News Flash

My dad called to tell me that there has been a new find.  Apparently a Pulaski doctor was cleaning out his old house, and he happened on a marriage certificate from the Mahaffy family.  The house used to belong to Esther Watson and her husband -- I haven't yet dragged out the family tree to recall what her married name was.  Dad recalls visiting her at that house (maybe it was on the North Road) when he was a kid.  Aunt Esther was an old lady with no teeth and a hairy chin, and lived without modern conveniences like indoor plumbing.  He says this was a revelation to him, that it was possible to live that way.  She was the last surviving member of the Watson family, and so she probably ended up with some of her sister's things.  What the doctor unearthed is a marriage certificate from 1873, when Mary Watson wed David Cropsey Mahaffy.  Her father, the Methodist minister William Watson, performed the ceremony.  Witnesses were Frank Mahaffy (a brother?) and Harriet Watson, Mary's mother.  The certificate is big and elaborate -- I can't wait to see it.

The doctor has also unearthed a family Bible with Mary's name in it.  What else is there that was hers, I wonder?