Cemeteries, Graveyards, and Headstones
Speaker: Pam LaFond
Topic Description:
The “Cemeteries, Graveyard’s, and Headstones” presentation will cover many interesting facts about numerous everyday items located in these old and new resting grounds. Join us for an in-depth look into why so many symbols are on display in our final sleeping places.
Pam LaFond is the Director of Membership Outreach and past 2nd Vice President of West Valley Genealogical Society. She and her husband Dave are retired from the USAF and Pam went into teaching for a few years before retiring for good. She has been working on her family ancestry for over 40 years and still has a few brick walls to hurdle before she is completely done.
Reminder – print the handout and bring it with you to the meeting. You may print one copy of a speaker’s handout for your personal use. Paper copies of handouts will not be available at monthly meetings. The speaker owns the copyright to the presentation and handout which are used by WVGS only with the speaker’s written permission.
Barring technical difficulties like we’ve experienced recently with other speakers, Pam’s presentation will be recorded for later viewing for members who cannot attend in person.
Membership Meetings are held on 2nd Monday of the month from September through May.
Membership meetings begin at 1:00 p.m. and end at about 3:00 p.m. It is free and open to the public.
Please arrive after 12:30 pm to sign up for classes, SIGs, or the 2023 Seminar, ask questions of a Board Member or Committee Chairperson, etc.
The short business meeting will start at 1:00 pm sharp followed by our featured speaker.
In-person meetings are held at the First Presbyterian Church located at 12225 N. 103rd Ave., Sun City, AZ. (click here for map) – will open in new tab in your web browser)
The Collection Development Committee not only works with collections donated to our library but also gets to purchase books when one of our members reaches the age of 90, the member can choose a book for WVGS to purchase and gets presented at a Monthly Membership meeting, then the book goes back to the library to be accessioned into our collection for all of us to use.
At the January 9th membership meeting Sheri Erickson was happy to introduce such a member: Irma Hardin, Past President and currently the Publicity Chairperson. The book presented is “Germany, A Nation In Its Time, Before, During And After Nationalism, 1500- 2000” by Helmut Walser Smith.
Irma was born in Illinois and moved to Phoenix in 1965 for her children’s health. She has four children, seven grandchildren, and nine great-grandchildren. She worked for the state for 22 years – retired in 1993 to care for her parents and her husband’s parents. The last position was the best – Unclaimed Property Supervisor! Abandoned safe deposit boxes, forgotten bank accounts, and utility deposits are turned over to the state and the task was to locate the rightful owners and return the funds to them.
She started genealogy in 1969 – her sister had identical twin girls – she always wanted twins – ‘Where did they come from? – (Doctor told her “Multiple births come from the mother’s side” – there were twins and one set of triplets in her husband’s family – looked at the 1850 census – found second great-grandfather had identical twin girls.
Further research revealed 5 sets of twins! She discovered her grandmother’s sister (her great-aunt) still lived in the house her second great-grandfather had built, and she had a family Bible and other documents – so took her grandmother on vacation to Illinois – at first, her great-aunt was reluctant to talk about ‘dead’ people or share information, then was asked if she knew where they were buried – would she show? She did and discovered her second Great grandfather Rabourne had been a minister and the little country church he built was still there – right next to the cemetery! She forgot paper but copied tombstone information on the back of checks, deposit slips, etc –
Favorite vacation: the day after retirement she went to Ireland for three weeks! Later a cruise to Alaska. All other vacations were to Illinois and included research at various libraries.
Recently she was contacted by a great-nephew of her grandfather and his niece is writing a thesis for her doctorate on the WEIGLE name. She can hardly wait to hear from her!