If you missed Chapter I, you can go back and read it here.

Chapter 2: Part I

In the Beginning: 1978-1982

When I was ten, Deb arrived in Worcester. She was twenty-four, married, worldly-wise, and yet young enough to still be cool. Deb understood pop culture, unlike my missionary-kid mother who spent her formative years at an Indian boarding school, nestled in the Himalayan foothills. When my mother talked about Woodstock, she meant her high school, not the iconic music festival. I was a teenager before I figured that one out.

Deb and I talked about everything, from her teenage crush on Davy Jones (of the Monkees fame) to my fascinations with Broadway musicals, Star Trek, and Doctor Who. I once declared that William Shatner was an amazing actor, while Deb kept her face in a perfect deadpan. She meant the world to me, and as I grew older, she took on different roles from big sister to mentor and friend.

The Foothills Theatre Company lured Deb to Worcester when they cast her in a production of The Silver Cord. She and her husband Bill were New York-based actors. After she graduated from the prestigious American Academy of Dramatic Arts, Deb played Juliet at the Heritage Playhouse, a summer-stock theatre in Westerly, Rhode Island, where the couple met. Prior to her Worcester debut, Deb and Bill toured the country in a Volkswagen van while performing a show called Tall Tales of the Frontier as well as working a variety of jobs in New York City and other regional theatres.

After her debut performance, Deb stayed in Worcester. The theatre offered her a part in the final show of the season, a musical comedy called Be A Sport. When the next season opened, she appeared in almost every show and was considered a full-fledged member of the Foothills resident company. Not wanting to be left behind in New York City, Bill followed soon thereafter. In November, he took a supporting role in Bernard Shaw’s Saint Joan, then performed in two more shows, The Hound of the Baskervilles and Two Bites From an Irish Apple, alongside his wife.

A few blocks west of the theatre, the couple rented a cozy apartment. They filled it with stacks of books, props, costumes, fencing swords, show posters, and the scent of Bill’s pipe tobacco. As former New Yorkers, Deb and Bill did not own a car. Instead they walked everywhere or rode the bus. Deb tucked knitting projects into her bag and pulled them out when she traveled across the city. Once a fellow passenger assumed that she was blind as the bus climbed up Pleasant Street; often, she knitted without looking down. Bill knew how to drive. If they needed to transport gear or heavy objects, they borrowed a car from a friend, and for longer trips, they rented one.

Bill was raised by a Methodist minister. When the couple settled in Worcester, they sought out the nearest congregation of that denomination. They found Wesley United Methodist Church perched on a hill at the corner of Main and State streets, near a cluster of historic buildings that surround Lincoln Square, including the Unitarian Church, the old County Courthouse, the Memorial Auditorium, and the former Boy’s Club. Main Street begins (or ends) at Lincoln Square along with a handful of other major streets—Highland, Belmont, Grove, Salisbury, and Lincoln—as they spiral out of Worcester’s city center towards more residential neighborhoods.

Wesley United Methodist Church is a Gothic Revival stone behemoth, built in the mid-1920s after two smaller congregations merged. The building’s exterior features a stunning rose window, a square bell tower, and dozens of stained glass windows. The interior contains a labyrinth of rooms, which include the formal sanctuary with a full pipe organ, an adjoining smaller chapel, a large hall with a proscenium stage, an industrial kitchen, a library, dozens of offices, meeting rooms, classrooms, nurseries, and choral rooms; tucked away in the basement is a two-lane candlepin bowling alley.

When my parents divorced, we left the Fairlawn Church parsonage in Shrewsbury and moved into a house that bordered the Tatnuck Brook as it flowed into the Patch Reservoir. Our five-minute walk to church now took half an hour to drive. Our new home was much closer to Wesley United Methodist Church. We switched churches, which relieved some tension between my parents. I am sure it was awkward for my mother to remain in my father’s parish.

At Wesley, my mother joined the choir, enrolled in Bible study classes, and socialized with the women’s circle. She was no longer the minister’s wife, but a divorcee with two young children. Every week, we rose early for Sunday School and the pre-service choir practice. We arrived in plenty of time to find a good parking space in the upper lot behind the church and enjoy a donut in Brewer Hall. During special services, I sang in the youth choir. We looked like Catholic altar boys, in our long purple robes and white surplices.

All the children left the sanctuary before Rev. Johnson’s sermon. The mass exodus began during the second verse of the mid-service hymn. The youngest children headed towards the nurseries, while elementary school-aged students attended a second round of Sunday School lessons. I volunteered in the nursery and avoided the extra Bible instruction. In the toddler room, I built block towers, colored with crayons, and created artwork from construction paper and paste.

Once Deb and Bill found us down on Main Street, things began to change. They became beloved members of the congregation and involved themselves in many activities. Church members grew to appreciate the pair’s quick-witted humor and their willingness to lend a helping hand. At six foot five inches tall, Bill was hard to miss, with his deep baritone voice, honed from years of stage-work, that carried across a crowded room. Deb was considerably shorter, initially shy, and exceedingly generous with her time and affection. She joined the choir, where she met and befriended my mother. For reasons that still confound me, the two women—a twenty-something, free-spirited artist and a disillusioned divorcee— just clicked. Both read a lot, enjoyed singing, and lived abroad for part of their childhoods. My mother and Bill understood one another, with midwestern mindsets and Methodist ministers for fathers. Whether it’s grown in Indiana or Iowa, fields of corn look pretty much the same.

A mutual appreciation of theatre played its part as well. The visual arts, like painting or sculpture, held little interest for my mother, but music and theatre did. Religion is a unique kind of performance, with its own brand of costumes, music, pageantry, and oratory, and my mother always enjoyed a good show. My maternal grandparents, Eugene and Louise McGraw, spent decades as missionaries in southeast Asia, where my mother spent portions of her childhood. In Malaysia, Grandpa held dual positions as a minister and an educator. He taught high school math, served as a school principal, and later became a district superintendent. When Grandma first arrived in Taiping in 1939, she was sent to play the organ at Grandpa’s church and teach at the nearby girl’s school. They married soon thereafter. When they returned to Asia after World War II, Grandma continued to teach English and her love of Shakespeare. Every year she produced one of the Bard’s plays with her students. My mother’s childhood was infused with traditional Christian and classical European music. She sang in choirs, both at church and school, and played the oboe in her high school orchestra.

For us, it’s hard to say which came first—the Foothills Theatre Company or Deb and Bill. Regardless, we saw many plays at the theatre until it was shuttered. Sunday matinees after church were preferable. One memorable show was Neil Simon’s The Sunshine Boys, one of the last productions staged at the theatre’s Chatham Street location. It was February 1982. Dark clouds covered downtown and threatened snow. Deb and Bill played supporting roles, along with another company regular—Paul Mayberry—who attended services at Wesley from time to time. In Simon’s comedy, two retired vaudeville actors reunite for a television special. During its original Broadway-run, The Sunshine Boys was performed over 500 times. It was later adapted into a film and a television pilot.

On that cold winter afternoon, a lead actor called in sick, some unknown catastrophe, sudden illness, or family emergency to blame. There were no understudies. Jack Magune, the show’s director, stepped in at the last moment. He knew the blocking, but not all the lines. Throughout the performance, he carried a script in his left hand. Thirteen-year old me missed the memo. During intermission I asked, “Why does he keep carrying that book around?” My mother laughed and clued me in.

After another matinee, Deb and Bill took us and a few others on a backstage tour. For eight years, the Foothills Theatre Company occupied several floors of the old Y.W.C.A. building on Chatham Street. In 1960, when the Y.W.C.A. constructed a new complex at nearby Salem Square, they sold their old building to Denholm’s, the sprawling department store next door. The store expanded their retail space into the new property, but a decade later, the Worcester Galleria Mall opened. Denholm’s lost their customers and filed for bankruptcy. The city took possession of the former Y.W.C.A. building and leased it to the fledgling theatre company.

When Foothills moved in, they adapted the space to meet their needs. They created a lobby with a grand staircase, a box-office, administrative offices, dressing rooms, rehearsal spaces, storage rooms, technical booths, costume and scene shops, and a black box theatre with 200-250 seats. Underneath the new façade, elements of the old Y.W.C.A. building remained, including the old bowling alley and the ground-floor swimming pool. When Denholm’s took over, they covered the pool to create more retail space. The theatre removed the flooring when they made their renovations.

On our tour, we wandered through a warren of dark and dusty rooms. When we reached the pool, the industrial lights revealed a lofty ceiling with banks of blacked-out windows. Our feet clicked across the floor tiles and echoed off the walls. In the center of the room, the floor pitched downwards towards the deep end. Against the far wall, beneath archaic depth measurements, stood rows of clothing racks, packed full of sequined dresses and Victorian gowns. I made my way down the steep slope to run my hands through velvet skirts and silky bodices, as one of the adults droned on with tales of the building’s former glories.

In the summer of 1982, after the season ended, the theatre lost its lease on the Chatham Street property. The city of Worcester found a new developer for the building and evicted the Foothills Theatre Company from their home. Deb, Bill, and the whole company faced an uncertain future.

For more information on Eugene and Louise McGraw and their missionary work, check out the Dictionary of Christian Biography in Asia

Written by Deborah Sweeney, with absolutely, positively, no-AI involvement © 2026

Chapter 1: September 1993

Summer was over. Labor Day had come and gone, and for the first time in twenty years, there was nowhere I needed to be. After thirteen years of public school, four years of college, and three years of graduate studies, my formal education was finished, except for my unwritten master’s thesis.

I stood on the porch, leaned on the railing, and breathed in the crisp autumn air. Sunlight filtered through the trees. Fall comes early in northern New England. The maple and birch leaves were turning brilliant shades of red and yellow.

My break over, I opened the screen door as it creaked in gentle protest. My eyes adjusted to the dim light as I glanced around the room. The last of my belongings were stacked in the middle of the floor. I skirted the pile to make one last check. Nothing was left in the closet or the bathroom except for the lone spider above an empty shelf.

I grabbed the last crate of books and pushed the door open. It slammed shut as I made my way down to the car. Leaves crunched under my feet. I put the crate down, shifted a bag of clothes, then pushed the books in. The hatch banged shut. The car was stuffed full, with just enough space to see out the back.

I had worked at camp since I was nineteen and a lot had happened in the last six years. There were those who did not understand why I kept coming back. Many of my college friends had focused on their careers, marriage, starting families, or like me, furthering their educations. I continued to spend my summers in the woods, instead of seeking out internships or other work in my field. Only those who knew the magic of these woods understood.

I looked back at Frogmore, my home for the past five summers. It was one of the cabins used by the kitchen staff and had earned its name from a fruit box label in the 1970s. Constructed of thick pine boards weathered dark brown with age, Frogmore perched on top of a slight embankment that overlooked the office, the main gravel parking lot, and the dining hall—a perfect crow’s nest for observing camp life. Its proximity to the dining hall made it a convenient home for generations of kitchen staff.

For the first two years, I shared Frogmore with Donna, and occasionally her boyfriend Marty, when he had a night off from cabin duty. Then Amy moved in. We had a blast that summer. She took the next year off to travel Europe, and I missed her a lot, but as a consolation prize, I didn’t have to share Frogmore anymore. My graduate program at the University of Michigan was beyond stressful. The solitude helped me to de-stress and unwind.

Once the regular season ended, I continued to work in the kitchen through Family Camp, earning two more paychecks. On Labor Day, camp officially closed. The families left and the rest of the staff began to leave. Bill, the camp director, let me stay a bit longer. He and a handful of others remained to prep camp for winter. I helped when I could. We ate the leftover food in the dining hall as the nights grew colder. I burrowed deeper into my sleeping bag, piling layers of wool blankets on top, as I tried to stay warm.

But now the summer was truly over and without school or another job lined up, I had only one option—my childhood home in Worcester. Like most twenty-five year olds, I had no desire to live under the parental roof again, especially after years of freedom. My mother may have mellowed since her remarriage, but there were still plenty of issues between us. I headed home, but kept a lookout for the nearest escape route.

With the car packed, I wandered down to the Small Cove, the epicenter of camp’s waterfront activities. Bill and two counselors, Mike and Tom, were moving the rowboats up to the Lodge for winter storage. When I arrived, the younger men were lifting a boat onto a pickup truck while Bill directed the maneuver. Another counselor was loading kayaks onto his boat trailer, while a member of the sailing staff took life jackets and oars down from their racks and put them away in the shack.

I sat on the edge of the dock and watched them work. A sharp wind blew off the lake, creating small whitecaps across the surface and forcing me to zip up my windbreaker. I could have stayed and listened to the conversations for hours, but it was time to rip off the band-aid.

“I’m going to take off,” I said. “Thank you for everything and have a great winter.”

“Hope to see you back next summer,” Bill replied, as he shook my hand.

“Of course! I plan on it.”

I said good-bye to the others, then walked across the swim dock and down the path through the trees. I thought about next summer as I returned to the car. Life in the kitchen had been fun, even if the work was repetitive, sometimes hard, and occasionally disgusting. Being constantly covered with food has its drawbacks. My dish-washing days were over. Next summer, I intended to be a full-fledged counselor, but my options were limited. I was unqualified to teach most of camp’s outdoor activities. My solution was to become the next pottery instructor. I had the next nine months to make that happen.

But things did not turn out as I planned.

To be continued…

Deborah Sweeney © 2026

Note: Names have been changed to protect living individuals.

To read a previous adventure of my life at camp, click here.

Robert stood in front of his work table and reviewed his notes for the upcoming lunch. The four of us—Clara, Renata, Brian and I—gathered around the kitchen and awaited instructions. Clara and Renata stood by the industrial sink, their quiet conversation in German unintelligible to the rest of us. On the opposite side of the room, Brian and I leaned against the stainless steel counter while he explained some of the kitchen routines.

His thoughts organized, Robert looked up and began assigning tasks. Renata had worked in the kitchen before and knew the drill. Clara, one of Renata’s friends from Germany, was new and her English was limited. Robert kept the pair together. He sent Brian off on another job, then turned to me.

“Grab the bag of carrots from the walk-in and start slicing them up for the salad,” he said.

I nodded and turned towards the large refrigerator, located around the corner in the kitchen’s entryway. The ancient handle groaned as I pulled it down. The suction released, the door swung open, and a blast of cold air hit me in the face. An unopened fifty pound bag of carrots lay on a shelf next to a box of apples and another filled with heads of lettuce. I pulled the bag down, then dragged it back to the kitchen.

◊◊◊

Meanwhile, the rest of Camp Zephyrus’s staff waited for the campers and their families to arrive. The morning’s tranquility would soon be broken.

At breakfast, the staff trickled through the dining hall. Some grabbed a bowl of cold cereal while others took the hot option—scrambled eggs, or maybe French toast—from the kitchen window. Muted conversations drifted across the room as the coffee machine percolated in the corner. Waves lapped against the rocks below the lakeside windows while the melamine dishware clicked against the wooden tables. Forks scraped against plates and spoons swirled in steaming mugs of coffee. A screen door creaked open, then swung shut with a bang. By dinner time, this quiet interlude would be lost in a cacophony of one hundred and ten boys.

Afterwards, the staff dispersed: to wait in their cabins for campers, to prep last minute tasks in activity areas, to direct incoming traffic, or to monitor check-in stations. A few stopped at the dock to gaze across the lake and enjoy a final moment of solitude.

A steady stream of Bimmers, Volvos, Jeeps, and other expensive cars traveled down the camp road and found their way to the gravel lot by the vintage gas pump between the front office and the dining hall. Some big-city parents locked their cars. Alarms chirped and horns honked. The local inhabitants, both human and animal, were startled by the racket. The staff shook their heads and rolled their eyes in disbelief. As a general rule, most of the staff kept their cars unlocked, often with the keys tossed on the dashboard. Who would steal a car parked in the woods in the middle of nowhere? Besides, it was easier to loan your car to a friend when the keys were in the car, not buried somewhere in your cabin.

Not all campers came with their parents. A loaded bus arrived mid-afternoon from a southern drop-off point, while others flew into Boston. A couple of counselors drove to Logan for the pick-up run, arriving back at camp for dinner. A mound of steamer trunks sat in the office garage and waited to be reunited with their owners.

As the day progressed, cheerful voices echoed through the woods. Returning campers greeted old friends and their former counselors with generous hugs, high fives, and fist bumps. Questions filled the air: Is so-and-so back this year? What cabin are you in? What activity are you teaching?

The boys pointed out landmarks to bemused parents as they headed up to the office. The assistant director and a handful of staff passed out cabin assignments. The nurses collected medical forms and prescriptions. Down on the dock, the swimming staff administered tests to campers who had yet to pass their Red Cross requirements. Campers picked their beds, unpacked their bags, and bid farewell to their parents.

◊◊◊

The kitchen staff prepared a buffet lunch, an easier option than a full sit-down meal since the campers arrived throughout the day. We made several salads—mixed green, potato, macaroni—and served them in gigantic forty quart bowls. There were platters of sandwich meats, cheese, sliced tomatoes, lettuce leaves, and baskets of bread. Containers of mayonnaise, mustard, pickles, and other condiments flanked the platters. Jars of peanut butter and jelly stood nearby. Bowls filled with apples, grapes, oranges, bananas, peaches, whatever fruit was in season, sat on another table. Our baker Pete provided a cornucopia of desserts on the last table: blond brownies, cookies, and a variety of pastry, from mini eclairs to cream puffs. Today was the day to impress the parents with the quality of camp’s food.

The plastic bag holding the carrots was clamped shut with a large metal ring. It was too heavy to pry open with my fingers. I looked around the kitchen for a pair of pliers, or anything that would provide leverage. Tool acquired, I jammed it between the metal loops, exerted force, and ripped my finger open. Metal ring – 1, finger – 0.

Blood dripped everywhere. The first aid kit contained band-aids as well as a supply of finger cots, which we just called condoms. I cleaned the cut and rolled a condom down my finger to keep it dry. The cut was so deep that it took several years for the scar to disappear.

Robert shook his head, grabbed a knife, and sliced the plastic bag open. He probably thought, Who is this idiot they hired for my kitchen? At the same moment, my thoughts echoed his. Duh! I am such an idiot.

With the bag open at last, I filled a giant colander with carrots, headed over to the sink, and tried to make a better impression with my new boss.

P.S. If you worked at Camp Zephyrus with me, back in the day, and want to share your memories of the first day of camp, drop me a line!

Deborah Sweeney © 2026

Note: Names have been changed to protect living individuals.

Summer camp is a rite of passage for many kids. Throughout my childhood, I enjoyed a variety a camp experiences, from Camp Wind-in-the-Pines, a month long day camp run by the YWCA in central Massachusetts, to several week-long overnight adventures at Camp Aldersgate, a United Methodist camp in Rhode Island. As a boy scout, my husband spent several summers at Camp Pahatsi, situated near the Donner Summit in northern California.

Camp was such an integral part of our summers growing up that I regret that our children missed this quintessential experience. We live within the bounds of a large school district in northern California. To reduce overcrowding in the elementary schools, they and many surrounding districts implemented a year-round school policy long before my children were enrolled. They were assigned to B-track in Kindergarten, and there they stayed, until their sixth grade promotions.

The year-round calendar consists of three months on, and one month off, with the school year starting the third week of July. There are four tracks (A, B, C & D); one track is always on vacation while the other three are in session. The B-track schedule takes its first break in late August…so one month on, one month off, then a three month run until Thanksgiving. The best part of the schedule was the six-week long break between Thanksgiving and New Year’s. But that doesn’t really work for summer camp. By the time the kids had time off in August, most camps were closing down.

As a child, my mother became friends with a younger couple from our church. They were actors, employed by Worcester’s only professional theatre company. Around the time I reached junior high, William took a summer job at a boy’s camp in northern New England. He worked there for many summers, and eventually, Carol joined him, becoming one of the few female staffers. In late June, they packed their bags and headed north. The summers stretched on in their absence, but at the end of August, they returned, with plenty of new tales to tell.

After my freshman year at UMass, I returned home without much of a plan beyond finding temporary clerical work, hanging out with old friends, visiting my dad in New York City, and taking the annual trek to Indiana to see my grandparents. A quick trip to the local Kelly Girl office landed me a job at the Hancock Insurance headquarters, a five-story Art Deco behemoth located on Lincoln Street. Since we had one car and my mother used it for her work commute, I took the bus. Conveniently, one of the major WRTA routes ran down Lincoln Street where a bus stopped in front of the insurance building.

The summer dragged on as I typed forms in triplicate, filed documents into rows of metal cabinets, froze in an air-conditioned office, and choked under a cloud of cigarette smoke. At home, I returned to my status as an inmate, trapped in a parental cage of arbitrary rules and mandatory church attendance. The freedoms I had enjoyed at college faded into obscurity, the upcoming fall semester a distant dream. I secretly vowed never to return.

One bright moment came in mid-July. We arranged to see William and Carol over Visitor Weekend at camp. We drove up Saturday morning and passed the afternoon in the shack where Carol taught campers leathermaking. That evening we enjoyed Beach Supper, a traditional all-camp barbeque by the lake, where we feasted on burgers, hot dogs, and salad, then washed it all down with plenty of bug juice, a.k.a. lemonade.

Post dinner, we headed to the Lodge for the evening’s entertainment. A hundred plus campers, a couple dozen staff members, and a host of visitors perched on rows of pine benches. A cool lake breeze drifted through the window screens, which for the most part, kept the mosquitos out.

William directed two plays each summer, including one Gilbert & Sullivan musical. That summer‘s offering was Ruddigore. A handful of campers and several counselors played the parts. Carol was Rose Maybud, an unwed village maiden desired by several local bachelors. An assistant director, as the evil ghost of Sir Rupert Murgatroyd, led a crew of sinister ghosts. Another counselor stole the stage with two different roles—Mad Margaret and Dame Hannah. As predicted, hilarity ensued. Waves of laughter shook the rafters as the actors hammed up their parts, cheesy special effects hit their marks, and an obligatory can of SPAM made a cameo.

After the show ended, the campers returned to their cabins. We headed towards the office, where Carol fulfilled one of her weekly adjunct duties as co-editor of the camp newspaper. The paper was another camp tradition. Each week, campers received the paper to read during Sunday’s after-lunch rest hour. Issues were filled with artwork, poetry, trip summaries, trivia, and other random articles.

The team put me to work. I wrote the Ruddigore review. Show reviews were usually Carol’s purview, but since she was the show’s “star,” they passed the job onto me. We worked past midnight, typing up camper articles, printing pages on the old ditto machine in the storage room, and stapling the damp pages together while trying not to smear the fresh ink. The tasks were completed under the watchful eyes of former campers.

In my mind, camp became the perfect escape route from the drudgery of another Worcester summer. My mission was to return next summer, not just as a visitor, but as a staff member. I wrote to the director around Christmastime, expressing my desire to join the staff. He remembered me from my visit and thanked me for my interest. But, he needed to confirm who was returning before he could offer me anything. I held my breath for weeks. Another letter came in late March. A position might be available in the kitchen. Five weeks passed. I began to lose hope. April was almost over before the long-awaited envelope, emblazoned with the camp logo, arrived in my mailbox. I called the director immediately, and accepted the position.

Six weeks later, in late June, just like William and Carol, I packed my things and headed north, my bags stowed in the trunk next to theirs.

Deborah Sweeney © 2026

“According to the Kinsey Report

Ev’ry average man you know

Much prefers to play his favorite sport

When the temperature is low,

But when the thermometer goes ‘way up

And the weather is sizzling hot

For the kitchen

On a mission

Is not

‘cause it’s too too

too darn hot

It’s too darn hot

It’s too darn hot!”

--Cole Porter [some lines altered from the original]

The sky glows orange and pink at sunset, silhouetting the mountains on the distant shore. The faint strains of a bugle blow across the cove. Taps, the final call of the day, is its name. Maybe the temperature will drop with the setting sun. Maybe. Chances are the night will be hot and sticky like the one before. The mosquitoes will be rejoicing as they seek their prey. The holes in the cabin screens welcome them with open arms.

What little wind there is blows gently up from the lake. Pieces of conversations drift towards the sleeping cabins. A dog barks in the distance. The lights in the office blaze through the gathering darkness. Already many stars are visible. Ursa Major. Ursa Minor. The Pleiades. Soon the waning moon will rise to brighten the sky.

The night is still young. The O.D.s begin their rounds while some cabins listen to ancient tales from tattered tomes. A car engine turns in the blackness. A few are leaving camp for the evening A movie, perhaps? The kitchen door slams shut. Grazing time has begun. The kitchen has become a free-for-all. What is left on the staff shelf tonight? Maybe a bowl of Cheerios is a better idea. How many glasses will the kitchen crew find scattered about in the morning?

Time passes quickly. Someone writes a letter. The laundry machines are in constant motion. All must be done before eleven o’clock. Who wants to play cards? Rummy? or perhaps scrabble? Cribbage. Don’t worry, Phil wins anyhow. The O.D.s walk through the dining hall. Keep it down, the Woodchucks are awake. No one really listens as the noise level slowly ascends once more.

Ten minutes more. It’s eleven o’clock. Time to go to bed. Lights begin to fade and disappear. Yawing becomes the trend. The day has cooled into night. Perhaps sleep will be easier tonight. Tomorrow will be a bright sunny day. Hopefully, it won’t be so hot.

Deborah Sweeney © 1988-1993

In January, my son purchased a used bicycle on Facebook Marketplace. He convinced his roommate to drive him three hours (one way) across southern California to broker the deal in the coastal city of Ventura. The adventure took most of the day. Throughout the spring, he tinkered on the bike in their crowded dorm room.

When I picked him up mid-May, we loaded up my car. He dismantled the bike, piece by piece, to make it fit around the rest of his possessions. Although my car appears deceptively small from the outside, it has a TARDIS-like interior which can transport an abundance of belongings. Even with the bike frame balanced on top of his computer towers and dirty laundry, I could still see through the back window with the rear view mirror.

Since then, our garage has been transformed into a bicycle repair shop—a laboratory of Frankenstein proportions. New vehicles have emerged, resurrected from a graveyard of abandoned bicycles, previously stashed in another dusty corner of the garage. Supplemental parts appear from a litany of vendors: local bike shops, an army of Amazon delivery vans, and a hodgepodge of internet sellers and marketplaces. Where once we had no functioning bicycles, we now command a legion.

By the time he reached the sixth grade, like most kids from Gen Z, my son had worked his way through a collection of self-propelled vehicles—tricycles, scooters, kiddie bikes, skateboards. I could not drive him to school for most of that year, due to the cocktail mixture of chemo drugs, nausea meds, and pain relievers I was ingesting. My husband worked long hours out-of-town and none of our close family was willing to help. Our options were limited. My son needed something reliable for school transportation. At almost four miles away, the distance was too far for him to walk alone. We bought him a sturdy bike and upgraded his Wi-Fi accessible iPod to an iPhone. Twice daily, I took deep breaths to avoid a panic attack while I tracked his progress through major intersections and past a busy shopping center as he made his way to school and back.

Cycling was part of his routine by the time he started seventh grade at the nearby middle school. I relaxed, enjoyed his independence, and relished my emancipation from the daily taxi routine. Then the pandemic hit and no one went anywhere.

He returned to in-person learning a year and a half later, but this time to the high school side of the joint campus. Some days, I walked out to the garage with him, said good-bye, and watched him roll down the driveway. Eventually, a part on the bike broke. My son had neither the parts nor the skills to fix it. He borrowed his dad’s fixie bike until it was stolen from the high school. He left early one morning for an out-of-town track meet. Long after dark, when the team returned, the bike pen was locked. The night custodian was nowhere to be found so the bike remained on campus for the remainder of the weekend. By Monday morning, it was gone. The school administration shrugged their shoulders and considered the matter closed.

The father of one of my son’s friends cleaned out his garage, insisting that he take one of the old bikes. It was going whether he took it or not. My son used that bike until he left for college. It’s recently been cannibalized.

The present enthusiasm for bicycles is contagious. My husband caught the bug, too. The resident bike shop technicians built a bike to replace the stolen one, and then they assembled one for me with the surplus of miscellaneous parts. My old one was salvaged for its components long ago. I have yet to try the new one, but plan to soon. The newest work in progress is for my son’s girlfriend.

At present, YouTube videos from bicycle aficionados dominate the television line-up in the evenings. Quirky cycling adventurists and repair gurus entertain my men for hours, then they head back out to the garage to tinker. As my husband drifts off to sleep, my son heads out for a midnight ride. The garage door rumbles under my office chair as I look up from my book. From my window, I watch him shoot down the driveway, just like he did each morning on his way to school. The safety lights flash on his helmet, and a headlight illuminates his path. I hold my breath and wait for his return.

To be continued…

Deborah Sweeney © 2026

Lest anyone accuse me of just telling stories about my ancestors, let me assure you that I document everything. In FACT, I love to write up lineages and footnote the beejeezus out of them. The writing is dry and technical, and therefore, not particularly entertaining, but between the lines, buried in the cracks between the birth, marriage, and deaths dates lurk the tales, waiting to be excavated and spun.

Of Sherman’s eleven children, only five had children of their own. The sons left Connersville as young men. Some of the daughters remained in the county; two bore children who also moved away. The Scofield name disappeared from Connersville a hundred years ago, except for a few remaining graves in the City Cemetery and some brick buildings that Sherman built.

And don’t forget to look at the endnotes!

Sherman⁶ Scofield (Silvanus⁵, Silvanus⁴, John³, Samuel², Daniel¹, Daniel^A), born 29 June 1810, Stamford, Fairfield County, Connecticut,[1] and died 11 October 1877, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana.[2] Sherman married (1) on 5 January 1832, in Fayette County, Indiana, Eliza Milner, the daughter of John and Nancy (Miranda) Milner.[3] Eliza was born 3 April 1816, Bracken County, Kentucky, and died 9 April 1848, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana.[4] Sherman married (2) on 21 March 1849, in Fayette County, Indiana, Eliza Ross.[5] Eliza was born 15 January 1818, possibly in Fleming County, Kentucky, and died 3 October 1860, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana.[6] Sherman and his wives were buried at Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana.[7]

Known children of Sherman⁶ Scofield and his first wife, Eliza Milner:

i. ELIZA JANE⁷ SCOFIELD, b. 25 September 1833 and d. 1 March 1835, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana.[8] Burial at Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Indiana.[9]

ii. MALINDA SCOFIELD, b. 30 August 1835, Connersville, Indiana;[10] d. 12 June 1901, Connersville, Indiana.[11] She married on 31 January 1854, in Fayette County, Indiana, Abraham Jefferson Claypool.[12] The couple had no children. They were buried at Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Indiana.[13]

+ iii. THADDEUS S. SCOFIELD, b. 24 August 1839, Connersville, Indiana;[14] d. 23 January 1897, Los Angeles, California.[15] He married on 15 November 1860, in Fayette County, Indiana, Ellen McCann.[16] Burial location is unknown.

iv. FRANKLIN SCOFIELD, b. 31 July 1842, Connersville, Indiana;[17] d. 11 April 1924, Sharpsville, Tipton County, Indiana.[18] He married on 17 February 1870, in Fayette County, Indiana, Laura Gifford.[19] They had no children. Burial at Sharpsville Cemetery, Sharpsville, Tipton County, Indiana.[20]

+ v. CECELIA SCOFIELD, b. 19 October 1845, Connersville, Indiana;[21] d. 1 October 1920, Marion, Grant County, Indiana.[22] She married (1) on 15 December 1864, in Fayette County, Indiana, Martin Hughes Updegraff.[23] She married (2) on 26 April 1893, in Fayette County, Indiana, William S. Hargrove.[24] Burial of Cecelia and Martin Updegraff at Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Indiana, while William S. Hargrove rests at East Hill Cemetery, Rushville, Indiana.[25]

vi. ELIZA SCOFIELD, b. 9 April 1848 and d. 6 September 1848, Connersville, Indiana.[26] Burial at Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Indiana.[27]

Known children of Sherman⁶ Scofield and his second wife, Eliza Ross:

i. BALZORA⁷ SCOFIELD, b. 28 January 1851, Connersville, Indiana;[28] d. 2 September 1929, Tipton, Indiana.[29] She never married. Burial at Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Indiana.[30]

+ ii. ELLA REYNOLDS SCOFIELD, b. 5 June 1853, Connersville, Indiana;[31] d. 4 June 1917, Connersville, Indiana.[32] She married on 18 December 1873, in Fayette County, Indiana Daniel Kerschner.[33] Burial at Lick Creek Cemetery, Harrison Twp., Fayette County, Indiana.[34]

iii. LENA M. SCOFIELD, b. 12 January 1855, Connersville;[35] d. 26 December 1935, Connersville, Indiana.[36] She married on 8 February 1894, in Fayette County, Indiana, John Hackleman.[37] The couple had no children of their own, but John had six sons from his first marriage. Burial at Lick Creek Cemetery, Harrison Twp., Fayette County, Indiana.[38]

+ iv. SHERMAN SCOFIELD, b. 28 March 1856, Connersville, Indiana;[39] died 11 November 1929, Denver, Colorado.[40] He married on 16 December 1885, in Fayette County, Indiana, Florence H. Wiles.[41] Burial at Fairmount Cemetery, Denver, Colorado.[42]

+ vi. EUGENE B. SCOFIELD, b. 12 August 1858, Connersville, Indiana;[43] d. 16 November 1932, Indianapolis, Indiana.[44] He married on 25 October 1882, in Henry County, Indiana, Etta West.[45] Burial at Mount Summit Cemetery, Mount Summit, Henry County, Indiana.[46]

Bibliography

Barrows, Frederic Irving, editor. History of Fayette County Indiana: Her People, Industries and Institutions. Indianapolis, Indiana: B. F. Bowen & Company, Inc., 1917.

Colorado. Denver. The Denver Post. 12 November 1929.

Dinsmore, Alma. Sherman Scofield Family Group Sheet. Privately held by Deborah Sweeney, Elk Grove, CA, 2000.

Find A Grave. Database with images. www.findagrave.com.

Indiana. Connersville. Connersville Daily News. 27 January 1897.

Indiana. Connersville. Connersville Daily News. 12 June 1901.

Indiana. Connersville. Connersville Evening News. 4 June 1917.

Indiana. Connersville. Connersville Examiner. 30 October 1877.

Indiana. Connersville. Connersville News Examiner. 2 October 1920.

Indiana. Connersville. Connersville News Examiner. 5 October 1920.

Indiana. Connersville. Connersville News Examiner. 27 December 1935.

Indiana. Connersville. Connersville Weekly Times. 10 October 1860.

Indiana. Fayette County. Marriage Books, 1822-1949. FamilySearch.org.

Indiana. Henry County. Marriage Books, 1823-1951. FamilySearch.org.

Indiana. Knightstown. The Knightstown Banner. 25 November 1932.

Indiana. Tipton. Tipton Daily Tribune. 11 April 1924.

Indiana. Tipton. Tipton Daily Tribune. 3 September 1929.

“Indiana, U.S., Death Certificates, 1899-2017.” Database and images. Ancestry.

Scofield, Eugene B. (Indianapolis, Indiana) to “My Dear Sister Lena” [Lena Scofield Hackleman]. Letter. 17 November 1929. Privately held by Deborah Sweeney, Elk Grove, California. 2026.

[1] Frederic Irving Barrows, editor, History of Fayette County Indiana: Her People, Industries and Institutions (Indianapolis, Indiana: B. F. Bowen & Company, Inc., 1917), 790-791. Also, Find A Grave, database and images, (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 26 May 2026), memorial page for Sherman Scofield (1810-1877), Find A Grave Memorial no. 37,052,640, Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana; the accompanying photograph by Wayne L. Osborne (Member ID 46,540,493) is legible. The stone provides only birth and death years. Also, Alma Dinsmore, Sherman Scofield Family Group Sheet; supplied by Dinsmore [deceased], 2000. Alma was Sherman’s great granddaughter, through the line of his daughter Ella (Scofield) Kerschner. The sheet provides full birth and death dates for Sherman Scofield, his wives, and children, but without specific source documentation.

[2] “Sherman Scofield,” obituary, Connersville Examiner (Connersville, Indiana), 30 October 1877, p. 2, col. 4.; digital image, NewspaperArchive (https://www.newspaperarchive.com : accessed 26 May 2026).

[3] Fayette County, Indiana, Marriage Book B: 303, Sherman Scofield and Eliza Milner; “Indiana, Marriages, 1811-2019,” digital image, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : accessed 26 May 2026), FHL film 4,540,449, image 182/240. Also, the probate documents of John Milner (1786-1856) name his deceased daughter Eliza Scofield and her four children: Malinda Claypool, Thaddeus Scofield, Franklin Scofield, and Cecilia Scofield.

[4] Find A Grave, database and images, (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 26 May 2026), memorial page for Eliza Milner Scofield (1816-1848), Find A Grave Memorial no. 37,053,042, Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana; the accompanying photograph by Wayne L. Osborne (Member ID 46,540,493) is somewhat legible as the stone is broken into several fragments. The low resolution image dates from 2009. Also, Dinsmore, Alma, Sherman Scofield Family Group Sheet, previously evaluated in note 1.

[5] Fayette County, Indiana, Marriage Book F: 90, Sherman Scofield and Eliza Ross; “Indiana, Marriages, 1811-2019,” digital image, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : accessed 26 May 2026), FHL film 4,540,514, image 626/795.

[6] Find A Grave, database and images, (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 26 May 2026), memorial page for Eliza Ross Scofield (1818-1860), Find A Grave Memorial no. 38,013,829, Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana; the accompanying photograph by Wayne L. Osborne (Member ID 46,540,493) is somewhat legible as the stone is broken into several fragments. The low resolution image dates from 2009. Also, Dinsmore, Alma, Sherman Scofield Family Group Sheet, previously evaluated in note 1. Also, DNA evidence indicates that Eliza may be a descendant of Richard Ross (1765-1828), who died in Fleming County, Kentucky. Also, “Died,” obituary, Connersville Weekly Times (Connersville, Indiana), 10 October 1860, p. 3, col. 3; digital image, NewspaperArchive (https://www.newspaperarchive.com : accessed 26 May 2026).

[7] Find A Grave, Sherman Scofield, memorial no. 37,052,640. Also, Find A Grave, Eliza Milner Scofield, memorial no. 37,053,042. Also, Find A Grave, Eliza Ross Scofield, memorial no. 38,013,829.

[8] Find A Grave, database and images, (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 26 May 2026), memorial page for Eliza Jane Scofield (1833-1835), Find A Grave Memorial no. 37,054,146, Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana; the accompanying photograph by Wayne L. Osborne (Member ID 46,540,493) is somewhat difficult to read due to the low resolution of the 2009 photograph. Birth is calculated from the age at death: 1 year, 5 months & 4 days. Also, Dinsmore, Alma, Sherman Scofield Family Group Sheet, previously evaluated in note 1. A different birth date is given for Eliza Jane: 9 January 1833. If correct, Eliza’s age would be 2 years, 1 month, 20 days, which conflicts with the age carved on her gravestone.

[9] Find A Grave, Eliza Jane Scofield (1833-1835), memorial no. 37,054,146.

[10] Find A Grave, database and images, (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 26 May 2026), memorial page for Malinda Scofield Claypool (1835-1901), Find A Grave Memorial no. 37,149,876, Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana; the accompanying photograph by Wayne L. Osborne (Member ID 46,540,493) is somewhat difficult to read due to the low resolution of the 2009 photograph. However, the stone lists full birth and death dates.

[11] “Sudden Death,” obituary, Connersville Daily News (Connersville, Indiana), 12 June 1901, p. 2, col. 2: digital image, Newspaper Archive (https://www.newspaperarchive.com : accessed 27 May 2026). Also, Find A Grave, Malinda Scofield Claypool, memorial no. 37,149,876.

[12] Fayette County, Indiana, Marriage Book F: 266, A. Jefferson Claypool and Malinda Scofield; “Indiana Marriages, 1811-2019,” digital images, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : accessed 27 May 2026), FHL film 4,540,514, image 715/795.

[13] Find A Grave, database and images, (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 26 May 2026), memorial page for Abraham Jefferson Claypool (1829-1891), Find A Grave Memorial no. 37,149,576, Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana; the accompanying photograph by Wayne L. Osborne (Member ID 46,540,493) is somewhat difficult to read due to the low resolution of the 2009 photograph. However, the stone lists full birth and death dates. Also, Find A Grave, Malinda Scofield Claypool, memorial no. 37,149, 876.

[14] Dinsmore, Alma, Sherman Scofield Family Group Sheet, previously evaluated in note 1. The sheet gives Thaddeus’s full birthdate as 24 August 1839. The year is consistent with Thaddeus’s age on census years and voters’ lists.

[15] “LOCAL AND PERSONAL,” death notice, Connersville Daily News (Connersville, Indiana), 27 January 1897, p. 3, col. 3; digital image, NewspaperARCHIVE (https://www.newspaperarchive.com : accessed 27 May 2026). “Thaddeus S. Scofield, a former well known citizen of this city and county, died suddenly at his home in Los Angeles, California, last Saturday [23 January 1897].”

[16] Fayette County, Indiana, Marriage Book 1: 144, Thaddeus S. Scofield and Ellen McCann; “Indiana Marriages, 1811-2019,” digital image, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : accessed 27 May 2026), FHL film 4,540,515, image 106 of 710.

[17] Indiana State Board of Health, death certificate no. 13799, Franklin Scofield (1924); “Indiana, U.S., Death Certificates, 1899-2017,” digital image, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com : accessed 27 May 2026). Also, Dinsmore, Alma, Sherman Scofield Family Group Sheet, previously evaluated in note 1. The group sheet provides the same birthdate as the death certificate.

[18] Indiana death certificate no. 13799 (1924), Franklin Scofield. Also, “Sharpsville Resident,” obituary, Tipton Daily Tribune (Tipton, Indiana), 11 April 1924, p. 5, col. 2; digital image, Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com : accessed 28 May 2026).

[19] Fayette County, Indiana, Marriage Book 1: 627, Franklin Scofield and Laura Gifford; “Indiana Marriages, 1811-2019,” digital image, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : accessed 28 May 2026), FHL film 4,540,515, image 349/710.

[20] Find A Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 26 May 2026), memorial page for Franklin Scofield (1842-1924), Find A Grave Memorial no. 38,916,232, and Laura Gifford Scofield (1841-1918), Find A Grave Memorial no. 38,916,340, Sharpsville Cemetery, Sharpsville, Tipton County, Indiana; the accompanying 2011 photographs by Catie & Will (Member ID 46,946,326) are legible. The stones list full birth and death dates for Frank and Laura.

[21] Indiana State Board of Heath, death certificate no. 33182, Cecilia L. Hargrove; “Indiana, U.S., Death Certificates, 1899-2017,” digital image, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com : accessed 27 May 2026). Also, Dinsmore, Alma, Sherman Scofield Family Group Sheet, previously evaluated in note 1. The group sheet provides the same birthdate as the death certificate.

[22] Indiana death certificate no. 33182 (1920), Cecilia L. Hargrove. Also, “Former Resident Called By Death,” obituary, Connersville News Examiner (Connersville, Indiana), 2 October 1920, p. 8, col. 3, and “Mrs. Hargrove is at Eternal Rest,” death notice, Connersville News Examiner (Connersville, Indiana), 5 October 1920, p. 3, col. 2; digital image, NewspaperARCHIVE (http://www.newspaperarchive.com : accessed 28 May 2026).

[23] Fayette County, Indiana, Marriage Book 1: 330, Martin H. Updegraff and Cecilia Scofield; “Indiana Marriages, 1811-2019,” digital image, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : accessed 28 May 2026), FHL film 4,540,515, image 200/710.

[24] Fayette County, Indiana, Marriage Book 4: 16, William S. Hargrove and Cecilia Updegraff; “Indiana Marriages, 1811-2019,” digital image, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : accessed 28 May 2026), FHL film 4,540,516, image 370/668.

[25] Find A Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 28 May 2026), memorial page for Cecilia Scofield Hargrove (1845-1920), Find A Grave Memorial no. 38,915,795, and Martin H. Updegraff (1834-1887), Find A Grave Memorial no. 38,916,171, Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana; there is no gravestone photograph on Cecilia’s memorial page, while the accompanying 2011 photographs of Martin’s stone by Bill Daugherty (Member ID 47,160,704) are mostly legible. Also, Find A Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 28 May 2026), memorial page for William Hargrove (1840-1894), Find A Grave Memorial no. 18,763,026, East Hill Cemetery, Rushville, Rush County, Indiana: the accompanying photograph by Just Suzy (Member ID 46841831) is legible. The stone lists only birth and death years.

[26] Find A Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 28 May 2026), memorial page for Eliza Scofield (1848-1848), Find A Grave Memorial no. 38,908,557, Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana; the accompanying 2014 photograph by Kathy Edgington (Member ID 47,503,234) is legible. “Eliza, daughter of Sherman & Eliza SCOFIELD Died Sept. 6, 1848, Aged 4 mo 27 d’s.” Birth date is calculated from death date, which corresponds with the death date of her mother.

[27] Find A Grave, Eliza Scofield (1848-1848), memorial no. 38,908,557.

[28] Indiana State Board of Heath, death certificate no. 30679, Balzora Scofield (1929); “Indiana, U.S., Death Certificates, 1899-2017,” digital image, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com : accessed 27 May 2026). Death certificate records birth date as 1 July 1851. Also, Dinsmore, Alma, Sherman Scofield Family Group Sheet, previously evaluated in note 1. The group sheet gives birth date as 28 January 1851, which conflicts with the birth date on the death certificate. Further documentation will be required to determine the correct date.

[29] Indiana death certificate no. 30679 (1929), Balzora Scofield. Also, “Death of Splendid Woman,” obituary, Tipton Daily Tribune (Tipton, Indiana), 3 September 1929, p. 5, col. 7; digital image, Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com : accessed 28 May 2026).

[30] Find A Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 28 May 2026), memorial page for Balzora “Zora” Scofield (1851-1929), Find A Grave Memorial no. 38,930,995, Connersville City Cemetery, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana; there is no gravestone photograph on the memorial page.

[31] Indiana State Board of Health, death certificate no. 19171, Ella Reynolds Kerschner (1917); “Indiana, U.S., Death Certificates, 1899-2017,” digital image, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com : accessed 27 May 2026). Also, Dinsmore, Alma, Sherman Scofield Family Group Sheet, previously evaluated in note 1. The group sheet provides the same birth date as the death certificate.

[32] Indiana death certificate no. 19171 (1917, Ella Reynolds Kerschner. Also, “Mrs. Kerschner is Called From Earth,” obituary, Connersville Evening News (Connersville, Indiana), 4 June 1917, p. 6, col. 4; digital image, NewspaperARCHIVE (http://www.newspaperarchive.com : accessed 28 May 2026).

[33] Fayette County, Indiana, Marriage Book 2: 176, Daniel Kerschner and Ella R. Scofield; “Indiana Marriages, 1811-2019,” digital image, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : accessed 29 May 2026), FHL film 4,540,515, image 480/710.

[34] Find A Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 29 May 2026), memorial page for Ella Reynolds Scofield Kerschner (1853-1917), Find A Grave Memorial no. 38012888, and memorial page for Daniel Kerschner (1846-1916), Find A Grave Memorial no. 38012872, Lick Creek Cemetery, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana; the accompanying 2009 photographs by GenealogyLady (Member ID 47,137,469) are legible. The stones list only birth and death years.

[35] Indiana State Board of Health, death certificate no. 36404, Lena Hackleman (1935); “Indiana, U.S., Death Certificates, 1899-2017,” digital image, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com : accessed 29 May 2026). Also, Dinsmore, Alma, Sherman Scofield Family Group Sheet, previously evaluated in note 1. The group sheet provides the same birth date as the death certificate.

[36] Indiana death certificate no. 36404 (1935), Lena Hackleman. Also, “Woman, 80, Burned to Death in Her Home,” Connersville News Examiner (Connersville, Indiana), 27 December 1935, p. 1.

[37] Fayette County, Indiana, Marriage Book 4: 56, John W. Hackleman and Lena M. Scofield; “Indiana Marriages, 1811-2019,” digital image, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : accessed 29 May 2026), FHL film 4,540,516, image 390/668.

[38] Find A Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 29 May 2026), memorial page for Lena Scofield Hackleman (1855-1935), Find A Grave Memorial no. 38,917,870, and memorial page for John Wesley Hackleman (1843-1927), Find A Grave Memorial no. 38,917,837, Lick Creek Cemetery, Connersville, Fayette County, Indiana; the accompanying 2020 photographs by Hughes-Wilhelm (Member ID 47,236,865) are legible. The stones list only birth and death years.

[39] Dinsmore, Alma, Sherman Scofield Family Group Sheet, previously evaluated in note 1. The group sheet provides a birth date of 28 March 1856.

[40] Scofield, Eugene B. (Indianapolis, Indiana) to “Dear Sister Lena” [Lena Scofield Hackleman], letter, 17 November 1929; privately held by Deborah Sweeney, Elk Grove, California, 2026. Eugene wrote to Lena that he received a letter from Florence informing him that Sherman died “at 4:30 a.m. Nov. 11^th .” Also, “Sherman Scofield Funeral Services Will Be Wednesday,” obituary, The Denver Post (Denver, Colorado), 12 November 1929, p. 15, col. 3; digital image, GenealogyBank (https://www.genealogybank.com : accessed 29 May 2026).

[41] Fayette County, Indiana, Marriage Book 3: 208, Sherman Scofield and Florence H. Wiles; “Indiana Marriages, 1811-2019,” digital image, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : accessed 29 May 2026), FHL film 4,540,516, image 139/668.

[42] Find A Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 29 May 2026), memorial page for Sherman Scofield (1856-1929), Find A Grave Memorial no. 38,931,407, and memorial page for Florence H. Wiles Scofield (1860-1936), Find A Grave Memorial no. 38,931,613, Fairmount Cemetery, Denver, Denver County, Colorado; the accompanying 2013 photographs by Joyce Escue Culver (Member ID 269,074,345) are legible. The stone lists only birth and death years.

[43] Indiana State Board of Health, death certificate no. 32413, Eugene B. Scofield (1932); “Indiana, U.S., Death Certificates, 1899-2017,” digital image, Ancestry (https://www.ancestry.com : accessed 29 May 2026). Also, Dinsmore, Alma, Sherman Scofield Family Group Sheet, previously evaluated in note 1. The group sheet provides the same birth date as the death certificate.

[44] Indiana death certificate no. 32413 (1932), Eugene B. Scofield. Also, “Death of Rev. E. B. Scofield,” obituary, The Knightstown Banner (Knightstown, Indiana), 25 November 1932, p. 1, col. 2; digital image, Newspapers.com (https://www.newspapers.com : accessed 29 May 2026).

[45] Henry County, Indiana, Marriage Book 7: 51, E. B. Scofield and Etta West; “Indiana Marriages, 1811-2019,” digital image, FamilySearch (https://www.familysearch.org : accessed 29 May 2026), FHL film 4,171,279, image 718/822.

[46] Find A Grave, database and images (https://www.findagrave.com : accessed 29 May 2026), memorial page for Rev. Eugene B. Scofield (1858-1932), Find A Grave Memorial no. 99,087,422, and memorial page for Etta West Scofield (1863-1944), Find A Grave Memorial no. 99,087,445, Mount Summit Cemetery, Mount Summit, Henry County, Indiana; the accompanying 2012 photographs by DSON1942 (Member ID 46,855,689) are legible. The stones list only birth and death years.

Deborah Sweeney © 2026

On April 11, 1876, the Connersville Examiner announced that the case against Mary Helm, John Gilchrist, and others—which at one point included Sherman and Silvester Scofield—had been decided. The Frisbee heirs had won their inheritance, after waiting decades for their Aunt Ursula to die. Their uncle’s real estate—valued at $30,000 or more—belonged to them. The heirs filed a multitude of lawsuits against a slew of Connersville’s residents following Ursula Tate’s death in 1874. These unsuspecting land owners bought land from Orrin Frisbee’s estate in good faith. Regardless, the Frisbees wanted their share of the money, and they didn’t care who paid.

Orrin Frisbee and his bride, Ursula (Hotchkiss) Frisbee, natives of Connecticut, arrived in Connersville around 1818. Although the Frisbees are not found on the Fayette county census records for 1820, the Warner & Beers History of Fayette County, Indiana (1885) lists a tanner named Frisbee among Connersville’s businessmen in the 1820s. The couple lived in the city by the fall of 1821 when Frisbee purchased half of lot no. 62 in Harlan’s Addition (located on Central Avenue between 3^rd and 4^th streets). As the years progressed, Frisbee acquired more land in the city and the neighboring countryside. A grave for an infant, Orrin Frisbie, Jr., who died in 1826 rests in the City Cemetery, but the location of his father’s gravesite is unknown. Perhaps Frisbee slumbers under the Whitewater River with countless others whose graves were lost when the river flooded and changed its course.

During the summer of 1829, Orrin Frisbee died; Ursula served as executrix to the estate. The terms of the will allowed her one year to sell any property necessary—both personal and real—to pay his outstanding debts. He bequeathed to his beloved wife Ursula: “…the personal estate forever and the real estate for and during her life, the remainder to her issue of body by me begotten provided also that such issue live to lawful age, and on failure thereof then remainder to my own relations by consanguinity at the time of her decease, who may inherit the same by the rules of the common law…” The will also made note of Samuel Frisbee, a brother who owed him $200 and lived in Alabama.

Ursula’s children did not survive to adulthood. The summer after Orrin’s death, she lived in Connersville with a boy, under five years old. What happened to him is anyone’s guess. Did he succumb to a childhood illness or die in a tragic accident, leaving his mother to grieve alone? Four years after Orrin died, Ursula married John B. Tate. By 1840, the Tate household did not include a boy of a corresponding age.

Despite the terms laid out in her husband’s will, Ursula Tate sold property that once belonged to Orrin Frisbee, many years after the debts were paid. She did not own the land, and had no authority to sell it. Frisbee’s will stipulated only a lifetime interest for his widow. Meredith Helm was one of many hapless victims who purchased land from Mrs. Tate. Maybe the victims knew of the will and the prevailing laws and gambled on the ignorance of the Frisbee clan down in Alabama. Evolving legislation towards Indiana’s married women granted them greater rights over property ownership as the 19^th century advanced. Maybe they thought Frisbee’s will was no longer relevant or legally binding.

In 1847, John and Ursula Tate sold several acres of land to Meredith Helm, located next to his homestead on the south side of the Rushville Road (now known as State Route 44 or West 3^rd Street). A decade later, Meredith and his wife Mary sold nineteen acres on West Hill to Sherman Scofield, a local building contractor. At one time, the two men were brothers-in-law when Robert D. Helm married Sarah Scofield. Sherman Scofield intended to divide the land into smaller parcels and expand the addition he platted in 1850 on the north side of the Rushville Road. An 1875 map of the city illustrates Scofield’s lots numbered 27-81 on the west side of Mrs. Helm’s property.

Mary Helm sold more of the former Frisbee land after Meredith Helm died in 1859. Her situation was similar to Ursula Tate’s. She, too, was a childless widow with a life interest in her husband’s property. Helm’s surviving siblings, nephews, and nieces would one day inherit the remainder of his estate. But he died intestate, so while the bulk of the estate would pass to his heirs, Mary Helm had more freedom to determine the distribution of the estate, based on the prevailing inheritance laws.

The Frisbee heirs spared no one. When Sherman Scofield filed for bankruptcy in 1867, he noted on Schedule B that “all the property mentioned on this sheet is in Scofield’s Addition to the town of Connersville. Owing to a cloud on the title, the property is undesirable and will not sell. One Frisby, who was the former owner of all this land, and who died probably in 1829, tried in his will to entail the estate, and although I believed my title good, there is still so much doubt in the matter that it is impossible to sell the property…” John L. Gilchrist, a Scottish immigrant, lawyer, and farmer, who purchased a portion of the Frisbee estate from Mary Helm in 1866, became another target of the heirs.

Ursula Tate died in September 1874. Three months later, the Connersville Examiner reported that William Frisbee of Alabama was in the city, looking after his interests in Mrs. Tate’s estate. William, his brother, and two sisters wanted their inheritance. They filed several lawsuits, but many chose to buy off the Frisbees, who signed Quit Claim deeds for hefty sums of cash, including the heavily indebted Sherman Scofield. Silvester Scofield held a mortgage on a four-acre parcel where his brother’s house stood on West Hill. In July 1875, the younger Scofield brother paid the Frisbees $600 on Sherman’s behalf while Frisbee vs. Helm, et al made its way through the legal system.

In the end, the court awarded the plaintiffs all the land Meredith Helm and John L. Gilchrist acquired from Ursula Tate. Mrs. Helm and John L. Gilchrist were required to pay monetary sums for damages and all court costs accrued by the plaintiffs. Yet another win for an archaic and patriarchal system, based on entails and life interests. A system that penalized women, like Ursula Tate and Mary Helm, widows forced to survive, treated as second class citizens, left unable to inherit property and powerless to manage their own self-interests.

Selected Sources

Indiana. Connersville. Connersville Weekly Times. 20 August 1863.

Indiana. Connersville. Connersville Examiner. 30 September 1874.

Indiana. Connersville. Connersville Examiner. 12 January 1875.

Indiana. Connersville. Connersville Examiner. 11 April 1876.

Indiana. Fayette County. 1820 U.S. census.

Indiana. Fayette County. 1830 U.S. census.

Indiana. Fayette. “Complete Probate, Vol. A.” Orin Frisbie will.

Indiana. Fayette. “Complete Probate, Vol. C.” Meredith Helm Estate.

Indiana. Fayette. Land Deeds.

Deborah Sweeney © 2026

Eliza (Ross) Scofield is many things—an enigma, an obstacle, a personal albatross, an unsolved mystery. She is a female ancestor without a past who taunts me from the sixth ring of my fan chart—one of thirty-two individuals who shaped my existence in minute ways. Eliza holds the lamentable honor of being one of three ancestors whose parentage remains unknown after decades of research. William McGraw, his wife Martha (Higgins) McGraw, and Eliza lived in Fayette county, Indiana. All were early settlers of the nineteenth state. They shaped new lives for themselves and their families on the frontier, and buried their pasts in the newly tilled soil.

One anecdote about Eliza remains, passed down from my grandfather’s generation. She rode side-saddle the entire way from Kentucky to her new home in Indiana. But when this journey occurred is anyone’s guess, but doubtless, it took place during the 1830s or 1840s. It was an expedition she did not take alone. She came with family. But the question remains, who were they?

Eliza waltzes into Sherman Scofield’s life in 1849 and momentarily steals the spotlight. She plays her role, giving birth to five children, maybe six. The final curtain descends on her brief life eleven years later as she exits stage left. Her collapsed and broken stone at the City Cemetery memorializes that life. Eliza, wife of Sherman Scofield, died October 3, 1860, aged 42 years, 8 months, and 18 days. A short and flowery obituary adds little to her story—“Eliza, wife of Sherman, died at her residence in West Connersville, in her 43^d year.” She is described as a true and devoted Christian, a faithful companion, an affectionate mother, a kind neighbor, and a warm-hearted friend with a large family and many friends who will mourn her departure.

The Christian Church formed from a schism in the Baptist faith. Both Eliza and Sherman were members. Elder John O’Kane officiated at their marriage on March 21, 1849. When O’Kane was a thirty-year old, newly married minister in 1832, he moved to Milton, in Wayne County. He toiled as a schoolmaster to feed his growing family. In his remaining time, he preached to the masses, traveling across Wayne, Rush, and Fayette counties, in meeting houses and in open fields. O’Kane helped organize the Christian church at Connersville in 1833. He stayed for a few years, then left to serve more of the faithful in the western and southern sections of the state. O’Kane returned to Connersville a decade later, in 1848. During his twelve-month sojourn in the city, he joined the Scofields in holy matrimony.

When Eliza married Sherman, she was a bona fide spinster, having reached her thirty-second year. She gained an instant family, as well as a husband, becoming a step-mother to Sherman’s four children: Malinda (14), Thaddeus (10), Franklin (7), and Cecilia (4). Over the next decade, she doubled the size of the family, producing Balzora, Ella, Lena, Sherman, Jr., and Eugene. Her death occurred a few months after Eugene’s second birthday.

Eliza signed many land deeds related to Sherman’s building contracts, under a legal requirement known as “releasing her dower portion.” After the Panic of 1857, when Sherman’s financial affairs collapsed, the couple managed to save the family home through a complex tangle of legal maneuvers. Sherman “sold” their house to his brother Silvester who immediately “sold” the property back to Eliza. Married women had recently gained the privilege of owning their own property in Indiana. She held the title in her name, thereby protecting their home from any of Sherman’s business debts. After her death, the situation became even more complicated because Eliza died without a will. Sherman inherited one third of her property while their children owned the rest. Throughout her entire marriage, not a single document alludes to her family—the Rosses.

Ross is a common surname, although not as ubiquitous as Jones, Brown, or Smith. Add a popular 19^th century first name like Eliza, and the search becomes a wild goose chase. Eliza was born in Kentucky, according to the 1850 and 1860 censuses. Her children reinforced that belief with their own responses in later census years. If known by the informant, Kentucky was written down on the children’s death certificates as their mother’s birthplace. The Bluegrass State became my breadcrumb. I followed its trail as I walked the neighborhoods of Fayette county, diving deep into the record books. In the early to mid-19^th century, three unrelated Ross families migrated to the area.

Joseph Ross (c. 1781-1836), his wife Sarah (Kennedy/Canady) Ross, and their children migrated from North Carolina in the 1820s. They farmed in Jennings township, to the east of Connersville. Joseph had a daughter, Eliza, who married John Huston. Both Eliza and her father died the same week in 1836. None of Joseph’s six sons were old enough to father a child in 1818.

Alexander Ross (c. 1775-1866), a native of Ireland, lived to the west in neighboring Rush county. He spent decades in Kentucky where he married two or three times, before moving to Indiana. His three eldest sons—Henry (b. 1794), Alexander (b. 1799), and Thomas (b. 1802)—were old enough to father Eliza, but their marriages occurred after 1820.

Thomas Ross (1780-1877) settled in Fayette county with his wife, Rachel (Staekhouse) Ross, and their children—Charles (b. 1802), Sarah D. (b. 1804), John S. (b. 1805), and Oliver P. (b. 1816). They lived in Columbia township, a few miles from where Sherman Scofield grew up. However, this family came from Pennsylvania, and never lived in Kentucky.

Anyone named Ross, in either Fayette or Rush county, belonged to one of these families. But not Eliza. Despite the hours of research, no relatives emerged from the reels of microfilm or dusty old books. How did a young woman ride all the way from Kentucky without a single family member to accompany her?

DNA testing became an option. I set Eliza in my cross hairs, spit into a tube, and crossed my fingers. My answers did not arrive overnight. Several test kits and hundreds of dollars later, Eliza’s parents were still unknown.

But one day, Marjorie materialized near the top of my mother’s match list at My Heritage. The two shared an impressive 82 centimorgans (cMs) of DNA. The algorithm predicted a relationship of second or third cousins. Her family tree listed only her parents, but it proved easy to build the tree back several more generations. Marjorie was not the expected cousin, but her great, great grandfather carried the Ross surname.

John N. Ross was born in Kentucky, c. 1821-1822. He married Caroline Douge, a North Carolina native, on October 9, 1844, in Rush county, Indiana. The newlyweds moved to Madison county, about forty miles to the north, soon thereafter. They raised several children, including a daughter named Katie—Marjorie’s future great grandmother. The family appears in The History of Madison County, Indiana (1914) under the biography of James C. Hull, who married Katie’s sister. The text mentions John N. Ross briefly, but fails to elaborate on his family history.

DNA mapping with DNAPainter was the primary focus of my genealogical research for several years. Marjorie shares segments with my mother on chromosomes 2, 7, and 13. As I mapped more of my mother’s matches, a pattern emerged with the overlapping segments—a common ancestor.

Richard Ross died on July 7, 1828, in Fleming County, Kentucky. In his will, he appoints his wife Nancy as the executor. Sons and daughters are mentioned but not named. No known county history records his family. Poorly documented trees crisscross the Internet, misattributing a multitude of progeny. Of these children, at least three, appear to be his: John Ross, who married Mary Stites, and died in 1824; James Andrew Ross, who married Nancy Moore, and died in 1832; and Nancy Ross, who married James B. Shockey, and died in 1833. A transcription of a letter written in 1897 by Richard H. Ross—the son of John Ross and a grandson of the elder Richard—is linked to various trees on Ancestry and his profile in Family Search’s Shared Tree. If genuine, the epistle confirms several branches of Richard’s family.

A cluster of DNA matches descends from Nancy (Ross) Shockey, while a larger group belongs to the descendants of James Andrew Ross. Many of Richard’s children, grandchildren, nephews, and nieces crossed the Ohio river and settled in Indiana and Illinois. James Andrew, known more commonly as Andrew, moved to Rush county, Indiana, and died somewhere in the state, circa 1832. His widow, Nancy (Moore) Ross, married Recompence Murphy, on November 9, 1833, in Rush county. None of Andrew and Nancy’s known children remained in Rush county, choosing to migrate further into Indiana or west to Illinois where their cousins settled. Marjorie’s ancestor, John N. Ross, seems to be one of Andrew’s progeny, based on the DNA evidence.

I built a tree containing sixteen descendants of Richard Ross who matched my mother, including Marjorie, in the WATO Plus tool at DNA Painter. Their shared DNA ranged from 16 cM to Marjorie’s 82 cM. For those unfamiliar, WATO is an acronym for What Are the Odds?, a tool that calculates relationships based on shared DNA. Would the program predict Eliza’s place in the family? I clicked the generate hypothesis button. Hypothesis No. 3 determined that Andrew Ross was Eliza’s father, with a 100% probability.

But, of course, there is a snag. According to the four sources of Eliza’s age—the 1850 census, the 1860 census, her gravestone, and her obituary—she was born in 1818. More specifically, on the 15^th of January, if one calculates from the stone’s death data. Andrew Ross wed Nancy Moore on September 9, 1819, in Fleming county, twenty-one months after Eliza’s birth. He was twenty-two and she was seventeen. If Andrew had a prior marriage, it was not recorded in the Fleming county marriage books. In addition, the WATO probability drops to 1% if Eliza was a half sibling to Andrew’s other children. Like many genealogical questions, answers generate more questions. Maybe birth dates were fudged? Maybe Eliza was a twin? Maybe I will never know for sure if Andrew was Eliza’s father. But, his family was in the right place, at the right time, for Eliza to migrate north, riding side saddle, to her new home in Indiana.

Select References

“Died [Mrs. Eliza Scofield].” Connersville Weekly Times. 11 October 1860.

Find A Grave. Database with images. www.findagrave.com : 2026.

Forkner, John La Rue. History of Madison County, Indiana. 2 volumes. Chicago and New York: Lewis Publishing Company, 1914.

“John O’Kane.” History of the Restoration Movement. Accessed 5 May 2026. www.therestorationmovement.com

Deborah Sweeney © 2026

Sherman Scofield never lived on Western Avenue in the brick house with an elegant cupola. He built the house in 1847 for Elisha Vance, a prominent Connersville attorney, Justice of the Peace, and the then current postmaster. Vance owned the house for two and a half years, then sold the house in 1849 to John Cassady. The house remained in the hands of the Cassady family well into the twentieth century.

A Connecticut native, Sherman Scofield arrived in Fayette County in 1821 with his parents, Silvanus and Ruth (Reynolds) Scofield and eight siblings. Mary, the eldest, was twenty-five and single, while Sarah, a toddler, was not quite two. Sherman, aged eleven, was the oldest of the three younger boys. Silvester was eight and Lorenzo was five. The others included: Silvanus, Jr. (23), Seeley (20), Elizabeth (16), and Eliza (14). The family moved from Stamford, Connecticut, to the town of Rye, in Westchester county, New York, about 1818. Not satisfied with life in New York, the family decided to migrate to the Indiana frontier.

Most early settlers in Indiana’s southeastern section came up from Kentucky or slid across the Ohio border after the War of 1812 when the skirmishes with the native populations ended. Migrants from the northeast were rare. But a few did make the journey. In the spring of 1816, Massachusetts-born brothers, Philip and Horatio Mason, migrated from Herkimer County, New York. The small group, including Philip’s wife Sarah, travelled by sled and wagon to Olean Point in western New York, where they obtained passage on a raft down the Allegheny river to Pittsburgh. After spending a few days in the city, they boarded another raft which took them down the Ohio river to Cincinnati. From western Ohio, the group trekked by wagon along dense, wooded trails to Laurel, a small outpost on the Whitewater river where Philip’s brother-in-law, Samuel Jenks, lived. About four miles upstream was another outpost called Ashland, which gained its name due to an over-abundance of ash trees. A few decades later, it would be renamed Alpine by the post office to avoid confusion with another nearby town also known as Ashland. In October 1816, Philip Mason purchased his first 80 acres near Ashland, in Columbia Township, Fayette County.

When Sherman’s younger brother, Silvester Scofield, died in 1901, his obituary noted that he came to Fayette county at the age of eight with his family. Silvester lived at or near Alpine until 1830 when he moved to Connersville. In the late 1860s, Dr. Philip Mason wrote a memoir titled A Legacy to My Children. He recounted a visit to Des Moines, Iowa, in the 1850s where he ran into an old friend, Silvanus Scofield. Sherman and Silvester’s oldest brother lived out the end of his days in Des Moines, after living in various locations, including Indianapolis, and Elizabethtown, Kentucky.

Alpine nestled on the western bank of the Whitewater river, about ten miles south of Connersville. Its chief industry revolved around mills, powered by the river. Allen Crisler built the first saw mill around 1814. A newly-arrived Philip Mason assisted Crisler in the construction of a mill-house during the summer of 1816, with Philip and his brother Horatio running the mill for a while. The site later expanded to include a grist mill, a hemp mill, and a still house. In 1817, Allen Crisler’s future son-in-law, John A. White, began his tenure as miller.

There is no record of Silvanus Scofield, Sr., ever buying land in Fayette County. He died in the fall of 1822 of a swamp fever, along with two of his children—Seeley and Eliza—the year following their arrival. Through tenacity and hard work, Ruth kept her remaining family together. In those days, giving up or fostering children was a common practice for financially strapped widows (or others down on their luck). Her neighbor Philip Mason provides a prime example. After the death of his first wife Sarah in 1842, he encountered financial difficulties and was unable to care for his four youngest children. He found the boys apprenticeships and placed his daughter with a local family. In Ruth Scofield’s case, her eldest children—Silvanus, Jr., Mary, and Elizabeth—helped bear the burden with their labors.

Since the family did not own land, they rented property from a local land owner. Allen Crisler possessed much of the land around Alpine, situated in the northeast quarter of Section 27, Township 13, Range 12. Crisler purchased the NW¼ quarter of Section 27 with his brother-in-law, William Conner, in 1818. The same year, he also bought the SE¼ quarter. John A. White built a cabin on the southeast corner of his father-in-law’s portion in the NW¼ quarter after he married Amelia Crisler. William Wherret rounded out the neighborhood when he acquired 122 acres in 1817 from the south half of the NE¼ quarter.

The 1830 census shows that Ruth Scofield and her children lived near Alpine. At first glance, this fact is not apparent. In 1830, Fayette county was too small to warrant dividing the census into townships. The population of the entire county is recorded on 52 sheets. Fortunately, the sheets maintain the order of the enumerator’s visits, i.e. the names were not rearranged alphabetically at a later date. Philip Mason commands the first line of sheet number eight while Ruth is recorded on line 14. Her entry falls between John A. White (line 13) and Allen Crisler (line 15). William Wherrett appears on line 17. By 1830, Ruth Scofield and William Wherrett were family. Mary Scofield married William’s son, Nicholas, in 1826. Ruth’s house was nestled somewhere on the Crisler property, or maybe on the Wherrett property, depending on how the enumerator meandered around the farms.

Sherman Scofield turned twenty years old in the summer of 1830. He no longer lived at home with his mother. His census tick is buried in an unknown household, upriver in Connersville where he moved to learn the brickmason’s trade. It is clear that his first home in Fayette county, Indiana, was near Alpine. Soon his brother Silvester would join him in Connersville, as well as Silvanus, Jr. and Lorenzo. Ruth and her daughters would move to Connersville, too, where she was recorded on the 1840 census.

To be continued…

Deborah Sweeney © 2026

Selected References

Barrows, Frederic Irving, editor. History of Fayette County Indiana: Her People, Industries and Institutions. Indianapolis, Indiana: B. F. Bowen & Company, Inc., 1917.

History of Fayette County, Indiana: containing a history of the townships, villages, schools, churches, industries, etc… Chicago: Warner, Beers & Co., 1885.

Indiana. Fayette County. “Deed records, 1814-1901, indexes, 1816-1903.” FamilySearch. https://www.familysearch.org.

Indiana. Fayette County. 1830 U.S. census. NARA microfilm publication M19, Roll 26.

Mason, Philip. A Legacy to My Children. Cincinnati, Ohio: Moore, Wilstach & Baldwin, Printers, 1868.

[Obituary Silvester Scofield]. Connersville Daily News. 17 October 1901.

Our ancestors led complex and varied lives. Their histories are often lost, becoming half remembered fragments passed down to successive generations. With each retelling, the stories change and morph, evolving into folklore and creating sugarcoated versions of the past. Many genealogists and historians are dismayed to discover skeletons hiding in dusty attics or buried beneath rotting graves. To them falls the heavy burden of enlightenment and the banishment of long held beliefs.

Many years ago, during my own dark ages, I pursued a master’s degree in Ann Arbor, Michigan. As I fled purgatory, I drove south towards Centerville, Indiana, to land on my grandparents’ doorstep. I spent a month de-stressing, plowing through novels, curled up in my grandpa’s recliner. They lived in a snug post-World War II bungalow, filled with treasures, shipped from Malaysia after years of missionary work. I slept in the upstairs front bedroom, stuffed with my grandma’s sewing machine and notions—a welcome change from the musty basement room with its shelves packed with rows of preserved fruits and vegetables where I slept during my childhood. At night, fireflies danced outside my bedroom window while freight trains sped through the darkness, their horns echoing from the nearby crossing.

The faded wallpaper in the hallway was covered with family photographs and mementos, including two family trees mounted in identical black frames. Each chart contained the stereotypical leafy green tree with spaces on various branches for direct line ancestors. My grandma’s flowing cursive hand recorded five generations of McGraws and Leonards—his and her families. Genealogy piqued my interest as a teenager, but I had not fallen down the rabbit hole yet. My grandpa spun tales of his Hoosier ancestors. One was a brickmaker who built many of the fine buildings in Connersville. His son, the Rev. Eugene B. Scofield, was my grandpa’s namesake. One day, we drove down to Fayette County to find the family graves in the old Robinson Chapel cemetery.

My grandpa’s four great grandfathers—William McGraw, Jacob Troxell, Daniel Kerschner, and Sherman Scofield—were all early settlers of Fayette County. When I began my research in earnest a few years later, I turned to these four men and their families. None of grandpa’s cousins seemed to know much about them prior to their arrival in Indiana. These forefathers pretty much left their pasts behind when they moved to the frontier. My decades of perseverance has paid off. I unearthed more than the last few generations have known.

Along the road to discovery, I pursued certification through the Board of Certification of Genealogists in the 2010s. The process requires the submission of a portfolio containing various genealogical research products, one of which is the Kinship-Determination Project, or KDP. The KDP is often the most laborious of the requirements and can be up to 150 pages long—at least, that was the requirement back then. The KDP must connect three generations of a family through documented sources, with thorough and exhaustive research, utilizing records beyond censuses and family histories. Sherman Scofield became my focal point. His family came from Connecticut before they settled in Connersville. His life provided me with a vast range of resources between Indiana and New England. His story would highlight my genealogical skills. Along the way, I studied his parents, Silvanus and Ruth (Reynolds) Scofield, and the family of his daughter, Ella (Scofield) Kerschner, my 2X great grandmother.

Sherman lived a fascinating life. He migrated to Fayette County in 1821 when he was eleven. The journey across New York and Pennsylvania, and then, down the Ohio River on a flatboat to reach Connersville must have been an adventure for the boy and his siblings. His family lost their farm in Connecticut, an indirect result of the eruption of Mount Tambora in 1815. They relocated to Westchester County, New York, for a few years, before deciding to migrate to the Indiana frontier. The father, Silvanus Scofield, died soon after they arrived, along with two of Sherman’s older siblings, Seeley and Eliza. His mother, Ruth, kept the remaining family together, and over time, they began to thrive in their new home.

As a young man, Sherman trained as a brickmason, and by age twenty-two, he owned an interest in Connersville’s brickyard. Sherman practiced several trades over the years—farmer, canal boatman, merchant, banker—but he made his name as a building contractor, constructing many brick buildings in and around Connersville. The county deed books record the number of properties he bought and sold through his business dealings. The pattern repeats over and over—land lots purchased, mortgages assumed to cover costs, buildings constructed, then properties sold. By the mid-1850s, Sherman was a wealthy man.

I amassed a mountain of documentation on Silvanus Scofield, Sherman Scofield, and Ella (Scofield) Kerschner while researching for my KDP. Then one event after another derailed my plans—FamilySearch stopped lending microfilm, a debilitating cancer diagnosis, a global pandemic, and the BCG’s changing policies over privacy and DNA in portfolios. By the time things seemed “normal,” I had moved on and certification was no longer on my bucket list. What remained were piles of research and stories waiting to be told.

A YouTube video on Sherman Scofield surfaced in the summer of 2025, produced by a local Connersville TV station. I found the link during a random Google search. Words cannot describe how upset I was (and still am). Needless to say, I was floored by the sheer amount of misinformation the video spouted. At its crux, the video posited that Sherman Scofield once resided in a house on Western Avenue, an historic brick structure with a unique cupola. But through my research, I knew this was incorrect. Sometime in the past, someone assumed Sherman lived there, at this house he built in 1847. A misconception now regarded as fact. Even Connersville’s Tourism Board propagates the story in a pamphlet anyone can download from the Internet.

But this is the actual chain of events told through evidence found in historical documents:

The house known as Sherman Scofield’s residence is located at 509 Western Avenue. The legal description of the lot is McCarty Drew Lots #8 & 9 or 509 Western Avenue. On 21 April 1819, Enoch McCarty, William C. Drew, Daniel J. Cazwell, Robert Hannah, Jonathan McCarty and Harvy Bates platted an addition to the town of Connersville that became known as McCarty & Drew Addition, or McCarty & Others Addition. (Fayette Land Deed Book A: 30) At one point, Western Avenue was known as Tanner Street, but Connersville changed all the names of its main streets between the 1850s & 1870s.

Nahum H. Burke, a tinner of Connersville, purchased two lots (No. 8 & 9) in McCarty’s Addition to the town from Abner and Jonathan McCarty on 13 June 1846 for $186. (Fayette Land Deed Book N: 450)

Six months later, Burke sold lot No. 8 to Sherman Scofield on 25 January 1847 for $83. (Fayette Land Deed Book N: 459)

On 9 February 1847, ten days after Sherman acquired lot No. 8, he signed a mortgage for the lot from the State of Indiana for the sum of $200. His wife Eliza (Milner) Scofield co-signed the deed. The mortgage appears in the book following the Burke sale. (Fayette Land Deed Book N: 460)

On 5 February 1847, four days before signing the mortgage, Sherman sold lot No. 8 to Elisha Vance, a Connersville attorney, for the sum of $800. In the deed, Vance acknowledges the $200 mortgage to the [State] School Fund and agrees to assume and pay the mortgage. In the deed book, this document follows the sale from Burke and the mortgage. All three were recorded on the same day—11 February 1847. (Fayette Land Deed Book N: 461)

Why would Sherman Scofield, a building contractor, buy a lot and sell it two weeks later at an 800% markup? Sherman owned the property for two weeks. The house was built for Elisha Vance.

Elisha Vance owned the house for two and a half years. On 23 October 1849, he sold lot No. 8 to John Cassady [Casady] for $1,300. The deed acknowledges the $200 mortgage, and Cassady assumes responsibility for it. (Fayette Land Deed Book P: 118)

John Cassady, a saddler, and his family lived in the house on Lot 8 on the 1850 census (1850 U. S. Census, Fayette County, Indiana, sheet 190A, dwelling 314, family 318). Cassady’s next door neighbor was James Miller, a hatter (dwelling 313, family 317). In 1855, Cassady bought ½ of Lot 9 from Miller (Fayette Deed Book S: 341).

The fate of the house becomes complicated in the 1870s when John Casady had major financial troubles. Several legal battles later, and one in particular, filed by Casady’s wife, Almira [Elmyra] Casady, against John L. Gilchrist and others in 1879, show that John Casady was the owner of the house and it was his residence in 1875. (see Fayette County Complete Civil Records, v. 6, case No. 2001) The verdict and sheriff’s sale allowed Almira [Elmyra] Casady to purchase the house in 1882. (Fayette Land Deeds, Town Lots v. 5: 355-357)

To be continued…

Deborah Sweeney © 2026

12.21/31

My Dear Sister Lena:

I write at 3:00 a.m., and use this paper as I cannot get out stationery without waking the frow [frau]. I go to sleep early—have slept over eight hours, and will read, as I feel rested. We have to hire a man for all hard work. I do enough for healthful exercise but not any more. In his last years Father lost the use of one arm, and believed he would have have [sic] lived longer had he exercised more. We have had a mild fall and we have both been much “in God’s-out-of-Doors.” Etta was very sick four weeks ago, and has had Dr. Cooper 4 visits. Has not been

[page 2]

doing any poultry work meanwhile. A man comes whenever we need him. Our poultry was ready for winter before Etta got sick. She will look after them now. Our “man” drove me to City last Thursday and I got eats for a month or more. Chickens are so cheap that we buy little meat. Milk is at our door every morning. Bread is delivered here also. - - -Mt. Summit had a bank robbery last Friday. Before the robbers left the Sherrif knew, and posse was getting their machines for a chase. 3 young men were arrested soon. Were sent to State prison for 25 years. Mrs. Provence long time bookkeeper was forced out with them so citizens would not shoot. Kidnapping is a “life” penalty. India Provence was not hurt much.

[page 3]

This epistle is far different from your pretty Christmas Card.

Much love and the Season’s Greeting

Eugene

To view and download the original images of Eugene’s letter, follow this link.

Transcribed from the Marion Leader Tribune, 19 December 1931, p. 1, col. 4 and p. 5, col. 8

Three Bandits Caught After Bank Robbery

Mt. Summit Gang Uses Woman For Shield Against Gunfire of Vigilantes During Fight

START FOR PRISON

Trio Is Arraigned at Newcastle; Guilty Pleas Bring 25-Year Terms at Michigan City

Newcastle, Ind., Dec. 18. (AP) — Twelve hours after they held up and robbed the Mt. Summit, Ind., bank of approximately $2,000, John B. Siler, 26, of Dunkirk, and Robert Stewart, 24, and Arthur Nelson, 24, both of Chicago, were enroute to the Indiana state prison at Michigan City to serve a 25-year term for bank banditry.

The three were arraigned tonight before Judge John H. Morris, Pleaded guilty, and sentence was pronounced immediately.

The three were started for the prison in charge of Deputy Charles Zores.

Officers said Siler was paroled recently from the Indiana reformatory where he had served six years on a robbery charge. The two Chicago men denied ever having been in criminal difficulties before.

Taken Without Shot

Muncie, Ind., Dec. 18 (AP) — Three men who abducted a woman bookkeeper to shield them from the gunfire of vigilantes as they fled from the Mt. Summit State Bank at noon with about $2,500 were captured late today on a farm southwest of Yorktown.

The arrest was made by Fred W. Puckett, Delaware county sheriff, three deputies and two Mt. Summit citizens without a shot being fired. They recovered approximately $1,800 of the loot.

The bandits gave their names as Robert Stuart, 24, and Arthur Nelson, 24, both of Chicago, and John Siler, 26, of Dunkirk, Ind.

They had released Mrs. India Province, 50, bookkeeper in the bank, after having driven about 15 miles. She was unharmed but had become chilled as she wore no wrap.

The capture was made on the farm of Mrs. Elmer Gentry. The men had driven their car into the Gentry garage and taken refuge in a ditch behind a barbed wire fence. The officers succeeded in backing the robbers against a barn and disarming them.

Posse Joins Officers

Mrs. Gentry saw the men drive into her garage and try to find a hiding place. They did not try to approach the house, so she telephoned the sheriff’s office. Sheriff Puckett and his deputies reached the farm about the same time a posse from Mt. Summit which had been trailing the robbers arrived, and the men joined in the capture.

The robbery of the Mt. Summit bank, in Henry county, six miles north of Newcastle, was the fourth bank robbery in Indiana this week.

(Continued on Page Five)

Three

(Continued From Page One)

Officers questioned the trio unsuccessfully in an effort to link them up with other recent holdups.

The robber gang used an automobile stolen here Wednesday night. They said they drove away from here this morning with no definite destination and decided upon the holdup when they observed the apparently unguarded condition of the bank.

One of the men remained in the automobile while the two others entered the bank, which was occupied by S. L. Thively, president; Chester E. Lamb, cashier, and Mrs. Province.

Suspicious of the men, Lamb sounded a burglar alarm as one of them approached his window. About the same time they announced that the bank was being held up, and the employes were lined up against a wall. Each man held a revolver.

While one robber guarded the bankers the second man collected money from the counter, drawers and safe. While this was taking place Earl Osburn, a vigilante who had heard the alarm, rushed toward the bank with a shotgun. He fired twice at the waiting bandit car, but the driver did not retaliate.

Other armed citizens had arrived by the time the two men walked out of the bank, pushing Mrs. Province ahead of them. Because of her, the possemen did not shoot.

Deborah Sweeney © 2026

Eugene died on November 16, 1932, from a blood clot. He was seventy-four years old. Three weeks previously, he and his beloved wife, Etta, had celebrated their fiftieth wedding anniversary. They were never blessed with children beyond a two-month-old infant son who died in 1884. Henceforth, they played the rolls of favorite Uncle and Aunt to a host of nieces and nephews.

Rev. E. B. Schofield, 74, Dies At Suburban Home

The Rev. E. B. Scofield, 74 years old, state secretary of the Disciples of Christ brotherhood from 1894 to 1898, died Thursday in his home ten miles north of the[sic] Indianapolis on the Spring Mill road.

Funeral services will be held in the David funeral home in Newcastle at 1:30 o’clock this afternoon. Burial will be in the family lot in Mt. Summit.

The Rev. Mr. Scofield held pastorates in Muncie, Noblesville, Shelbyville and Columbus. He was retired eight years ago. He formerly was connected with the Scofield-Pierson book shop at Pennsylvania and Ohio streets. The Rev. Mr. Scofield was born in Connersville Aug. 12, 1858. The widow, Mrs. Etta West Scofield, survives.

---Indianapolis Star, November 19, 1932, p. 3, col. 5

Death of Rev. E. B. Scofield

The Rev. E. B. Scofield, age 74, retired Christian minister, died Thursday last at his home, 10 miles north of Indianapolis on the Spring Mill road. The Rev. Mr. Scofield served as pastor for many churches in Indiana.

He is well remembered by many persons in Knightstown, preaching here in 1885 and following year. During his stay here he conducted a big revival, which resulted in 130 conversions and additions to the Christian Church. All of the converted ones were baptized in the waters of Blue river just south of the highway bridge near the old Church mill property, now occupied by the Rose Bud Syrup Company. An audience of 500 persons witnessed the baptizing.

Mr. Scofield was born in Connersville, August 12, 1858. He removed to Indianapolis in 1890, and at time of his death was affiliated with the Scofield-Pierson Book Store.

Funeral services were held Saturday afternoon at the David funeral home in New Castle. Burial was made in the family lot at Mr. Summit. The widow survives.

---Knightstown Banner, November 25, 1932, p. 1, col. 2

A few months after Eugene’s death, Etta wrote to her sister-in-law, Lena Hackleman:

Postmark:

Jan. 25, 1933, 7:30 PM, Indianapolis, Ind.

From:

Mrs. E. B. Scofield

R.R. No. 16 Box 99

Indianapolis, IND.

To:

Mrs. Lena Hackleman

#923 Fayette Ave.

Connersville Ind.

[page 1]

Dear Lena:

I have a few moments to write you a note. I was going to send you a birthday card and my neighbor passed away the day it should have been mailed so in the sorrow of that family I forgot it. I was going to put in the Scofield family Bible Eugene’s death and I discovered that the only

[page 2]

2

death entered was Mrs. Claypool’s in Eugene’s writing so you see there is Thad, Frank, Celia, Ella, Balzora, Sherman, Eugene. If you have the name & date of death correct and will send them to me I will write them according to date of death they should all be written before Eugene’s. If you can get all of them and be sure they are correct I will

[page 3]

3

see that the record is up to date. I do not intend to keep the things that belong to the Scofield family but at present I am not giving anything to anyone as it all seems part of Eugene’s life. I have been asked for his Bibles that have his sermon notes pasted in them but felt I could not part with them now as his Bibles

[page 4]

are so marked that I like to read what he has marked. I have been wishing you would write to me. If there is anything you want to know about Eugene’s last days I will be glad to write you,

With love,

Etta Scofield

Jan 24 – 1933

Link to downloadable transcription and images of the letter at Internet Archive

Deborah Sweeney © 2026

The Rev. Eugene B. Scofield (1858-1932) traveled around the state of Indiana, preaching the gospel of the Christian Church during the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Along the way, he wrote letters to family and friends. Eugene was my grandfather’s namesake, a great uncle on his maternal side, and most likely influential in his choice of professions. I posses dozens of letters that Eugene wrote to his sister Lena, rescued from her house after a fire that led to her death in 1935. The earliest letters date from the 1880s and continue until Eugene’s death in 1932.

Two decades ago, Jane—a now deceased and distant cousin—mailed me a photocopy of a letter written to her great grandmother, Sarah (Scofield) Hunter, who was also Eugene’s first cousin. This chatty epistle provides a laundry list of cousins and siblings, their activities, and their locations. While I knew much of this family history already, it’s always wonderful to hear the information from the horse’s mouth—a contemporary source.

Letter from Eugene B. Scofield of Indianapolis, Indiana, to his first cousin Sarah E. (Scofield) Hunter of Ottumwa, Iowa

Postmark: January 15, 1918, Sharpsville, Indiana

[page 1]

Jan. 15, 1918

Dear Cousin Sarah:

While visiting my brother Frank at Sharpsville Ind. I have a fine opportunity to get information from Sister Balzora who lives with him, and who spent several years with Uncle Lorenzo, early in the “eighties.” She says that Lorenzo’s oldest son Walter Sanders Scofield went to Brazil at the close of the Civil War, and still lives there, so far as we know.

Cousin Will Wherrett passed away about ten years ago. His wife and daughters, Alice and Blanche, and

[page 2]

Son, Harry Wherrett live in Pittsburg, Penn. Harry has a big salary.

Albert S. Pierson has a son and daughter, and is in a prosperous hardware company (Lilly Hardware Co.) Indianapolis.

Charles William Pierson, bachelor, has charge of a big orchard, 150,000 apple, and 40,000 peach trees. His address is Solon, Clark County, Indiana. He was my partner in a bookstore thirteen years, until 1913.

Lorenzo Scofield’s sons Walter S. Scofield, Brazil, Archie P. Scofield, Baptist minister, Goshen, Miss Eddward J Eddy Johnson Scofield, Tylertown, Miss.

Page 3]

Elizabeth J. Wickman (their sister) Algiers, La.

My father’s oldest daughter Malinda Claypool passed away in June 1900 and Thaddius S. before her, 1897.

Frank lives in Sharpsville, Ind. Cecelia Hargrove, 1102 W. 4^th St. Marion, Ind.

My mother’s children—

Balzora Scofield, Sharpsville, Ind Ella Kerschner, died June 4^th, 1917 Lena Hackleman, R.F.D. Connersville Sherman Scofield, 1718 Franklin St., Denver, Colo.

Eugene B. Scofield, M1, Box 99 Indianapolis, where we live in summer, letters to that address will follow me. I farm by proxy, and delight in my kitchen garden. Eleven

[page 4]

North of Washington Street, three north of City Limits

Have met Cousins Ruth and Frank Reynolds often. Called on them once in Boston. They were away.

If any of your’s care to unite with the Son’s of the Revolution or with the Daughter’s of American Revolution they can get the “Scofield line.” Write to the sons of the Revolution, Indianapolis, and ask for a copy of my line, which you can use.

Shall be glad to hear from you often, Sincerely and

Truly Yours

E.B. Scofield

This post is part of my effort to organize and scan my mountains of genealogical information, collected over decades of research. If you would like to read more of Eugene’s correspondence, follow the link to my website.

© 2026 Deborah Sweeney

Dr. R. S. (Roscoe Schiele) Yegerlehner of Kentland, Indiana, served in the U.S. Navy during World War II. In early 1942, Roscoe was a 37-year-old, happily married, professional man with two young sons and a third on the way. He volunteered a month after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. A catastrophic fire in 1973 at the National Personnel Records Center (NPRC) in St. Louis, Missouri, destroyed 16-18 million files of military records. These files covered 80% of the personnel who served in the Army during WWI and WWII as well as 75% of those who were discharged from the Air Force between 1947-1964. Naval records were not impacted by the fire. While the loss of Amy records is significant for those researching their military ancestors, my family was fortunate enough to receive a copy of Roscoe’s naval records a decade ago—a 200-page file that I am still combing through today.

Some military files from the twentieth century are still considered private and only accessible to the veteran or their next of kin (spouse, parents, siblings, children)—there is currently a 62 year rolling period from the time of discharge. Roscoe died in 1989. By the time I attempted to obtain a copy of his records in 2014, my grandmother was deceased as well as my two uncles and all of Roscoe’s siblings. Grandchildren do not qualify as next of kin. Luckily, my father—the youngest and last surviving child—still lived. And so began an intricate three-way conversation between the National Personnel Records Center, my father, and myself. I provided documentation, like Roscoe’s proof of death, and my father submitted information to prove his identity because, of course, he had legally changed his name. We eventually arranged to have the copies shipped directly to me. After a drawn out, four-month process, a 1½ inch thick envelope finally arrived in my mailbox.

Besides the minutia of military life, the file contains a wealth of biographical information. As a physician, Roscoe enlisted as an officer. He was required to submit documentation of his good character, his education, his work experience, and even a copy of his medical license. The NPRC file supplements the abundant amount of information I possess regarding Roscoe’s military experience. Between the years 2012-2016, I transcribed and posted over 1,300 letters written between Roscoe and his wife Gladys while he served overseas. Roscoe also kept all his military paperwork, primarily his change of duty orders and reimbursement receipts. Two volumes of letters from 1942—Dear Mother, Love Daddy and Lots of Love, Daddy—were published in 2015 and 2016. The remaining letters are accessible on my website: genealogylady.net

The first letter of 1943

If you have ancestors who served in the Army during WWII, check out the Morning Reports, 1940-1946 that are now available on the NARA website.

NOTE: This essay is based on my experience obtaining records a decade ago. Procedures and access have changed since then. Please do your due diligence when researching your ancestors.

© 2026 Deborah Sweeney

My shoulders tightened before I shut her down with a single sentence. “No, I am not interested in football.” I was too tired to bother explaining my views on the evils of modern sports. A cash cow with an almost cult-like following that sucks away funding from the arts. If you have nothing nice to say…echoes in my head.

“Oh,” she uttered in surprise before she returned to the conversation with her coworker behind the counter.

I manage to block out most sporting events and seasons, especially in the current state of play. Streaming services allow me to watch what I want, when I want, and to ignore what bores me. The football insanity rarely interferes with my life. However, this year’s big game prevented my husband from booking a hotel in the greater San Francisco region for weekend. I knew the Patriots were playing. At some point, I heard that tidbit on a random NPR broadcast last week. My Massachusetts blood was piqued, but three days after the game, I have no idea who won.

The sole exception to my sports aversion is the Olympics, which I have watched regularly since the late 1970s. In those days, viewing the games was limited to whatever ABC or NBC chose to broadcast in the evenings and on the weekends. I remember lots of skiing and bobsled racing over the years. Figure skating has always been my favorite. Scott Hamilton, Brian Boitano, Katarina Witt, Kristi Yamaguchi, Oksana Baiul (and Nancy Kerrigan), Tara Lipinski, and Michelle Kwan are the skaters from my youth and young adulthood. I learned to skate as a child, practicing on a rough patch of ice in the woods behind my house, across the street on Mill Pond, and under the iron bridges at Elm Park. Occasionally, we splurged at an indoor rink when the pond ice was too thin and unsafe. In my head, I was an elegant, ballerina floating across the ice, but in reality, I was a gangly amateur who could barely manage a basic two-foot spin. But I could go fast in a straight line.

I missed most of the last winter Olympics in Beijing. They occurred during my second round of major surgeries and cancer treatments since I turned fifty. Four years later and it’s back to more of the same—cancer treatments and the games. This time I have more options to watch the events that I chose (although the internet connection with the live feed is often glitchy). I didn’t plan to watch the games this year, but as usual, the spirit of the games sucked me in, as well as the ice skating.

Quilt Progress

Much time spent quilting this last week as I have surgery scheduled for next week. I don’t know how long my recovery will be or what new disabilities I will inherit. Fifty percent of the blocks are quilted, a sample of the border has been stitched, and part of the binding is attached (although I messed up royally last night and will have to redo most of it).

Sketchbook

Class was back on campus last week so we had a good day drawing. Most of our time was spent on a full figure drawing with conte pencils. I am pleased with my result.

I managed to do five sketchbook drawings in the past week, but I’m still catching up on posting them.I decided to take a little break from figures and concentrate on proportions with some of the shoes from my closet. Sketches from 2/1-2/11:

And a warm welcome to my new subscribers (both free and paid) this week!

© 2026 Deborah Sweeney

I returned to school in the summer of 2022 with the goal of earning a supplemental teaching credential in Art. The credential requires twenty college credits, a mixture of art history and studio art. Two classes I had taken years ago—figure drawing from my undergraduate years and jewelry design from graduate school—counted towards the twenty. Five down, fifteen more to go. I enrolled at the local community college, taking two asynchronous courses—Introduction to Art and Introduction to Art History, a full semester of learning crammed into eight weeks. Those weeks passed in a blur. My hand grew tired, making flash cards for all the art vocabulary terms I needed to memorize.

I’ve always been an artist although not formally trained in the traditional sense. When I was young, there were the occasional classes at the local art museum during summer vacations, the after school or weekend arts & crafts groups at the local Y, and the weekly enrichment class in elementary school (until Prop 2½ slashed the visual and performing arts budgets). As a senior in high school, I opted to take Art I instead of taking AP French or Physics—a class that served me well when I switched from History to Theatre in college.

Life is a journey with many forks in the road. I earned my supplemental art credential, but I could no longer teach, nor did I want to. My cancer treatments and the resulting disabilities made standing in front of a classroom untenable. But the post-pandemic classroom is not a place I want to inhabit. After the teaching credential, I kept going. The courses filled my days. I finished the requirements for an AA in Art History, and then an AA in Studio Art. Any day now, an AA in Art Design should land in my mailbox. I have taken most of the art classes the community college has to offer or will max out the limits of courses I am allowed to take soon. I have no desire to make a profit from my artwork or run a business. That would strip away any joy I find in the making. Art is my therapy through illness and our upside-down world.

Quilting Progress

The “Crow” quilt top is well on its way. Of the 99 blocks (9 columns x 11 rows), I have finished quilting 33. My goal is to finish by April, but we shall see.

Sketchbook

Although I post my drawings daily in notes, I am behind in the weekly update. Today I shall endeavor to add a few more to catch up. Last week my community college experienced a massive power outage. An upgrade to an aging infrastructure caused catastrophic failure. All on campus classes were cancelled for the week. My five-hour drawing class with a live model was reduced to an hour and a half session over Zoom. Everyone experienced a range of pandemic flashbacks. I gave a report on Julio Reyes, a native Californian artist who excels in figurative art. The professor assigned a stack of homework, tons of drawings including self-portraits and blind contours with conté pencils. Drawings posted from 1/24-1/31:

After you read this, get off your device, and go make some Art today! May Spring bring you plenty of sunshine and warmer days.

© 2026 Deborah Sweeney

Sketchbook images: I transitioned from my personal sketchbook to the one I purchased for class. Although I had already been leaning towards figurative drawing, the new book will focus completely on the human form. I used some old family photos for inspiration with this group. Drawings from 1/17-1/23:

© 2026 Deborah Sweeney

California is an amazingly large state. This time of year, the tulle fog is thick in some places, the visibility low as I hurtled down I-5. Across miles of flat land and gently rolling hills, the surrounding mountain ranges obscured behind walls of white mist and a low cloud layer. Agricultural land fills the landscape of the Central Valley. The damp fields showcase multiple shades of green, with lush orchards bursting with produce, and large scale machinery prepping the soil for the next crop. The occasional stench from large scale dairy farms is overwhelming, long before the cows are visible. Water flows south in the California Aqueduct, which runs parallel to the freeway for many miles. Gas stations and fast food restaurants line the edge of the unending pavement while reflective green signs advertise distant wonders like Yosemite and San Francisco. I blare Broadway tunes for the last hundred miles—to keep awake— my precious cargo left behind in the wilds of Los Angeles for the spring semester. In four months, I’ll repeat the journey.

Meanwhile, my own class starts this week—Figure Drawing II. The syllabus, class supplies, and schedule are already posted on Canvas. At this point, the supplies are mostly assembled. An almost daily sketchbook is required. It’s a good thing that I’ve been drawing daily. I will need the discipline to fill a fifty page sketchbook over the next sixteen weeks.

Here are the sketches from the last week:

© 2026 Deborah Sweeney

This year’s goal is to draw every day. I know there will be days in the near future when drawing will be impossible, but trying is the goal. My sketchbook from last year was abandoned after six weeks with only sixteen random attempts made. I didn’t try hard enough and let other things distract me.

I am more determined this year—also a bit more focused. I earned my A.A. in Studio Art in December 2024. This fall I completed the final course to earn an A.A. in Art Design. There are few art classes left in the catalog at my local community college that I can take. Figure Drawing II was added to the roster for Spring 2026. Class starts in two weeks. I prefer drawing things I observe. As my final project for this last fall confirms, I dread composing “scenes”—placing objects together on the canvas that are, in fact, not there in reality. Is that a skill I would love to have? Definitely. But I am not there yet.

Since my current focus is the figure, I plan to practice drawing body parts for the forseeable future. A perfect exercise for a daily sketchbook. Posted below are my drawings from Week 1. I am hoping Substack will provide me with some accountability. And thank you to everyone for following me on this journey.

© 2026 Deborah Sweeney