, how time flies

A couple of you have dropped me e-mails asking what was going on with me.  To make a long story much shorter, I applied for, interviewed, was hired, and have worked two weeks on a real paying job.  What a marvel that is.

I have returned to teaching, and am working as a part-time teacher (actually more of a tutor) at the Tule River Indian Study Center in Porterville.  I have been assigned six youngsters, five boys and one girl, from 5th Grade to 9th Grade (freshman at PHS).  I work Monday through Thursday, 1:30 to 5:30 p.m. with Friday off.  Those Fridays when I need to leave for the northern part of the state for one of my monthly meetings, I am already off and don't have a conflict.

Since it has been much too long since I posted, it's time to catch you up on what is going on around the hilltop.

Spirit, the black and white twin calf is still doing reasonably well.  She's still on the bottle, and doing quite nicely.  She's started picking up on Calf Manna, and today I added grain and alfalfa hay.  She's growing and really fills up the dog house in the kennel, so may have to make some further arrangements soon.

Strawberry, the big roan drafter, has found her place with Dandy and Shiplay.  Dandy is still a bit of a stinker to her.  He tries to herd her away from hay, or if we offer a carrot.  She simply moves away a bit, until he quits, then immediately returns.

IT RAINED!  Man, did it rain.  Over a period of sixteen days, I got 13.30 inches of rain in my gauge.  On the hill behind us, and north to the south side of Snailhead, the ridge between here and Springville, there are several outcroppings of white stone, some of which was responsible for the digging of a Tungsten mine on the hill behind my home during WWI.

Also present in this area is a deposit of crystal stone, similar to Rose Quartz.  Every spring I have seen in these hills has a smattering of quartz which carries the water.  My theory is that when the mountains shift and slip, stone such as granite simply crumbles and crushes.  But the quartz stones shatter like glass, leaving cracks which carry water.

During the big rain, a much greater amount of water than usual was deposited on the foothills.  As this soaked in, it found quartz paths which do not usually get filled with water.  But this winter every outcropping is oozing water.

One of the small gullies draining some of the country to the east of the house, will only run if the rain is heavy.  Not only did it run, but it ran strong.

During this rainy period, a portion of the hillside behind the house fell away.  Because it was just below the road leading up to the old mine shaft, I assumed I needed to do some ditching on the road or have it wash out during the next good rain.

When I got to the site, I discovered it had nothing to do with run-off from the road, but simply was the hillside being saturated with water.

Of course, all this water falling on the area raised the Tule River up to the point the County Road Department removed the railings and support posts on the Upper Globe Bridge, closing it to traffic.

The Tule River drops quickly but the high-water level is obvious.

Looking upstream from the deck of the bridge, the highest water level deposited a little trash there.

Most of the locals went around the signs, crossed the bridge without the safety measures, and saved time and miles, especially if the trip were to Springville.

The book is coming along, even if slowly, with the support and advice of the Writer's Group.

I will make an effort to get in here and blog a little more often ... let's make that a whole LOT more often.